Inspiration for GODI came from an unexpected place: the bathrooms of TivoliVredenburg, Utrecht.

While attending an event there, a couple was removed from the bathroom, allegedly for hooking up. What struck us was not the incident itself, but the fact that security appeared to know exactly where they were without receiving directions or information from other attendees. This raised an unsettling question: how did they know where to look?

That question led us to discover indoor positioning systems (IPS), technologies capable of locating individuals inside buildings with remarkable precision by using a triangulation of network routers. In many cases, these systems can estimate a person’s location without requiring active participation or even a direct connection to local networks.

We soon realised that these technologies are already widely deployed. They are used in airports, shopping centres, event venues, and other public spaces for crowd management, security, behavioural analysis, and commercial optimisation. Unlike cameras, these systems often remain invisible to those they monitor, operating silently in the background while producing detailed maps of movement and behaviour.

GODI emerged from the desire to make these hidden forms of surveillance visible and tangible. Rather than exposing users to another layer of monitoring, the project seeks to personify surveillance itself, transforming abstract infrastructures into a singular presence that can be seen, felt, and interacted with.

By giving surveillance a personality, a voice, and a body, GODI asks what happens when systems that already watch us begin to acknowledge their own gaze. At the same time, the project explores whether visibility can become a source of agency rather than merely control, allowing users to negotiate, perform, and even find pleasure in relationships with technologies that were previously invisible.

The name GODI draws inspiration from the legend of Lady Godiva, a figure historically associated with visibility, exposure, and the dynamics between observer and observed. According to a story recorded from at least the thirteenth century, Lady Godiva rode naked through the streets of Coventry, covered only by her long hair, as an act of protest against the oppressive taxation imposed by her husband, Leofric, Earl of Mercia. Later versions of the legend introduced the figure of Peeping Tom, a man who secretly watched Godiva’s ride and was punished for his act of voyeurism, giving rise to the modern term “peeping tom.”

GODI reinterprets this relationship within a technological context. Rather than representing only the observer or the observed, GODI exists as a mediator between the two. It embodies the countless invisible surveillance systems surrounding us, consolidating them into a single symbolic observer. 

This exploration is also reflected in GODI’s physical design. The device intentionally removes the forms of control we have come to expect from everyday technologies: there are no buttons, no on/off switch, and no direct way for the user to command or disable it. This lack of control is not a limitation, but a deliberate reflection of the power dynamics present in surveillance systems. Much like many existing forms of monitoring, GODI observes without requiring constant interaction or negotiation. By placing the user in a position where control is limited, the device questions how consent functions within surveillance environments: can consent truly exist when the conditions of observation are defined by the system rather than by the individual?

Through this tension between visibility and control, GODI turns surveillance into a relationship that can be questioned, negotiated, and experienced. It asks whether making surveillance visible can give us agency over the systems that watch us, or whether it simply reveals how deeply embedded these systems already are in our everyday lives.