RHIZOME DIGEST: 9.03.04

discussion

Posted Sept. 2 2004 20:00

RHIZOME DIGEST: 9.03.04

RHIZOME DIGEST: September 3, 2004 Content: +announcement+ 1. Gregory Chatonsky: Translation / Traduction - Incident.net @ Basekamp (Philadelphia) 2. John Hoppin: PiÃ±ata Party – It Can Change @ Gavin Brown's Enterprise Passersby +opportunity+ 3. Daniel Green: Collective: Unconscious Call For Events from Local and International Artists 4. Doug Easterly: visiting artist lecture needed 5. Brett Stalbaum: [Fwd: Fwd: Scale Journal 8/9 Call For Participation + Guest Editor Joel Swanson + <a rel="nofollow" href="http://scale.ucsd.edu/">http://scale.ucsd.edu/</a>] 6. Cynthia Beth Rubin: Position at Rhode Island School of Design: Computer-Based Design Courses Manager +work+ 7. Barbara Lattanzi: C-SPAN Karaoke 8. Rhizome.org: Just added to the Rhizome ArtBase: Hlemmur in C by Pall Thayer 9. Rhizome.org: Just added to the Rhizome ArtBase: fuorange by Kate Southworth +essay+ 10. Lewis LaCook: Explaining Pictures to a Dead Protocol: Programming Aesthetic Experience + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 1. Date: 8.29.04 From: Gregory Chatonsky <cgregory@incident.net> Subject: Translation / Traduction - Incident.net @ Basekamp (Philadelphia) 18.09.2004 > 31.10.2004 TRANSLATION / TRADUCTION <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.incident.net/events/translation/">http://www.incident.net/events/translation/</a> Basekamp 723 chestnut st, second floor, Philadeplie, pa 19106 Opening and performance 18.09.2001 Philadelpha : 16:00 | Paris : 22:00 With: The revolution took place in New York by Gregory Chatonsky Googlehouse, The Inhabitants by Marika Dermineur Des Fleurs, Om, Incidence by Reynald Drouhin Ladies by KRN Ram, Submission, Extract by Julie Morel Dialogues by Michael Sellam with the funds from Etant donnes (The French-American Fund for Contemporary Art) / AFAA. On our screens and in our existence, 0 and 1, an unbroken series of numbers translate our sensations into images, texts and sounds. From identical elements, have emerged a complex perceptive web. Translation is a problematic which allows us to question the deep ambivalence in the digital. On one hand Digital constrains various medias (images, texts, videos, etc.) into a unique language formed of 0 and 1, which makes it translatable in a literal way, on the other hand an exact translation is impossible. Then how can we translate, i.e. interpret the behaviour of the viewer in an interactive system? How can we translate a text into an image in order to construct a story? What are the places that allow us to go between technologies and our affects? Is the simplicity of binary language a source of inaccurate translations, separation effects and shifts, which would open new and unpredictable significance? Translation incidents offer a world of possibilities and it questions the disjunctive relation between an aesthetic system and the very plural public. Is Art a foreign language, impossible to translate? What is the resistance of translation? Is it the transfer from one language to another that allows the significance to be transmitted? And isn't thought always dreamt as translatable[1]? Can the signifier and signified be divided? And if some untranslatable exist, isn't it the absolute dream of peculiarity, a sort of absolute unique form? But translation must take place, therefore an impossible possible. One can and has to translate, especially when it is possible. One speaks easily of the impossibility of translation. It is a current experience for a translator to find that task impossible. This possibility is thought in continuity with difficulty, and the difficulty starts with the first sentence. For the translator translates events before translating words. Even a word is already being carried away by the sentence, the syntax. In this difficult angle, the heroic and angelic task of a translator is so hard that it becomes too difficult to carry on. It is impossible. But this impossibility defies the possibility of translation. In continuity with it, nothing is translatable, nothing is untranslatable. Another impossibility exists, or a new order of impossibility, both more simple and more radical, which would have nothing to do with difficulty, but it is a rather silly one. Here it goes: when the language of a text is remarked/noted as a natural language, it can't be translated. A simple sentence: 'Cette phrase est en francais' (this sentence is in French). The words 'cette phrase' refer to this sentence where these words are, it cannot translate because its meaning is mixed with its truth in act. The sentence does not cause any problem of meaning, it is not hard to translate, it is impossible. This capacity of a language to be itself happens every time it uses the idiom. For example 'apprendre par coeur' (to learn by heart). The language curls itself up its idiom, tries to protect her identity, and it is that which invites and calls a mechanical[2] way which would not be called translation anymore. Another example is Bilingualism: The studies related to bilingual phenomenon are various[3]: There are Julien Green, Samuel Beckett, Vladimir Nabokov and Franz Kafka as examples of auto-translation. Beckett writing at the speed of the thought in a language which is not his, as if the thought - this speed of interiority - was always foreign. Gregory Chatonsky [1] Jacques Derrida, Â« Donner du temps Â» (de la traduction). [2] Many translaters are online, for example : <a rel="nofollow" href="http://tr.voila.fr">http://tr.voila.fr</a>. [3] To quote only some of them : Â« Bilinguisme et contact des langues Â», by William F., Klincksieck, 1977, Â« Attitudes et reprÃ©sentation liÃ©es Ã  lâ??emploi du bilinguisme Â», by Maurice Riguet, Publications de La Sorbonne, 1984. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 2. Date: 9.02.04 From: John Hoppin <johnhoppin@yahoo.com> Subject: Pinata Party – It Can Change @ Gavin Brown's Enterprise Passersby PRESS RELEASE Contact: john@itcanchange.com PIÃ?ATA PARTY It Can Change at Gavin Brownâ??s Enterprise at Passersby September 4-16, 2004 Reception & PiÃ±ata Party September 10 from 6pm until every piÃ±ata is smashed A pinata is an object to be destroyed, like the title of a book about Gordon Matta-Clark. As the pinatas are beaten pleasure is attained; beauty and craft are sacrificed. The pinata party is a celebratory assault on culture. It Can Change will be presenting a pinata party at Gavin Brown's Enterprise at Passersby from September 4-16, 2004. For this project we are asking artists to contribute pinatas. From September 4-9 the pinatas will hang in the gallery unmolested. On September 10 we will invite people into the gallery for a pinata party. Each pinata will be struck with a blunt object until whatever is inside of it falls out. >From September 11-16 the results of our pinata party will be on view. During the party debris from each pinata will be collected and heat-sealed in plastic and packaged along with photographs depicting the destruction of each pinata. The photographs and bags of destroyed pinatas will serve as mementos of the actions that took place during the pinata party. It Can Change <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.itcanchange.com">http://www.itcanchange.com</a> itcanchange@itcanchange.com Tel: (510) 697-7934 Gavin Brown's Enterprise at Passersby 436 W. 15th St New York, New YorkÂ 10014Â USA gallery@gavinbrown.biz Tel:Â  (212) 627-5258 Fax:Â  (212) 627-5261 Hours: Monday-Friday 10am-6pm + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Rhizome is now offering organizational subscriptions, memberships purchased at the institutional level. These subscriptions allow participants of an institution to access Rhizome's services without having to purchase individual memberships. (Rhizome is also offering subsidized memberships to qualifying institutions in poor or excluded communities.) Please visit <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rhizome.org/info/org.php">http://rhizome.org/info/org.php</a> for more information or contact Rachel Greene at Rachel@Rhizome.org. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 3. Date: 8.28.04 From: Daniel Green <hebdemnobad@verizon.net> Subject: Collective: Unconscious Call For Events from Local and International Artists colleagues: i am a co-founder and co-director of collective: unconscious, an artist-run multi media art space and production facility that has just moved into nyc/usa/tribeca, to hopefully engage in ther heretofore rather obscure task of the de-gentrification of a neighborhood in new york city. at this point, the best way that many of the prolific members of the experimental art/media/theater community can help us is through doing a show/event at collective: unconscious. our carrying expenses are 7000 dollars a month, and we need to have a full schedule of weird, strange, shocking, experimental, original stuff going on in our space to keep us from economically crashing and burning in short order we have karen finley <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.karenfinley.org/">http://www.karenfinley.org/</a> doing a run of shows in september and october, which means sizable audiences to glean for a whole slew of open 10pm slots. a partial and by no means exhaustive pitch for our new facility: air conditioning that actually works a dsl line useful for webcasting, along with possible access to a t-1 a no smoking space that doesn't leave you smelling smoky on your way out much more noise insulation from the street than our old space a collective of artist administrators that have busted their asses without pay for many months to keep our ongoing institutional experiment alive- we need help the only space of its kind left in lower manhattan, in a sea of starbucked duane readed name branded cultural garbage, a barnacle of freakdom that you can help keep alive in the trying months ahead come by any of our bookings meetings any sunday at 6pm at 279 church st., nyc, usa, and/or email scheduling@weird.org. speak to gecko or myself we are inviting both local artists and international artists seeking to do shows/events in new york city at low cost. we want engaging original work that may not be as established as the work presented by other experimental art spaces in nyc such as the kitchen or ps122. if you don't know about our space and you are interested in booking an event with us, check out our website <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.weird.org">http://www.weird.org</a> to find out about work we've produced and presented, goto: <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.weird.org/what_we_have_done/">http://www.weird.org/what_we_have_done/</a> + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 4. Date: 8.30.04 From: Doug Easterly <playfight@mac.com> Subject: visiting artist lecture needed Syracuse University is looking for a visiting artist who can give a lecture to our Computational Media Projects class, on one of the following dates: Sept. 20 Sept. 27 Oct. 4 (all Monday's) the class meets from 10 - noon. The class is based on MAX/MSP/JITTER/SOFTVNS - preferrably you use these tools extensively in your art making process. Ideally, the lecture would be an artist talk/demo: discuss your concepts and methods while showing a few unique Max related techniques. We can pay for your trip, meals and around $500 artist fee. Please email Doug Easterly, with url showing examples of work. deaster@syr.edu + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 5. Date: 9.02.04 From: Brett Stalbaum <stalbaum@ucsd.edu> Subject: [Fwd: Fwd: Scale Journal 8/9 Call For Participation + Guest Editor Joel Swanson + <a rel="nofollow" href="http://scale.ucsd.edu/">http://scale.ucsd.edu/</a>] >+ please forward + > >This email is a call for submissions from theorists and practitioners in >the following fields: Art, Architecture, Communication, Comparative >Philosophy, Computation, Computer Audio, Critical Theory, Design, >Literature, Media (New and Old), Music, Performance, and Software >Design. > >SCALE (<a rel="nofollow" href="http://scale.ucsd.edu">http://scale.ucsd.edu</a>) would like to encourage you to submit >"work" for its upcoming online-only August & September issue. SCALE is a >non-profit journal that explores new modes of production and >dissemination based on open-source and networked communities. > >The theme for the August/September SCALE is APOCALYPSE. As we look >forward to the coming election in November, it seems prudent to reinvest >ourselves in exploring the possibilities of our own self-destruction. >Often rooted in religious and science-fiction genres, apocalyptic themes >have proven fruitful as a framework from which to question our >collective hopes, fears, and concerns, on a local and universal scale. >In your submissions, feel free to explore and exploit your personal >imaginations of APOCALYPSE as a loose starting point for your >submission. Please keep in mind that SCALE likes to abide by terms >obliquely, and as such encourages all types of submissions, from dirty >sketches and musings, to polished images and essays. > >Initially formulated within the graduate programs of the Visual Arts at >the University of California, San Diego, SCALE was created by Jon >Phillips (<a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.rejon.org">http://www.rejon.org</a>) and Patrick W. Deegan >(<a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.pwdeegan.org">http://www.pwdeegan.org</a>) as a strategy of response to a growing >interest in developing Open Source communities across the globe. SCALE >is a monthly publication living in both PDF print and online PDF/WIKI >format. > >+++++++++++++ > >SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS: > >+ Additional instructions for submission can be found at ><a rel="nofollow" href="http://scale.ucsd.edu">http://scale.ucsd.edu</a> under ¹ÄúRead the File and Style Guidelines.¹Äù > >+ Text or Image submissions must be in PDF format NOT exceeding 10MB and >8.5¹Äù x 11¹Äùin dimension. Because this month is ONLINE-ONLY, color >submissions are encouraged. Images must be 300dpi. > >+ Multimedia submissions will be hyperlinked for download from a page >within in the compiled PDF publication. If submitting a file for >linkage, it is recommended you also submit some type of graphic image in >consideration of how your piece will be represented in the layout. By >doing so, we can include the URL to your file within the image provided >by you. If other circumstances are desired, please let us know. > >+ For Multimedia submissions, please upload the actual file and NOT the >URL to where it is located on behalf of your own site. WE WILL BE >HOSTING THESE FILES ON THE SCALE SERVER. However, mentions of your >respective websites are allowed. > >+ All work submitted will be initially accredited to you unless >suggested otherwise, however, in its online format the work will be >deemed Open Content (as defined by <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.creativecommons.org">http://www.creativecommons.org</a>) and >could possibly be subject to artistic reinterpretation (at a later date) >on behalf of SCALE¹Äôs community of readers. > >+++++++++++++ > >DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSIONS: > >+ The submission process begins now and ends effectively on Monday, >September 20, 2004. > >+ In the week to follow, we will be compiling and publishing the >online-only August/September issue. > >+ Submissions, progress, and status can be immediately checked online. > >+++++++++++++ > >If you have any questions, please contact any of us directly. Thank you. >We look forward to your submissions . . . > >The September & August SCALE team: > >Joel Swanson | Guest Editor, August & September Issue SCALE. | >jeswanson@ucsd.edu | <a rel="nofollow" href="http://hippocrit.com">http://hippocrit.com</a> > >Patrick Deegan | Co-founder of SCALE | pdeegan@ucsd.edu | ><a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.pwdeegan.org">http://www.pwdeegan.org</a> > >Jon Phillips | Co-founder of SCALE | jon@rejon.org | ><a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.rejon.org">http://www.rejon.org</a> > > >_______________________________________________ >scale-announce mailing list >scale-announce@cabbage.ucsd.edu ><a rel="nofollow" href="http://cabbage.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/scale-announce">http://cabbage.ucsd.edu/mailman/listinfo/scale-announce</a> + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Rhizome is now offering organizational subscriptions, memberships purchased at the institutional level. These subscriptions allow participants of an institution to access Rhizome's services without having to purchase individual memberships. (Rhizome is also offering subsidized memberships to qualifying institutions in poor or excluded communities.) Please visit <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rhizome.org/info/org.php">http://rhizome.org/info/org.php</a> for more information or contact Rachel Greene at Rachel@Rhizome.org. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 6. Date: 9.02.04 From: Cynthia Beth Rubin <cbrubin@risd.edu> Subject: Position at Rhode Island School of Design: Computer-Based Design Courses Manager Manager, Computer-Based Design Courses Rhode Island School of Design Providence,Â RI Job Code: Â  Posted: Aug-19-2004 Â  - Department: Continuing Education - Full-time OVERVIEW: Develop, plan, staff, coordinate, monitor and evaluate all CE technology course offerings. Supervise the following certificate programs coordinators: Advertising for Print, Broadcast + Internet; Computer Animation; Print Design Process + Production; Video Editing for Digital Postproduction; Web Design/Development; and Fast Track Computer programs and assorted Young Artist and Pre-College programs. Work to help integrate technology into non-technological areas of CE and help plan for the advent of online learning efforts. Supervise the Computer Lab Specialist and co-supervise the Programs Assistant. Work with the director and others in tailoring courses for the public to meet the particular needs of area businesses. Advise students and faculty as necessary and conduct orientation sessions. Make recommendations concerning software, hardware, lab facilities, etc. ESSENTIAL FUNCTIONS: Prepare draft copy of seasonal (spring, summer, fall, winter) Extension course catalogs, sections of the Summer Studies and Pre-College catalogs, faculty and student handbooks, and orientation and training materials. Work closely with the CE Marketing Manager on initiatives for these programs. Participate in establishing annual goals, objectives and action plans for technology dependant CE programs. Develop and implement academic policies and procedures, establishing criteria for assessment, portfolio review, and program completion. Develop new certificate programs in the area of technology. Manage and oversee the implementation and evaluation of those programs. Monitor budgets and staffing plans. QUALIFICATIONS: Master's Degree, or equivalent education and a combination of experience in art design, technology, and/or adult education desired. Minimum BFA, BA/BS required. Three to five years experience in program planning, implementation and evaluation, preferably in a continuing education environment. Experience in an arts school or organization, or as a consultant will be considered. Familiarity with emerging technologies, network issues, software applications and platforms relevant to web design, animation, graphic design, digital post-production for video, 3D modeling, digital photography, and game design, etc. is required along with proficiency with business and educational applications of such technology tools. Excellent writing and math skills are required. The ability to remain current with post-secondary level technology and teaching trends in the fields of art and design as well as training curriculum for the corporate sector is desired. Familiarity with registration database software and Excel, along with the ability to assess the technology knowledge level of potential course instructors is desired. Ability to work independently, and as a member of a team. To apply, visit <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.risd.edu/about_jobs.cfm">http://www.risd.edu/about_jobs.cfm</a>. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 7. Date: 8.29.04 From: Barbara Lattanzi <threads@wildernesspuppets.net> Subject: C-SPAN Karaoke The Interrupting Annotator presents… C-SPAN KARAOKE FREE SOFTWARE FOR COLLABORATIVE AND CONVIVIAL VIDEO VIEWING C-SPAN KARAOKE software displays media that streams from public archives of the CSPAN.org website, along with karaoke tunes gleaned from various free offerings on the web. So, gather together with friends and loosen up those vocal cords… While you are navigating the flows of institutional political process, faithfully and invaluably documented by CSPAN, you can always break out in song…and the louder the better. Use CSPAN KARAOKE and your voice in collective chorus with friends, to navigate CSPAN video streams - whether these be representations of illegitimate authority or suspect versions of reality. Sing with conviction, because resonant frequencies have been known to shatter glass. A NOTE ABOUT C-SPAN ARCHIVES Although streaming video archives are available at the CSPAN website as a not-for-profit, public service of the lucrative American cable television industry, they are only publically accessible for a brief period of time. Some more significant videos may remain available longer, but most CSPAN videos can be accessed for only a few months before they disappear. The disappearing CSPAN video archive means that over time, the accumulated list of video titles for "CSPAN KARAOKE" may contain an occasional "dead" link, a gap in collective memory of institutional political process. Note that the more recent videos will always appear conveniently near the top of the selection list for your KARAOKE pleasure. Description: <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.wildernesspuppets.net/yarns/annotate/cspankaraoke.html">http://www.wildernesspuppets.net/yarns/annotate/cspankaraoke.html</a> Software download page: <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.wildernesspuppets.net/yarns/annotate/cspankaraokedownload.html">http://www.wildernesspuppets.net/yarns/annotate/cspankaraokedownload.html</a> Video demo of C-SPAN Karaoke software: <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.wildernesspuppets.net/yarns/recordings/cspankaraoke.html">http://www.wildernesspuppets.net/yarns/recordings/cspankaraoke.html</a> —————————————————————– Barbara Lattanzi www.wildernesspuppets.net + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + For $65 annually, Rhizome members can put their sites on a Linux server, with a whopping 350MB disk storage space, 1GB data transfer per month, catch-all email forwarding, daily web traffic stats, 1 FTP account, and the capability to host your own domain name (or use <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rhizome.net/your_account_name">http://rhizome.net/your_account_name</a>). Details at: <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rhizome.org/services/1.php">http://rhizome.org/services/1.php</a> + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 8. Date: 9.01.04 From: Rhizome.org <artbase@rhizome.org> Subject: Just added to the Rhizome ArtBase: Hlemmur in C by Pall Thayer Just added to the Rhizome ArtBase … <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rhizome.org/object.rhiz?27338">http://rhizome.org/object.rhiz?27338</a> + Hlemmur in C + + Pall Thayer + For the past few year I've been working with various different types of data and by visualizing/audifying them, examining their characteristics as artistic media. Lately, I've been working quite a bit with GPS data which has very unique and somewhat more predictable and understandable characteristics. Hlemmur in C is one of these projects. + + + Biography audio/visual experimental multi-user whatever-you-wanna-call-it all to create abstract imagery cv - <a rel="nofollow" href="http://130.208.220.190/cv.html">http://130.208.220.190/cv.html</a> <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.this.is/pallit">http://www.this.is/pallit</a> <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.this.is/isjs">http://www.this.is/isjs</a> <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.this.is/harmony">http://www.this.is/harmony</a> <a rel="nofollow" href="http://130.208.220.190/panse">http://130.208.220.190/panse</a> + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 9. Date: 9.03.04 From: Rhizome.org <artbase@rhizome.org> Subject: Just added to the Rhizome ArtBase: fuorange by Kate Southworth Just added to the Rhizome ArtBase … <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rhizome.org/object.rhiz?27525">http://rhizome.org/object.rhiz?27525</a> + fuorange + + Kate Southworth + fuorange is a collaboration between Kate Southworth, Patrick Simons and Christina McPhee. fuorange comes from 'fuckyou orange' - construction workers' lingo for the orange mesh around forbidden zones, like manholes and tresspass lines. fuorange is a short circuit past the fuck you, don_t go there, into a matrixial spacewalk via sound curves and cascades of text. fuorange records the derive of a real world walk, captured and meshed within the artifice of the net. Audio and digital photography were recorded on location in Cornwall, July 2004. Sound processing and generative music design are by Patrick Simons from location/voice recordings. Photography and html edit is by Christina McPhee. Progressive movies created by Kate Southworth. A coproduction of Glorious Ninth and naxsmash group. Produced with fellowship support from the Interactive Art & Design Research Cluster at Falmouth College of Arts, Falmouth, Cornwall 2004. + + + Biography <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.gloriousninth.com">http://www.gloriousninth.com</a> Kate Southworth is an internet artist. Her work focuses on the co-emergence of knowledge, and on trying to understand and articulate different ways of knowing ourselves and others through processes of interaction. Kate received an MSc in Multimedia Systems from London Guildhall University, UK and a BA (Hons) in Fine Art from Manchester Polytechnic, UK. She is currently undertaking practice-led PhD research into Matrixial Networks at the University of Leeds, UK. She has taught Multimedia and Interactive Arts at London Guildhall University and Dublin City University. Kate is currently based at Falmouth College of Arts, Cornwall, UK where she is leader of the Interactive Art & Design Research Cluster, and Programme Leader of MA Interactive Art & Design. Producing work with new technologies since the early 1990s, she began working with sound artist, Patrick Simons on Internet art projects at the end of 2000. Their work explores personal, social and historical phenomena using a variety of aesthetic, political, theoretical and conceptual approaches. The space between their different approaches is Glorious Ninth. Glorious Ninth has exhibited net art projects at galleries and museums including: Centre of Contemporary Culture, Barcelona; Evergreen Cultural Centre, British Columbia, Canada; Irish Film Centre, Dublin; Watershed Media Centre, Bristol and the Institute of Contemporary Art, London. They are featured in several net art databases including Martin Wattenbergâ??s Net Art Idea Line on the Whitney Museumâ??s site, Rhizome Artbase, and Soundtoys. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 10. Date: 9.02.04 From: Bubble Sort <llacook@yahoo.com> Subject: Explaining Pictures to a Dead Protocol: Programming Aesthetic Experience Explaining Pictures to a Dead Protocol: Programming Aesthetic Experience Science is what we understand well enough to explain to a computer. Art is everything else we do. –Donald Knuth, The Art of Computer Programming The Beethoven Code The idea of programming aesthetic experience is a seductive one. Figuritive painters have employed means for centuries to control the flow of a viewer's sight through a painting; composers have developed strategies to break Western Art Music out of the comfort of functional tonality and into the realms of serialism(Schoenberg) and indeterminacy(Cage). Indeed, all arts, even those not executed via computer, seem to be based on the idea of programming experience, and by the binary forces inherent in programming: freedom and control. Paul Tulipana, one of the members of the art programming group Eidolon(<a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.node99.org/denature/">http://www.node99.org/denature/</a>), has written that: Underlying the acts of the creation and viewing every piece of art created in or by a computer there are thousands of lines of code. Everything from the algorithm which controls image manipulation in many recent paintings to the html that underlies the visual elements of Alexei Shulgin's 'form art' is driven by lines and lines of code, resultant (albeit not necessarily considered) in what the artist intends to be your viewing experience. The infrastructure is compounded when viewing a piece of art on the computer - Maciej Wisniewski's Turnstile Part II, for example, is reliant not only on HTML and a JavaScript client-side program, it is reliant on an XML backend that allows communication with a huge database of found data. Moreover, viewing this piece is reliant on the code that runs the server (say, stadium.com), not to mention the code that allows your computer to connect to the server (TCP, IP, your internet provider, your browser, your operating system, and so on for a very long time).(Tulipana, 2002) Tulipana is honing in on computer-based arts here, specifically network art. But in a way this also applies to more 'realtime' art activities; is there not code in Beethoven? Is the system of notes and time signatures that is a formal music education not in essence a programming language? Or at least a markup language, like HTML(it does lack control structures–no while loops on the staff). But traditional art music praxis does bring to mind the dynamic of computer and network art; the score can be seen as code executed by an orchestra or any other set of musicians. Christiane Paul, introducing the 2002 Whitney ArtPort commission project CODeDOC(<a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.whitney.org/artport/commissions/codedoc/index.shtml">http://www.whitney.org/artport/commissions/codedoc/index.shtml</a>), points out, "…there is no digital art that doesn't have a layer of code and algorithms, a procedure of formal instructions that accomplish a 'result' in a finite number of steps. Even if the physical and visual manifestations of digital art distract from the layer of data and code, any 'digital image' has ultimately been produced by instructions and the software that was used to create or manipulate it. It is precisely this layer of 'code' and instructions that constitutes a conceptual level which connects to previous artistic work such as Dada's experiments with formal variations and the conceptual pieces by Duchamp, Cage and Sol LeWitt that are based on the execution of instructions.(Paul, 2002)" Control and its Other "Within the past quarter of a century, operational instructions have been imbedded in the design of many industrial and household utilities. They implement our daily use of telephones, automobiles, cameras, TVs, and radios. Our hospitals, factories, banks, and shopping centers all depend on the algorithms that control inventories, transactions, communications and security. They are ubiquitous and our mass culture would collapse without them.(Versotko, 2004)" If this makes you nervous, it probably should. The fact that contemporary urban culture has become so dependent on algorithms IS a bit scary–I mean, who's writing this code, anyway? What do they want of me? In a world of voice mail and instant messaging and ATMs and cable television remote controls, have I, as a human being, become nothing more than some pre-determined entity that presses buttons in precisely prescribed sequence? This is where art usually steps in–to "humanize" phenomena; not to anthropomorphize it per se, but to lay a veneer of the "organic" over our mechanized, algorithmic culture. Network and software art should play a vital role in this: successful aesthetic programming often highlights and debunks the control structures inherent in our communication networks. Such works critique the medium because it's their duty to; comprised of the medium, they often utilize control to no purpose(at least from a capitalist perspective), or for the 'fuzzy' purpose of pleasure… "The path of a user's experience follows a narrative trajectory: confusion > discovery > understanding > exhaustion. " Brad Borevitz surmises. "The pleasures of this passage involve the sensual, empathetic experience of the algorithms of the software(Borevitz, 2002)." To speak of empathy and algorithms in the same sentence may puzzle many; to the daily user, automation goes unnoticed, is taken for granted (I don't get particularly excited when using the ATM). But to the PROGRAMMER, ah, the programmer sees in the abstraction of a good algorithm beauty and elegance. Sites like sweetcode.org(<a rel="nofollow" href="http://sweetcode.org/index.html">http://sweetcode.org/index.html</a>) may seem to offer little more than ascetic tools for ascetic codehawks, but note the presence of projects like Filelight(<a rel="nofollow" href="http://methylblue.com/filelight/">http://methylblue.com/filelight/</a>), billed at sweetcode as "a cute interactive visualization of disk space consumption." The Artist-Programmer Caresses Her Tool So who is this weirdo who finds something to empathize with in automation? Is he obsessive-compulsive? Does he spend his day washing his hands over and over again? Recently, I became interested in the relationships network and software artists had with the programming languages they knew. In true democratic netizen fashion, I sent a survey out to a few email lists–most notably the Rhizome list, Netbehaviour, Webartery and Wryting. What I got back reads (perhaps not surprisingly, since we're talking about something as intimate as one's relationship with language, whether that language compiles or not) as strangely personal, confessional even. Of course, when one of the questions in a survey is "Have you ever dreamed in code?" you can't expect institutional responses. To the query, "Does each programming language imply an ontology?", Francis Hwang, Rhizome's Director of Technology, points out that "…under the surface in OO design…these debates (are) raging. People in stricter typing languages (C++, Java) tend to believe that you need to set up this deep forest of Platonic types before you can write a single line of code. We dynamic folks (Ruby, Smalltalk) are much more likely to believe that types are practical and provisional, but have no reality behind them. You discover types as you need them, and you discard them if you think they're no longer relevant to your task(LaCook, 2004)" Francis outlines here the differences in variable declaration procedures in programming languages; some languages require a variable to be declared, and tied to a specific data-type(text, number, true/false polarity), before it can be used; others will treat a variable as a less-than-definite entity, easily converted from one data-type to another. Strict languages do seem to be more Platonic, more dependent on transcendent "categories," than, say, Flash's ActionScript, an interpreted language that pretty much trusts the programmer to know what kind of data she is working with, and that she knows what to do with it. Or, as multimedia artist and poet Dan Waber answers:"…some ideas are sonnet shaped, some ideas are rondeau shaped, some ideas are free verse shaped." One factor in the relationship between artists and programming languages that always fuels fiery debate is whether or not the language in question is open source. To create interactive Flash objects, for example, one must buy Macromedia's product; not only that, but programmers have no access to ActionScript's core engine, can't modify it to suit their whims. A language like PHP, on the other hand, is a free download, and programmers are encouraged to modify it. Would artists particular about the politics of art and social critique frown on proprietary technologies? " I don't choose my paint based on political ideas." Dutch artist Jan Robert Leegte replied curtly. But Jessica Gomula was quick to point out one of the advantages of open source code: "I would never have had the opportunity to learn if tutorials and resources were not available online and if other programmers had not posted their source-code as examples." Gomula also outlined the very fundamental difference between networked/algorithmic art objects and more familiar media. "Once it is interactive the artist loses control over the exact expression of an experience," she explained. "But by programming specific response and avenues into the piece, the overall experience is still highly guided. Coding it is one of the only ways to introduce a non-linear experience, which I believe adds an important element to art, as the idea of the non-linear experience, stemming from web use, is a paradigm that has yet to reach it's fullest expression." Just to confirm that I wasn't imagining things, and that indeed the execution of code could provide some rare personalities with pleasure, I also asked if it were true that one could code catharsis, could introduce into an artwork some automation that reaches the user on a more intuitive, subjective level. Dan Waber took umbrage: "To me, the answer to this is so obviously 'yes' that I am compelled to ask you: what makes you think a coded art object might be inherently incapable of producing catharsis in the user?" Net poet and theorist Alan Sondheim completely dissolved the art object in his response. "I'm not sure what 'art object' is." He wrote, "…anything can produce anything depending on the content…" And artist-programmer Rob Myers cut to the chase as far as human subjectivity and automated objectivity go. "Yes. I wrote a small script to print "I am drunk" repeatedly the other night. It was very cathartic." A compiled text of the responses to the Programming Survey can be seen at <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.lewislacook.com/programmingSurvey">http://www.lewislacook.com/programmingSurvey</a> . Questioning the ability of code to produce empathy and catharsis in end users will, as time goes on, become a pointless activity. "In a world where artists use software to write software that will be seen via other software, questions about the 'aesthetics of the code' become a symptom of not being able to see the wood for the trees." Richard Wright asserts in the latest issue of Mute. "Programming is not only the material of artistic creation, it is the context of artistic creation(Wright, 2004)." That is, the subject of code is surrounded by code. When Francis Hwang wrote about the Platonism of strictly-typed languages, he could just as well have been referencing the longing artists and theorists often feel when confronted with algorithmic art objects. A desire for the transcendent, for immanence; basking in the mediation that is algorithmic reality. And hasn't art always been mediation? … Lewis LaCook ———————— Works Cited Borevitz, Brad. Super-Abstract: Software Art and the Redefinition of Abstraction. Graduate Thesis. 2002 LaCook, Lewis. Programming Survey distributed to list-servs (Rhizome, Netbehaviour, Webartery, Wryting). 2004. Paul, Christiane. CODeDOC <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.whitney.org/artport/commissions/codedoc/index.shtml">http://www.whitney.org/artport/commissions/codedoc/index.shtml</a> 2002 Tuulipana, Paul. On Network Art. <a rel="nofollow" href="http://art.paultulipana.net/">http://art.paultulipana.net/</a> 2001-2002. Wright, Richard. Software Art After Programming. Mute, Issue 28. 2004. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Rhizome.org is a 501©(3) nonprofit organization and an affiliate of the New Museum of Contemporary Art. Rhizome Digest is supported by grants from The Charles Engelhard Foundation, The Rockefeller Foundation, The Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, and with public funds from the New York State Council on the Arts, a state agency. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Rhizome Digest is filtered by Kevin McGarry (kevin@rhizome.org). ISSN: 1525-9110. Volume 9, number 36. Article submissions to list@rhizome.org are encouraged. Submissions should relate to the theme of new media art and be less than 1500 words. For information on advertising in Rhizome Digest, please contact info@rhizome.org. To unsubscribe from this list, visit <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rhizome.org/subscribe">http://rhizome.org/subscribe</a>. Subscribers to Rhizome Digest are subject to the terms set out in the Member Agreement available online at <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rhizome.org/info/29.php">http://rhizome.org/info/29.php</a>. 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