RHIZOME DIGEST: 9.16.05

discussion

Posted Sept. 15 2005 20:00

RHIZOME DIGEST: 9.16.05

RHIZOME DIGEST: September 16, 2005 Content: +opportunity+ 1. Joshua Ippel: Mind in Matter: Constructions of the Built Environment 2. Troy Innocent: ::: THIRD ITERATION - Final Call for Papers & Artworks 3. drew hemment: CFP - Mobile Music Technology workshop 2006 +work+ 4. Sal Randolph: whereyouare, an invitation +announcement+ 5. Ken Goldberg: atc @ ucb: fall 2005-spring 2006 6. nick@maisonduchic.com: 23 Reasons to Spare New York: Music Videos from the Art Rock Scene 7. Greg Smith: vague terrain 24/09 Toronto +Commissioned for Rhizome.org+ 8. Ryan Griffis: Interview: AUDC and the Disappearance of Architecture + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Rhizome is now offering Organizational Subscriptions, group memberships that can be purchased at the institutional level. These subscriptions allow participants at institutions to access Rhizome's services without having to purchase individual memberships. For a discounted rate, students or faculty at universities or visitors to art centers can have access to Rhizome?s archives of art and text as well as guides and educational tools to make navigation of this content easy. Rhizome is also offering subsidized Organizational Subscriptions 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 Lauren Cornell at LaurenCornell@Rhizome.org + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 1. From: Joshua Ippel <joshippel@hotmail.com> Date: Sep 12, 2005 8:54 AM Subject: Mind in Matter: Constructions of the Built Environment CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS Beneath our feet and above our heads, sidewalks, lawns, plazas, blocks, gardens, buildings, streets, and curbs surround and bound the spaces in which we move and live. Much more than a lifeless negative space, these elements of the built environment provide us with symbols through which we construct our understanding of the world, deriving stories about our past, present and future. At the same time, architects, planners, and designers, acting under the influence of political, social, and economic forces, tear down, alter, construct, and preserve these physical forms in an attempt to shape the environment along socio-political and aesthetic lines. The tension between these ?intended? uses and the meanings assigned to the resulting physical environment by different individuals and groups is played out in nearly every social arena, from the political to the interpersonal. As an art space located just north of downtown Champaign, Illinois, OPENSOURCE Art is itself not free from troubling questions about its situation in the physical environment and the polarizing interpretations of that circumstance. OPENSOURCE can be viewed, on one hand, as a progressive-minded, community-based art space bringing new life to an aging and abandoned neighborhood. Another view is that OPENSOURCE is an opportunistic appropriation of a vibrant historical neighborhood by a privileged group of artists complicit in a process of displacement and imperialism. Cognizant of these polemic interpretations of our own existence, we feel that OPENSOURCE serves as a sensible starting point for an investigation into the creation of structure and meaning in the built environment. Mind in Matter seeks works that explore the ways in which we perceive, interpret, and react to these tensions in the constructed forms and spaces that surround us. Contributions might choose to address the following: ? Site-specific installations that engage with the realities of OPENSOURCE?s situation in the spatial and temporal urban fabric; ? Other site-specific installations (in OPENSOURCE or elsewhere) that respond to the built environment; ? Differing interpretations of and reaction to elements of the built environment at varying scales; ? Political ramifications of the interpretation of forms and space; ? Creation of social cues in the urban design process; ? The arbitrary and artificial divide between ?scientific analysis? and ?artistic reaction.? Schedule: October 7th ? Submission deadline October 14th ? Notification of acceptances Nov. 3rd ? Artwork due at OPENSOURCE Nov. 10th ? Opening reception, 7-10 pm Submission guidelines: Please submit a detailed proposal that includes documentation, installation time and contact information. Documentation may be in the form of, but not limited to, drawings, sketches, slides, video, cd and dvd. Supporting materials (cv, portfolio, statement, etc.) are not necessary, but would be helpful. Proposals may be sent via postal service, email or delivered in person. OPENSOURCE Art 12 E. Washington Champaign, Illinois 61820 opensource@boxwith.com opensource.boxwith.com NOTE: If you would like your proposal returned, please include a self-addressed package with sufficient return postage in the form of stamps. Accepted works must include return packaging and proper postage. Materials that cannot be returned will become donations to OPENSOURCE. OPENSOURCE is not responsible for lost or damaged material. Curation process: This show will be juried by five people, including at least one OPENSOURCE co-director. Inclusion or exclusion of each piece will be decided by a majority vote. Any work submitted by members of the committee will be voted on by the full OPENSOURCE membership at the Oct. 14 member meeting. Specific works are likely to be solicited, and some flexibility may be exercised for these entries with regard to scheduling. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Refresh! The First International Conference on the histories of media art, science, and technology. Hosted by the Banff New Media Institute, Leonardo/ISAST, and the Database for Virtual Art. September 28-October 1, 2005 The Banff Centre, Banff, Alberta, Canada For info. and to register Visit: www.banffcentre.ca/bnmi <<a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.banffcentre.ca/bnmi">http://www.banffcentre.ca/bnmi</a>> E-mail: luke_heemsbergen@banffcentre.ca + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 2. From: Troy Innocent <troy@iconica.org> Date: Sep 14, 2005 12:05 AM Subject: ::: THIRD ITERATION - Final Call for Papers & Artworks FINAL CALL for Papers & Artworks The Conference Committee has been inundated with a great number of requests to extend the deadline for submission of Papers, Technical/Artist Talks and Artworks. The new and absolute final date for submission is now September 23, 2005. For submissions being posted, please email iterate@csse.monash.edu.au so we can confirm receipt of your material. ……………………………………………………………. THIRD ITERATION third international conference on generative systems in the electronic arts November 30th to December 2nd, 2005: Melbourne, Australia THIRD ITERATION is the third international conference on generative systems in the electronic arts. It investigates three major themes ? human-computer creativity, generative meaning systems, and the computational sublime. Following on from First Iteration (1999) and Second Iteration (2001), this year?s conference will be held in Melbourne, Australia. For further information please visit the conference web site at <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~iterate/TI/">http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~iterate/TI/</a> or contact us via email at iterate@csse.monash.edu.au + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Rhizome ArtBase Exhibitions <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rhizome.org/art/exhibition/">http://rhizome.org/art/exhibition/</a> Visit the fourth ArtBase Exhibition "City/Observer," curated by Yukie Kamiya of the New Museum of Contemporary Art in New York and designed by T.Whid of MTAA. <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rhizome.org/art/exhibition/city/">http://rhizome.org/art/exhibition/city/</a> + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 3. From: drew hemment <drew@futuresonic.com> Date: Sep 15, 2005 8:46 PM Subject: CFP - Mobile Music Technology workshop 2006 Apologies for cross-posting. —————————————————————- THIRD INTERNATIONAL WORKSHOP ON MOBILE MUSIC TECHNOLOGY 2-3 MARCH 2006, BRIGHTON, UK <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.viktoria.se/fal/events/mobilemusic/">http://www.viktoria.se/fal/events/mobilemusic/</a> Combining mobile technology and music promises some exciting developments in a rapidly emerging field. Devices such as mobile phones, walkmans and iPods have already brought music to the ever-changing social and geographic locations of their users and reshaped their experience of the urban landscape. With new properties such as ad hoc networking, Internet connection, and context-awareness, mobile music technology offers countless new artistic, commercial and socio-cultural opportunities for music creation, listening and sharing. How can we push forward the already successful combination of music and mobile technology? What new forms of interaction with music lie ahead, as locative media and music use merge into new forms of everyday experiences? Following two successful workshops that started to explore and establish the emerging field of mobile music technology, this third edition offers a unique opportunity to participate in the development of mobile music and hands-on experience of the latest cutting-edge technology. The programme will consist of presentations from invited speakers, in-depth discussions about the crucial issues of mobile music technology, hands-on group activities and break-out sessions where participants can get valuable feedback on their work-inprogress projects. The invited speakers include Michael Bull (University of Sussex, UK), often dubbed by the press as 'Professor iPod' for his iPod and car stereo user studies that reveal fascinating trends for mobile music. The workshop will take place at the University of Sussex in Brighton, UK. Brighton is situated on the British 'Sunshine Coast' and easily accessible: only 30 minutes from London/Gatwick airport and 60 minutes from central London. Don't miss this chance to help shape the mobile music landscape! CALL FOR PARTICIPANTS We invite practitioners, artists, designers and researchers from all areas, including music, technology development, new media, sound-art, music distribution, locative media and industry to register for this international mobile music workshop. CALL FOR WORK-IN-PROGRESS Are you working on a mobile music project and looking for feedback from like-minded people to help you to move on with your ideas? We invite submissions of work-in-progress projects exploring the topic of mobile music. Projects will be discussed, receive critical review as well as support with ongoing problems and issues. Your work should not be completed yet, but either be on-going or just about to get started. Potential projects could include but are not limited to mobile music systems or enabling technologies, interface design, on-going or planned user studies, ethnographic fieldwork, art pieces and other areas relevant to mobile music. Submissions should include a presentation of the project, explain its relevance to the field of mobile music and describe issues and problems that could be discussed during the workshop. Please include a short biography with the submission. Accepted project authors will be given time to present and discuss their work and will receive feedback by smaller groups of workshop participants including specialists in the field. Authors are encouraged to bring material and prototypes to the workshop. Submission format: one page in ACM SIG publications format. Submission deadline: 28th November 2005 Notification of acceptance: 15th December 2005 CALL FOR MOBILE PLATFORMS AND SYSTEMS In addition to the presentations, discussions and project feedback sessions the workshop will also offer handson group activities to explore technological platforms. We are looking for mobile platforms, systems, installations, applications or devices that include music features or can be used for musical projects. The workshop participants will get hands-on experience with these platforms, so they should be suitable for groups of at least 8 people. This provides you with the opportunity to introduce your platform to experts and practitioners in the field of mobile music and to gain valuable feedback. We invite you to submit a platform description, explain how it can be used for mobile music and how larger groups can use it during the workshop. Submission format: one page in ACM SIG publications format Submission deadline: 31st October 2005 Notification of acceptance: 14th November 2005 SUBMISSIONS Please send your platform or project submission as a PDF file, to all three, f.behrendt@sussex.ac.uk (Frauke Behrendt), lalya@viktoria.se (Lalya Gaye) and dh@loca-lab.org (Drew Hemment). In the subject line, state MOBILE MUSIC WORKSHOP SUBMISSION followed by PROJECTS or PLATFORM and the name of the main author. REGISTRATION The number of participants is limited to 25 places. Accepted submitters are given priority, other participants are accepted on a first-come first-served basis. Regular fee for the workshop is 70 Euros (47 GBP), and reduced student fee is 45 Euros (30 GBP). The fee includes morning and afternoon coffee breaks and lunch for both days. Registration deadline: 17th January 2006 MORE INFORMATION For more information about the previous and up-coming workshops, as well as the ACM SIG publications format and travel and accommodation information, please consult the website: <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.viktoria.se/fal/events/mobilemusic/">http://www.viktoria.se/fal/events/mobilemusic/</a> The 3rd international workshop on mobile music technology is organised by the Department of Media and Film Studies, University of Sussex (UK), the Future Applications Lab, Viktoria Institute (SWE) and Adelphi Research Institute, University of Salford (UK). In collaboration with PLAN (Pervasive and Locative Arts Network) and Futuresonic. CONTACTS Frauke Behrendt: f.behrendt@sussex.ac.uk Lalya Gaye: lalya@viktoria.se Drew Hemment: drew@futuresonic.com + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Rhizome.org 2005-2006 Net Art Commissions The Rhizome Commissioning Program makes financial support available to artists for the creation of innovative new media art work via panel-awarded commissions. For the 2005-2006 Rhizome Commissions, eleven artists/groups were selected to create original works of net art. <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rhizome.org/commissions/">http://rhizome.org/commissions/</a> The Rhizome Commissions Program is made possible by support from the Jerome Foundation in celebration of the Jerome Hill Centennial, the Greenwall Foundation, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, and the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs. Additional support has been provided by members of the Rhizome community. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 4. From: Sal Randolph <sal@highlala.com> Date: Sep 15, 2005 10:57 AM Subject: whereyouare, an invitation Dear friends, I'd like to invite you to participate in a new project of mine. Whereyouare ( <a rel="nofollow" href="http://whereyouare.org">http://whereyouare.org</a> ) is an experiment in the collective documentation of neighborhoods. It harnesses the power of folksonomy tags from a range of sites that host and organize content of different kinds (flickr for photos, vimeo for video, delicious for links, etc.). To contribute, you simply tag your content with a tag that is unique to your neighborhood and the project, and everyone's material is brought together on whereyouare.org. I began this project with the idea of documenting my own neighborhood of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, whose quirky and ephemeral beauties are currently endangered by a wave of new development. Walking my familiar streets I realized that I couldn't possibly be the only person who had this idea - many others must be simultaneously working to capture the flavor of this place, this moment in time. Why not invite collaboration and share our perceptions of place with each other? As with most people, recent events have radically altered my idea of what an endangered or lost neighborhood is, and it seemed right to open the project up for wider use. Everyone is invited to participate by documenting any neighborhood they love. Those with material from neighborhoods which have now been damaged or destroyed by Katrina are especially warmly encouraged to contribute. <a rel="nofollow" href="http://whereyouare.org">http://whereyouare.org</a> all the best, Sal <a rel="nofollow" href="http://salrandolph.com">http://salrandolph.com</a> :: Whereyoure was created for the new issue of glowlab ( http:// glowlab.com ) :: + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Support Rhizome: buy a hosting plan from BroadSpire <a rel="nofollow" href="http://rhizome.org/hosting/">http://rhizome.org/hosting/</a> Reliable, robust hosting plans from $65 per year. Purchasing hosting from BroadSpire contributes directly to Rhizome's fiscal well-being, so think about about the new Bundle pack, or any other plan, today! About BroadSpire BroadSpire is a mid-size commercial web hosting provider. After conducting a thorough review of the web hosting industry, we selected BroadSpire as our partner because they offer the right combination of affordable plans (prices start at $14.95 per month), dependable customer support, and a full range of services. We have been working with BroadSpire since June 2002, and have been very impressed with the quality of their service. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 5. From: Ken Goldberg <goldberg@ieor.berkeley.edu> Date: Sep 11, 2005 10:32 PM Subject: atc @ ucb: fall 2005-spring 2006 mooring is scarce in diluvian times. our series resumes on sept 21. ———————————————————————– The Art, Technology, and Culture Colloquium of UC Berkeley's Center for New Media Fall 2005 - Spring 2006 Speaker Program Wednesday Evenings, 7:30-9:00pm, 160 Kroeber Hall, UC Berkeley Sep 21 Jaron Lanier, Artist and Musician, Berkeley Can Soulful Music Survive Digital Epistemology? Sep 28 Cobi van Tonder, Artist and Musician, Johannesburg Ephemeral Gumboots: Dancing the Rhythm of Change Oct 17* Bruno Latour, Professor and Curator, Ecole des Mines, Paris From Object to Things: How to Represent the Parliament of Nature? Nov 2 Tom Marioni, Sculptor and Conceptual Artist. SF Digital Sound as Sculpture Material Nov 9** Miranda July, Artist and Filmmaker, LA Ten True Things Feb 1 Mark Pauline, Artist, Survival Research Labs, SF Exploiting the Momentum of Self Righteousness Mar 1 Steve Beck, Artist and Designer, UC Berkeley Engineering From Pre-Digital to Post-Digital: Forty Years of Electronic Art and Music Mar 15 Michael Rees, Digital Media Art and Sculpture, Rutgers Univ. Monsters and Programs and Other Beautiful Fictions Apr 5 Shirley Shor, New Media Artist, SF Dynamic Landscapes Apr 26 Marina Grzinic, Artist and Writer, Lubiljana Representing Time in the Absence of Space May 3 Okwui Enwezor, Curator and Dean, Art Institute, SF Contemporary African Photography and Film * Bruno Latour will be on Monday Evening on Oct 17, Morgan Hall, Room 101 * Jointly Sponsored by Berkeley's Science, Technology, and Society Center ** Miranda July's appearance is presented in conjunction with the Dept of Art Practice's "INTERVENTIONS" lecture series. ===================================================== Primary Sponsors: UC Berkeley Center for New Media (CNM) and Center for Information Technology in the Interest of Society (CITRIS) Additional Sponsors: Office of the Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost, College of Engineering Interdisciplinary Studies Program, Consortium for the Arts, BAM/PFA, and the Townsend Center for the Humanities. ATC Director: Ken Goldberg ATC Assoc. Director: Greg Niemeyer ATC Grad. Associate: Irene Chien Curated with: ATC Advisory Board Contact: goldberg@ieor.berkeley.edu, or phone: (510) 643-9565 For updated information, please see: <a rel="nofollow" href="http://atc.berkeley.edu/">http://atc.berkeley.edu/</a> + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 6. From: nick@maisonduchic.com <nick@maisonduchic.com> Date: Sep 15, 2005 9:13 PM Subject: 23 Reasons to Spare New York: Music Videos from the Art Rock Scene Ocularis at Galapagos Art Space 70 North 6th Street, Brooklyn, NY 11211 Contact: Contact Thomas Beard for further information :: thomas@ocularis.net 646.420.0359 FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 23 Reasons to Spare New York: Music Videos from the Art Rock Scene Sunday, October 2 at 7 PM Ticket Price $6 Ocularis is excited to present an overview of the NYC art rock community and its connections to contemporary video art and underground cinema on October 2. "23 Reasons to Spare New York: Music Videos from the Art Rock Scene," curated by Nick Hallett (of Plantains and Maison du Chic) features the franticly experimental sound of the city, as realized by such bands as Antony and the Johnsons, Black Dice, Ex-Models, Foetus, Japanther, Jason Forrest, Liars, Mitgang Audio, Mixel Pixel, My Robot Friend, Oneida, Regina Spektor, Ted Leo, and Vaz (to name just a few). The identification of psychedelic themes by video artists will be the evening's focus, with stroboscopic, DayGlo imagery re-imagined through digital means by such filmmakers as Cody Critcheloe, Danny Perez, Devin Flynn, Disbelief Street, English Kills, Glen Fogel, Karen O, Mighty Robot, Noah Lyon, Pancake Mountain, Punkcast, Starter Set, and Waverly Films (again, just a sample here). Plus, we will throw in some alternative responses to new music by filmmakers like Kent Lambert and Tom Moody. A broad variety of countercultural media are included, including documentary, video mash-up, computer animation, and "promotional" music videos which deconstruct the consumerist models of their top-of-the-pops counterparts. Please join us. About Ocularis Ocularis is a 501©3 not-for-profit organization that provides a forum for the exhibition of independent, experimental and documentary film/video and new media, as well as international and repertory cinema. Ocularis was established in 1996 as a rooftop film series catering to local audiences in North Brooklyn. Since then, Ocularis has evolved into a weekly cinema, a producer of collaborative film/video work and a summer open-air screening series. Ocularis screens weekly at Galapagos Art and Performance Space. 70 North 6th Street Brooklyn, NY 11211 <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.ocularis.net">http://www.ocularis.net</a> tel/fax: 718.388.8713 – Thomas Beard Program Director Ocularis at Galapagos Art Space 70 North 6th Street Brooklyn, NY 11211 <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.ocularis.net">http://www.ocularis.net</a> + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + Rhizome Members can purchase the new monograph on Thomson & Craighead, Minigraph 7, for a discounted rate: £10.80 which is 10% off £12.00 regular price plus free p+p for single orders in UK and Europe. thomson & craighead Minigraph 7 Essays by Michael Archer and Julian Stallabrass Jon Thomson and Alison Craighead ¹s extraordinarily varied, almost unclassifiable artworks combine conceptual flair with sophisticated technical innovation. Encompassing works for the web alongside a host of other new media interventions, this book ? the first monographic survey of the artists¹ work ? highlights a number of impressive installation and internet-based pieces which use digital technology to echo the art-historical tradition of the ready-made. Part-supported by CARTE, University of Westminster. Published by Film and Video Umbrella 52 Bermondsey Street London SE1 3UD Tel: 020 7407 7755 Fax:020 7407 7766 <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.fvumbrella.com">http://www.fvumbrella.com</a> To order, Rhizome Members should write Lindsay Evans at Film/ Video Umbrella directly and use the reference ³Rhizome T + C² in the subject line. + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 7. From: Greg Smith <smith@serialconsign.com> Date: Sep 15, 2005 9:39 PM Subject: vague terrain 24/09 Toronto saturday september 24th - vague terrain presents… granny'ark - vancouver / zora lanson / interdisco naw - noise factory / vague terrain akumu - spider records video / patricia rodriguez - substance communications art bar / the gladstone hotel limited capacity $5 / doors open @ 9pm 1214 queen st. west toronto, canada <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.vagueterrain.net">http://www.vagueterrain.net</a> – artist information Granny'Ark is the music project of nomadic media artist Michelle Irving. Although officially a resident of Vancouver, Granny'Ark spends the other part of her time at Zora Lanson Label's home base in Berlin. Her first release Resurgo (2004) garnered praise from The Wire, XLR8R, De-Bug, and was featured on the late John Peel's legendary Radio One show. Granny'Ark's music can be described as a blend of explorations in electroacoustic sampling, and musical structures of rhythm and melody. Generally, Granny'Ark attempts to transform sounds into a progressive soundscape that evokes a sense of mood or place in the listener. Sometimes this might mean enticing them to dance. Her music is featured in the internationally acclaimed documentary "The Corporation" and another award winning Canadian documentary "Scared Sacred." In the fall Granny'Ark will be releasing her follow-up EP on Zora Lanson Label as well as a collaborative project with Si Cut.db on Biphop. Granny'Ark's "Three Seas and One Bottle" EP is available for download at <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.interdisco.net">http://www.interdisco.net</a> Neil Wiernik (aka naw) has been extremely busy over the 12 months. The last year has seen the release of two naw albums; ?Green Nights, Orange Days? on Noise Factory and ?Terrain Vague? on Pertin_nce, as well as an extensive European tour. Neil's production was recently described by The Wire as having "the kind of sharpness and clarity usually lost amid the murk and decay of clicks and cuts and digital delays." Neil recently moved back to Toronto and began working with long-time collaborator Greg Smith in the creation of Vague Terrain, an entity which will promote a series of eclectic electronic music showcases and the website of which will act as a digital arts journal. Akumu is Toronto?s Deane Hughes, composer of atmospheric ambience, shadowy beats and minimal manipulations. Formed as a solo project in 2000, Akumu has released three full-length albums on his own Spider Records imprint. His newest CD, Magmas (2005) was conceived and written in Guatemala, Honduras and Mexico; it is the follow-up to 2004?s Fluxes, an ambient, zero-bpm recording of unflinching minimalism that The Wire says ?raises neat hackles across the skin.? For six months, Deane traveled throughout remote locations, making binaural recordings from which he created the drone- and loop-based instruments that form the spine of material on both CDs. Akumu has performed live across Ontario and Quebec, including 2005?s Mutek festival in Montréal, featuring visual projections of original photography, animated collages and 2D/3D digital experiments. His live sets highlight and improvise on Magmas and Fluxes to create an immersive, flowing sound scape of micro-sonics, ambient drones and low-frequency pulses. More information is available on Akumu at <a rel="nofollow" href="http://spiderrecords.com/">http://spiderrecords.com/</a> Keeping with our mandate of integrating electronic music with digital art, Vague Terrain will be welcoming back one of our earliest collaborators, video artist Patricia Rodriguez. Formally trained in the visual arts, Patricia is a multidisciplinary specialist, integrating analog and digital technologies. She delights in playing with perception and problem-solving. A keen synaesthete, Patricia enjoys the neurological mixing of the senses. Her love for improvisation translates into performances using movement, sound and light (including video and film), as well as real-time collaborations with musicians and other artists. She has shown her work alongside Richie Hawtin, Monolake, Kit Clayton, Derrick May, Steve Bug, and Damo Suzuki of Can to name a few. She has worked with several collectives including Clonk, Eight, Wabi, Whipit, Die Lux, and Geekend. Patricia is currently the Art Director for Substance Communications. Extensive artist & event information, album reviews and artist links are available at <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.vagueterrain.net">http://www.vagueterrain.net</a> + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + 8. From: Ryan Griffis <ryan.griffis@gmail.com> Date: Sep 15, 2005 9:17 PM Subject: Interview: AUDC and the Disappearance of Architecture Tandem Surfing the Third Wave: AUDC and the Disappearance of Architecture - An Interview by Ryan Griffis - Note: This interview, conducted by email during 2004-5, is a discussion with Kazys Varnelis and Robert Sumrell, of the LA-based AUDC (Architecture Urbanism Design Collaborative). AUDC produces published texts, multimedia installations and a collaboratively-produced wiki, all of which present their efforts at creating ?conceptual architecture.? One of their more extensive projects, ?Ether,? (<a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.audc.org/projects/index.php/Ether">http://www.audc.org/projects/index.php/Ether</a>) uses photographs, magazine articles, and even a Sims mod to follow a complex narrative involving real estate, telecommunications and cultural mythology as they coalesce at the site of LA's One Wilshire Building. As an extension of my Tandem Surfing series of interviews with media arts collectives, I wanted to speak with AUDC about their experiences navigating the disciplinary boundaries of new media, history, architecture, and art. Ryan Griffis: How and why did AUDC begin? Kazys Varnelis: AUDC began at the Southern California Institute of Architecture, in 2001, where I was teaching history-theory and Robert was a graduate student. We found working together immensely productive, a process that allowed us to step into each other's territories. Advising Robert on a design thesis (on the web at <a rel="nofollow" href="http://varnelis.net/projects/muzak/index.html">http://varnelis.net/projects/muzak/index.html</a>) allowed me to work creatively while, as my teaching assistant, Robert worked with theory and research more directly. We formed AUDC to keep this going. Initially, we had naive thoughts that we might be a consultancy or design practice like Rem Koolhaas's AMO, but with the implosion of the 90s economic boom and with AMO?s now-inevitable degeneracy into making cute proposals about moving the Charles River to accommodate the Harvard Business School, it became clear to us that this was the last thing that anyone needed. Instead we looked to groups like Archizoom and Superstudio for inspiration. If, in the mid-1990s, architecture had been too caught up in a disciplinary posturing masquerading as resistance, by 2001, it was clear that the interest in Deleuzean smoothness and in working with capital had run its course. More than anything, we thought, we could use the unique ways of thinking inherent in architecture as a form of research while history could be revealed to be a form of design itself. As a collaboration, AUDC works with both of our strengths. Robert builds drawings and models, and I take photographs and code the web site. Through the use of our wiki software (<a rel="nofollow" href="http://audc.org/projects">http://audc.org/projects</a>), we are able to collaborate on our texts. The writing on our website is written neither by Robert nor myself but by the two of us. Robert Sumrell: Working collaboratively helps us to expand our interests and test ideas from multiple perspectives. Kazys's background lies in the History of Architecture, Urbanism, and Telecommunications, while I spent time in Comparative Religious Studies and Interior Design. When our interests and knowledge bases overlap (Büro Landschaft or post-1960 Italian design, for instance) we investigate these questions from a variety of schools of thought, and not just from our shared experience in architecture school. Working collaboratively also helps us to avoid comfort zones and familiar logic. There are few topics of conversation in most architecture schools, and the terms used to investigate them are exhausted. Even the youngest students are already hip to the game, rolling their eyes and playing along as someone spends an hour rambling on about nonsense like "programmatic indeterminancy" or "interstitial space." Most architecture schools are reactionary, dealing with their backwardness by limiting research to ever-more proscribed themes. We want to do the opposite: open up new areas of research. RG: To give readers a better understanding of AUDC?s work, I?m wondering if you could talk about one of your current projects. Maybe the Quartzsite work? KV: Quartzsite, Arizona is a town of 5,000 residents in the summer, located 180 miles from this site. Situated along I-10, some fifteen miles from the California border, every winter Quartzsite swells with an influx of snowbirds, campers from across North America, generally escaping the cold northern climate in search of sunshine, the solitude of the desert, and the company of like-minded individuals. According to the Bureau of Land Management and the Quartzsite Chamber of Commerce, up to 1.5 million inhabitants settle in town every winter, bringing their lodgings with them, in the form of recreational vehicles or RVs. At any one time in January and February, hundreds of thousands of residents make this remote desert town into a substantial urban center. Quartzsite fascinates us because it?s a kind of living parable for the contemporary city. It is void of any qualities and has no higher aspiration. There are mall-like shopping spaces and residential compounds, but there is no public space. Production is non-existent. Instead, Quartzsite is a city of trade, consumption, and tourism. It?s a place in which individuals go to get away from their neighbors and to become individuals, but it?s also a place of incredible density where RV is packed cheek-by-jowl with RV. AUDC?s installation for the 2004 High Desert Test Sites (<a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.highdeserttestsites.com/">http://www.highdeserttestsites.com/</a>) reproduces Quartzsite in the patch of desert through a series of thirteen signs, each containing a scene from Quartzsite. The number on each sign corresponds to a number on the map on the back-side of this page. You may visit the signs geographically or you may visit them numerically. Visited geographically, the signs allow you to meander through the topography of this site as you come to an understanding of the lay of the land in Quartzsite. Read in numeric order, the signs form a narrative explaining the history of Quartzsite, as well as providing a sociological and anthropological reading of the community as it is today. The project also exists, as does all our work, on the web (at <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.audc.org/quartzsite">http://www.audc.org/quartzsite</a>). So even though you should go to the site itself, you can also go to the High Desert Test Sites site, or to the website. Each site (site/nonsite/website) is distinct, however, and brings with it its own experience. So in the HDTS version, you begin to experience not only Quartzsite but also the silence of the desert. On the web, we hope you begin to explore linear and non-linear processes and the interaction of this space with more distant ones. RG: I'm curious about the decision to utilize the kinds of cultural spaces that exhibit "Art." There is a great contradiction that seems to be gaining some momentum in shows like "the gardenLAb experiment" (<a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.rhizome.org/thread.rhiz?thread=14740&page=1#28146">http://www.rhizome.org/thread.rhiz?thread=14740&page=1#28146</a>) and "the Interventionists" (at MASS MoCA), where the art is being made by people with large personal investments outside of the artworld and its usual concerns, yet it hardly represents what one could call "outsider art." RS: Few stable public venues sponsor speculative research projects and installations. Because of this, not many people know that they exist or have any experience approaching them. Our projects don't overtly refer to a product, a sponsor, a design method, or a solution. In the absence of any of these conditions, the art gallery/museum has become an important forum for AUDC because it consistently looks for work which is difficult to categorize and will generally display it in a generic space without insisting on the participants' adherence to a specific format. There's nothing better than the white cube is there? The museum/ art gallery is one of the few remaining places where people gather specifically for the purpose of concentrating on and interacting with projects (many of which they do not anticipate immediately, or perhaps ever, fully understanding). It is the steady influx of these patrons that we are really after, not the "gallery installation" itself. AUDC has also undertaken and tailored projects for books, magazines, and the web. Installations, however, are capable of presenting complex ideas through a combination of media working together. It is the practice of art as a history of forms of presentation that interests me and informs our work. This applies equally well to the designs of trade exhibits, world's fair pavilions, and history museums. KV: What we're seeing is a final transformation of the institution of art. On the one hand, the art museum and gallery have finally fulfilled Robert Smithson?s prophecy to become discotheques. Most of the contemporary work in art venues, today, is some form of kitsch. If it provokes a smile or stimulates a gag reflex, it wins an award. There is no discernible project in contemporary art, today. As Alain Badiou says of contemporary art, when everything is possible, nothing is possible. There are no attempts to push boundaries or to create new possibilities, only to realize and endlessly retread existing ones. But we shouldn't be surprised about this. Art is a thing of the past. It is exhausted as a form of practice. For us, the interesting thing is not to condemn that condition but to take advantage of it. The academy, with its requirements of tenure, is still a narrow place. Ultimately that's a good thing, discipline instills a certain honesty and a need to focus. So work like ours can't readily appear there. It is neither architecture nor architecture history, nor architecture theory, nor is it art. Being unclassifiable, it doesn't fit in the academy. Instead, as our friend Julian Bleeker has said of his own project (techkwondo.com), art installations offer us a place to do what we can?t do elsewhere. If the gallery provides us a venue, then we take it. If the academy, or for that matter, the shopping mall would provide a venue, we would take that. The same goes for the web. It is a venue. Once you fetishize these places, you?re creating striated space and you?re in trouble. RG: Speaking of "speculative research," it seems quite a bit has been written about 'conceptual architecture,' lately–projects with no intention of being materialized beyond models. Peter Lunenfeld, in _Snap to Grid_ commented on Lev Manovich's assertion that computer graphics have "killed" architecture, saying that his dismissal of 3D space was a bit hasty. AUDC's projects seem to offer a different kind of "speculation" in that they seem concerned with analyzing architectural form in order to offer a critique of some kind, rather than generating theoretical possibilities for manipulating space and movement ? there's a concern in your projects for pre-existing spaces. KV: Our concern with pre-existing spaces stems from our belief that radical territorial changes are over, that form is obsolete as an object of research, and that the visual realm is of less and less importance, daily. Territories are complete. You can add a Frank Gehry concert hall or two, but structurally speaking that's an updated version of Utzon's Sydney Opera House. Architecture makes its flourishes in the city core. This acts as an alibi to sprawl. Disney Hall is funded by Eli Broad, but that?s the same Broad of Kaufmann Broad, now KB Homes, the largest builders of sprawl in the country. Disney Hall, Broad says, isn't penance, it's just what you do in the city while you build sprawl outside. What you will see is an environment that looks largely identical to the one we have now. Don't expect the city or the suburb to look radically different in the future. Instead, expect them to be augmented. Look at it this way, even if you can use the Building Architect Tool or Urban Renewal Kit in SimCity, most people don?t. For the vast majority of players, hours of fun can be derived from playing a game that consists of combining predefined structures in endless permutations. And although most SimCity games end with the city destroyed or the mayor thrown out, that doesn?t seem to stop anyone. RS: Architecture is not only too costly to construct, it has become incapable of acting as an agent for change. As a form of media, architecture addresses collective groups, or a society. We no longer live under these conditions and act, instead, as a fully-commodified collection of individuals. Modernism and the avant-garde have become aesthetic choices. What then, is an interesting or radical position for the present time? It must somehow include an interest in the existing world and apathy toward its products. The old post-modern world of the seventies was a surface application of history as ironic or decorative elements in a flat eclecticism. It was never meant to bring back the past, instead it desperately tried to maintain the idea that all of those goods were behind us and to keep them at bay by making them odd objects in a greater whole still of the time. eBay, as a practice, has made this idea obsolete. RG: Considering that "territories are complete," I'm wondering what you make of the work of other architecturally invested people, like Marjetica Potrc (<a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.potrc.org/project2.htm">http://www.potrc.org/project2.htm</a>), that seem to be exploring a new kind of utopian program combining "green design" concepts with an engagement in globalization discourses. KV: I appreciate any practice that strives to improve someone's quality of life. Marjectica Potrc tries to achieve this by making direct interventions in the city and producing work that illustrates the variety of conditions in which people live. But we cannot escape our own complicity and accountability within globalization, nor do we have the distance necessary to propose visionary alternatives. Andrea Branzi has stated that environmentalism is opposed to humanity. So is architecture. The building process is the greatest source of solid waste that civilization produces. As we mentioned earlier, AUDC was founded to produce buildings, but we grew past that. Conceptual architecture does not act in the world of goods, but on the assumptions that structure our relationship with the world itself. The production of physical forms is merely a source of fascination and novelty. I am much more interested in the United Nations guidelines for refugee camps and the temporary infrastructure continuously recreated in Quartzsite, AZ, than in the social space of Burning Man or the new Prada store. 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