RE: [-empyre-] old discussion, new discussion

["Brett Stalbaum" <stalbaum@ucsd.edu>]

I think I will use interfacial more often now:-o

Regarding an example, C5 has been exploring these notions in practice
for many years now - but it is difficult terrain. Maybe the best known
example is Lisa Jevbratt's 1:1 project - which is often taken up
critically as a data visualization, though I would argue that it is more
of a software art work that enables exploration of (and demonstrates the
drift of) IP space. In 1998 C5 tried to enable feelers into relations
between arbitrary data sets in a project called 16 sessions, and
presently we are writing a lot of software to simultaneously mediate and
analyze performance in the landscape, and a number of related
performances/experiments. (The C5 Landscape projects. Work in Progress.)
In general, we are oriented toward database mediated performances which
recursively generate new data for analysis.

I think data is of critical importance. We hear about Moore's law all of
the time - but seldom about the exponential explosion of scientific
data. (In the US, much scientific data is public domain, and there are
organizational attempts to make scientific data more accessible to the
interested public, btw.) There are spaces for artists to take on large
data and process it in an explorative manner informed by the techniques
of science, but perhaps with different goals or even a kind of
blindness, or other tact, that leads to accidental discovery... again,
some theory: http://www.c5corp.com/research/landscapeculture.shtml. (We
try to keep an accounting of what we suspect as we develop work... but
we think it is in practice that the answers will come, and that is where
most C5 effort is right now...)

-----Original Message-----
From: empyre-bounces@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
[mailto:empyre-bounces@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au] On Behalf Of Kanarinka
Sent: Sunday, January 04, 2004 7:31 PM
To: 'soft_skinned_space'
Subject: RE: [-empyre-] old discussion, new discussion

Hello all,

"interfacial" sounds a little, well, uh, pornographic --
pornographically futuristic, perhaps.

anyways, brett - i am very much interested in your abstract --
particularly:

>>>
artists working with database might seek to explore/reveal subject-less
and autopoietic relations of data in addition to those constrained by
relational algebra
>>>

Do you have an example of this? I ask because so much "data
visualization" artwork that i see is based on the relations of data at
the "relational algebra" level, as you call it. As a phenomenon, the
artistic visualization of data isn't anywhere near where the scientific
visualization of data is simply because (I believe) artists are confused
as to whether they are artists or scientists and end up in neither
realm, representing visually compelling but arbitrary relationships. 

the question is not about the data. there's enough data for everyone
everywhere everytime. the good beginning question is simply: what
question do you want to ask of your data? i walk out my door and am
confronted by a database (boston, massachusetts, usa, earth) every
single day. the hard thing is ask it an interesting and specific
question, to carve a path through it, to have a reason to ask. 

best,
kanarinka

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
http://www.ikatun.com/k/publicalley818/



-----Original Message-----
From: empyre-bounces@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
[mailto:empyre-bounces@lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au] On Behalf Of Nick
Montfort
Sent: Sunday, January 04, 2004 10:01 PM
To: 'soft_skinned_space'
Subject: RE: [-empyre-] old discussion, new discussion



Brett, thanks very much for the abstract and your comments, both of
which are helpful to me as I think about art and science. I just wanted
to pull out one minor point to particularly agree with and expand upon
--

> The abstract touches on the HCI level (interfacial is the term I used 
> here), vs. processing and data access levels (which deserve more 
> attention, imho).

Indeed, the interface is very important, and we should certainly deal
with where and how people and computers come together. But, as you point
out, the interface is not the only interesting thing about an
interactive computer system. The comptuer also does computation, even in
new media systems, and that aspect seems often neglected. It's pretty
hard to understand even a popular and not terribly complex phenomenon
like SimCity without looking under the interface and considering the
rules of the system and algorithms that make the simulated city go.

-Nick Montfort
 http://nickm.com  nickm@nickm.com
 My new book, Twisty Little Passages: http://nickm.com/twisty

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