Re: [-empyre-] Synaesthesia, with James Patterson, Amit Pitaru, and Joel Swanson

["js." <js@hippocrit.com>]

Responding to Jennifer's opening question . . .
Although I can see certain "synaesthetic" connections in my work, it
began as part of an ongoing exploration of pattern and randomness,
specifically how patterns are employed within ambient environments.
In her recent book [ My Mother Was a Computer, Digital Subjects and
Literary Texts, University of Chicago Press, 2005 ], Katherine Hayles
theorizes a cultural shift in perspective from presence/ absence to
pattern / randomness as defining metaphors for the posthuman/
cybernetic paradigm.  My research began as a very literal exploration
of visual and auditory patterns (the "granny" wallpaper vs. house
loops).  This may be taking the pattern / randomness dichotomy a bit
too literally, but I think that digital culture provides an easy
passage between metaphoric and literal meaning.

Both these patterns, the domestic wallpaper, and the house loops,
define ambient spaces in similar ways: the are seen and unseen, they
seem to vanish as they define space.  This tendency to define and
dissolve is my working definition of ambient: simultaneously there
and not there.  Upon entering my grandmother's dining room, the
wallpaper pattern defines space, but also fades into the ambient,
both there and not there.  In the same way, the base line of house
music defines the auditory space, and yet is internalized, as  the
listener / dancer focuses on the auditory variance.  Patterns have
this way of eating themselves, of looping over upon themselves in
time and space.  Every time I see a wallpaper pattern I have this
compulsion to find where the pattern repeats itself.  I find pleasure
in the fixed, yet variable nature of repeatability.

I think the synaesthetic connection here is the way both the
wallpaper and house loops function in similar ways.  The apparent
contradiction between domestic interior patterns and contemporary
house loops forces an exploration of the formal qualities of both
sources.  Beyond this methodological similarity, I really don't see
any ontological connection between these two sources.  I have always
had a distaste for Kandinsky's didacticism surrounding synaesthetic
connections.  I have always thought of synaesthetic connections as
more culturally formed than inherent.  But if I may abuse the
overused term, I enjoy the juxtaposition of these seemingly disparate
objects.

js.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
joel swanson
js@hippocrit.com
http://hippocrit.com


On Apr 5, 2006, at 6:05 PM, jennifer.gunther@gmail.com wrote:

> Hello world. (couldn't resist)
>
> Let's open up the discussion of the convergence of senses
> (synaesthesia) in the digital art experience with our guests James
> Patterson, Amit Pitaru, and Joel Swanson. I have a few questions to
> begin.
>
>
> Each of the artists combine the use of sound and imagery. To each of
> you (Patterson, Pitaru, and Swanson), I pose the following question --
> Chicken or the egg: What came first? The sound as creative process, or
> the image as informing sound?
>
>
> For Pitaru and Patterson,  Sonic Wire Sculptor and Dirty Scrubber both
> employ the hand and its movements as part of the interface. Can you
> say a little bit about the body, specifically gestural movements of
> the hand with the machine, that occur as part of your work? How do you
> see this online, interactive attention to the body and its senses as
> part of your digital art work?
>
>
> Joel Swanson actually inspired me to think in-depth about
> synaesthesia* in the first place, and I'd like to ask him this --
> It seems that you deal with a nostalgia of shapes, forms, patterns,
> and memories frequently in your work -- how do you see modern sounds
> as converging with patterns of the past? Why granny wallpaper? How is
> meaning engaged for you and for the audience/viewer through sensory
> perception in your work?
>
>
> And away we go--
>
> .jennifer
>
>
>  *In case you didn't see it the first time... Synaesthesia is,
> literally, the convergence of senses. From the Greek roots
> syn ("union") and aesthesis ("sensation"), synaesthesia describes a
> phenomena where sound corresponds to colors or tastes. Some people,  
> known as
>  synaesthetes, actually experience this involuntary convergence where
> touching something gives a taste, hearing something produces a  
> color in the
> mind, and colors actually create sounds when seen. This is a  
> condition for 1
>  in 2000 people, so it is not altogether uncommon. Though some have  
> regarded
> the online experience as breathing new life into the mind/body  
> problem, many
> artists are already working in a space that engages attention and  
> sense in a
>  convergence across a broader perceptual spectrum.
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