[-empyre-] Process as paradigm: Time/Tools/Agency
christopher sullivan
csulli at saic.edu
Wed May 26 04:35:28 EST 2010
very well put Maria, and inclusive of important distinctions.
slavery as a metaphor for a mistreated Machine is a very far reach though.
Machines do not have emotions.
"But I think we all agree that a specific medium offers particular
possibilities for expression so there is always a feedback loop between"
This to me is a very physical manifestation of the impossibility of making the
art you intend, there is always the imperfection of intent and actualization,
and that is part of it's beauty.
I guess the notion here of chance operation is one to think about. I have found
in contemporary New media work that chance implies truth, and purpose
manipulation, I do feel that minimalism can sometimes lead to this idea, clean
up the work, so your viewer won't be distracted by figurative, meaning. I have
heard from colleagues that the great digital animation my student make is not
new media, because it is recorded, single channel. And even because it is not
collaborative. those kinds of rules make my blood boil. It is Media, and it was
just made, It could not have been made just years ago, so I think , it is new.
I am not a Luddite by any means, but I am fully engaged in the
vast possibilities of the world outside some relationships that interest you.
I do feel that there is room on this planet for many kinds of work.
This moment of remix, and Data scramble, sometimes feels like that moment in
post modernism when we were told there are no original ideas, I have seen many
since the death of authorship.
Perhaps the main issue for me is why do we have to have so much intellectual
backing behind the work. can't the work just blow you away when you encounter
it. I hope so.
I truly appreciate that you realize I care about important work as much as
everyone in this discussion, I just want to make sure pluralism remains.
One last thing, always be suspicious if everyone agrees.
> intentions and medium.
all good things Chris.
Quoting Maria Verstappen <notnot at xs4all.nl>:
> Hello Chris,
> I don't think anyone here was talking about "data and machines being
> content"? But I think we all agree that a specific medium offers particular
> possibilities for expression so there is always a feedback loop between
> intentions and medium. A computer is mainly a processor, a tool to execute
> processes. We all use Photoshop or Open Office to process images and texts,
> software programs that were initially designed to replace tools like
> typewriter, pen, paintbrush, scissors, etc. But the computer as a tool has
> much more to offer, with the right skills (programming) we are able to make a
> more direct use of the significant features of the processor itself. We still
> see it as a tool, but we give the tool possibilities of creating something by
> itself. A collaboration between man and machine, in which the machine is not
> a total "slave" but having a certain degree of autonomy to act by itself,
> allowing unpredictability and surprise. To achieve this we have to design
> autonomously operating processes and processes of self-organisation. An
> important source of inspiration are the self-organising processes in our
> natural surroundings: the complex dynamics of all kinds of physical and
> chemical processes and the genetic-evolutionairy system of organic life that
> contineously creates new and original forms. So, this way of working can be
> seen as contemporary nature study, in which we concentrate on the
> possibilities that the underlying mechanisms of these processes can offer art
> by implementing processes of development and growth in a computer program. In
> these software programs we are not simulating the laws of our physical world,
> but instead we define an artificial (machine) nature that has its own
> generative principles and spontaneous expressions.
>
> It's true that this approach relates to some degree to Modernism, but at the
> same time it is fundamentally different. In contrast to modernistic artwork -
> that attempts to reveal the underlying harmony of reality by rational
> ordering, control and reduction of visual means - we are actually striving
> for complexity and multiformity in the final result. On the other hand, we do
> use a form of minimalism in the design of the underlying generative process.
> The harmony model has been replaced by the conviction that chance,
> self-organisation and evolution order and transform reality. For us it is a
> challenge is to make these intrinsic qualities of nature manifest in an
> actual artwork, to exhibit these artworks in public, to finally establish "a
> meaningful dialogue with the world at large".
> Best,
> Maria
>
> Driessens & Verstappen
>
>
> On May 25, 2010, at 6:38 AM, christopher sullivan wrote:
>
> >
> >
> > kick me off this group if you like, but I cannot believe that in a world
> > full of hunger, politics, love, sex, children, moose, you name it,
> > that so many people think that Data, machines, are content.
> >
> > Eilean is making a valid comparison. At least I hope you realize that
> those
> > using image and sound as generative content, are not just behind the times,
> we
> > work differently than you, and to much success.
> > As a teacher I have told graduate students that I could not work with
> them,
> > three times. one wanted to make fashionable purses, one was a color field
> > painter (I sent them to fine color field enthusiasts) and one animator who
> said
> > they where not interested in what there work was about. But in twenty years
> I
> > have run into nothing but people who look at there medium as a tool. I
> much
> > beloved tool, but a tool, a skill set, a craft, to be reckoned with
> > historically,
> > but not the content of there work..
> >
> > this is not about age, (I am 49) my 20 year old students are as bored by
> > glitches, chance operations, and algorithms as I am. a computer IS a tool.
> If
> > you have a relationship with it, that is fine, but many complex
> thinkers,(I
> > will call myself one) does look at my cameras, sound recorders, computers,
> as
> > tools.
> > We make our work about other things, like most filmmakers, writers,
> painters,
> > play writes, have been doing forever.
> > Why are so many New Media artists and academics, embracing modernism
> at
> > this moment in history. do we really have so little faith in having a
> > meaningful dialogue with the world at large! where is your blood?
> >
> > from the Love, hate, sex, birth, death guy, Chris.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > Quoting Erika Jean Lincoln <fur_princess at yahoo.ca>:
> >
> >> Hi Eileen,
> >>
> >> I am going to have to disagree on your comparison.
> >> You stated that
> >>> The image as output seems to me the most active agent
> >>> because it is out in the world
> >>> communicating.
> >>
> >> I don't think it is the image that communicates in the example we are
> looking
> >> at if that was the case then why have any process at all. the software
> >> communicates through the image.
> >>
> >>> However, if one is more
> >>> interested in the the data set being "algorithmically"
> >>> processed through a computer, then why waste the paper to
> >>> create an image that is non active at the end?
> >>
> >> I think the image can still be a part of the work, I feel that the way
> the
> >> work is described misplaces the location of the agency within the work.
> On
> >> the larger question of agency and images and tools, I think to describe a
> >> work as we are discussing by not talking about the software/hardware we
> do
> >> just create an impression of "computer as tool".
> >>
> >> Your illustration of a painting on the wall in a museum painted centuries
> ago
> >> cannot be used as an example. Time is not accounted for in the same way.
> >> Leonardo and/or his helpers painted an image where time is not
> considered.
> >> Yes it took time to make the work but that time was singular not to be
> >> addressed again. The desire of the artist was to create the work as a
> >> singular piece that exists in time the process stops when the artist puts
> >> down the brush an says "Yep its done". Conservators exist to halt time on
> >> such paintings, museums spend money to halt time on works.
> >>
> >> Where as a work that exists in space and is intended to change over time
> is
> >> very different. Process denotes actions over time. I happened to be in
> >> Toronto a couple of weeks ago and Hans Haacke's work Ice Stick was on
> >> display, (someone mentioned Haacke's work in relation to this topic
> earlier).
> >> It consists of a refrigeration unit, and condensed water vapor that is in
> the
> >> form of a stick, for lack of a better description. the work exists in its
> >> environment and changes over time. People may look at it and call it a
> giant
> >> popsicle sculpture. But it cant be reduced to only one element, the
> popsicle
> >> cant exist without its refrigeration unit which has to be plugged in to
> work,
> >> and the gallery's environment. these elements are integral to the work,
> and
> >> cannot be seen as tools displayed on a pedestal separate from the work.
> >>
> >> It is like the difference between the terms complicated and complexity
> that
> >> N. Katherine Hayles describes in her book "My Mother was a Computer:
> Digital
> >> Subjects and Literary Texts"
> >>
> >> Complicated: (within machines) parts interact with each other in defined
> and
> >> predictable ways. reducible
> >>
> >> Complex: (computation) many parts interacting with one another to create
> >> something different and unpredictable. non-reducible
> >>
> >>
> >> Erika Lincoln
> >> Electronic Media Artist
> >> Winnipeg/Manitoba/Canada
> >> http://www.lincolnlab.net
> >>
> >>
> >> --- On Fri, 5/21/10, Eileen Reynolds (Asst Prof) <EReynolds at ntu.edu.sg>
> >> wrote:
> >>
> >>> From: Eileen Reynolds (Asst Prof) <EReynolds at ntu.edu.sg>
> >>> Subject: Re: [-empyre-] Process as paradigm
> >>> To: "soft_skinned_space" <empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au>
> >>> Received: Friday, May 21, 2010, 11:18 PM
> >>> Hi Erika,
> >>>
> >>> The image as output seems to me the most active agent
> >>> because it is out in the world
> >>> communicating. However, if one is more
> >>> interested in the the data set being "algorithmicly"
> >>> processed through a computer, then why waste the paper to
> >>> create an image that is non active at the end? If the
> >>> production of the image is just a remnant and record of the
> >>> computer's processing, then no, it is not an active agent,
> >>> and only proof of the actively processing computer and its
> >>> ability to do something.
> >>>
> >>> My other thought is the old classic - "the computer is just
> >>> a tool". And since we place these tools on
> >>> such a high pedestal, perhaps the Louvre should instead
> >>> display the paint brush that Leonardo used to paint the Mona
> >>> Lisa rather than just the 30 × 20 inch remnant of the
> >>> pigmented data set that he "algorithmicly" processed through
> >>> the bristles. But I'm not too certain that would interest
> >>> very many.
> >>>
> >>> -Eileen
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> ________________________________________
> >>> From: empyre-bounces at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> >>> [empyre-bounces at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au]
> >>> On Behalf Of Erika Jean Lincoln [fur_princess at yahoo.ca]
> >>> Sent: Friday, May 21, 2010 11:38 PM
> >>> To: soft_skinned_space
> >>> Subject: Re: [-empyre-] Process as paradigm
> >>>
> >>> Hi Maria, Yann,
> >>> Isn't it more precise to say that the data set of the
> >>> digital image is "algorithmicly" processed through an
> >>> computer which leads to a different data set which is then
> >>> represented as an image?
> >>>
> >>> To me the image is not the active agent.
> >>> Thoughts?
> >>>
> >>> Erika Lincoln
> >>> Electronic Media Artist
> >>> Winnipeg/Manitoba/Canada
> >>> http://www.lincolnlab.net
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> --- On Thu, 5/20/10, Maria Verstappen <notnot at xs4all.nl>
> >>> wrote:
> >>>
> >>>> From: Maria Verstappen <notnot at xs4all.nl>
> >>>> Subject: Re: [-empyre-] Process as paradigm
> >>>> To: "soft_skinned_space" <empyre at gamera.cofa.unsw.edu.au>,
> >>> "Yann Le Guennec" <y at x-arn.org>
> >>>> Received: Thursday, May 20, 2010, 11:37 AM
> >>>> Dear Yann,
> >>>> In the context of this exhibition the notion of
> >>> "generative
> >>>> image" can be taken quite literal as a still image
> >>> that
> >>>> generates the next image in real time. Subsequently
> >>> this new
> >>>> image forms the basis for the next image, etcetera. In
> >>> case
> >>>> of a screen based work, the viewer experiences this
> >>> ongoing
> >>>> sequence as a dynamic animation.
> >>>> Maria
> >>>>
> >>>> On May 19, 2010, at 10:09 PM, Yann Le Guennec wrote:
> >>>>
> >>>>> Hello dear Empyreans,
> >>>>>
> >>>>> systems are open;
> >>>>> entropy is a mistake;
> >>>>> boundaries are in the mind (of the 'modelizer'=
> >>>> someone making a model);
> >>>>> every process is part of n systems;
> >>>>> quantum physics is a biface (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biface);
> >>>>> we build tools we need, to prove what we think;
> >>>>> we use tools someone built (some day), to prove
> >>> what
> >>>> we thought (some day);
> >>>>>
> >>>>> but ... i would still like to know what is this:
> >>> a
> >>>> 'generative image';
> >>>>>
> >>>>> http://www.laboralcentrodearte.org/en/714-catalogue
> >>>> (PDF p: 55)
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Do you mean a picture can generate something, or,
> >>> an
> >>>> image is necessarily a mind projection ? in the
> >>> future
> >>>> (unforeseen) ?
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>> best,
> >>>>> yann
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>> _______________________________________________
> >>>>> empyre forum
> >>>>> empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> >>>>> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
> >>>>
> >>>> _______________________________________________
> >>>> empyre forum
> >>>> empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> >>>> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
> >>>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> _______________________________________________
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> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> _______________________________________________
> >> empyre forum
> >> empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> >> http://www.subtle.net/empyre
> >>
> >
> >
> > Christopher Sullivan
> > Dept. of Film/Video/New Media
> > School of the Art Institute of Chicago
> > 112 so michigan
> > Chicago Ill 60603
> > csulli at saic.edu
> > 312-345-3802
> > _______________________________________________
> > empyre forum
> > empyre at lists.cofa.unsw.edu.au
> > http://www.subtle.net/empyre
> >
>
>
Christopher Sullivan
Dept. of Film/Video/New Media
School of the Art Institute of Chicago
112 so michigan
Chicago Ill 60603
csulli at saic.edu
312-345-3802
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