[-empyre-] ETC to Rose Goldsen and on and on

[Timothy Conway Murray]

Thanks, Renate.  I recall vividly my amazement at the walls of videotapes
framing the synthesizers in the ETC space.  Little did we imagine moving
them all to the Goldsen Archive within less than a decade.  We are now so
happy to share so many of these titles with the public in the New York
exhibition at Hunter College opening this week.  By the way, the opening
of the exhibition is this Thursday (not Friday) from 7-9.

I meant mention, along the lines the fluid shifts between analogue and
digital at ETC, that the Goldsen Archive was initially conceived to hold
digital new media art and reference materials exclusively. But as a result
of a number of fortuitous collaborations, with Wen Pulin in Beijing,
Elayne Zalis in LA, and Sherry and Ralph up the road, it became clear that
any archive of new media art would need to establish a firm bridge between
the analogue and digital histories of the electronic arts.  What's come to
pass, as made evident by the posts of both Lynne and Alan, is how the
analogue is now looping back into practice in a kind of retroactive
dialogue with digital formats and thinking.  The digital is now more than
ever a morphing of analogue or, as I once put, the digital is the analogy
of the analogue.


Cheers,

Tim

Timothy Murray
Professor of Comparative Literature and English
Taylor Family Director, Society for the Humanities
http://www.arts.cornell.edu/sochum/
Curator, Rose Goldsen Archive of New Media Art
http://goldsen.library.cornell.edu
A D White House
Cornell University,
Ithaca, New York 14853





On 9/21/15 1:00 PM, "Renate Terese Ferro" <rferro at cornell.edu> wrote:

>----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
>Thanks Alan and Lynne for you posts.  Alan your poetic description of the
>loft at ETC was spot on but I want to add to it by mentioning the iconic
>smell that was so distinctive of the space.  For me it reminded me of an
>attic.  The metaphor of the attic is an important one because of the
>reserves of artifacts and their histories.
>
>I am reminded this morning as I sit hear in my office of the residency
>that I did at ETC in the mid 2000¹s.  My project was to visit the studio
>and immerse myself in the Jitter tutorials. I remember on my first morning
>there Hank Rudolph graciously met me and set me up on a computer that was
>situated on a table directly in front of the analog image processors.  It
>did not take long for me to gravitate over to the immersive wall of analog
>mixers where I played for a couple of days mixing sequences and adding
>real filters. The situated microphones, cameras and other equipment around
>me at the time seemed to be speaking to me as I imagined how those before
>me had also experimented in the space. I also recall combing through the
>titles and authors of videotapes that comprised the video library in the
>room adjacent to where I worked every day.  Jitter took somewhat of a
>backseat that week!
>
>Ithaca is not far from Owego so every night I would make the trek back
>home to check in on what was happenings there.   On the occasion of one
>evening over a later dinner I mentioned to Tim (as in Tim Murray)  the
>amazing collection of video tapes that ETC had and how I wondered what
>would happen to their condition over time.  Like other artworks would they
>degrade in unguarded conditions?  Or perhaps they were never meant to be
>preserved? 
>
>The next day Tim stopped by the residency space and I showed him the
>amazing bookshelf  of videotapes and there was born the idea to
>investigate the possibilities of a collaboration between the Experimental
>Television Workshop and The Rose Goldsen Archive of New Media Art.  A way
>to preserve the history of experimental video and sound.  To imagine that
>almost ten years later Hunter College features Electronic Television
>Workshop artists in a retrospective exhibition is an auspicious moment in
>time.  Not only have the videotapes been preserved and archived but the
>supporting papers and documentation.
>
>The  short week I spent at ETC not only experimenting freely with the
>tools around me but immersed in an aura of history has had a significant
>impact on my practice and my teaching.  I just came from my teaching
>studio at Cornell where I relayed the important beginnings of ETC by a
>Binghamton professor Ralph Hocking and his partner Sherry Miller Hocking
>who has persisted in not only Ralph¹s early visions but her own
>re-visions. 
>
>I am looking forward to Hunter College¹s opening on Friday evening. Though
>Sherry and Ralph will not be there their presence will be felt throughout
>the entire exhibition as so many former residency artist¹s and so many
>others decent upon the Hudson Street Gallery to celebrate.  If you are in
>the New York area this Friday please join in.
>
>Renate
>
>Opening: September 24, 7­9pm
>205 Hudson Street Gallery
>Hunter College MFA Campus
>New York
>September 25­November 21, 2015
>
>Hours: Wednesday­Sunday 1­6pm
>
>www.hunter.cuny.edu
><http://www.hunter.cuny.edu/art/exhibitions-public-programs/galleries>
>goldsen.library.cornell.edu <http://goldsen.library.cornell.edu/>
>www.experimentaltvcenter.org <http://www.experimentaltvcenter.org/>
>
>
>http://www.artandeducation.net/announcement/the-experimental-television-ce
>n
>ter-a-history-etc/
>
>
>Renate Ferro
>Visiting Associate Professor of Art
>Cornell University
>Department of Art
>Tjaden Hall, Office 306
>Ithaca, NY  14853
>Email: rferro at cornell.edu
>URL:  http://www.renateferro.net
>          http://www.privatesecretspubliclies.net
>Lab:   http://www.tinkerfactory.net
>
>Managing Moderator of -empyre- soft skinned space
>http://empyre.library.cornell.edu/
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>On 9/20/15, 10:47 PM, "Alan Sondheim" <sondheim at panix.com> wrote:
>
>>----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
>>
>>
>>
>>On Sun, 20 Sep 2015, ETC wrote:
>>
>>> ----------empyre- soft-skinned space----------------------
>>
>>I think that what ETC tried to provide was a malleable space - one which
>>each artist could create in his/her own image and desire.
>>
>>
>>-- And this is perfect; the key was/is malleabolity, a porous space, and
>>something should be said about the rough-hewn, the _wood_ of the space,
>>its proximity to the bridge, to the gazebo - everything played a role. I
>>also noticed and worked with the windows (for shooting down into the
>>street for 3 a.m. performances), and the acoustic resonance of the room.
>>Finally, as with most rooms, but so often hidden, there were the traces
>>of 
>>machinery, other visitors, everything! in the room itself, which appeared
>>both as a domicile and an interior body. I remember a large bat flying
>>around us one night as we slept and slowly woke - it was an amazing peak
>>experience. The loft appeared less industrial and more like a kind of
>>primordial, natural order of things. Of course this is but fantasy...
>>
>>- Alan
>>_______________________________________________
>>empyre forum
>>empyre at lists.artdesign.unsw.edu.au
>>http://empyre.library.cornell.edu
>
>_______________________________________________
>empyre forum
>empyre at lists.artdesign.unsw.edu.au
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