I have recently gotten my hands on a copy of The Activist Drawing, a type of retrospective of Dutch artist Constant Niewenhuys’ experimental architectural vision of a possible future cityscape created in 1956; which he termed New Babylon. What brings this into current discourse is the uncanny resemblance to today’s world-wide web, reflecting Constant’s ‘unified urbanism’ and socio-political reconfigurations morphing almost as quickly as technology’s stratifigraphic formations. In New Babylon, every aspect of sensorial engagement would be plastic, reconstructed according to an individual’s momentary desires. He devised a parallel world where movement, not settlement would reign. Constant’s argument for such a possibility was seated in the discourse of a dialectical view of life, where one moment erases the preceding one; essentially a constant unfolding of experience. Keeping this in mind, one can readily see Constant’s deep involvement with Guy Debord and International Situationiste; even writing for the IS Journal during ’58. Often criticized for his dedication to what many thought to be an abandonment of current society, Constant believed his drawings and models to be an activist’s call to arms for a free and revolutionary culture.
(1971) New Babylon, Nord
The term moshing originated in the 80s hardcore punk scene in D.C. This aspect of mashing (currently referred to as moshing) was intrinsic to club culture at the time, and I soaked it up like a sponge. The term has grown in current culture to not only denote music and sound compositions, but aggregate web development portals using open source and APIs (web technologies that allow interaction between websites) as well. I am fascinated with this constantly morphing and rapidly evolving model of appropriation in both U.S. and transnational social trends.
The following video celebrates this idea of cultural moshing evident in the collaborative creative achievements of Ray and Charles Eames, drawing parallels between contemporary architecture music, and art.
There is a relevance to the conceptual nature to a series of seismographic process drawings (Commute) produced in L.A., which examine the connections between road condition and socio-economic landscape to Ice Cube’s reference to L.A. roadway culture: ‘need to know where you are.‘
A revolutionary pedagogical sharing system was announced this week in a joint partnership between Harvard University and MIT to advance enrollment, research, and educational opportunities world-wide. What makes this new system, EdX, so cutting edge is not merely the scale, but the mere fact that two such highly esteemed and generously funded higher education institutions are leading the world in the effort. President Susan Hockfield of MIT termed this pedagogical era as ”a moment charged with the most exciting possibilities presented to educators in our lifetimes” rather than one of volatility. Not only do these leaders embrace technology as experimental, but hold to the conviction of the collaborative process. Several previous small-scale pilot open-source platform collaborative projects paved the way for the EdX initiative, with MIT’s Provosts supporting key faculty members committed to this new ‘frontier of education.’ Fasten your seat belts!
Online virtual and live questions followed.
Why MIT and Harvard?
Preconditions of rich collaboration between these institutions exist, which underscores our commitment to the area as a hub of education.
Key goals of EdX:
Research in technologies to benefit online education, ease of collaboration, personalized learning for students, global involvement between faculty and students for a better synthesis of education.
Examine fundamental ways in which we learn both in a traditional classroom and online. For example, the research can tell us how well a student acquires and applies content months after a topic is introduced in a course.
How will this platform be different from Online Education for-profit companies:
Personalized learning can be drawn from this as an applicable process, videos for example. We can progressively push the online learning environment forward in quality by learning from one another.
Monetization, certification plans?
EdX is not driven for money, but to improve learning world-wide. They do need to find a way to be self-supporting, rather than becoming a burden for MIT and Harvard. Content will be able to compliment the classroom with the courses from the online version. The common set of values between the two institutions as dedicated to improving learning and research education advancement differ from for-profit models.
Host a web portal and offer courses as institution ‘brands’ (from other universities) and grades will be given based on these collaboratively designed courses. It will be an honor code type of certification process for students completing the course work.
Open courseware is already being utilized in the physical university setting, so we do not see EdX as detracting from the on-campus experience, but benefitting it.
Note: All of the questions and answers have been paraphrased.
To read press release - http://www.edxonline.org/release.html
I recently had the pleasure of viewing a film by Lars Von Trier, The Five Obstructions. The premise is quite simple, take an established film artist (Jorgen Leth) and challenge them to remake a film from 1967 (The Perfect Human) with obstructions, or rules to push their established praxis. Leth’s original film can be read as a critical examination of media vampirizing and reaffirming cultural metanarratives; in this case the perfect human.
It is a ploy in locating vulnerability, to force Leth into the forbidden space that creates empathy; to be touched by the process. The film, while examining the issue of control found in Leth, unfolds as a reverse examination of Von Trier himself as he imposes control via obstructions to his fellow film-maker.
I immediately like this man Jorgen, he makes endless lists in notebooks to feed the process, while holding fast to what he terms established cardinal rules when approaching a new project. I can relate. However, I watch with discomfort as a child does another’s scolding – simultaneously intrigued by the perversion of watching a fellow artist pushed to the edge, while wanting to apprehend the transgression about to unfold as if my own fate would be sealed with the other’s act.
Leth is forced to take risks, get closer to the elements of the everyday that he seemingly insulates himself from via the spectorial gaze. This theoretical construct of the gaze is best translated in the scene shot in Bombay’s Red Light District. The reading of this scene as a critique of post-colonialism becomes undeniable, particularly given the director’s recent film release Erotic Man (2010), riddled with complex notions of what it means to be an ‘outsider’. When given the obstruction that Leth must return to the worse place that he has ever visited to make the third adaptation, we see the portrayal of Leth’s controlled facade slip and convulse with moments of anxiety, drugs, sleeplessness and self doubt. Much like a serpent eating it’s own tail, the metanarratives driving the film become more and more difficult to tease out as the process unfolds.
Obstruction #3 Bombay
The film is genius as a contemporary examination of spectatorship, hidden agendas, and the game of control extrapolated into the realm of everyday culture. I came away with questions surrounding the interpretation of ‘progress’ that I had begun last year (a loaded and relevant term) and the tracing and/or penetration of said boundaries.
I recently completed an Artist in Residence/Guest lectureship at Franklin Pierce University. The AIR was a three-component project examining social, pedagogical and historic constructs. When offered the opportunity to have access to the entire campus, student body and faculty, I was immediately struck with the unbelievable opportunity to engage in a critical, non-hierarchical pedagogy; essentially building on the existing community potential and ratcheting it up via social exchange. I was prepared to have the proposed idea scraped due to it’s public nature; utilizing an internet platform as an ongoing forum and archive document. To my surprise, I was completely supported by the university.
The interdisciplinary aspect of this campus-wide engagement then led me to create a video/soundscape for the night of the exhibition. For the work, I recorded sound over the course of a typical day at university (7:30 am to 7:30 pm). I returned again the next day to capture video footage within the same time frame. I was utterly exhausted by the last take, but I rigorously adhere to my ‘rules’ set for every project. It is what it is has become my mantra at the end of the final recording wrap. I take it back to the studio, and magically, it always is enough, just right. The real gems are those small things I am too tired or wrapped up in the moment while recording to realize until I begin editing. The comment under the breath of someone passing, the clock striking in the distance, an airplane, a flock of geese departing.
I often utilize video technology in my sound work, but rarely sync the two mediums to not only avoid typical aesthetics, but to keep the audience engaged in the process of acute listening. Despite laying the tracks down together, I was careful to allow bleed and chance moments to seep into the work. I am enraptured much more by the momentary thumb over the lens in old home-movie reels than the events unfolding in front of the lens. Such less than perfect moments startle me, a reminder of the human presence behind the technology.
“A Social Excavation”
A soundscape was created along the central axis of the Student Center as a socio-historical unearthing of the site. The campus buildings and it’s borders were examined, co-mingling past with present, in an experiential sound chamber. The sound chamber was housed in a 25′ long corridor which links the Student Center with the Central Commons of the campus, often used by students and faculty as a transitional cut-through from the lower level of the building (zig zagging pathways running its length via ramps and stairs) upwards to the outdoors. The bends in the corridor created an element of surprise from either end, unable to see to the opposing entrance immediately. The lights were doused and sound was funneled through resonant HVAC duct-work above 24/7. The objective in my proposing the installation in the service corridor was to heighten the awareness of this in-between space; shifting time and place for a moment.
Sound Chamber
for more on the project: http://tamarareynolds.us/dirt-creative-interventions-thoughtful-encounters
I was so honored to be exhibiting with such a wonderful stable of artists at Marlboro College. The opening presented the chance to meet many of whom I didn’t yet know and a chance to discuss our process. The topic of progress is a conceptually loaded one.
To listen to an excerpt from Chalk Line, you may visit my site: www.tamarareynolds.us
Drury Gallery installation:
Chalk Line, soundscape/surveyor's chalk on paper
I have recently been invited to participate as Franklin Pierce University’s Artist in Residence for the 2011 fall semester under the topic of ‘dirt,‘ which I have chosen to define as a site of social excavation. When I was approached by Joni Doherty, Director of the New England Center for Civic Life (a think tank and ‘non-partisan academic institute of public deliberation and dialog’ housed on campus), I knew that I wanted to engage students campus-wide in a familiar platform of communal engagement -a WIKI site. In this initial phase of the residency, students will participate in thoughtful exchanges with faculty, administrators, and staff on campus. The purpose of the exchanges are to not only make identities real and tangible, as well as make cross-stratification connections, but to unearth the inter-workings of higher education pedagogical foundations and hone methods of research. Much like Facebook, the DIRT wiki will allow students to upload images and dialogue in an ongoing, dynamic manner to further this process of social excavation and cross-strata connectivity. My interest in interdisciplinary research is the impetus for students in various fields of study to engage in these creative encounters simultaneously, via their craft, to flesh out a greater understanding of themselves and their belief systems, while broadening their knowledge base of others. My hope is that students develop a dynamic habit of criticality and mode of inquiry through this exercise that they might utilize throughout their life. I believe that this experiential pedagogy resides at the heart of the everyday lived life.
The second aspect of the residency includes coursework/studio critiques and classroom lectures to students of various levels regarding interdisciplinary research methods and the relevance such methods have to their particular field of interest.
The third aspect of the residency will be the culminating sound and video installation exhibited in Pierce Hall on November 17th 2011. The installation will consist of a looped soundscape to be installed along the adjoining 25′ corridor leading to Pierce Hall; a sonic embodiment of the site’s rich history within the context of current use.
The main space of the hall will consist of a central non-narrative video projection and ambient soundtrack captured on campus over the course of the semester. A grid structure will be part of an additional ceiling video projection to accompany Wendy Dwyer’s dance ensemble, a nod to both changing notions of landscape representation and Sol Lewitt’s 1979 Expanding Grid, where figures humanize the mathematical (or scientific) aspect of the grid. The opening night will showcase student performance and completed works encapsulating the concept Dirt: Creative Interventions/Thoughful Exchanges.
” Experience is knowledge, all the rest is information.”
- Albert Einstein
