Thursday, February 21, 2008
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I wrote a little Processing applet yesterday to provide my twitter and facebook status.
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It takes a second to load so be patient.
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Monday, October 29, 2007
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I am working on a project (which I will discuss later). It would be a HUGE help if everyone who visits would fill this out. What this poll collects will dramatically influence the processes of my project.
The poll software seems a bit unreliable (it is my first time using it). If it appears to not behave properly (like it is displaying giant text and you can't see the submit button) follow this link to the the poll.
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The poll software seems a bit unreliable (it is my first time using it). If it appears to not behave properly (like it is displaying giant text and you can't see the submit button) follow this link to the the poll.
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Tuesday, October 2, 2007
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So in reading a catalog of Paul Pfeiffer (the purchase of which was a result of the fabulous Symposium Books in Providence) I came across this quote:
This lead me to think about Interactivity in Art. Interactivity in art is something that I have a very hard time with, and yes all art is interactive in some way, but I am talking about the stuff that asks you to play with to make it do something. And it might be in that relationship that I have a problem. As a viewer I have a hard time engaging an interactive work with the same sobriety that I tend to approach non-interactive objects or installation. As soon a person is asked to do something with a work of art a whole slew of problems can (and do) come up. The user interface begins to take a front row to the content. Since that is a person's primary level of communication with work of art, it will be the thing that makes the first impact, and thus the most significant one. Now, I think an interactive work can be successful when the method of interaction is so smooth and seamless that it manages to disappear. But then the temptation is to create something so slick and seamless that everybody stands around and says "Gee Whiz, that is slick" and again the attention is drawn away from the actual work of art.
I suppose then the challenge is to find something that treads a middle ground. A solution perhaps is to employ methods that are extremely familiar and are part of our social context. On a small scale, putting on headphones. While a very low level of interactivity, and perhaps it isn't even a from of interactivity, it requires the viewer to perform an action. Headphones can be used quite fluidly, they are not gimmicky, they are not intrusive, and they are very familiar.
A method that follows a similar model has a greater chance of succeeding.
Another problem I think I have with interactivity in Art is that the viewer is now positioned with a set of options. With a painting, you have very few options 1) Look At it, 2) Don't Look at it. With an interactive piece the viewer now has to choose what to do. Since there is that choice, the authority of the author and the intent of the author come into question.
There are many other problems that I have with interactive art, and I am sure my opinions will continue to develop over time. It may be that I simply have too narrow of a vision of what interactivity in art is. We shall see.
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"I've often thought of making artwork in terms of providing an entry point for the viewer. How to draw the viewer into a dialogue? That's the challenge every creative person has to face: that there are things you want to say and do, and you have to find a way to say them in the idiom of your time and place. The work can't exist outside a given context. So there's a labor involved to make sense of your relationship to the conditions and constraints you live in . It seems to me to be a labor of translation, or mediation."This is a constant challenge, especially in Digital Media/New Media. Work that can be so technical and so wrapped up in its own technicalness that it pushes the viewer out.
This lead me to think about Interactivity in Art. Interactivity in art is something that I have a very hard time with, and yes all art is interactive in some way, but I am talking about the stuff that asks you to play with to make it do something. And it might be in that relationship that I have a problem. As a viewer I have a hard time engaging an interactive work with the same sobriety that I tend to approach non-interactive objects or installation. As soon a person is asked to do something with a work of art a whole slew of problems can (and do) come up. The user interface begins to take a front row to the content. Since that is a person's primary level of communication with work of art, it will be the thing that makes the first impact, and thus the most significant one. Now, I think an interactive work can be successful when the method of interaction is so smooth and seamless that it manages to disappear. But then the temptation is to create something so slick and seamless that everybody stands around and says "Gee Whiz, that is slick" and again the attention is drawn away from the actual work of art.
I suppose then the challenge is to find something that treads a middle ground. A solution perhaps is to employ methods that are extremely familiar and are part of our social context. On a small scale, putting on headphones. While a very low level of interactivity, and perhaps it isn't even a from of interactivity, it requires the viewer to perform an action. Headphones can be used quite fluidly, they are not gimmicky, they are not intrusive, and they are very familiar.
A method that follows a similar model has a greater chance of succeeding.
Another problem I think I have with interactivity in Art is that the viewer is now positioned with a set of options. With a painting, you have very few options 1) Look At it, 2) Don't Look at it. With an interactive piece the viewer now has to choose what to do. Since there is that choice, the authority of the author and the intent of the author come into question.
There are many other problems that I have with interactive art, and I am sure my opinions will continue to develop over time. It may be that I simply have too narrow of a vision of what interactivity in art is. We shall see.
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Friday, May 4, 2007
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My recent silence can be attributed to several things. The first of which is laziness. However, I have been wisely spending my time. Since January I have been in a couple of small shows. Mainly I have been spending a bunch of time in research, reading, and learning a new programming language.
I realized that I have been complaining a lot lately that I had no theory at all in school and that I really knew nothing about it. And I knew very little of the history or "new media" art. It dawned on me, in one of those embarrassingly obvious eureka moments: I could buy books and start reading. I don't know why it never occurred to me. I put together a little book list on Amazon, and bought a pile of books.
Books:
The Art Dealers by Alan Jones, Laura de Coppet
Protocol: How Control Exists after Decentralization (Leonardo Books), Alexander Galloway
The Language of New Media (Leonardo Books), Lev Manovich
New Media in Art (World of Art), Michael Rush
Digital Art (World of Art), Christiane Paul
How Images Think, Ron Burnett
In addition to reading I have been learning a new programming language called Processing. Up till now, all of my programs have been written primarily in PHP. PHP is great language of pretty much everything I was trying to use it for. Processing, on the other hand, is essentially designed to do exactly what I want to do. So, that being said, I have been rewriting some of my projects in Processing, primarily as a way to learn the language better, but also to create more portable, faster, stabler (more stable), programs. To make rather long story short: if you are interested in programming and art and are not a programmer, check out Processing. It is a full featured language built on Java, in fact you can use real-deal Java in your programs if you want, but it give you a simplified syntax and structure so you can bang our projects quickly.
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I realized that I have been complaining a lot lately that I had no theory at all in school and that I really knew nothing about it. And I knew very little of the history or "new media" art. It dawned on me, in one of those embarrassingly obvious eureka moments: I could buy books and start reading. I don't know why it never occurred to me. I put together a little book list on Amazon, and bought a pile of books.
Books:
The Art Dealers by Alan Jones, Laura de Coppet
Protocol: How Control Exists after Decentralization (Leonardo Books), Alexander Galloway
The Language of New Media (Leonardo Books), Lev Manovich
New Media in Art (World of Art), Michael Rush
Digital Art (World of Art), Christiane Paul
How Images Think, Ron Burnett
In addition to reading I have been learning a new programming language called Processing. Up till now, all of my programs have been written primarily in PHP. PHP is great language of pretty much everything I was trying to use it for. Processing, on the other hand, is essentially designed to do exactly what I want to do. So, that being said, I have been rewriting some of my projects in Processing, primarily as a way to learn the language better, but also to create more portable, faster, stabler (more stable), programs. To make rather long story short: if you are interested in programming and art and are not a programmer, check out Processing. It is a full featured language built on Java, in fact you can use real-deal Java in your programs if you want, but it give you a simplified syntax and structure so you can bang our projects quickly.
Labels: art, books, computers, processing, research
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Sunday, February 11, 2007
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One of my prints, "Visualization of the inherent connections amongst friends. Geographically located iTunes Libraries. " will be in a show at the Seattle Municipal Tower Gallery. There is an opening on Tuesday, Feb 13 from 4:30-6:00pm. This print was purchased by the Seattle Public Utilities Portable Works Collection.
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Monday, February 5, 2007
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In thinking about the way that I work I have begun to see, what I think, is a good pattern. I spend time in the studio thinking and developing projects, not so much making them, but planning them out. I like to get three or four on the drawing board, so I can bounce between them, but also so if one does not work out, I have other things to do. Have a pile of planed out projects is like a roadmap, it lets me know that I always have things to do....I can't just go into the studio and stare at the wall, I have work to do.
After getting a plan, I then go into production. Of course during this period much of the project is fleshed out and developed, but I the foundation is there. It is exciting, but difficult. I enjoy the freedom of thinking about stuff, but when you actually have to start writing the code, spending the money, building the widget, it can get a bit daunting. I still throughly enjoy it, but I have to start taking responsibility for my plans.
In reality it is not that structured, but I noticed while I was in Connecticut at I-Park I spent a lot of time sketching out projects and not building them. That was partly due to having limted resources, financial, material, and otherwise, but more so due to having a lot of uninterrupted time. Long, slow thoughts were able to develop and and idea could build over several days or weeks without "real life" events getting in the way.
I am in a planning stage right now, I have been looking at my recent projects and where there are going trying to see the next stage.
I will talk about that in the next post.
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After getting a plan, I then go into production. Of course during this period much of the project is fleshed out and developed, but I the foundation is there. It is exciting, but difficult. I enjoy the freedom of thinking about stuff, but when you actually have to start writing the code, spending the money, building the widget, it can get a bit daunting. I still throughly enjoy it, but I have to start taking responsibility for my plans.
In reality it is not that structured, but I noticed while I was in Connecticut at I-Park I spent a lot of time sketching out projects and not building them. That was partly due to having limted resources, financial, material, and otherwise, but more so due to having a lot of uninterrupted time. Long, slow thoughts were able to develop and and idea could build over several days or weeks without "real life" events getting in the way.
I am in a planning stage right now, I have been looking at my recent projects and where there are going trying to see the next stage.
I will talk about that in the next post.
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Wednesday, January 31, 2007
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Art Imitates Life (2007)
I made a new piece that graphs the searches for "Art" and "Life" against each other for the time period between 2004-2006. It is amazing how similar they are.
You can see it here.
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I made a new piece that graphs the searches for "Art" and "Life" against each other for the time period between 2004-2006. It is amazing how similar they are.
You can see it here.
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Monday, January 29, 2007
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Seattle, February 1, 2007
The Artists Reformation Project is pleased to present Caleb Larsen and Brett Walker's new collaborative installation, This is/not a Room Full of Peanuts. The two Seattle artists will be creating a work centered around the age-old question of "physical reality." Employing tongue-in-cheek metaphors, the artists will transform the gallery space into an active work of art, directly engaging the viewers both in terms of the function of art and of the metaphysical debate.
Labels: art, brett walker, exhibition, opening
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An Installation as a Passive Performance. Or, Something that doesn't make sense now will make sense later.
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
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In considering an upcoming installation that Brett Walker and I are doing, I began thinking about "passive performative installations" (for lack of a better term). A work that is created and exhibited, but the viewers are not given the necessary information to completely understand the work. However, later in the documentation and supplementary text the visual and conceptual elements are completely explained and the viewer's response and confusion become part of the work. A tension is created with the initial viewer experience and it is resolved in the presentation of the documentation. I find the situation interesting where seeing the exhibition is not as important to experiencing the work as seeing the documentation.
This is a far from new idea. Many people use this strategy, Maurizio Cattelan comes to mind as does a recent installation at The Wrong Gallery by Michael Elmgreen & Ingar Dragset. These types of things can come off as one-liners, but a good one-liner is very hard to make.
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This is a far from new idea. Many people use this strategy, Maurizio Cattelan comes to mind as does a recent installation at The Wrong Gallery by Michael Elmgreen & Ingar Dragset. These types of things can come off as one-liners, but a good one-liner is very hard to make.
Labels: art, brett walker, ideas
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Sunday, January 21, 2007
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So I went to the opening of the Olympic Sculpture Park (it was dark so most of my pictures are blurry). I have been anticipating this for months. I am a firm believer that Seattle needs more art spaces that look beyond the city's almost painful provincial artistic mentality and embrace national and international artists. Imay just be being snobbish or naive.
The opening was a complete success, if by success you mean a lot of people, I mean really a lot of people, wondering around. They had "live music and dancing" and "art projects for the kids". Two things that I generally don't like.
The "music tent" was set up right next too Richard Serra's Wake. So that the generators were almost touching the steel. It was a beyond tasteless placement of the tent. The music was of the typically safe and upbeat type. The singer was wearing one of those hats people make from balloons. And about hand draw "do not touch" signs were arranged throughout the piece. Couldn't they at least run up to Kinko's and printed something out?
I am terribly excited to go and see the park when i
t is not filled with buskers, strollers, sub-par family-friendly hip-hop bands, and strange fellows waving around Technicolor scarves.
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Saturday, January 20, 2007
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Today Marci and I will be going to the Olympic Sculpture Park in Seattle. I first saw the project at the Landscape Architecture show at MoMA a couple of years ago. From what I have seen as they have been building it, it looks very neat. It is certainly beautiful and does a lot for the area that it is in (the lot used to be a couple of terrible parking/vacant lots). I am curious, however it will fall into more the "park" category than the "sculpture," i.e. acting primarily as a green space than an art venue.
I am a bit nervous of the opening days. From their website "Two full days of free festivities will kick off this historic occasion in grand style. Events and activities will include two stages of live music and dance, art making for kids and adults, artist demonstrations, self-guided park tours, and more! " Not really my cup of tea.
Pictures to come.
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Friday, January 19, 2007
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I went an opening at the Lawrimore Project in Seattle last night. I went for two reasons: 1) the Lawrimore Project is one of the few Seattle galleries that I have actually heard mentioned in the non-Seattle art press, 2) Josh Azzarella is Tiffany Calvert's significant other. I know Tiffany from a residency that we did at I-Park (which is a completely weird place, but extremely nice).
I think I like Josh's work. I had heard about it and seen bits online, but this was my first encounter with in person. It strikes me as Paul Pfeiffer meets Bill Viola meets USA Today. A bait and switch of mezmorizingly beautiful imagery and truly horrific content. I didn't like the projectors that Lawrimore used, I though the very visible light bleeds was distracting from the images, but I might just be nit-picking.
Labels: art, exhibition, opening, seattle
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