Yves Marchand & Romain Meffre's The Ruins Of Detroit

Yves Marchand & Romain Meffre's The Ruins Of Detroit

Crowd sourcing Bentham!

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/28/books/28transcribe.html?ref=arts

Why the Mind Sees the Future in the Past Tense

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704156304576003432223218682.html?mod=WSJ_hpp_sections_lifestyle

Facebook Event Page

Invite your friends!!!

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=166465970055178&num_event_invites=0

IMPORTANT END OF SEMESTER SHOW INFO

WHERE: Center for Intergrated Media Room A116 (level 1 by the mail boxes)

WHEN: TUESDAY 12/14 4P-10P (CLASS - 4P-6P)

WEDS 12/15 7P-9P

INSTALL: MONDAY 12/13- 10A-3P, TUESDAY 12/14 11A-3P

DE-INSTALL: THURSDAY 11A-12N, 1P-7P

FOR QUESTIONS- SEE TOM OR MEGHANN (OFFICE B101- HOURS- MON-THUR 11A-7P)

Here's a quote from Norman that might help us define our Parallel World project space- a scripted space within a context of a new canon- or 'anti-canon.'

"In effect, the history of the last fifty years is increasingly

about the crisis in representing space, from conceptual space to

virtual space to cyberspace to cinematic space to public space to

intimate space/identity. And the era when these Scripted Spaces,

these narratized, themed illusions began to take over begins around

1955. And not only in the fine arts, of course, also in architecture,

in urban planning, in themed environments. And finally, in media

environments - directly into the internet, games, media art. At last,

we begin to see the new canon emerging, for as surely as the stock

market opens every Monday, a canon must emerge in the art world.

Even if it is an anti-canon. But is it an anti-canon really? Instead

of abstraction, we have the ironic staging of space. Instead of

Enlightenment traditions of ontological real, we have Artifice, the

art of the handmade illusionistic space.

And even museums are being redesigned, reinvented as cultural tourism.

Space is problematical, an allegory for global madness, a soothing

journey into a sublime nowhere, a re-enactment of the invasion of the

self by entertainment, which stands in for global economic authority.

The canon then will be more architectonic, more about themed illusion,

trace the end of irony, let us say, from Pop into hyperbolic home

entertainment. Both Pop and Minimalism are potential points of origin,

not the post-modern moment, but rather a post-war paradigm as starting

point."

Here's the whole interview-

http://osdir.com/ml/culture.internet.nettime/2007-08/msg00103.html

States Falling Apart Under Mounting Debt.

NewYorkTimes, Dec.4, 2010

Mounting Debts by States Stoke Fears of Crisis

Mounting Debts by States Stoke Fears of Crisis

Paleo-Future Blog

"A look into the future that never was" 

http://www.paleofuture.com/

an awesome blog related to this class!

project proposal

A glass terrarium filled with living plants, seeds, dirt, rocks, and man-made remnants, including trash, building materials, asphalt/concrete, food. It is an enclosed ecosystem exploring how the contemporary state of the 'natural' world is forced to coexist with the man-made. Both are presented as organisms which grow and/or decay. It is presented in a terrarium to highlight the existence as spectacle, something alien, which is separate from the viewer via the glass. This functions to bring attention to the irony of putting this ‘mundane’ scene into a gallery space to be viewed as ‘art’, when the living artifacts are all around us all the time, mostly remaining unnoticed in our day-to-day activity. However, this world between the pavement remains an influence on our physical world as well as our psyche/ unconscious. The two worlds of seemingly autonomous nature and human residue can no longer be seen as naturally opposing or separate—no longer parallel.  A dejected dimension, yet akin to the ecotone, where two ecosystems meet at their edges, giving rise to unconventional diversity and interaction. This space is a global ecosystem in itself. 

This piece is inherently a time-based piece, as physiological changes will occur—namely growth and decay, birth and death, but also mutations, and possibly a variety of other mysterious dynamics. Ultimately, this set-up presents organisms normally understood to be at odds, forced into a confined, alienated space. On the one hand it is survival of the fittest, on the other it is about a dialectic between organisms. The man-made materials are living in that they interact with what is around them, are symbols, signifiers, and remnants of human creation/consumption, embodying the greater organism at work: humankind. This work is initially set-up with the hand of the artist (human), and then is left almost entirely to its own devices, self-contained with the exception of light (water will not be added during this exhibition). Within the gallery space, the plants cannot exist long without additional light—thus the interference of the florescent tube. The human is essentially the catalyst of this growing global ecosystem, which is on the fringes of society and the wilderness—the in between space, the fringes of consciousness of our very existence.

Celeste M. Evans

parallel worlds final project

1. description- intentions, theme
2. specific sources- materials
3. scale- the appearance it might take
4. what your process has not answered on this; or how it might change as you work on it
5. reminders- accompanying text perhaps for the wall or site

Maybe not plasticity - but certainly plastic!

http://singularityhub.com/2010/10/31/actroid-f-female-telepresence-robot-looks-super-real-creepy-video/

Virtual Pop goes live in Japan.... check this out-

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/technology/2010/11/japanese-pop-star-takes-the-stage-as-a-3-d-hologram.html

http://singularityhub.com/2010/11/09/cant-miss-videos-of-japans-3d-hologram-rock-star-hatsune-miku-in-hd/

... talk about plasticity! 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2010/nov/11/princess-hijab-paris-graffiti-artist

Ruin Porn in Detroit

This in from Norman-

http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/11/10/detroit.environment/

"With plasticity, we are not facing a pre-given difference, but a process of 

metamorphosis."

I was thinking about Catherine Malabou's talk last night on plasticity, attachment as pathology and her position that there is only one (singular?) world. I was also reflecting on her conflation of capitalism with globalization.  My searches led me to these articles in The Nation (www.thenation.com) by Susan George and William Greider.  I'd like to share them for purposes of furthering the discussion in class.... enjoy.  

http://www.thenation.com/article/another-world-possible?

http://www.thenation.com/article/155848/end-free-trade-globalization

Let Us Now Praise Famous Men - Depression-era landscapes by Walker Evans

The tunnel people of Las Vegas and Abandoned New York

Deep beneath Vegas’s glittering lights lies a sinister labyrinth inhabited by poisonous spiders and a man nicknamed The Troll who wields an iron bar.

But astonishingly, the 200 miles of flood tunnels are also home to 1,000 people who eke out a living in the strip’s dark underbelly.

Some, like Steven and his girlfriend Kathryn, have furnished their home with considerable care - their 400sq ft 'bungalow' boasts a double bed, a wardrobe and even a bookshelf.
Austin Hargrave Las Vegas tunnels

Deeper underground: Steven and Kathryn live in a 400sq ft 'bungalow' under Las Vegas which they have lovingly furnished with other people's castoffs

FULL ARTICLE HERE:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1326187/Las-Vegas-tunnel-people-How-1-000-people-live-shimmering-strip.html

Another interesting post of a story and pictures of an abandoned area of New York.

"In a different era, Edgemere's seaside was a thriving resort, with grand hotels, a bustling boardwalk, and thousands of residents. Today, it is devoid of buildings and permanent residents, and "has stood vacant, except for plant life and wild dogs, for more than 35 years, when thousands of summer bungalows and stores were plowed under as part of the Arverne Urban Renewal Project, a massive building project that was put on hold and never revived," according to the Rockaway newspaper The Wave. The city continues to maintain the streets in south Edgemere - to some degree - with signs lurking in the bushes and new curb cuts floating like islands in the urban wilderness. But few sidewalks remain intact, most roadways are pockmarked with potholes or covered in shifting sands, and the entire area is used as a communal dumping ground. Clothing, mattresses, toys and used condoms are discarded in the middle of streets. Some remain undisturbed for over a month. "

ARTICLE HERE:


http://kensinger.blogspot.com/2010/09/south-edgemere-wasteland.html

The Web That Time Forgot

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/17/health/17iht-17mund.13760031.html?_r=2

From Tuesday, June 17, 2008's NYT:

MONS, Belgium — On a fog-drizzled Monday afternoon, this fading medieval city feels like a forgotten place. Apart from the obligatory Gothic cathedral, there is not much to see here except for a tiny storefront museum called the Mundaneum, tucked down a narrow street in the northeast corner of town. It feels like a fittingly secluded home for the legacy of one of technology's lost pioneers: Paul Otlet.

In 1934, Otlet sketched out plans for a global network of computers (or "electric telescopes," as he called them) that would allow people to search and browse through millions of interlinked documents, images, audio and video files. He described how people would use the devices to send messages to one another, share files and even congregate in online social networks. He called the whole thing a "réseau," which might be translated as "network" — or arguably, "web."

Historians typically trace the origins of the World Wide Web through a lineage of Anglo-American inventors like Vannevar Bush, Doug Engelbart and Ted Nelson. But more than half a century before Tim Berners-Lee released the first Web browser in 1991, Otlet (pronounced ot-LAY) described a networked world where "anyone in his armchair would be able to contemplate the whole of creation."

Although Otlet's proto-Web relied on a patchwork of analog technologies like index cards and telegraph machines, it nonetheless anticipated the hyperlinked structure of today's Web. "This was a Steampunk version of hypertext," said Kevin Kelly, former editor of Wired, who is writing a book about the future of technology.

Otlet's vision hinged on the idea of a networked machine that joined documents using symbolic links. While that notion may seem obvious today, in 1934 it marked a conceptual breakthrough. "The hyperlink is one of the most underappreciated inventions of the last century," Kelly said. "It will go down with radio in the pantheon of great inventions."

Today, Otlet and his work have been largely forgotten, even in his native Belgium. Although Otlet enjoyed considerable fame during his lifetime, his legacy fell victim to a series of historical misfortunes — not least of which involved the Nazis marching into Belgium and destroying much of his life's work.

The entire article is worth a read. Check it out.

Name- Readymade

Check this project out- it explores the use of the 'name' as a 'readymade'...

parallel worlds- parallel identities?

http://www.aksioma.org/name/

NAME Readymade is a "Name changing” gesture perpetrated by three Slovenian artists who, in 2007 officially changed their names to the Slovenia’s economic-liberal, conservative prime minister at the time, Janez Janša.

All three of the Janez Janšas’ private and public affairs, their performances, writings and exhibitions – in a word, their entire lives – have been conducted under this name ever since.  Janez Janša works through a series of artistic, political, administrative and mediatic actions performed by himself together with Janez Jansa and Janez Jansa. Works exhibited in this show (valid ID cards, passports, credit and bank cards, driving licences, birth and marriage certificates, and so on) are generated by the reality itself.

NAME Readymade - THE EXHIBITION

Curator: Zdenka Badovinac

http://www.aksioma.org/name

Name as Readymade 

An interview with Janez Janša, Janez Janša and Janez Janša by Lev Kreft

www.aksioma.org/interview_kreft.html

NAME Readymade - THE BOOK

Museum of Modern Art Ljubljana, Oct. 2008

www.aksioma.org/name_book

Speaking of Hollywood in the age of collapse...

http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/entertainmentnewsbuzz/2010/11/metro-goldwyn-mayer-files-for-bankruptcy-after-creditors-stirke-deal-with-icahn.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/news/aamir-khans-3-idiots-becomes-bollywoods-biggest-grosser-1859492.html

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english2010/china/2010-10/27/c_13578414.htm