Day 1, Stream 2

Chair

Leah Barclay: Griffith University, Australia

Speakers

Jan Hendrik Brueggemeier: Centre for Creative Arts, La Trobe University Melbourne, Australia

Nancy Diniz: Xi’an Jiaotong Liverpool University, China

Bennedict Anderson: University of Sydney, Australia

Rewa Wright: University of Auckland, ELAM School of Fine Arts, New Zealand

Vicki Sowry: ANAT, Australia

Jodi Newcombe: Carbon Arts, Australia

Nigel Jamieson: AUT University, New Zealand

Andrea Polli: Art and Ecology, The University of New Mexico, US

Robbert De Goede: Architect and artist, Netherlands

Andrew Goodman: Fine Art, Monash University, Australia

ABSTRACTS

Jan Hendrik Brueggemeier  From Sound to Waves to Territories

In my paper I want to explore the idea of “shared sonic spaces” and connect it with my concept of the “imaginative leak,” which I mostly draw from the French philosopher Gaston Bachelard’s work on space, in order to address the question of how it influences our perception of place and therefore reality.

Discussing the work of artists David Dunn and Brandon LaBelle I will explore the concept of the electromagnetic field spectrum of sound, especially the frequencies that we humans can perceive, and that overlaps with other animals like dolphins. In terms of a media arts practice I focus on radio with its particular spatial qualities of being local, global and even cosmic — as demonstrated by radio projects like SETI. I examine the notion of a “shared sonic space” that relates the reference to radio astronomy with that of the dolphin research. As well, it opens up a space of inquiry that I describe as “imaginative leak” and which I located within the concept of the “poetics of space” by Bachelard.

I would like to position these two ideas within the current discourse around “ecocriticism.” By doing so I consider on one hand a certain ‘poetics of sonic space’ in our living world and on the other hand seek to go beyond an environmental media-critique by scholars like R. Murray Schafer. Schafer, closely linked to the acoustic ecology movement, has addressed the alienation from environment arising through a medium like radio.

In addition I also want to make a case for open standards in communication protocols that are represented in analogue radio in comparison to some of its digital counterparts.

Nancy Diniz & Bennedict Anderson  Breath – wearing your air

“Breath” is the air we share and the ‘holding’ of the air we breathe. “Breath” proposes a theory of action to the air we breathe and begins with the concept of the diaphragm as a metaphorical ‘intake of the invisible’ that is air. Referencing both historical and contemporary contexts of how air has been visualised and vandalised (miasma and foul air come to mind) in society over centuries “Breath” will position how the invisibility of air has not shared the same status water has enjoyed as essential life source. Through diagramming and visualisation of contemporary air conditions in a number of cities around the world, “Breath” will seek to position the economic and political osmosis between our air, the air of industry and for want of a better term the ‘outer air’ – that circulates between cities and countries.
We will present the discursive nature of our project, the ‘currents’ that surround it and its effects it has on a society, government and individual level. Wearing the moveable and detachable ultra-thin-soft devices subvert the idea of gimmick in favour of a philosophical understanding of our world through one of the four and essential elements that sustain our living. The debate touches upon a number of issues crucial to contemporary societies: pollution, civic engagement, public space, and restrictions to air quality data.
“Breath” is for the holding onto one’s breath through a philosophical and historical context that draws contemporary comparisons through the discursive nature of our project and the ‘currents’ that surround it (society, government and individual). Wearing the soft-ultra-thin detachable cells, subverts the idea of gimmick in favour for a geo-positioning of our world through one of the essential elements that sustain our living – air. “Breath” is taking this essential outside element to ‘live’ inside our bodies.

Rewa Wright  ‘We see in algorithms’: a virtual sculpture project in public space

From ancient Greece to contemporary art practice, placing objects at specific sites in dialogue with a local environment has long been the domain of sculpture. In the 20th century, the arrival of installation art eroded sculptures’ dominance of the site, challenging the paradigm of the monumental. In the 21st century, digital technology applied to the site enables an expanded conception of the object, not possible from within the plastic arts.

We see in algorithms is a performative research project by the author, which places animated virtual objects at familiar public sites in the city of Auckland, New Zealand. A digital file is presented as a record of the intervention, and the result mapped to Google Earth. In order to explore sculpture as virtual, and the potential of these objects to engage with a site in response to its intricacies and minutae, a series of public locations is selected and then photographically mapped using High Dynamic Range images. These HDR images are then projected as spherical maps around a virtual sculpture. The virtual object is immersed in the light and colour data of the space, then animated using procedural techniques. Through processes of fragmentation, reflection, bisection and conflation, the surface of the object reconfigures the environment as a series of separated pieces.

As virtual sculptures deployed in an expanded field, these objects provoke some challenging questions in regard their ‘fine art’ status.
Questions arise as to their objecthood (or non-object status), and they are complicit in the manufacture of an alternative urban ecology.

The act of presenting an alternative perception of the city- fabricating an impossible map linked to Google Earth- operates in the liminal border zone inhabited by the immaterial. Here, there is potential for the object to become site-responsive rather than site-specific.

Vicki Sowry & Jodi Newcombe  Echology: Making Sense of Data

The Echology: Making Sense of Data initiative seeks to break new ground in arts practice by asking artists to innovate with respect to a) the possible forms of data representation in public art and b) the artist’s role in engaging publics on environmental sustainability in new urban developments. Initiated by ANAT and Carbon Arts in 2011, Echology has seen three artists selected by National competition in 2012 for Lend Lease sites across Australia. In 2013 commissioning of one of these works, the Mussel Choir by Natalie Jeremijenko, began in Melbourne’s Victoria Harbour development. This emerging practice of data-driven and environmentally engaged public artwork presents multiple challenges to established systems of public arts production and management, at the same time as offering up new avenues for artists to forge new modes of collaboration. The experience of Echology and in particular, the Mussel Choir is examined here to reveal opportunities for expansion of this practice through identification of the factors that lead to a resilient ‘ecology of partnership’ between stakeholders that include science and technology researchers, education providers, city administrators, and urban developers.

Nigel Jamieson, Andrea Polli & Robbert De Goede  String, Sounds and Satellites; Site-specific Sculpture, Sonics and Mobile Geo-Reality

An initiative from a small international collective of artists and researchers, String, Sounds and Satellites (SSS) combines public art with emerging technologies to present new public space possibilities through both physical and augmented realities. SSS connects the public/participants’ experiences in everyday life with the immediate environment. SSS will be developed for specific locations in Sydney; the aim of SSS is to deliver a multi-sensory experience of place, site and its history, stories, imagery and issues. Initial proof of concept for SSS will be developed prior to ISEA2013. SSS participants will meet at the UNESCO-listed biosphere of Noosa, South East Queensland, during May/June 2013 to develop collaborative responses to this unique eco-environment. SSS brings together 3 individuals from 3 continents from 3 disciplines:

Andrea Polli (USA) creates public media and ecology art works internationally, focusing on the role of art in the understanding of environment. www.andreapolli.com

Robbert de Goede (The Netherlands) is an interior architect and visual artist. His installations have strong connotations with wireframe 3D models and computer aided design software, playing with the senses and unbalancing the viewer. www.robbertdegoede.nl

Nigel Jamieson (New Zealand) research centres on dynamic data visualisation of complex systems, virtual and augmented reality applications and mobile geo-reality. http://arden.aut.ac.nz/portfolio/nigel.jamieson

Andrew Goodman A thousand tiny interfac(ing)s: fertile acts of resistance

Taking as a starting point Brian Massumi’s assertion that the interface has no place within relational models (1995), this paper will attempt to rethink the interface within the framework of process philosophy. Massumi dismisses the concept of the interface for implying a system of privileged sites of relation existing between stable objects, untenable in a topological model within which process and relation precede position. By proposing the replacement of the stable ‘interface’ with the tactic of interfacing between organic and technical objects, the paper will explore how such events might be viewed as unfolding or contingent processes within a larger nexus of relation, as moments of intensity of disruption, invention and activity within a differential art machine rather than privileged or static.

This paper proposes to explore interfacing as fertile resistance through three philosophical concepts:

- Michel Serre’s concept of the parasite within relation – the interference or noise that multiplies and disrupts relation.
- A. N. Whitehead’s ‘tension of the non-compossible’, intensities through which the drive towards invention is generated, and Deleuze’s reading of the ‘fold of the outside’, which folds that which is beyond relation – the absolute outside – into the stratified in order to destabilize it.
- Simondon’s concept of the concretization of an event, a tending towards autopoeisis evolving through nexüs of interfacings.

These concepts will be unpacked through an examination of Raphael Lozano-Hemmer’s Relational Architecture (1997-2007) series of works, with particular emphasis on the tactic of positioning the body as mediator or resistor between technical objects to create complex relational outcomes.