Michaela Gleave describes her latest work:
Mobile Democratic Communication Device (MDCD)
Project description:
The MDCD is a portable, bubble-powered communication unit, devised to facilitate the public and democratic use of communicative air space. Part ‘hot-dog’ stand, part polling booth, and part mobile radio transmitter, the MDCD invites the public to post their thoughts, hopes, troubles, dreams and wishes anonymously out into public air space. The stand operates by translating the participants posted text into bubbles, activating the air space of the site through a visual demonstration of both ambient wind movement and the constant flow of naturally occurring as well as human generated air-borne data. Highlighting the shared nature of global air space, the MDCD operates in response to the environmental and social consequences of humanities current use and commoditisation of the atmosphere.Project Dates:
May 16-31, 10am-6pm
Opening at The Atrium, Federation Square, May 15 6-8pm
Reminds me of a work we acquired for ACMI called Black Hole Radio. It was a hole in the wall beneath a freeway into which people could say anything at all and it would be broadcast. Late at night it was treated as a kind of confessional with long guilt ridden un-burdenings.
Best wishes
Simon
Correction. It was telephone phone in. I’m not sure why I imagined it was under a freeway…
You can listen to a sample:
http://www.vdb.org/smackn.acgi$tapedetail?BLACKHOLER_002
You link came to a black screen, with this message posted:
Error
The information you have requested was not found or is not available.
I like it.
It’s like your thought went into air space, or a black hole.
My mind will hold the black hole. It’s more potent than a phone hook up.
I imagine Michaela’s MDCD reading her Project Description.
But the physical thing will be not be the one I imagine.
Like words, her bubbles sound fun to play with!
Hmmm. Video data base have changed their catalogue system. You now have to search for creator: Jem Cohen, or by title: Black Hole Radio
This Log is a black hole where I can sound off if I want.
Or you can, or anyone.
I see.
Jem Cohen: Black Hole Radio:
Black Hole Radio
00:08:00 1992
“In the late 1980s I saw ads in New York for a telephone ‘Confession Line.’ To call in and ‘confess’ was free; listening in incurred a by-the-minute charge. The soundtrack was built from a collection of these actual, anonymous calls. Adultery, theft, and regret; ghosts spun through phone wires and televisions.”
An installation version was created for the 1992 Worldwide Video Festival (Amsterdam).
Soundtrack: Jem Cohen with Ian MacKaye.
http://www.vdb.org/smackn.acgi$tapedetail?BLACKHOLER_002
Come to think of it, I saw/heard something similar at the Electric Blue show in London last month, at the Bargehouse, an artist’s run space near the Tate Modern.
Many of the works, including a puppet show, were interactive, and fun.
Here’s the one I’m thinking of:
The intertwining floors of South Bank’s atmospheric Bargehouse overflow with multi-sensory experiences for Electric Blue. The mixed-media artworks range from kinetic and sound installations — including Anthony Elliot’s Air Your Views, where passers-by are invited to express themselves and add to a loop played back the following day — to tactile sculptures, provocative performances and 2-D images designed to fool the unassuming eye. With an aim toward challenging the way in which an audience observes, all senses are assaulted upon entry, and participants are constantly encouraged to get involved.
Natalie Liechti
Flavorpill
http://flavorpill.com/london/events/2008/3/13/electric-blue
Another participatory sound piece that I saw in Electric Blue, was Modern-Day Miracles. I’ve written about it here:
http://www.antarcticanimation.com/content/wordpress/2008/03/20/electric-blue/
Bea Denton’s installation, Modern-Day-Miracles , includes a series of ‘lenticular’ portraits – photographs of people whose mouths appear to move when you walk past them. They reminded me of a brooch I had in the 1950’s of the Queen and the Duke of England. Turning its flat surface one way I could see the Queen, and turning it the other way, I saw the Duke. Modern-Day-Miracles evolved from collecting stories of people talking about miraculous things they have witnessed. People contributed their stories on-line and off-line, offering listeners different ideas of what a miracle might be.
I think that if you (general you that includes Michaela) are asking people to contribute then it is important to treat contributions with care and respect. You (Lisa) do this well.
I’ve got my back to the wall with assignments etc at the moment. When I surface we’ll get serious about your exegesis framework. Last time we spoke you were going to draw your doctoral journey. How did this go?
Funny you should mention the drawing the journey. I have not succeeded there. But I have just today been looking at thumbnails of all the images I’ve been uploading into the Log, since staring out.
(I have them backed up regularly onto the hard drive.}
These pictures are references to the journey taken so far. But they do not indicate its shape.
Since my father died, I’ve been thinking a lot about the shapes of our life journeys. These have patterns within them that can be identified through gestures we make, through the movement signatures I learned about from Peggy Hackney’s workshops earlier this year.
One of the questions she asks, when observing the habitual movement phrases of her clients, is, “What patterns in your life might these phrases describe?” For example, a preference for phrases of varying lengths may suggest a preference for often changing jobs.
Movement therapists work from the premise that our bodies hold patterns of thinking. Once these are known, through guided improvisations, these can be played with, and transformed.
My own pattern has been one of extremes – like the swinging Milankovitch cycles. I leap from one thing to another, then lurch back to a rigid. I don’t quite know what to do with this insight, in terms of drawing my journey. But I now see that pattern in my work, and accept it part of my practice.
Good luck with your assignments. I assume this is part of your course?
I spent last night animating to the sound of Phil Dadson’s voice. He’d seen in my zooplanktons, the doodles of Len Lye. Described his theory of the Old Brain. I heard that it revealed, when we’re in a certain state, genetic forms of our past existence. I doodles within the rhythm of Milanovitvh’s cycles. Through the process of animating, I find a certain narrative emerging. It’s not finished yet. The forms emerging felt like thoughts posted into my head space.
I woke up remembering how I lost a piece of art, Oceanic Thoughts:
http://www.antarcticanimation.com/content/objects/oceanicmindsobject01.php
I lost it as the Buenos Aires airport.
So words by A A Davis are out there, his thoughts described in ice.
With this new version of WordPress, I can’t go back and edit my Comments, so there are, I’m afraid, some grammatical errors.