Sunday 5 March 2006
meetings
The first meeting was held on Sunday March 5th. After a delicious brunch of mimosas and patties, Marek gave an introduction to the project. The purpose of these meetings is to discuss the various categories of paradises and to find approaches to the physical experience of the gallery installation.
Marek
The origins of Noplace rest in two architectural projects from the 60’s: Constant’s New Babylon and Cedric Price’s Fun Palace. In thinking about these interactive architectures, it seemed that New Babylon especially would need an information network to ride on top of the physical interrelationship of forms. This set up the dialog between Martin and Marek, especially the inclusion of “Feeds”. Feeds are a way to keep track of events on the Internet, whether they be weather reports, specific blog subjects or images based on a particular ‘tag’. At the time of these discussions, (2003) connecting the Internet with physical space - Google Maps, gps etc., was just starting to happen.
Both the above Utopian projects are fraught with issues. New Babylon assumes a state of ‘creative play’, which hardly seems satisfactory, for some this could lead not merely to ‘paradise’ but also to ‘hell’. (mw2mw love creative play, and would prefer to do it all the time) So the project widened to include any form of paradise, of which there are now about 12. At this point, Marek set about asking friends to send in images and texts of moments of ‘paradise on earth’. This is now the main blog on Noplace, and provides conceptual data for these discussions. Often, with these entries, we included feeds related to them.
Discussion
The methodology for many of MW2MW projects begins by being very inclusive and slowly narrowing down over time. Concepts of paradise are future-driven, perhaps related to states of desire - ‘Moving to New York’, ‘Escaping drudgery’ etc. What was interesting about the blog entries was their narrative impact, they are states to which we could either empathize or reject. This lead to skepticism about the impact of the installation itself. Merely ‘browsing’ content is not really very interesting. Its about how this information is processed and presented!
However, Martin keeps mentioning things he would like to see in paradise : chess games, recipes, amazing places…
Several strategies for the installation seemed interesting:
Not exposing everything, as people approach stuff slowly happens (like the blinking cursor on Apartment).
The importance of sound, sound in movies creates an emotional register that’s vital here..
“Guides”, similar to Dante’s Virgil, as possibly effective… taking you on various insights.
Each category, or sub-category needs a distinct identity, again like the rooms in Apartment.
Issues about the content driven into the space:
The filtering of feeds. Often these cannot be simple ‘tags’ but combinations of tags are probably clearer, eg. ‘Norway’ and ‘mountain’…
Possibly having ‘feed guides’ who shape the different feeds entering the project. These could be MW2MW at first, with others freely assigned this role later? (A heavy-metal view of paradise, etc?)
Categories of Paradises:
Considerable time was spent going through each category of paradise (see top left list). There was a desire to limit these to a handfull. However, going through them all, they all have specific tonal differences. Instead we came up with different classes of experience. These are:
Faith :
Sensation :
State of mind/body :
Narrative (which may be same as above) :
My sense of the categories expressed as a file tree:
Search
- Faith
— Utopia
— Paradise
— Nirvana
— Heaven, Hell, Limbo, Eden
- Narrative
— Shangri-la
— Wonderland
— Arcadia
- Sensation
— Dreamland
— Fantasy
— Dreamscape, Nightmare
My understanding of No Place
The search for meaning is a ‘no place’ activity, it is virtual, it happens in our heads. Stepping into the installation could be stepping into this ‘no place’ space.
The ‘feeds’ represent the raw data of experience. Though the bloggers are filters, raw life experienced is often pre-filtered in this way e.g. overheard conversations, observations of other peoples’ behavior so I still consider this raw data.
There are then your Marek filters - interactive controls with the viewer and manipulation of form that the projected data takes. You could see the instruments used to carry out the Search as being Faith, Narrative and Sensation. Anything can be processed by these instruments, preferably by all of them, to contribute toward our Search.
Faith Instrument: raw data is altered, trimmed and reconstituted to fit the Faith model. The Faith model adjusts only very slowly to accommodate the raw data. It aims mostly to make the data fit the model. The faith instrument tweaks our daily and long term decisions according to its external moral construct.
Narrative Instrument: the raw data is associated with a wide spectrum of popular narratives. The narratives are numerous and accommodate the diversity of data. Narratives are interchangeable and open to being reconstituted. The narrative instrument shamelessly generates emotional constructs. The narrative instrument tweaks our daily and long term decisions according to our socializing relationships.
Sensation Instrument: Raw data is amplified to become sensory, the further from our frontal lobe the better, to more successfully impact our auditory senses, sense of touch and sense of smell. In the visual realm, text is the least sensory input whereas visual information relating to our basest instincts (physical danger, food, sex, anything ecstatic) most activates our sensory receptors. The sensation instrument tweaks the output from moment to moment.
Adjectives/phrases that describe visual and sound qualities that could be assigned to the Faith, Narrative and Sensation subcategories:
Utopia – (adjectives that describe lost, broken dreams) silent, dry, dead, windy, empty, abandoned.
Paradise – (adjectives that describe promised and deferred desires) hyper real but shallow depth of field, large vistas mostly obscured by atmospherics, soaring zooms across large vistas, a sense of space but disconnected from its details, orchestral soundtracks.
Nirvana – (adjectives that describe the conscious attempt at unconsciousness) bright blinding sight, the sound of silence at full blast, equalizing of every input which become a unified tone or hum.
Heaven, Hell, Limbo, Eden – in the distance, seen from afar, rumor, promise, views up, views below, cumulus clouds, judgment, jingling keys, choirs, inevitable, fate
Shangri- la – bright, colorful, exotic, journey, smells good, upbeat, warm, Indian musical, spicy, formalized sensuality
Dreamland, Wonderland – oral histories written down or told over generations, “once upon a time”
Fantasy – the human body, the physicality of landscape and objects, the sensuality of things, rhythm, drum beat and base, earth, darkness and light effects, sex, taboos, alter ego, private
Dreamscape – changeable, logical nonsense, smooth, fast, defying gravity and other physical constraints
Utopia:
I always think of the American Victorian when I hear this word. When people left cities and started having picnics in their own back yards. I think it was the time in architectural history when suburbs were developing. But it also had something to do with balloon wood framing and the widespread popularity of Victorian cottages; Andrew Jackson Downing style. Not very interesting I know, but that’s what comes to mind for me. I think I would have enjoyed living in this time though.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Andrew_Jackson_Downing
http://utopia.nypl.org/
Dreamland:
This is where Wes and I were on similar thoughts, although I feel like I’m personally never able to really visit my own dreamland while doing other things. I can understand the “Whistle while you work” concept, but I’m unable to do it. I always feel its something to strive for because I’m never there. This is what we then discussed as being more Fantasy and I suppose it is. But Midnight Oil has some great lyrics to a song called Dreamworld which I kept humming to myself during this one
http://www.midnightoil.com/music/album-diesel.html#dreamworld
Paradise:
Future Eden?
There’s an exercise I try to do 2wice a year. Write out your perfect day. Minute by minute, what you’re wearing, what you’re doing, how long, what’s next, who is with you. The perfect day. Its amazing how hard it is to do the things you love.
Shangri-La:
Is this where Nirvana is reached?
I’ll get back to you on this one when we see that movie Ben and you mentioned.
Nirvana:
The last day; When you’ve accomplished all. Have you seen the film Being There by Hal Ashby? The ending is beautiful. And while very un-religious, Chauncey Gardner somehow walked out of this world into another place where he could see it all - maybe he walked right into Arcadia:
if you know the film, the pond reference comes into play with what we were talking about regards to “Walden”. Self-reflective, contemplative, a focus vision within, to see out. I specifically jotted down “Windows out (nature) provide the necessary windows in (ourselves).
Fantasy:
who are we kidding? Angie hit the nail on the head that sexual conquests, intimacies and lusts are some of the first things we think of. Why should I be any different? I’m personally fond of Eva Herzigova and Monica Belluci.
Dreamscape:
The props/set designs of our own sub conscience. They morph into each other and are sometimes non descript places because you just KNOW where you are, even though you’re not Really there. I can remember the boat I was on when I had a NIGHT MARE
(”Interestingly, the mare in nightmare has nothing to do with a female horse. Instead, it comes from Old English maere ‘goblin, incubus.’ The word was nigt-mare in 1300, and it referred to an evil female spirit afflicting sleepers with a feeling of suffocation. By 1350, it was nytmare and in 1440 it was nyghte mare. Mare ‘goblin’ is a cognate with Middle Dutch mare, maer ‘incubus,’ Old High German mara, Middle High German mar, mare (dialectical modern German Mahr ‘nightmlare’), and Old Icelandic mara ‘incubus.’ Mare comes from the Proto-Germanic word *maron.
Nightmare was used to describe ‘a bad dream caused by an incubus’ in the 16th century, and by 1829 it was used to describe ‘a bad dream’ in general.”) - from takeourword.com
eDreamscapes are the environments of our dreams; they are ever changing.
Wonderland:
This was our funny Graceland meets Michael Jackson joke…
Hmmm- This is the one that I didn’t feel certain belonged in the list. Although I suppose if we could do supernatural things, such as fly or walk through doors or teleport ourselves to alternate locations, I can imagine feeling like I could be a part of a wonderland. Also, extreme remote areas of nature conjur this thought. I bet if I could hire a submarine and descend into the south pacific to see ther earth tubes/vents. Or go into Mt. St. Helens - that could be a wonderland.
Limbo
I love the religious conotations of this word. I suppose because I was an altar boy and even though its a temporary state, according to Roman Catholic theology, it is not necessarily a bad place - for me it means the waiting room before you find out what’s wrong with you. sometimes you have to wait i guess. Limbo=patience. Can a place create a virtue?
Purgatory
Another word I’ve been around. This i suppose is the prescription after coming out of the waiting room. The purification of the soul - the workout or regime. It will end…sometime.
Eden:
the past. the place of choice, temptation. you could have it all, but then? the quest for knowledge or the curiosity for something different that you don’t know leads to exile. intellect and thirst for more made us real (in the biblical sense). Eden has a mythical feel to it - but maybe eden is an adjective or a verb? Eve was going eden! Adam edened his life away? it made them “human”, not otherworldy.
Heaven:
So the altar boy thing comes to mind again - and in school all the priests and nuns must have made me think God was in a brilliant (as in very bright) place with a big flowing beard (white) and muscular and masculine, like Michaelangelo’s paintings. As an adult there have been a few places on earth that I have seen that felt “like Heaven on Earth.” Starring at the stars in the wilderness at 14,000 ft. elevation. Seeing the aurora burealis (sp?). amazing sunsets/sunlight/sunrises/extreme quiet in the world. the sublime.
Hell:
There’s a great song the Who used to open their live acts with in 1970/1971 - “Heaven and Hell”. John Entwhistle, the bassist wrote the song and would wear a skeleton jumpsuit on stage - here are the lyrics:
“On top of the sky is a place where you go if you’ve done nothing wrong,
If you’ve done nothing wrong.
And down in the ground is a place where you go if you’ve been a bad boy,
If you’ve been a bad boy.
Why can’t we have eternal life,
And never die,
Never die?
In the place up above you grow feather wings and you fly round and round,
With a harp singing hymns.
And down in the ground you grow horns and a tail and you carry a fork,
And burn away.
Why can’t we have eternal life, And never die,
Never die?”
Sometimes words others have created makes for better imagery…hope you don’t mind the references and borrowed imagery in some places.
Utopia
A rationally defined fiction. A desire for perfect balance, peace, and understanding despite humanities proclivity for messing things up.
Dreamland
Mind divorced from body. A mental state that either unintentionally or willfully layers itself on top of your physical situation. Whistle while you work, daydreaming, falling into a painting, etc.
Paradise
Can only exist in the future.
Shangri-la
The exoticism of a Buddhist utopia as seen from a Christian perspective.
Nirvana
The willful stripping of all material commodities, burdens and fears. To return to where you started.
Arcadia
A naturalist escape outside of the confines of civilization. A space that one goes to in order to remind yourself that you are an animal and not all that separate from that which surrounds you.
Fantasy
The only category besides hell that has any sexual potential. Seems like it is always based on personal idiosyncrasies and desires. Something you yearn to live out but realize you never will. Earthly desires.
Dreamscape
the space rather than mental state of dreamland
Wonderland
This seems like a space that is man made to exist as an escape. Could refer to a youthful perspective on an imaginary world…peter pan, where the wild things are. Very likely attached to a narrative or fable. Disneyland and the like play of the physical manifestation of these imagined spaces.
Limbo
A non-space between two defined spaces. An unfocused reality. A general sense of confusion. A doomed space of frustration (or maybe only frustrating to anyone outside of it…Sisyphus always seems complacent with his task)
Eden
A lost and outwardly perfect world that can only exist in the past. A space with finite boundaries. An ignorant space without emotion, reason, sex, or growth. In a way Eden is surprisingly similar to limbo.
Nightmare
A dreamscape made of both rational and irrational fears. A space you are never in control of.
Heaven
Outmoded Biblical space. (where is it really?) The direction up and out of a 2 dimensional world. Ultimate passivity. A place to reconnect with memories/family/origins. Whiteness. No violence, no critical thought, impotent. A concept advertisers love. Boundless.
Hell
Outmoded biblical space very much like heaven. A space that contains the polar opposites of however you define heaven.
Some other thoughts…
I like the idea very much of a graphic equalizer to help a viewer/participant navigate the space. I also am quite fond of the shadow object taking on an iconic role to help a viewer quickly understand wherever he or she is. Without a physical reference the shadow object seems like a separate piece from the utopia project. Maybe these two concepts could be combined into one? Rather than traditional EQ sliders the orientation, dimensions, proximity to viewer, color, speed of vibration, etc could be used to clue in the participant. Of course the problem with this (and maybe one of the biggest challenges in general) is figuring out how to make its logic blindingly obvious without much if any explanation. I also think that sound is of major importance to creating a richer experience. Maybe there is some way of producing the soundtrack in a similar manner to the image/space generation. Seems like some basic real-time pitch and tempo adjustment to streaming content or translation of blog based text into sound/rhythm/speech could be possible.
In my mind there seems to be a lot of information that needs to be funneled some how so that it reads in a comprehensive manner. There was talk of guides that could act as a filter and in my notes I listed as a possible suggestion that there exist a number of guides that would take us through each theme. So for instance you would have 7 different guides such as an emotional, encyclopedic, gendered, cultural, racial, comedic and an associative guide. Each guide would filter information through their understanding of each term and so you would have access to these ideas in terms of different personalities which I think makes it more understandable and perhaps gives a gauze of narrative and categorization that makes the whole project more visible.
We also discussed three main categories that you’ve mentioned:
Faith, sensation and narrative/state of mind. I think Ben did a great job breaking that down in his response so I wont go into is except to say I think it’s a good idea.
How this develops visually and audibly is going to be the thing that makes the information understood and digestible. I think that is where the art comes in. There needs to be some manipulation of the info. that allows us to see what you’re up to.
Utopia
When I hear the word utopia I think immediately of failed utopias. A place where an ideal is met but creates a sterile and unchanging environment. An impossible, unhealthy world. Hitler tried to create a utopia. I generally think of a rigid system that rarely works; a broken or misguided fantasy.
Dreamland
I think of an escape, distraction. A soft place for the mind to go that enables even the most boring of tasks a playful edge. Dreamland is a distinct divorcing of mind and body.
Paradise
A place of abundance; a land of plenty. A calm balanced environment where all creatures live in harmony.
Shangri-la
I don’t really know what this is. I put down the exotic, the other, a place that time forgot. But I think that was everyone else’s take on it. It sounds like a meditative place where people search for enlightenment but I don’t know. The word itself sounds like people dancing.
Nirvana
Emptiness. Complete. Everything and nothing all at once. Truth. No thought. Seeing everything as it truly is. Perfection. Enlightenment.
Arcadia
A great forest, cool and quiet. A contemplative space where one goes to hear the sound of their own footsteps. A place where the world feels bigger than oneself.
Fantasy
A place you want to get to or conjure that usually involves something sexual and dirty. A mental space that releases inhibitions and summons a lustful open existence. Unfolding your body and mind inviting a sensory pleasure with a mental scenario.
Dreamscape
Fictional environments, a backdrop for the aforementioned fantasy space, a mental landscape. For some reason I’m thinking video games too. A moving/scrolling environment completely fictional or imagined by someone but creates a stage for something else to happen.
Wonderland
Same as dream land. Or perhaps, using the word to describe the word, a place that inspires wonder. Awe. Sublime. Charlie and the chocolate factory, where unicorns live, Roller-coasters, Narnia, or to go back further romantic literature or painting Casper David freidrich, Constable. etc.
Limbo
Stuck in the middle of something. Indecision, frustration, confusion. An annoying party game and song.
Eden
Before man, before consciousness. Before knowledge. Synonomous with birth, baby childlike.
Nightmare
Fears becoming a felt reality though not necessarily real.
Heaven
Religious after-life. Skies. Chocolate. Expensive dark chocolate.
Hell
Torture. Ones own personal fears manifest. Shopping for car parts with Wesley.
Ontology is Overrated: Categories, Links, and Tags
interesting read.