My last project in Berlin – July 2011
I intervene in the footpath area in front of ‘Errant Bodies Space’ in Kollwitzstraße by attaching a contact microphone on the bike railing, on a pot and several objects/materials I find in the given space willing to transmit pre-recorded sounds/noises for creating a physical/behavioural interaction/situation for visitors. During the performance event I am in the celler for monitoring the whole system and for mixing field recordings every half hour through a programming language. There are in total four speakers, two in the pavement outdoor, one in the cellar and another one in the corridor next to it. All the playbacks have been taken from everyday places I have lived during the last four months in Berlin area – voices in the park, shared steps, tiny slams, chirps and thunderstorms, forms of protest and sonic social behaviour – edited afterwards in order to question the nature of public places and its people in a contextual environment. All urban artifacts I chose for the sonic interplay act as a symbolic reference for expectation and hope, loss and separation, unconscious desires and irrational fears – emotions experienced by everyone but deeply connected with the private sphere of the body where disruptive spaces and free movements can be explored and discovered.
Immersive Sound Installation at the Große Wasserturm, Prenzaluer Berg, Berlin
back to the season
The Hamburg sound artist Andreas Oldörp has been working with the interplay between sound and space since 1985. His installation “Arbeit mit Lager” with four “singing flames” was already on display in the Large Water Reservoir in 1997. Now, 14 years later, Oldörp has realised a re-installation of this fascinating, localised work. The small gas flames that cause the air in glass tubes of different lengths to vibrate create powerful, space-filling sounds that differ depending on the location. Constant bass sounds create powerful and changing sound textures in the space. Sometimes a few steps or a movement of the head already suffice in order to bring about a completely new sound environment. A fascinating, acoustic as well as visual work that is related to the space results, in which the visitor can embark on a journey to find new tones in a wonderfully light way.
Opening: 30.06.2011 at 8 p.m.
Wed – Sun 2 – 8 p.m.
Long Night: 11.09. to midnight
singuhr – hoergalerie
Großer Wasserspeicher: Entrance Belforter Straße
Entry: 4 / 3 € (für both reservoirs)
RE-TOUCHING McLUHAN – THE MEDIUM IS THE MASSAGE
well, went to this intense three days conference about the tought of mc luhan on media & communication last week- end at the Embassy of Canada in Berlin. was a bit overwhelming but having had interesting conversations around the theme of the acoustic spaces in digital environments
transmediale, in collaboration with the Embassy of Canada Berlin and Marshall McLuhan Salon invite you to a key weekend event celebrating the legacy of Canadian media philosopher Marshall McLuhan on the occasion of the 100th anniversary of his birth. Part of the McLuhan in Europe 2011 network of events initiated by transmediale, Berlin’s Conference and Centennial Weekend will take place May 27 – 29 at the Embassy of Canada and Marshall McLuhan Salon.
The international conference Re-Touching McLuhan: The Medium is the Massage chaired by Dieter Daniels and moderated by Christopher Salter, sees leading international media and digital culture researchers Richard Cavell, Martina Leeker, Claus Pias, Dieter Daniels, Katja Kwastek, Michael Darroch, Janine Marchessault and Lorenz Engell explore McLuhan’s unique take on tactile and multi-sensory media expressed by the media philosopher’s unintentionally published blurring of the words message and massage.
The opening of the Centennial Weekend features the worldwide (re-)launch of McLuhan’s 1968 audio art classic The Medium is the Massage, digitally remastered for the first time, produced and presented by hip-hop musician and conceptual artist Paul Miller aka DJ Spooky.
Legendary McLuhanist Derrick de Kerckhove and Berlin-based McLuhan scholar Steffi Winkler elaborate on rare material from the McLuhan archives in the first session of the McLuminations screening and discussion series, produced by Baruch Gottlieb.
The Centennial Weekend will feature the European première of Through The Vanishing Point, a major new multi-media installation by leading Canadian digital artists David Rokeby and Lewis Kaye, and Play_McLuhan from media students of Hochschule Darmstadt under direction of Sabine Breitsameter. The Weekend will be preceded by the 2nd German-Canadian Professionals Conference featuring keynotes Brian Lee Crowley, Linus Neumann and Gundolf S. Freyermuth.
Programme Highlights
Friday May 27, 18.00
Re-Touching McLuhan Centennial Weekend
Opening and Reception featuring Richard Cavell and Paul Miller aka DJ Spooky
Saturday May 28, 10.00 – 18.00
Re-Touching McLuhan: The Medium is the Massage
Conference chaired by Dieter Daniels
Sunday May 29, 14.30
McLuminations #1
Screening & Discussion featuring Derrick de Kerckhove and Steffi Winkler
Sunday May 29, 17.00
Through The Vanishing Point
Installation by David Rokeby and Lewis Kaye – Vernissage
Special Pre-Events
Friday, May 27, 12.00 – 17.00
Global Village: Calamity or Chance?
2nd German-Canadian Professionals Conference
gcp-conference.de/2011
Friday, May 27th, 17.00
PLAY_McLUHAN
Exhibition presentation by Sabine Breitsameter and students of the Hochschule Darmstadt
The events will take place in English / Die Veranstaltungen finden in englischer Sprache statt.
The Centennial Weekend will take place at the Embassy of Canada / Marshall McLuhan Salon, Leipziger Platz 17, 10117 Berlin. Please arrive early to ensure enough time for embassy security.
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Re-Touching McLuhan is a project of transmediale in collaboration with the Embassy of Canada and its Marshall McLuhan Salon with the support of the Government of Canada, the Deutsch-Kanadische Gesellschaft, Blackberry, the McLuhan Estate and the Gingko Press. The event is part of the McLuhan in Europe 2011 Network, initiated and directed by Stephen Kovats in collaboration with Michelle Kasprzak, celebrating the centenary of Marshall McLuhan and his impact on European Art and Media Culture.
Through The Vanishing Point was commissioned in 2010 by the Scotiabank CONTACT Photography Festival (Bonnie Rubenstein, curator) and the Faculty of Information McLuhan Program in Culture and Technology (Dominique Scheffel-Dunand, director) University of Toronto, Canada.
TUNED CITY NÜRNBERG 2011
went to this interesting event in the city of Nuremberg last week-end. the main topic was about sound and the build environment. met many artists, architects and researchers of this field.
Mini Tuned City Nürnberg
Sounds of Muggenhof
11. – 17. April 2011
As part of an interdisziplinary artist competition initiated by the city of Nürnberg/Germany Tuned City is going to realize a ‘mini-event’ in a very interesting part of the city called Muggenhof/Eberhardshof. The area is a mix of havitation and industrial architecture inbetween a green belt with a little river on one side and the main connection highway to Fürth (and the parallel train track) on the other side. The industrial architecture is dominated by the former production facilities of AEG and the Quelle (mailoder) headquarter build by Ernst Neufert.
With workshops and public interventions we’re going to explore that neighborhood for one week. The results are going to be shown on the 16th of april with presentations, performances and lectures. (See details >>> workshops and lectures))
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STADT-FLIMMERN ELISABETTA SENESI EXHIBITION IN BERLIN UNTIL 12 NOVEMBER
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{sounding code} in berlin
went to this inspiring symposium on supercollider developing platform for artists and musicians..
Installation Großer Wasserspeicher Print
Großer Wasserspeicher, 18. – 26. September, 14 – 20h
Opening: Friday 17. September, 18h
Alberto de Campo, Generative Art class at UdK Berlin & guests:
“Varia Zoosystematica Profundorum – Experimental studies in deep sea communication”
organized by UdK Berlin in cooperation with singuhr e.V.
Read more…
Installations .HBC Print
18. – 26. September, 14 – 22h
Opening: Friday 17.Sept. 20h
ground floor
Ron Kuivila — Alex at Twilight
Andre Bartetzki — A Show Case for SC Tweets
second floor
Jost Muxfeldt — Audio Kinematics
Marije Baalman — Sonobotanics – Montreal models
Jonas Hummel — [PB_UP] – a patchwork portrait
Hanns Holger Rutz & Nayari Castillo — Dissemination
outdoors
Victor Mazon Gardoqui — Interferenzen – Expanded Field
Read more…
.HBC Open Stage Print
Monday 20. September, 20h (incl. Berlin SC user group meeting)
Tuesday 21. September, 20h
Wednesday 22. September, 20h
Read more…
Thursday, 23.Sept., 19h, WFS Concert Print
John Bischoff “Sidewalk Chatter (Redux)”
Marcus Schmickler “Bonner Durchmusterung”
Bjarni Gunnarsson & Miguel Negrão “Fallacies”
Alberto de Campo “Reversing Pendulum Music”
Read more…
Thursday, 23.Sept., 22h, Ausland Concert 1 Print
Ruben Patiño — 3.3.3
Itaru Yasuda — complex composition
Scott Cazan / Jana Papenbrook — I Like Supercollider and Supercollider Likes Me
Roberto Garretón — From one place to another and the paths in between
EVOL– Untitled
Nick Collins — scryptogram
Read more…
Friday 24.Sept., 19h , Kl. Wasserspeicher Concert 1 Print
Daisuke Ishida — Erratic Flow
Paulo Ferreira-Lopes — de Profundis, for violin and electronics
Scott Price — Veils
Pyoung Ryang Ko — Fantaisie-Impromptu electroacoustique, for flute, percussion and electronics
Olaf Hochherz — Hoffnungsträger
Fernando Lopez-Lezcano — A Very Fractal Cat, Somewhat T[h]rilled, for performer and four virtual pianos
Tom Hall & Katy Price — “Under the Yoke”, for narrator, flute, electric guitar, trombone, percussion and laptops
ensemble unitedberlin
Read more…
Friday 24.Sept., 22h, Ausland Concert 2 Print
Chad McKinney and LAG — Neuromedusae II
Yvan Volochine — untitiled
Alo Allik — f(x)
Mark Rossi — Untitled (parts I-IV)
Fredrik Olofsson — redUniform
Read more…
Saturday 25.Sept., 19h, Kl. Wasserspeicher Concert 2 Print
Andre Bartetzki — String-Theory, for violin and electronics
Sergio Luque — “Sex, Drugs and Rock ‘n Roll” was never meant to be like this
Nicola Buso — Wassersprache in Wasserspeicher, for computer and electroacoustic feedback
José Miguel Fernandez — M-brana, for double bass, percussion and electronics based on instrumental motion capture
Robin Meier — The Body is a Vessel for Apnoe Diver and Computer Freediver: Elisabeth Kristoffersen (Norway)
Quiet Noise Quartet untitled
ensemble unitedberlin
Quiet Noise Quartet
Read more…
Saturday 25.Sept., 22h, Raum 20 Print
Supercollider Club Event Pre-Midnight Line.up
Curtis McKinney — When the Snake eats its Tail
Timur Kuyanov — “nanoscape.0″,
WORLD DOMINATION Mattias Petersson, Daniel Karlsson and Jonatan Liljedahl
Mario de Vega DJ
Post Midnight Line-Up:
Cylob (London/Berlin, UK)
Binray (Bristol, UK)
Somtek vs Skylla (Luzern, Switzerland)
Heinrich At Hart (Frankfurt/Berlin, Germany)
Dj Poingi (Tel Aviv/Berlin, Israel)
Read more…
Sunday 26. September, 18h, .HBC – Laptop Ensembles Print
installation
Andre Wakko Hostalácio — Marionet, interactive network installation
concert
Cole Ingraham — LAGMonster
Benoit and the Mandelbrots — Ad-LiBerlin
Das IMM-Rundfunkorchester — Extractions Pt. I
Read more…
XII International Architecture Exhibition – Italian Pavillion
AILATI.Reflections from the future is a play on words, a reversal of the country’s name that opens up a new reading of contemporary architecture in an original and sideways glance at objects, reality and designs (in English, the title would be YLATI). The exhibition offers a bold, knowledge-led haven for reflections of the future delivered to us by reality on a daily basis; the resources upon which Italian architecture will draw to forge new forms of identity and development.
AILATI.Reflections from the future unveils a vision of architecture as civil art, attuned both to reality and people, and yet capable of generating solutions for a restless society, a society in the midst of deep-seated change, frightened by the future… and yet a society in which architecture can and should prompt Italians to live the spaces of contemporary life with greater focus and more courage.
AILATI. Reflections from the future is divided into three sections.
“Amnesia. Italian Contemporary Architecture 1990-2010” is an initial and timelyoverview of Italian architecture during the last 20 years, fostering a sharper and more aware understanding of Italy now.
AILATI. Reflections from the future will also be casting a contemporary eye on the recent past, the incumbent present, and the near future of Italian architecture as part of one continuum, in a ground-breaking exhibition designed by Salotto Buono Studio and Francesco Librizzi whichoccupies 1800m2 of the new Pavilion looking out over theGiardino delle Vergini. The exhibition graphics and corporate identity have been designed by Tank Boys to make the exhibition comprehensible and accessible to non-specialists who’d like to find out more about Italian architecture.
www.ottoidee.it
Lab Italy
Renato Rizzi con Barbara Borgini, Casa d’Arte Futurista Fortunato Depero, Rovereto (TN). DAP studio/ Elena Sacco – Paolo Danelli, Biblioteca civica “Elsa Morante”, Lonate Ceppino (VA). Cherubino Gambardella e Simona Ottieri, RestauroTorre dello Ziro, Pontone d’ Amalfi (Sa). aMDL Michele De Lucchi, Fondazione Giorgio Cini. Intervento di ripristino funzionale della Manica Lunga, Venezia. ELASTICOSPA – Stefano Pujatti Architetti, Atelier Fleuriste e abitazione privata, Chieri (To). Markus Scherer con Walter Dietl, Recupero del Forte di Fortezza, Fortezza (BZ). Emanuele Fidone, Restauro della Basilica Paleocristiana di San Pietro, Ortigia, Siracusa. Davide Vargas, Nuovo Municipio, San Prisco (CE). Piuarch Partners, D&G Headquarters, Milano.
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La strada 106 costeggia il mar Jonio ed è l’unico collegamento tra tre regioni italiane: Puglia, Basilicata e Calabria, una delle parti più belle e più degradate della Penisola. Ognuno dei suoi 491 chilometri, mostra luoghi e paesaggi naturali bellissimi, minacciati e in parte già devastati dall’abusivismo edilizio. Si tratta di territori fortemente controllati dalla Mafa. L’edilizia è purtroppo una delle attività lucrose per i gruppi mafosi che, con arroganza, spesso costruiscono senza rispettare le leggi, lasciando dei segni evidenti della propria presenza sul territorio. La Jonica è come un fume rumoroso,lungo il quale abitano circa 900.000 persone e che se risalito rivela tutte le contraddizioni di un territorio privo di tutela per una natura mozzafato: scheletri di case mai fnite, spazzatura e spiagge meravigliose, sbarchi di clandestini e templi greci, tir nei centri storici. Frapiccini e Romano trovano nel paesaggio i segni di un identità culturale collettiva, che si dibatte tra gli interessi della Mafa e la Legalità. |
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The route 106 runs in the extreme south of Italy along the ionian coast between the regions of Calabria and Puglia. 460 kilometers of beauty and devastations, in one side the natural enviroment, olive trees, oranges and all the tipicals naturals elements of the mediteranean enviroment. In the other side, the abbandon and the devastation done by the humans in a territory where the hands of mafa are the only rules and the crime has left signes of devastation like a knife’s slash on a beauty full face. The route is also called the Reggio Calabria-Taranto, taking the name from the two cities linked by the road. Mile by mile is a sequence of never fnished houses, builded with no permissions, abbandoned factories that never worked, not rules, no esthetics, boxes of concrete and bricks from the outside, to not pay taxes, waiting for a moratorium from the goverment, that sistematically legalized such devastation of the enviroment. The majority of this buildings are done with the mafa money, that reinvest its incomes from the drugs trafking into the construction business. The Mafa interests are devided in two differents levels, building for the single private, or building in large scale like hotels or appartments towers. “Bricks” create jobs and social agreement in Calabria, a region where unemployement is one of the highiest in the Europe. Is a circle where the conspirancy of silence, the so called “omertà”, can hide everything except the landscape, wich is the mirror of way of life and the martoriated skin of the sick body called “Sud Italiano”. |
public art, territory & social responsabilty / MILAN CONFERENCE
A La Triennale di Milano, in occasione di “Ermenegildo Zegna. 100 anni di Eccellenza. Dalla Fabbrica del Tessuto alla Fabbrica dello Stile”, mostra che celebra il centenario del Gruppo, la Fondazione Zegna ha organizzato “Alberto Garutti, Michelangelo Pistoletto. Arte pubblica, territorio e responsabilità sociale”.
Garutti e Pistoletto, protagonisti della conversazione, lavorano da molti anni sul rapporto tra arte e territorio; i due maestri, partendo dai rispettivi progetti realizzati per la Fondazione Zegna, si confrontano sui processi generativi di un’opera pubblica, sul suo delicato inserimento nel contesto sociale, sull’etica e la sensibilità con cui l’Artista deve agire per legare un lavoro al luogo e alla comunità che lo ospitano.
All’incontro, promosso dalla Fondazione Zegna, partecipano anche Andrea Zegna e Barbara Casavecchia – curatori del progetto ALL’APERTO, Fondazione Zegna –, e Judith Wielander, curatrice del progetto “Visible”, avviato da Cittadellarte in collaborazione con la Fondazione Zegna.
Modera Maria Luisa Frisa, giornalista, storico dell’arte e della moda e direttore del Corso di Laurea in Design della Moda presso lo IUAV di Venezia.
RADIO APOREE – mapping sounds all over the world
about the project
The project radio aporee ::: maps has started 2006. It connects sound and space in order to create a cartography which focusses solely on sound, open to the public as a collaborative project. It contains recordings from numerous urban, rural and natural environments, showing its audible complexity, as well as the different perceptions, practices and artistic perspectives related to sound, space and sense of place. (more about aporee.org
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how it works
find places
you can move the map with the mouse or the arrow keys at the upper left corner. with the slider or the mouse wheel you can zoom in & out. search + provides a basic interface to search for places, sounds, contributors or addresses. hit ::: maps for a search within the aporee database or google for an address search. the buttons on the upper right corner of the map let you choose between different map views. click places + for the most recent or all contributions to the project.
add recording
clicking the map opens a bubble window which lets you choose between upload sound, fetch sound from URL or phone call. you will be asked for a title, your email address (see privacy statement), a short description and the date/time/timezone of the recording. the timezone should be set automatically, please check. if you choose to upload a sound, there’s a button for selecting the file from your hard drive, if you want to fetch an already existing recording from your website, give the full url to the file in the corresponding form field, including http:// at the beginning. in case of a phone call, only title and email are neccessary, the phone number will be sent to you by email.
- the title should be an address or short term describing the recording, or both. this label shows up in the navigation bars. please keep it short and significant…
- for uploads, the browse button opens a window to your hard drive. here you can select the soundfile to send to radio aporee. it must be an mp3 file, max. 25mbyte, 44.1 or 48khz sample rate, up to 320k bitrate. for best audio quality, we recommend bitrates of 256 or 320 kbit. please be patient while uploading, don’t hit reload or back on your browser until the site has returned. depending on your connection, this may take a while.
- fetching sounds from an URL is usually very quick, since it happens between two servers. use this option if you have sounds already somewhere on the web.
- calling into the system by phone works a bit different. once you have choosen the phone call option, an email will be sent to your address. it contains the (german) phone number of radio aporee and a code for identifying the place. a (german speaking) voice system will guide you through. it’s not clear yet if and how the phone / voice interface will be supported in future. we like it… while it adds and has proofed to be an interesting acoustic layer for spoken words, the sound quality of most phones is ugly. that may change for next generation smartfones.
- after hitting OK, all necessary information to activate your sound in order to make it audible / visible on the map will be send to your email address, as well as some instructions how to access the editor. it obviously makes no sense to enter an invalid email address… if something goes wrong, you should get an email with an error message explaining the problem briefly. almost all known problems are related to the wrong file format, i.e. if you try to send wav, aif or mp4 files.
- if you want to add a sound to an existing place, just click the red blinking marker or more… at the lower right corner, which opens the info window for this sound. choose the corresponding option for uploading, fetching from url or call, then proceed as described above. if there’s more than one sound at a place, they will be played consecutively in chronological order.
- there are also some other options available in the info window. if you click on the title of the recording, it starts to download the file. embed map lets you include a little map of this place on your blog or website, bookmark creates a bookmark for this place in your favorites folder. these functions may not work on all browsers, just try. the envelope opens a comments form which goes directly to the contributor of this sound.
edit your recordings
you don’t need a login or account in order to participate on the project, however, after uploading your first sound, you have access to an editor for your contributions. it lets you edit titles, locations, descriptions and other info. it also provides a possibility to create your own projects. imagine it as the radio aporee ::: maps with only your recordings, under a dedicated URL. there are links in the confirmation emails you receive after uploading, about how to get a password and access the editor.
play recordings
when the map loads initially, it jumps to the most recent recording and plays it. the currently playing sound is indicated by a blinking red marker. click it to get more information about this sound. play + on the menue bar has several options for playing random selections, an Internet radio stream or the currently visible sounds on the map. you may like the mix and multi modes:
when in mix mode, all markers on the map are sensitive for the mouse pointer moving over them. they will start playing when touched, max. 3 at the moment and restricted to close areas. sounds will be mixed based on the geographical distance between them, in analogy to walking if you want, the sound changes by direction and the speed of your movement. move the mouse slowly over the map.
multiplay mode lets you play different places around the world simultaneously. it’s a bit like mix mode, but without the mouse moving/mixing and not restricted to local areas. playtime, give it a try… note: these functions may put some load on our computer, esp. if it’s an older one. things may become slow or hang. don’t worry, it will not damage anything…
about content
this project is about sounds and sites, check the many recordings to get an idea. get yourself a recorder, go out and listen… it’s not about music!… please don’t send songs, your CD collection or some greatest hits. excessive workings or sound manipulations are also undesirable. in case of doubt, send an email. spam, garbage and illegal stuff will be deleted without comment, as well as obviously copyright-protected material. if you want to send sounds from others, implicitly ask for permission first and give propper credits. if you look for a great site for almost any kind of sounds, radio aporee recommends freesound.org
back to photography
Agency and Automatism
Photography as Art since the 1960s
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Jeff Wall
A Sapling Held by a Post 2000 Tate © Jeff Wall |
Friday 11 June 2010, 10.30–18.00
Saturday 12 June 2010, 10.30–18.00
Despite attending to similar features of photography as an artistic medium, philosophers and art historians have drawn opposed conclusions about their implications. This conference brings them into dialogue around questions of agency and automatism in the photographic process.
Speakers include artist Jeff Wall, art historians Carol Armstrong, Robin Kelsey, Anna Dezeuze, Briony Fer, Susan Laxton and Margaret Iversen, philosophers David Davies, Nigel Warburton, Cynthia Freeland, Sherri Irvin and Diarmuid Costello.
This event is part of the AHRC-funded research project ‘Aesthetics after Photography’ directed by Margaret Iversen (University of Essex) and Diarmuid Costello (University of Warwick). See the research project pages on the Univeristy of Essex website and Univeristy of Warwick website for more information.
Download the full programme (PDF)
Programme of speakers
Thursday 10 June
| 18.30 | Welcome by Marko Daniel |
| 18.35 | Introduction by Margaret Iversen and Diarmuid Costello |
| 18.45 | Jeff Wall Agency and Automatism keynote address Followed by Q&A chaired by Diarmuid Costello |
| 20.00 | Drinks will be served in the Starr Auditorium Foyer |
Friday 11 June
| 10.30 | Session 1: Chaired by Dawn Phillips |
| 10.40 | Carol Armstrong Automatism and Agency Intertwined: The Spectrum of Photographic Intentionality My aim will be to address the different ways in which photography since the 1960s has joined, rather than opposed, the processes of automatism and agency. Beginning with an address to the manner in which photography works by way of happenstance more than other media, followed by a discussion of the historical convergence of post-sixties practices with anti-authorial discourse, I will argue that the photographic artist intervenes to make use of the aleatory event in an interaction that defines photographic intentionality. |
| 11.35 | David Davies Agency, Automatism, and the Possibility of Photographic Art Appreciative interest in an artistic manifold is always interrogative, seeking to understand its ordering in terms of motivated agency. The automatism of the photographic process therefore challenges the artistic pretensions of photography. I examine different responses in recent photographic theory and practice to this tension between automatism and agency. I argue that an interrogative interest in the photographic image itself, and thus properly photographic art, requires that the image issue from a process in which they are mutually constraining forces. |
| 12.30 | Break |
| 13.30 | Session 2: Chaired by David Campany |
| 13.40 | Briony Fer Test-site In Ed Ruscha’s book, Royal Road Test, a typewriter is mangled and so is narrative. The allusion in Ruscha’s title to Freud’s famous saying that ‘the interpretation of dreams is the royal road to the unconscious’ is explored in this paper as a comic gambit as well as a serious provocation. Ruscha’s image of the test-site is reconfigured as a means to put in question what or who is at stake in the work of the artwork. |
| 14.35 | Robin Kelsey Random Generation: John Baldessari, Photography, and the early 1970s In the early 1970s John Baldessari investigated, spoofed, and dismantled photography’s often suppressed, sometimes mystified, truck with chance. In series such as Throwing Three Balls in the Air to Get a Straight Line: Best of Thirty-Six Attempts (1973), Baldessari lampooned the decisive moment and the elevation of chance to a cosmic principle. At the same time, his engagement with random generation played off the contemporaneous rise of simulation in various cultural domains, from the military-industrial complex to the game industry. |
| 15.30 | Tea and coffee will be served in the Starr Auditorium Foyer |
| 16.00 | Session 3: Chaired by Jason Gaiger |
| 16.10 | Cynthia Freeland Icon and Index Revisited: Artistic Explorations of Medical Imaging Technologies My paper explores a range of medical imaging technologies that challenge the icon/index distinction articulated by C.S. Peirce. These range from electrocardiograms to X-rays, ultrasounds, and fMRI images of the brain. I question the nature of realism in such images and examine the role of interpretation and aesthetic choice in their creation. Finally, I discuss work by various artists who have used “automatic” imaging technologies for creative purposes, including Robert Rauschenberg, Gary Schneider, Aline Mare, and Gabriele Leidloff. |
| 17.05 | Anna Dezeuze Photography as a Way of Living By setting up a dialogue between the writings of Michel Foucault and Michel de Certeau, I will analyse the kind of automatism mobilised by Richard Wentworth’s Making Do, Getting By series (ongoing since 1977). In its technique and subject matter, I will argue that this conceptual project stages a biopolitical continuum between nature and culture, body and technology, while exploring the ambivalent nature of the everyday as the intersection between the personal and the collective, between agency and instincts or reflexes. |
| 18.00 | End |
Saturday 12 June
| 10.30 | Session 4: Chaired by Simon Baker |
| 10.40 | Susan Laxton As Photography: Abstraction and Automatism in Gerhard Richter’s Overpainted Snapshots Gerhard Richter’s exploration of painting “as photography,” repeatedly restaged as an engagement between photography, chance, and the suspension of control over the image, on one hand, and painting, aesthetic attention and the artist’s will on the other, becomes explicit in his overpainted snapshots. These works, composed entirely of dejecta, ask us to consider the possibility that, beyond the most obvious attributes of these mediums, lie their shared and repressed irrationalities – compelling us to look for meaning in the politics of heteronomy. |
| 11.35 | Margaret Iversen Analogue: On Tacita Dean and Zoe Leonard It is significant that both Leonard and Dean have recently produced exhibitions simply titled Analogue. Current debates concerning artistic agency and automatism often hinge on the difference between digital and analogue photographic processes. This is so because some prominent contemporary artists produce photographs which foreground intentionality through digital manipulation. The debate is joined in this paper through the work of two artists who attach great value to the analogue image and the chance encounter. |
| 12.30 | Break |
| 13.30 | Session 5: Chaired by Wolfgang Brückle |
| 13.40 | Sherri Irvin Artwork and Document in the Photography of Louise Lawler What makes a photograph an artwork, as opposed to a mere document? I reflect on this question in relation to Louise Lawler’s photographs of others’ artworks (usually in the context of an auction, gallery or private collection). Lawler’s work provides a fascinating test case for probing this distinction, since her central aim is to examine the institutional setting in which artworks are presented and understood, and that institutional setting is precisely what makes it possible for her own photographs to be artworks rather than mere documents. |
| 14.35 | Nigel Warburton Absence and Presence in the Work of Thomas Demand For several decades analytic philosophers have focused obsessively on the alleged automatism of photographic media and especially on the consequences for pictorial realism. This rarely sheds light on actual photography. In contrast, in this paper I examine a series of Thomas Demand’s photographs from a philosophical angle and suggest some ways philosophers might contribute to the understanding of photographic art by sometimes beginning with the particular rather than the general. |
| 15.30 | Tea and coffee will be served in the Starr Auditorium Foyer |
| 16.00 | Session 6: Chaired by Margaret Iversen |
| 16.10 | Diarmuid Costello The Question Concerning Photography This paper explores some surprising affinities between Martin Heidegger’s theory of art and Kendall Walton’s theory of photography. I suggest that photography, understood in terms of Walton’s ‘mind-independence’ thesis, mirrors the anti-subjectivism of authentic art on Heidegger’s account. Both are committed to an automatism thesis of sorts. If is right, I argue that Heidegger and Walton’s theories are equally contentious in so far as this commitment leads them to downplay the agency of artist and photographer respectively. |
| 17.05 | Closing remarks |
Speakers
Carol Armstrong is Professor of History of Art at Yale University, where she teaches and writes about 19th century French painting, the history of photography of both centuries, and feminist theory and criticism. Among her publications on photography are the October book Scenes in a Library: Reading the Photograph in the Book, 1843-1875, published by M.I.T. Press in 1998, along with numerous essays on women photographers in October, and pieces of criticism in Artforum. She is also a practicing photographic artist.
Simon Baker is Curator of Photography and International Art at Tate. From 2004 to 2009, he was a lecturer in Art History at the University of Nottingham, where he published extensively in the fields of the European avant-gardes (especially surrealism), contemporary art, and photography. Alongside a monograph, Surrealism, History and Revolution, his principal research projects have been contributions to exhibitions: Undercover Surrealism (Hayward Gallery London, 2006); and Close-up: Proximity and Defamiliarisation in Art, Film and Photography (Fruitmarket, Edinburgh, 2008).
Wolfgang Brückle worked as an assistant curator at the Staatsgalerie Stuttgart, and as an assistant professor at the art history departments at the universities of Stuttgart and Bern, where he also pursued curatorial projects. Since 2007, he has been Senior Research Fellow at the Department of Art History and Theory at the University of Essex. Brückle’s research interests focus on later medieval art, early modern art theory and contemporary art with a special focus on photography.
David Campany is Reader in Photography at the University of Westminster. Books include: Art and Photography (2003), Photography and Cinema (2008) and Jeff Wall in conversation with David Campany (2009). He has written for Tate’s ‘Cruel and Tender’ (2003) and Rewriting Conceptual Art (2009), Frieze, Aperture, Photoworks, Tate, Source, The Oxford Art Journal, Ojodepez and Philosophy of Photography. He curated ‘Current History: Photographs and Films by Hannah Collins’ for Caixaforum, and is co-curating ‘Anonymes’ for Le Bal, Paris. David co-founded PA magazine.
Diarmuid Costello is Associate Professor of Philosophy, University of Warwick and Chair of the British Society of Aesthetics. He co-edited Photography after Conceptual Art, Art History, 32:5 (2009); The Life and Death of Images (2008); and Art: Key Contemporary Thinkers (2007). Recent articles have appeared in The British Journal of Aesthetics, Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Critical Inquiry, Rivista di Estetica, and Angelaki. He is working on two longer projects: Aesthetics after Modernism and On Photography.
David Davies is Associate Professor of Philosophy at McGill University. He is the author of Art as Performance (Blackwell, 2004), Aesthetics and Literature (Continuum, 2007), and The Philosophy of the Performing Arts (Blackwell, forthcoming). He also edited a volume on the cinema of Terrence Malick. He has published widely on issues concerning photography, cinema, literature, music, and the visual arts, and is currently studying the nature and appreciation of artworks, like photographs and cast sculptures, that can have multiple instances.
Briony Fer has written widely on modern and contemporary art. Her books include The Infinite Line (Yale 2004) and most recently Eva Hesse: Studiowork (2009), which was written to accompany the exhibition of the same name organized by the Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh and which is now showing at the Tapies Foundation, Barcelona. She is Professor of History of Art at UCL.
Cynthia Freeland is professor and chair of the Philosophy Department at the University of Houston. She has published on topics in ancient philosophy, feminist theory, aesthetics, and film theory. Her books include Philosophy and Film (co-edited with Thomas Wartenberg), 1995; The Naked and the Undead: Evil and the Appeal of Horror (1999); and But Is It Art? (2001). Her latest book, Portraits and Persons: A Philosophical Inquiry, will be published by Oxford in June, 2010.
Jason Gaiger is a Senior Lecturer in Art History at The Open University. His books include Aesthetics and Painting (Continuum, 2008), an English edition of Herder’s Sculpture (University of Chicago Press, 2002) and, as co-editor with Charles Harrison and Paul Wood, Art in Theory: 1648-1815 (Blackwell, 2000) and Art in Theory: 1815-1900 (Blackwell, 1998).
Sherri Irvin is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Oklahoma. Her research interests center on the philosophy of contemporary art, the relation between aesthetics and ethics, and the aesthetics of everyday experience. She is Aesthetics and Philosophy of Art editor of Philosophy Compass and has published articles in the British Journal of Aesthetics, the Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Museum Management and Curatorship, and several anthologies.
Margaret Iversen is Professor in the Department of Art History and Theory, University of Essex, England. Her most recent books are Beyond Pleasure: Freud, Lacan, Barthes, 2007 and Chance. Her other published books include Alois Riegl: Art History and Theory (1993); Mary Kelly (1997) co-edited Photography after Conceptual Art for Art History, 32:5 (2009)and Art and Thought (2003). Writing Art History (co-authored with Stephen Melville) is forthcoming from Chicago. She is Director (with Diarmuid Costello) of the AHRC research project, “Aesthetics after Photography.”
Robin Kelsey is Shirley Carter Burden Professor of Photography in the History of Art and Architecture Department at Harvard University. He has published extensively on the history of photography and received several awards for his scholarship and teaching, including the Arthur Kingsley Porter prize from the College Art Association for an essay on the survey photography of Timothy H. O’Sullivan. He is finishing a book on photography and chance and starting another on photography in America during the Cold War.
Susan Laxton is Assistant Professor of the History of Photography at University of California, Riverside. Her work on play in the visual arts can be found in October, Papers of Surrealism, and scattered among a number of recent anthologies. Currently she is a fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton, where she is finishing a book on the ludic strategies of the interwar avant-gardes.
Dawn M. Phillips is Research Fellow in Philosophy for the AHRC Project ‘Aesthetics After Photography’. In published articles she has critically examined the ‘mind-independence’ of photographic images and defended the significance of the causal provenance of photographs by presenting an original account of the photographic production process. Her current work includes a comparison between photography and music and her further interests lie in trace, transparency, testimony and time, which in various ways relate to photography as a recording medium.
Jeff Wall is one of the most influential photographic artists of his generation. He studied art history at the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, and at the Courtauld Institute, London. His work has been exhibited in numerous international exhibitions, including a touring solo retrospective at the Museum of Modern Art, New York; The Art Institute of Chicago, and the San Francisco Museum of Art, in 2007. He has been the recipient of numerous prizes, including The Paul de Hueck and Norman Walford Career Achievement Award for Art Photography (2001); Ontario Arts Council, Canada; Erna and Victor Hasselblad Foundation International Award in Photography (2002); and the Roswitha Haftmann Prize for the Visual Arts (2003).
Nigel Warburton is Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at the Open University. He has published a number of articles on the philosophy and history of photography and edited a book about the photographer Bill Brandt. His other books include Ernö Goldfinger: the Life of an Architect; The Art Question and Free Speech: A Very Short Introduction. He regularly teaches courses on aesthetics at Tate Modern and, with David Edmonds, makes the podcast Philosophy Bites. For more information see www.nigelwarburton.com.
