Culture Jam 2.0

I decided to redo my culture jam project. I felt that it was the weakest of the projects that were assigned and I felt that the idea I was trying to project didn't show based on feedback from my piers. I kept the theme of keeping the earth clean and healthy. This time, I drew my original character and scanned it into the software. I went with a "sad stump" to show that a former tree is depressed because of the new life he lives. I added the symbol for recycling to show that if more recycling were to happen less trees would have to suffer his fate.

I jammed this in the cafeteria at SFSU. In the upper cafe and lower cafe seating areas. I placed these flyers that I printed out onto tables in the morning and handed them to people who were getting coffee or breakfast. Though this was my second culture jam I was still hesitant and anxious to carry out the jam. Taking photos was the hardest part. I was even more scared to the point of being in panic, to take a picture of people. I wasn't comfortable with people looking at me. I think this is because I didn't know if they were okay with my art, or with the idea of the jam, or something similar. Something inside me is ashamed or embarrassed to share things without the permission of other people taking it in. It reminded me of proselytizing one's faith.

The Augmented Body - Plugging In

As a human species, we have used technology to learn, adapt, and grow, but we continue to pollute the Earth with harmful chemicals, slaughter animals to extinction, and allow criminals to terrorize the innocent without justice, the once beautiful land is now barren and extremely dangerous. It is not ideal for you or your loved ones to live in such a hospitable environment. Fortunately for you there is an alternative. With the new marriage of hightech electronics and body preservation, it is now possible to live in paradise, forever. You will live in a virtual paradigm. Your brain will be plugged in and your thoughts, memories, and consciousness uploaded to our database. In our virtual world you will be as perfect as you can imagine. A strong, healthy copy of your physical self. Let go of reality and embrace virtuality as we augment your brain with our technology.

Mitchell Baker

April 27, 2015

E.A.T. -- Experiments in Art and Technology

Experiments in Art and Technology was founded in 1966 by engineers Billy Klüver and Fred Waldhauer and artists Robert Rauschenberg and Robert Whitman. The non-profit organization brought together engineers and artists to work on performances that incorporated new technology. E.A.T. Became an essential catalyst in stimulating the involvement of technology into the art world. It worked together with engineers and contemporary artists.

Artists and the art community responded enthusiastically to E.A.T. By 1969, given early efforts to attract engineers, the group had over 2,000 artist members as well as 2,000 engineer members willing to work with artists. Expressions of interest and requests for technical assistance came from all over the United States and Canada and from Europe, Japan, South America and elsewhere. People were encouraged to start local E.A.T. groups and about 15 to 20 were formed. Artists involved with 9 Evenings: Theatre and Engineering include: John Cage, Lucinda Childs, Öyvind Fahlström, Alex Hay, Deborah Hay, Steve Paxton, Yvonne Rainer, Robert Rauschenberg, David Tudor, and Robert Whitman. Notable engineers involved include: Bela Julesz, Billy Klüver, Max Mathews, John Pierce, Manfred Schroeder, and Fred Waldhauer.

Video projection, wireless sound transmission, and Doppler sonar resonate from the 1960's. Never before had any used these tools to artistically display a piece. This merging of science, technology, and art broke down the barriers for decades to come.

The pinnacle of E.A.T. was at the Pepsi Pavilion at Expo '70 at Osaka Japan where E.A.T. artists and engineers designed an immersive dome that included a fog sculpture by Fujiko Nakaya. The project included 75 artists and engineers from the US and Japan- the original structure consisted of a geodesic dome covered by a water vapor cloud. A Mylar mirror (spherical) produced real images depicting that of a hologram. Because of the size of the mirror, the spectator could walk around the image and view it from all sides. Surrounding Pepsi Pavilion were seven of Robert Breer's “Floats.” These six foot high sculptures paroled around the pavilion at no more than two feet per minute. They emitted sounds. When the float hit an obstacle or was pushed, it would reverse direction and float in the opposite direction. Those who experienced this Expo first hand would be able to experience what has come to be known as the most important and influential art and technology projects of the 20th Century.

http://experimentsinartandtechnology.net/E.A.T..html

Technology and the Body

Tony Quan is a graffiti artist who was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's Disease. He lost all ability to draw and became an inspiration for Zach Lieberman, James Powderly, Evan Roth, Chris Sugure, and Theo Watson to create "EyeWriter." This device tracks the movement of the eye and translates that movement into marks onto a digital screen. Now people with degenerative nerve disorders like Tony still can have the pleaser of drawing through the device: EyeWriter.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=AztH_YVQN-k

A team called Eidos has build Sensory Augmentation Equipment. One part covers your eyes and another, your mouth and ears. The equipment blocks all sight and sound that you might observe while wearing it, but on the equipment are sensors that pick up the world around you just like your eyes and ears would. The equipment processes these through a computer and gives them back at you in the best quality that you can ever receive. The software even allows you to isolate on what you are interested in and mute out everything else. Check the link for a video for a full explanation.

https://vimeo.com/58771063

Culture Jam

My culture jam project is focused on pollution and the harmful effects that arise from it. I went to different areas in the city and planted this image to remind the public that they are breathing in harmful chemicals. I jammed a particular street near my house that I walk by everyday, down the M line and BART railways, and into Chinatown in San Francisco. I used the "Breathe Easy" logo, a pharmaceutical program that promotes healthy breathing and helps patients that suffer from asthma and the like. I manipulated its image to ironically represent a different ideal. I changed the text to "Breathe Deep," suggesting breathing in heavily the deadly icons circling around it. The skulls and biohazard images were found using a simple google search.

The creation process of my logo was no problem for me, but the jamming part gave me some psychological issues. I wasn't embarrassed to place my logo, rather concerned for what laws I was breaking around public posters. If there were any. I have had my run in with the law and I have turned over new leaves because of the prices I had to pay. I did not enjoy seeing myself shamed in the past and I don't wish to repeat it. If I were to do something like this again. I would more thoroughly research the law about public posting and keep to them. One may argue that, "That's the man keeping you down." or "We must take back our pubic space!" to that I just have to say that I'm not that kind of artist. I'll express my ideals in another fashion. Whether it be a different kind of culture jam or not at all.

I do enjoy the expression of culture jamming. Like most things I don't like the "in your face" style, but a subtle, thought provoking approach that might make you ponder the rest of your walk home.

My logo.

My culture jam on a transformer box door.

Breathe Easy logo

One of the skull images

Adobe Illustrator

Doctor Peppa- Just some practice with Illustrator. I'm using image tracing, layering, text and drop shadow effects. I'm not going to jam this anywhere because I don't have any emotional energy in this piece. I just put it together real fast for the experience. Some things that I found that were difficult in the Adobe Illustrator process was getting fonts to install properly on my machine. I tried to download a font from the internet and install it, but my PC wouldn't allow it. Therefor, I was restricted to using a offset font for the letter 'a.' I got it the closest I could, but it still looks noticeable.

Chance Operations Art

While learning about Chance and Randomness, I got to experience my own chance operation art form. I teamed up with a classmate and we swapped our chance operations that could be used to create art.

This was my chance operation. It simply used different die rolls to complete different tasks that you would systematically do in the painting. I chose to use watercolor as my medium. I used die rolls for everything from choosing the paper size (5x7") to where rolling where I would paint on the paper. I had a operation to stop painting. If I rolled 1-1-1 or high-high-high, I would stop, but I never got those rolls. So, after Filling the page I just stopped.

https://www.wizards.com/dnd/dice/dice.htm

Next Is the random operation I used from Tina:

The instructions got a little beat up and painted on, but they are still readable. Basically it calls for dipping a gummy snack into paint and stamping it onto a page. I'm using gouache here. First the instructions call to stamp horizontally and then vertically. Randomness comes in the gummy you choose from the big pile of gummy snacks that I have now. Like pulling from a hat. Also from the instructions there are randomness from when it says, "the color of the shoes you wore today."

Here are the works that my partners produced using the chance operations that we shared:

 Lance Kramer

 Tina Kashiwagi

Tina Kashiwagi

Culture Jamming: Shock, Shame, Fear, and Anger – Are Believed to be the Catalysts for Social Change.

John Heartfield, an anti Nazi political artist. Born Helmut Herzfeld in June 18, 1891, He was a pioneer in public political art, and probably the father of "Culture Jamming." His messages resonate with truth today as politicians unknowingly emulate the themes of the past. His 3 posters that are popular are "5 fingers Has the Hand," "Adolf the Superman: Swallows Gold and Spouts Junk," and "Never Again!" He used these posters in public places to try to expose German Nazism during World War II; Trying to expose the propaganda that was prevalent during this time. I imagine his posters might have been near these Nazi propaganda posters contrasting his ideal. (Fear)

http://www.johnheartfield.com/John-Heartfield-Exhibition/john-heartfield-art/political-posters-sale

This next artist goes by the name, Eyesaw. As a child he grew to love painting graffiti because of its expressiveness and disregard for authority. Not much is known about Eyesaw, but his aim is clear when he paints. He has worked so far producing advertisement posters. He uses a simple silhouette with a short and amusing story about a person. Eyesaw explains, "By placing my work in prime advertising space the passer-by is almost fooled into believing my work is an advert selling more shit they don’t need." Society's downfall is that they are attracted to a fake ad, such as Eyesaw's and are driven to buy more. However, it isn't real. (Shame)

http://www.eye-saw.net/


Banksy- I love Banksy more than I probably should. His combination of creativity, street art, authority, urban environment, and art is what makes him a strong contender in the street art world. His identity is kept secret and he keeps a very close knit group of friends that help him with his work, but I think that with or without a secret identity the work he puts out is inquisitive and thought provoking. I looked through his website and I looked up culture jamming: Shock, Shame, Fear, Anger- Are believed to be the Catalysts for Social Change. Banksy's work is a little bit of these four. However, I believe, His work is to be a level that transcends Fear, transcends Shame, transcends Shock, and transcends Anger. It is subtle, pleasant, and encouraging. If I could add another word to the list for catalysts for social change. It would be Wisdom. Banksy understands the paint, the canvas, the people he paints, how he paints them, where he paints them, even if its abstract.  (Wisdom)

http://banksy.co.uk/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mLr0qZ86bJs

Chance Operations

Matthew J Koehler and Punyasholke Mishra have developed Inverso, a computer program that randomly selects lines of poetry to form Haikus. Critiques question whether this form of random poetry is a true form of writing or whether the poems the program produces mean anything. One of the more “meaningful” poems Inverso produced is this one here:

    Order from chaos

Big Bang, a day of creation

Spring is coming

(Inverso, 2002)

As an emotion species, we humans get ideas when creation and life itself is questioned. When a computer program starts putting together lines about the big bang and order and chaos and new seasons of change questions arise like, what does this mean? Or what is the author's intentions? Unfortunately the poem is random it's not any different that a nother of Inverso's Haikus:

    The gypsy moths swarm

she fears the simplicy

Winter is coming

(Inverso, 2002)

http://imej.wfu.edu/articles/2002/1/03/index.asp

Wan Chai, Joyce Yung, and Minnie Yip are the founders behind RAW: Random Art Workshop. They are based in Hong Kong and focus on organizing workshops for busy city dwellers to relax and unwind through the enjoyment and randomness that art can bring. RAW doesn't have any set system of chance that I can conclude. However, after thinking about the rituals that a business person has to go through in Hong Kong. Long hours- 6 or 7 days a week- and you're whole career feeds you and your family. Maybe taking some time at Random Art Workshop isn't such a bad idea after all. Even though the system isn't randomized, after a few years of the same job over and over again, even placing down colorful paper down on in a shadow box at random is random enough.

http://yp.scmp.com/article/4117/city-slickers-take-random-chance-art

Remko Scha gives a lecture on the present state of artificial art. Hitting on his section of “Chance Art,” he mentions Picabia and Polke who use a grid and black and white dot system, like pixels. He also talks about the construction of random shapes and random landscapes- A project by Lévy. This draws a “map” with random coastlines. He talks about these simple systems that can be applied to produce results, but there is a “language” that they are trying to develop in order to get more. One such style of coding is Harold Cohen's AARON. It's a drawing program that tries to mimic existing artists. It can have a much richer and more flexible area to develop.

http://www.artificialart.com/rs/artkunstE.html

Art/Science/Tech/Culture in the 21st Century

Himanshu Khatri is ambitiously working on a new display that will be an alternative to LCD or Plasma that we currently use today. It’s called "Aquaplay", and it uses rising bubbles to project a 3D image in front of the user. The instillation currently is heavy, uses a lot of water, and has limited viewing angles at it’s current stages. However, some are hopeful for this new type of display that will contrast the LCD powerhouse. If Aquaplay becomes a resourceful way to present images it can be useful to artist who are looking for a new and edgy way to display digital or 3D models. It can be the sculpture of the future for artists. In a gallery it can be changed to multiple different pieces to fit a theme.

http://www.pixelsumo.com/post/aquaplay

My last post will be on this quick link I saw- "Artbots, the Robot Talent Show." I had to look at this... After reading the description on the website I was a little confused. From my knowledge of robots and computers, robots cannot be creative, yet. Alas, it's about "robotic art and art making robots." There are eleven artists who build robots and they program these robots to create art, I think. These artists are Ranjit Bhatnagar, Alex Braidwood, Ivan Henriques, Katie Koepfinger, Burcum Turkmen, Korinna Lindinger, Logos, Alexander Reben, Dustyn Roberts, Ben Leduc Mills, and Shahar Zaks. I'm assuming that they to give the art a look of free will. However, even the random tasks we give to computers, and robots today run on set algorithms. The most intelligent computer we can build today is about as smart as a cricket. I think this robot art has strange yet interesting application. The non-randomness is and free will to make art is what is holding me back allowing it to be a true art form.

http://www.artbots.org/2011/

Growing up I remember seeing commercials for the incredibly popular toy Tickle-Me-Elmo. I couldn't help, but be disturbed, impressed, repressed, emotional, and stunned at the same time when I peered over Kelly Heaton's multimedia instillation "Live Pelt." I was ultimately drawn in by my memory of this doll and viewing it  in such a radical way is very striking to the senses. In one of her art pieces she has arranged to have 64 Tickle-Me-Elmo dolls transformed into a woman's coat. It provides full body vibration and can be substituted for a lover. The artist developed eight different art pieces in the instillation to describe "Live Pelt." Each with it's own twisted antics. The Trapper, The Industrialist, The Taxidermist, The Alchemist, The Sociopath, The Debutante, and The Fashionista are all different stages or characters who have their pass at each Elmo doll on their way to becoming part of the coat. Heaton's "Live Pelt" has creatively reused the retro Tickle-Me-Elmo doll, and just as some people who owned them in the 90s are getting a little older and will view the art.

http://www.feldmangallery.com/pages/exhsolo/exhhea03.html