This is a post about META

On Saturday afternoon I went to META. I walked to the Bourroghes (Queen and Bathurst) from my house, and trust me that's a distance. Also I had a giant blister on my foot, so owie.

The show was on the sixth floor of the building. The elevator was terrifying.

It's a high-ceilinged open space with ART in it. ART EVERYWHERE. I don't know how many pieces were there, but it was a number. Most disappointingly, the first piece at the entrance (cars that make music or whatever) weren't doing anything. I went left.

There was the immersive WTF thing, but someone was in that. And there was the music playing thing, but strangers were using it. So I looked at the earthquake ready/lie detecty machine that was drawing pictures. Cool. And then I listened to the voices in the corner. It reminds me of Janet Cardiff's piece The 40 Part Motet, but with people talking about their experience with mental illness instead of signing a beautiful motet.

Next I went right. I looked at the rain room thing. I wondered if I should step into it, but there were mirrors on the floor so I just looked. It's a very visually interesting piece. The mirrors on the floor and ceiling make the rain on the wall look like it's going down into the floor forever. And the sound of rain is very calming. Also calming - the womb room. I think I stayed in there for a while because it's quiet and dark and I like that kind of thing.

Then I went into the back section. There was a hanging sculpture with rear projection mapping. A dress I didn't realize was moving until I read the thing on the wall. A bike and mirror that I didn't realize were part of the same piece. A thing trying to solve a marble maze except there was no end point and it just looked really sad. Kathleen was there? And the thing at the end that I didn't realize what it was supposed to do. There was a bridge I was afraid to step on, but I did and the touch screen seemed really unresponsive. And then I went back to the front room.

The WTF video installation thing was free, so I stepped inside. It was... disagreeable. I felt probably how Republicans feel when they watch Michael Moore documentaries. The medium was appropriate to get the message across, but I feel like the message is fundamentally conservative. Technology changes the way we interact with the world, and that's perfectly acceptable to me. It's ironic that new media was used to promote an anti-technology view.

While I was back, I also took the personality test thing. It reminds me of one of those online quizzes you take to find out "which Game of Thrones character are you?" and it's probably based in some philosophy of personality I fundamentally disagree with. I guess some people like to know how INT-J they are because they need this information for something. I also don't understand the necessity of the video game layer. It's a multiple choice quiz. Those have existed for far longer than Unity has.

And then I walked home. And that was my experience of META 2014.

Guest Speaker - Antonin Fourneau

This Wednesday (March 5), Antonin came to speak about his work and process.

I thought a lot of Antonin's pieces used video games and game hardware in interesting ways. I find that the interactive pieces fit into two categories: 1. using existing game hardware to interact with new elements (IkeaStation) and 2. creating a new mechanism for interacting with existing games (Patch & KO).

The reference to familiar systems does the pieces a great service. It sort of relates to what my section of Max Dean's class was talking about at the gallery -- how does the form of the piece work to welcome interaction? In a lot of Antonin's pieces, there's an existing reference point that we are already comfortable interacting with. You see a PlayStation controller, and you already know how to interact with it. Or you recognize a fighting game and realize it needs your input if it's going to work. This familiarity provides a necessary bridge for engagement with the work.

There's also the interesting example of the non-interactive piece Ghostpad (the joystick that moves by itself). It uses the familiar form of an inherently interactive joystick, but subverts expectations by moving by itself. A lot of new media piece move by themselves, so that's nothing special. The interesting part is the subversion that comes from previous associations with the material.

IkeaStation

Patch & KO

Ghostpad

Installation Proposal - There Are Knives

Here is a copy of the proposal I proposed on Thursday, for a piece I will be making this spring.

ARTIST STATEMENT

There Are Knives is a sculptural installation featuring hundreds of suspended plastic knives. I will hang 200 tightly-spaced plastic knives from the ceiling so that they point towards the middle of the room. A spot in which participants are encouraged to stand. The knives will cover a wall and a portion of the ceiling and be cut into points, like prison shivs. The position of the knives creates tension in the space. Although the sculpture is static it evokes immense danger. I want to create a space that is threatening and uncomfortable for the person in it, and makes them hyper-aware of their position in space and time.

Some concepts in this piece are drawn from the work of other artists. Spatial awareness and danger are subjects of the work of Marina Abramović. In Rhythm 10 (1973), knives and an element of danger are fundamental elements of the performance. Another of her pieces, The Artist is Present (2010), forces participants to be present and in the moment – essentially putting them on the spot. This is what I hope to achieve with my piece: total body awareness.

I also draw from the materiality of other works. Suspension of sharp objects is achieved by Guo-Qiang in Bon Voyage: 10,000 Collectables from the Airport (2004). And in The Mending Project, Beili Liu performs beneath hundreds of pairs of scissors that hang from the ceiling.  

VISUAL SUPPORT MATERIAL
Installation Cross-Section
 
 Knife Modification
   

REFERENCES

Abramović, Marina. “Rhythm 10”. 1973. 
Abramović, Marina. “The Artist is Present”. MoMA. 2010.
Guo-Qiang, Cai. “Bon Voyage: 10,000 Collectables from the Airport”. Collection of Centre national d’art et de culture Georges Pompidou, Paris. 2004.
Liu, Beili. “The Mending Project”. 2011.

Installation Idea - Don't Look Up

This is a model of an installation I plan to make. Here, the paper represents a wall and ceiling. The thumbtacks are knives that will be securely affixed to the wall and ceiling. The figure is for scale.

Artist Presentation - Marina Abramović

The artist I researched and talked about is Marina Abramović. She is a performance artist who is concerned with awareness of body, time, and ephemeral experiences.

She was born in 1946 and originally from Serbia (formerly Yugoslavia). She began doing performance art in Yugoslavia in 1973. In 1976, she moved to Amsterdam and met her long-time collaborator Ulay (Frank Uwe Laysiepen). Her most recent collaborators include Lady Gaga and Jay-Z.

Abramović has said that "Performance is time-based art. Performance is living form of art. And performance is immaterial form of art. It is very important for the public to understand and feel for themselves."

The concepts I draw on from her work is its immateriality, its time-conscious form, and the way it makes its audience aware of their own bodies. She uses the body and time as a medium, and often incorporates her own body and the bodies of her audience. Her work forces you to be present and in the moment. You are aware of your own body in relation to others in a way that is unable to be captured. The immateriality of her work fascinates me. It requires the audience to be in the moment of experience, like zen meditation. Life is fleeting. You try to hold onto it, but you can't. Best not to try.

Some of her works:

Rhythm 10 (1973, top left) - Recorded sound of the knife game until she cut herself, then played the recording back and tried to match exactly while also recording a new track. There were 6 tape recorders and 20 knives. She merged past and present, using time and her own body as media.

Rhythm 0 (1974, top center) - She stood passive for 6 hours with a table of 72 objects. Participants could do anything to her. At first they were shy, but then they became more and more bold. Someone tore her clothes. Someone pricked her skin with the thorns of a rose. Someone pointed a loaded gun at her, and someone else pointed it away.

Imponderabilia (1977, top right) - Abramović and Ulay stand facing each other in a doorway, naked. In squeezing through the doorway, one must choose which artist to face.

The Great Wall Walk (1988, bottom left) - In order to break up their practice, Abramović and Ulay walked to opposite ends of the Great Wall of China from its middle, never to see each other again until

The Artist is Present (2010, bottom right) - Abramović sat at a table in MoMA for three months. People were invited to sit silently across from her. Many attended, including Ulay. It was not only participatory for the audience, but also performative.

All these works explore ideas of body awareness and utilize time as a medium. They create no lasting artifacts, and need to be experienced as a performance and often a participatory work. Most of all, they force the audience to be present.

My Slides