undercover (2007, 59 MB, 13:21 min.)
by Brian Bress.
Monthly Archives: January 2011
Edward Picot: Dr Hairy in Frank Talking #3
Frank Talking #3 (2010, 278MB, 10:01 min)
Latest instalment in Edward Picot’s Dr Hairy saga which feels like
a weird amalgam of Oliver Postgate, soap and Carry On.
It’s interesting to observe how bold, deft & convincing Picot has become with the lo-fi
techniques he deploys in these and, furthermore, how engaging the actual
narrative is.
Great stuff!
“Toe Jam” by Keith Schofield
Toe Jam (2009, 23MB, 3:27 min.)
A number of people get naked in “Toe Jam”, The BPA featuring
David Byrne and Dizzee Rascal. Directed by Keith Schofield.
Oliver Laric – 2010 Clip Arts
2010 Clip Arts (2010, 20MB, 3:21 min)
Stunningly executed, but, for me at least, somewhat vacuous
sequel to his 787 Clip Arts of 2006.
From oliverlaric.com
Array – United Visual Artists
“Array is a field of columns set in the courtyard of the Chuya Nakahara
Memorial Museum in Southern Japan. The columns create a field of
light and sound which gently shifts in response to the viewers
Alan Sondheim – Over The Edge
Over The Edge (2010, 49MB, 1:37 min)
Alan Dojoji Pushes Fau Ferdinand in the Water because
She’s not Paying Him any ATTENTION!
so the story will be about I’m trying DESPERATELY TO GET YOUR ATTENTION,
but you’re ignoring me because you’re away or sleeping or not watching the
terrific goings-on in OpenSim so I sneak up on you (because you’re not
looking) and push you into the water which is very difficult because
pushing avatars requires the greatest skill, making sure that the pusher
is right behind the pushee, otherwise the pushee escapes, so you’re pushed
into the water and just as you’re falling you wake up and type “UOY” which
can only mean it’s a backwards world, and then we’re both in the water and
I’m dancing furiously and AGAIN YOU’RE PAYING NO ATTENTION!
Alan Sondheim
Diez – Architectural Mapping Preview – Metz Station
The Summer of Van Torre – Human Dog
European Vacation (2005, 25.6 MB, 2:18 min.)
Morning Routine (2005, 44.3 MB, 4:34 min.)
The Summer of Van Torre was hugely popular in 2005 in video blogging circles.
The wepisodes recount the life of Jon VanTorre, each week bringing him closer
to total cardiac arrest with Ether Baths, Spider-Man Nightmares, and Meat Sandwiches.
The series (which began in 2001) was presented online in 05 by Human Dog.
Here is an interview (2005, 67.5 MB, 13 min.) by Josh Leo with writers & directors
Jon VanTorre, Michael Schwartz and Chris Weagel.
Curt Cloninger –TOM#2
Touch Me (2011, 562KB , 2:00 min)
Hear Me (2011, 12MB, 1:11 min)
Second two parts of TOM (an instrumental rock opera remix in four parts)
by Curt Cloninger, of which we posted the first two last week.
Tony Oursler – Studio: 7 Months of My Aesthetic Education (Plus Some)
7 Months of My Aesthetic Education (2005, 14 MB, 1:45 min.)
Speed up documentation from Tony Oursler‘s installation, “Studio: Seven Months of My
Aesthetic Education (Plus Some)” at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2005.
It combined video, sound, music and poetry to create environments that truly reflect the dissolving
boundaries of twenty-first-century culture. The work is inspired by Courbet
Thomas Bayrle – (b)alt
“Thomas Bayrle has been pursuing the concept of developing ‘superstructures’
from encapsulated image patterns since the 1960s. He uses it for drawings,
photocopy-montages or film animations, at first needing to work painstakingly
by hand. It is now possible to process images like this more or less automatically
by computer. Thomas Bayrle meets his grandson in the computer-animated video
‘(b)alt’ and uses interconnecting, superimposed image patters to address the
sequence of human generations sensually as well as metaphorica”
From Media Art Net.
Chris Caines – Mathematics
Mathematics (2010, 163MB, 10:40 min)
There’s a wonderful deadpan quality to this piece from Chris Caines,
which captures dream logic perfectly (and satisfyingly –
I was worried about bathos and I needn’t have.)
It looks and sounds rather sumptuous too.
I do wonder if it couldn’t have moved just a tad quicker…
Annie Abrahams
Mutant #2 (2010, 64MB, 4:04 min)
Annie Abrahams is a singular and compelling voice, her singularity
ironically copper-bottomed by her willingness to embrace the network
& collaboration thereon fearlessly, inquisitively and to always
striking effect. This piece is described as a video arising out of
the second session of a
“Telematic Performance / Experiment investigating communication and
relational dynamics in a dispersed group.”
and it’s bewitching.
The pages documenting it bear the motto
“Communication is never clean, smooth and transparent”
True – and to turn that truth into crystalline & affecting art is a little miracle.
Derek Larson – Measurement: Burn
Measurement: Burn (2010, 50MB,1:52 min.)
“Part I of the Measurement series; displaying approximate measurements in
video space in reference to Mel Bochner‘s 1969 piece, Measurement: Shadow.”
Ethernet Orchestra Networked Improvisation Live on FBi Radio, Sydney
Ethernet Orchestra on FBi Radio (2010, 92MB, 11:48 min)
More from the splendid Ethernet Orchestra with:
in Sydney, Australia – Roger Mills (Processed Trumpets), Bukhchuluun Ganburged (Mongolian Horse fiddle and throat singing) and Yavuz Uydu (Turkish Oud and Bendir)
in Londrina, Brazil – Chris Vine (Guitar)
and in Braunschweig, Germany – Martin Slawig (Laptop Electronics and Max/MSP processing).
All of it great, though I’m particularly a sucker for the throat singing.
Curt Cloninger –TOM
Feel Me (2011, 11MB, 1:03 min)
Two parts of a rather good new work –
TOM (an instrumental rock opera remix in four parts)
by Curt Cloninger, of whom we are fans.
He remixes the 1975 film of the Who’s rock opera Tommy to striking effect.
I can’t imagine crossing the road to see the original, even for free, but
here Curt’s sense of beauty, drama and balance – which have served him
well in a number of works and projects involving remix/appropriation, notably
his fantastic playdamage project –
redeem banality to something genuinely affecting.
More next week.
Brian Bress – rock your body
Chris Laxton/Yell at Birds – Curse Her Black Heart
Curse Her Black Heart (2010, 137MB, 4:24 min)
Chris Laxton’s creative deployment of a turntable & nice fractal images…
Omer Golan – Non-Linear Creation
Non-Linear Creation (2010, 58 MB, 3:16 min.)
Installation at ‘Fresh Paint 3‘ in Old Jaffa Port, Israel. the project is based on a live
camera input where the video camera is mounted above a the projection screen.
“The thought behind “Non-Linear Creation” is to think about video as some sort
of a “streaming deck of cards” which I shuffled again and again in real time using
Cycling74’s Max. I collected in a memory buffer the latest 60 cards/video frames,
shuffled them and played the outcome in 30 frames per second. The result is a video in
which the viewer is in constant, unnatural, flickering present, as it is reflected in the video.”
By Omer Golan.
Nuit blanches 2010 Metz, France with DIEZ and paradigme
Nuit blanches 2010 – DIEZ and paradigme (2010, 41 MB, 1:55 min.)
Collaboration of Video mapping, light and sound installation, done for
Nuit blanches 2010 Metz.
Audio Visual design by paradigme.
Scenography and video mapping by DIEZ.
Marc Garrett & Ruth Catlow – At Winter Equinox We Burn the Sun
At Winter Equinox We Burn the Sun (2010, 37MB, 3:48 min)
And by way of wishing a Happy New Year to all, here’s a tremendous piece from my friends
Marc Garrett & Ruth Catlow, the movers behind the indispensable Furtherfield.org & the Netbehaviour list.
Here they ritually burn a copy of the evil Murdoch’s UK organ The Sun & accompany this
with music both apposite and well executed.
I think this is shot very well. I don’t mean in a boring technical sense – who gives a? –
but that it is utterly alive, especially those beautiful final, almost vertical, shots.
There’s a delicious play here too on folkishness which treads a fine line in avoiding
being itself folksy.
Further – here’s a practical demonstration of how political art doesn’t have to
be dour or ploddingly earnest and indeed can summon a visceral beauty.
There’s a dialogue (or, perhaps better, an argument) between this celebration of the beauty
of the world, betokened in this scene and what passes therein, and the real ugliness and
anti-humanity of the paper and its contents.
Great Great Great.