[iDC] iDC Digest, Vol 37, Issue 33

Thu Nov 22 16:15:21 UTC 2007

Sorry to jump into this thread a bit late.  But adding to Richard's 
response to John, I'd like to shift the terms of the debate a bit. 
John, I'm wondering whether the vast majority of artworks created on 
various new media platforms hasn't shifted the terms of our 
curatorial responsibilities away from "fidelity" per se, especially 
as understood within an oral-written binary.  Particularly were we to 
emphasize "narrative fidelity," I'm wondering if interactive works 
and works with multiple narrative and sound tracks don't encourage 
users (and curators and archivists) to prioritize the fluidity of 
fabulation and the nature of the artistic shifter over prior 
institutional concerns with fidelity.  Speaking of the shifter, a 
linguistic concept, it sometimes points to the event or act of 
reference without embodying or signifying a particular referent.  On 
a less abstract level, this could mean emphasizing the emulation of 
networks, processes, procedures, and interactions more, say, than the 
reproduction or replication of particular source code, exhibition 
environments, or recording/playing instruments.  In this case, the 
emphasis would be the open-endedness of fabulation, a process that 
grows and changes in time, rather than the closure of "narrative 
fidelity" and the aura of "source" itself.

Best,

Tim

>

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>Today's Topics:
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>    1. Re: shelf life (john sobol)
>    2. Re: shelf life (Richard Rinehart)
>
>
>----------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>Message: 1
>Date: Wed, 21 Nov 2007 08:36:05 -0500
>From: john sobol <john at johnsobol.com>
>Subject: Re: [iDC] shelf life
>To: Richard Rinehart <rinehart at berkeley.edu>
>Cc: idc at mailman.thing.net
>Message-ID: <b4b8dc1feadff9e48e07b908b2a46bae at johnsobol.com>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII; format=flowed
>
>Hi Richard,
>
>lots of excellent food for thought... but there are two points I'd make
>in response to your latest post:
>
>You say, in relation to the Variable Media Project:
>
>>   some degree of re-interpretation is certainly required, the same as
>>  it's required of a conductor when leading a symphony in the
>>  (re)performance of a piece by Beethoven, or when a story is re-told
>>  again and again.
>
>The problem I see here is precisely that the two examples you give are
>not compatible, not of a kind. In fact, they represent fixity and
>fluidity at their most divergent. A symphonic score, despite the
>reverence afforded the conductor-as-interpreter, is an extremely fixed
>musical form. Not just because every one of the thousands of notes in a
>Beethoven symphony is played in identical sequence every time the work
>is performed, and has been for two hundred years, but also because of
>the extreme homogeneity within European classical music instrumental
>sound culture. The fact is that the range of sounds heard between, say,
>100 classical trumpet players playing Beethoven is less than that you'd
>find between any two jazz trumpet players performing Body and Soul. Or,
>for that matter two storytellers reciting Ali Baba and the Forty
>Thieves, or the Iliad. Which brings us to what happens when a story is
>re-told again and again.
>
>The seminal work of Millman Parry and Alfred Lord in the early 20th
>century, which laid the groundwork for a wide range of studies of oral
>cultures, notably by Walter J Ong and his colleague Marshall McLuhan,
>demonstrated conclusively that the widely credited feats of memory by
>oral poets performing day-long epic poems were an illusion. Their field
>recordings in Serbia and Croatia over decades showed that despite the
>sworn assurances of poets and their audiences that they were reciting
>their poems with 'word-for-word' precision year after year, their
>poetic recitations were in fact 'woven', or improvised, from a vast
>array of poetic stock phrases, also known in contemporary oral cultures
>as 'riffs' or 'samples'. They were not at all 'word for word' or
>anything remotely like it, any more than any two recordings of
>Greensleeves by John Coltrane are identical.
>
>The oral poet cannot possibly hope to compete with the symphonic
>orchestra for narrative fidelity. Nor would he or she wish to. The two
>forms of recitation are profoundly dissimilar. They engage different
>neurons, different relationships, different dialogues. One would be
>lost - void - without the written page, whose fixed directives the
>musicians enact, and whose output provides listeners with an immersive
>refuge in transcribed canonized genius. The other relies on a form of
>creative expression that mashes up the intangible past freely, easily
>and highly contingently in pursuit of a collectively renegotiated
>present. One is literate, and fixity is its defining characteristic.
>(Just see how long it takes to get thrown out a great orchestra for
>getting any ONE of those thousands of notes wrong!) The other is oral
>and has no fixed past, only the need to recreate one again and again in
>its own shifting image, always new, always true.
>
>But they are not in any way interchangeable. Nor can they be lumped
>together. They are antagonists. They do not and cannot coexist within
>the same cultural framework.
>
>
>You also make some very valid points in defense of museums, while
>recognizing their need to change, but in response to my point...
>
>>>  Museums are about art products not art processes, whereas folkloric
>>>  traditions are experiential and interpersonal by nature.
>
>you say
>
>>  to say museums are not experiential is perhaps a bit much. After all,
>>  one experiences artworks, objects, installations, and the like, right?
>>  This is the whole idea behind a museum...
>
>Well yes, we do. But as with the example above, the kind of experience
>in each is very different. Knowing that one can come back tomorrow or
>next year and see the same artwork in the same place, or buy a book or
>postcard of it, knowing that knowledge is available 'on the shelf',  is
>not the same thing as events experienced as unique, dependent upon a
>social context that can never be precisely recreated.
>
>Anyway, I'll cut my rant short here, fearing that I'm getting too
>preachy (wouldn't be the first time) and again conclude with a strong
>sense of doubt that older museums can abandon their historical mandate
>to preserve authenticity in order to  become fluidly responsive to
>context. And I say this though I know some excellent people working
>passionately from within museums to make this happen. But it would be
>like a bassoon player in a famous philharmonic deciding to improvise
>during a performance of Ode to Joy, and being applauded by the
>conductor fro doing so! It's just not going to happen. The two cultures
>- fluidity and fixity - are very, very, very tough to reconcile.
>
>So I remain a skeptic, tho I will definitely check out some of your
>documentation, when I am not spending so much of my precious free time
>writing long posts on this list!
>
>Regards,
>John
>
>
>
>------------------------------
>
>Message: 2
>Date: Wed, 21 Nov 2007 16:04:48 -0800
>From: Richard Rinehart <rinehart at berkeley.edu>
>Subject: Re: [iDC] shelf life
>To: john sobol <john at johnsobol.com>
>Cc: idc at mailman.thing.net
>Message-ID: <p06230903c36a7078d69d@[169.229.5.51]>
>Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii" ; format="flowed"
>
>John,
>
>Great counter-arguments and thoughts. One never knows when to drop a
>thread on a list like this, so I'll just keep plunging along til I'm
>told to shut up :)
>
>I probably wasn't writing clearly, but I didn't mean to suggest that
>western musical notation and practice was symmetrical with oral
>traditions; I rather wanted to suggest that those are both examples
>of traditions that are still more fluid than traditional museological
>fixation on a single, authentic, primary, and
>unchanging/inviolate/continuous physical object, and that digital art
>preservation needs to head further in the general direction of both
>music and stories; more fluid.
>
>Western music is of course one of the more fixed traditions,
>certainly true, but still with room for interpretation in terms of
>approach, attack, fingering, etc., and there are scores that include
>places explicitly for improv to happen and many jazz pieces are
>scored too. So still more open than uber-fixed museum preservation.
>But yet another example of art forms that seem to survive with more
>fluidity might be theater. For instance, I'm thinking the original
>Hamlet production transforming into the 2000 film version with Ethan
>Hawke.
>
>So, whatever ratio of fixity to fluidity each of the examples above
>exhibit, they nonetheless must strike that balance ; none of them is
>completely open, nor completely fixed. Completely open and the work
>dissolves; there is no continuity at all and what you have is a
>completely new work each time with no relation to past works.
>Completely fixed and the parameters for (re)performing or presenting
>are so strict that only the original moment will ever fit the bill,
>cancelling out any chance at longevity. So, I guess I don't see it as
>a binary dilemma; that fluidity and fixity are mutually exclusive,
>rather they exist at either end of a continuum and the preservation
>of all art/cultural forms land somewhere in between.
>
>Digital art preservation is nowhere on that continuum yet; it's too
>new, but I would strongly urge that it resist the intertia of history
>and NOT be placed at the same point as traditional museum
>preservation of objects, and instead land somewhere a little toward
>music, stories or theater - perhaps somewhere between western music
>and oral tradition. Of course where digital art ends up will
>determine, for instance, whether we can call the work by the same
>name when re-creating it a century from now, or whether we need to
>append a "2.0" or some such mechanism.
>
>And alas, poor museums, always suffer in these discussions; I guess
>it's natural and necessary. But I'd ask everyone to consider that the
>notion of the museum as exclusively the temple of the unchanging and
>fixed is a very 19th century notion. 20th and 21st century museums
>are already engaging with much more fluid forms; site-specific and
>temporary installation art, performance art, etc. Even my own latest
>exhibition, at a museum, was a hybrid between works that remain on
>view in the gallery for months, to performances that were
>improvisational and gone in one night, to digital works that are
>open-sourced on the Internet for anyone to download and re-mix into
>new versions of the work. (see
>http://bampfa.berkeley.edu/digitalart/ripmixburn).
>
>(you actually raise an interesting point about museums in comparison
>to libraries though; it's libraries that promise more or less
>"continual access" to their collections; museums rotate their
>exhibitions and thus access all the time; very fluid, sometimes
>frustratingly so)
>
>I guess we all agree here on certain basics; that the formal
>institution cannot do this in it's current configuration, we only
>differ on the amount of optimism (blind?) that we have regarding the
>ability of the institution to upgrade in time to remain relevant :)
>
>
>Richard Rinehart
>---------------
>Digital Media Director & Adjunct Curator
>Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive
>bampfa.berkeley.edu
>---------------
>University of California, Berkeley
>---------------
>2625 Durant Ave.
>Berkeley, CA, 94720-2250
>ph.510.642.5240
>fx.510.642.5269
>
>
>At 8:36 AM -0500 11/21/07, john sobol wrote:
>>Hi Richard,
>>
>>lots of excellent food for thought... but there are two points I'd
>>make in response to your latest post:
>>
>>You say, in relation to the Variable Media Project:
>>
>>>   some degree of re-interpretation is certainly required, the same
>>>as it's required of a conductor when leading a symphony in the
>>>(re)performance of a piece by Beethoven, or when a story is re-told
>>>again and again.
>>
>>The problem I see here is precisely that the two examples you give
>>are not compatible, not of a kind. In fact, they represent fixity
>  >and fluidity at their most divergent. A symphonic score, despite the
>  >reverence afforded the conductor-as-interpreter, is an extremely
>>fixed musical form. Not just because every one of the thousands of
>>notes in a Beethoven symphony is played in identical sequence every
>>time the work is performed, and has been for two hundred years, but
>>also because of the extreme homogeneity within European classical
>>music instrumental sound culture. The fact is that the range of
>>sounds heard between, say, 100 classical trumpet players playing
>>Beethoven is less than that you'd find between any two jazz trumpet
>>players performing Body and Soul. Or, for that matter two
>>storytellers reciting Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, or the Iliad.
>>Which brings us to what happens when a story is re-told again and
>>again.
>>
>>The seminal work of Millman Parry and Alfred Lord in the early 20th
>>century, which laid the groundwork for a wide range of studies of
>>oral cultures, notably by Walter J Ong and his colleague Marshall
>>McLuhan, demonstrated conclusively that the widely credited feats of
>>memory by oral poets performing day-long epic poems were an
>>illusion. Their field recordings in Serbia and Croatia over decades
>>showed that despite the sworn assurances of poets and their
>>audiences that they were reciting their poems with 'word-for-word'
>>precision year after year, their poetic recitations were in fact
>>'woven', or improvised, from a vast array of poetic stock phrases,
>>also known in contemporary oral cultures as 'riffs' or 'samples'.
>>They were not at all 'word for word' or anything remotely like it,
>>any more than any two recordings of Greensleeves by John Coltrane
>>are identical.
>>
>>The oral poet cannot possibly hope to compete with the symphonic
>>orchestra for narrative fidelity. Nor would he or she wish to. The
>>two forms of recitation are profoundly dissimilar. They engage
>>different neurons, different relationships, different dialogues. One
>>would be lost - void - without the written page, whose fixed
>>directives the musicians enact, and whose output provides listeners
>>with an immersive refuge in transcribed canonized genius. The other
>>relies on a form of creative expression that mashes up the
>>intangible past freely, easily and highly contingently in pursuit of
>>a collectively renegotiated present. One is literate, and fixity is
>>its defining characteristic. (Just see how long it takes to get
>>thrown out a great orchestra for getting any ONE of those thousands
>>of notes wrong!) The other is oral and has no fixed past, only the
>>need to recreate one again and again in its own shifting image,
>>always new, always true.
>>
>>But they are not in any way interchangeable. Nor can they be lumped
>>together. They are antagonists. They do not and cannot coexist
>>within the same cultural framework.
>>
>>
>>You also make some very valid points in defense of museums, while
>>recognizing their need to change, but in response to my point...
>>
>>>>Museums are about art products not art processes, whereas
>>>>folkloric traditions are experiential and interpersonal by nature.
>>
>>you say
>>
>>>to say museums are not experiential is perhaps a bit much. After
>>>all, one experiences artworks, objects, installations, and the
>>>like, right? This is the whole idea behind a museum...
>>
>>Well yes, we do. But as with the example above, the kind of
>>experience in each is very different. Knowing that one can come back
>>tomorrow or next year and see the same artwork in the same place, or
>>buy a book or postcard of it, knowing that knowledge is available
>>'on the shelf',  is not the same thing as events experienced as
>>unique, dependent upon a social context that can never be precisely
>>recreated.
>>
>>Anyway, I'll cut my rant short here, fearing that I'm getting too
>>preachy (wouldn't be the first time) and again conclude with a
>>strong sense of doubt that older museums can abandon their
>>historical mandate to preserve authenticity in order to  become
>>fluidly responsive to context. And I say this though I know some
>>excellent people working passionately from within museums to make
>  >this happen. But it would be like a bassoon player in a famous
>>philharmonic deciding to improvise during a performance of Ode to
>>Joy, and being applauded by the conductor fro doing so! It's just
>>not going to happen. The two cultures - fluidity and fixity - are
>>very, very, very tough to reconcile.
>>
>>So I remain a skeptic, tho I will definitely check out some of your
>>documentation, when I am not spending so much of my precious free
>>time writing long posts on this list!
>>
>>Regards,
>>John
>
>
>--
>
>
>
>------------------------------
>
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>_______________________________________________
>Institute for Distributed Creativity (iDC)
>_______________________________________________
>www.distributedcreativity.org
>_______________________________________________
>The research of the Institute for Distributed Creativity
>(iDC) focuses on collaboration in media art, technology,
>and theory with an emphasis on social contexts.
>_______________________________________________
>
>
>End of iDC Digest, Vol 37, Issue 33
>***********************************

-- 
Timothy Murray
Professor of Comparative Literature and English
Director of Graduate Studies in Film and Video
Curator, The Rose Goldsen Archive of New Media Art, Cornell Library
http://goldsen.library.cornell.edu
285 Goldwin Smith Hall
Cornell University
Ithaca, New York  14853

office: 607-255-4086
e-mail: tcm1 at cornell.edu