There are some basic experimental presumptions that I'd like to try out in the Einsteins Dreams work. There aren't many, but they go to the heart of research in how we compose the behavior of rich responsive environments. The TML starts from where most of the world of interactive environments stops.
One of those places is how events evolve. The obvious ways include: timeline (graph, cues), random (stochastic), decision tree (if-then).
This is where things were at up to the 1990's, well, even now if you ask most programmers and conventional time-based media artists.
I started designing responsive environments with a profoundly different approach to media choreography. And that's been a core part of the TML's radically different way of making rich responsive environments that are more like ecologies. This approach learns from continuous state evolution characteristic of tangible, physical, ecological systems.
Practically, how do we do this? That's an open question. The Topological Media Lab is for exploring open questions, rather than producing artwork reproducing convention. And it is not the case that sprinkling some "AI" will save the day. GIven that learning methods such as HMM, PCA, ICA, are all retrospective, (Bergson's critique of mechanism), and given that scores, scripts, clocks, and timelines cage action, we set them aside in favor of techniques that give us the maximum nuance, and potential for expressive invention over conditioned space. The most powerful alternative we've only begun to exploit is the dynamical systems approach. Rather than rehashing it, let me attach some references, like the "Theater Without Organs" essay (for artists, writers), and the more precise Ozone ACM Multimedia paper.
Most fundamentally, the ED project is to really push on these fronts:
• Move from time-line, random, or decision-tree logics that are typical of engineered environments to dynamical systems modeled on ecologies. (See pages 16-19 of "Theater Without Organs.")
• Acting & Articulating vs. Depicting or Allegory
The TML is about making environments that palpable condition experience in definite ways, not to display representations (pictures) or models of experience. The radical experimental challenge of ED is about inducing rich experiences of dynamics, change, rhythm, not making an image (representation) of some model of time. The latter is merely allegory. Easy. The former is alchemically transmuted experience. Hard. Given enough skill, making representations is easy. We built the TML, got the ED seed grant, and coordinated the temporality seminars these past 3 years to do something hard: inducing a different mode of temporality -- sense of temporal change.
• Rhythm ≠ Isochrony (regularly periodic)
There are no mathematically regular periods "in nature" -- that's an artifact of delusions imposed by our models of mechanical time -- frozen in by computers.
Adrian Freed has a rich way of thinking about this, and a rich way of making things that reflect this.
No matter what "curves" you draw, if the pattern is repeated, then you have imposed an isochronous pattern. So we've cheated life by pushing / pumping with an artificial "beat." Instead, ED includes how pseudo-regularities emerge from the dynamical system.
• Give up (geometric) time as a independent parameter
Also since a few years ago, when people like Adrian and David Morris' students came on board, some people have taken up a challenge I put to radicalize our notion and use of "time"
Instead of using time as an independent parameter, in fact, instead of using any parameter as a "clock" driving the event, use our sensors -- cameras and mics -- to pick up what is happening, and from the contingent action derive the changes of the responsive environment.
100 years ago Bergson insightfully criticized what he called the cinematic conceit of time / temporal experience. (This is part of the point of the Ontogenesis group this past year with Magda, Will, Felix, Liza, Harry, Adrian, and myself.) We don't need to fall back into those naiveties.
Even more fundamentally, let's be mindful of Maturana and Varela's profound observation that "time" is itself just a linguistic description rather than some thing in the stuff of our bodies and the stuff of the world:
Time as a Dimension
Any mode of behavioral distinction between otherwise equivalent interactions, in a domain that has to do with the states of the organism and not with the ambience features which define the interaction, gives rise to a referential dimension as a mode of conduct. This is the case with time. It is sufficient that as a result of an interaction (defined by an ambience configuration) the nervous system should be modified with respect to the specific referential state (emotion of assuredness, for example) which the recurrence of the interaction (regardless of its nature) may generate for otherwise equivalent interactions to cause conducts which distinguish them in a dimension associated with their sequence, and, thus, give rise to a mode of behavior which constitutes the definition and characterization of this dimension. Therefore, sequence as a dimension is defined in the domain of interactions of the organism, not in the operation of the nervous system as a closed neuronal network. Similarly, the behavioral distinction by the observer of sequential states in his recurrent states of nervous activity, as he recursively interacts with them, constitutes the generation of time as a dimension of the descriptive domain. Accordingly, time is a dimension in the domain of descriptions, not a feature of the ambience. (H. Maturana & F. Varela, p 133. Autopoiesis and Cognition. See also Henri Bergson's example of the arcing arm, Creative Evolution, chap 1.)
Why not tug the sun as a controller rather than passively watch it sail out of reach!
As I said before, I think time is an effect not an "independent parameter." This permits a more profound interpretation of Lightman's novel beyond its "time is…" syntax.
• Functional relation ≠> Determinism
A curve f(t), eg f(t) = sin(t), can provide an utterly precise and reproducible result simply because it is a FUNCTION. For example, f(t) could govern the height and intensity of the "sun" in the Blackbox. However f(t) need NOT be fed parameters t1, t2, t3 ... in a regularly incremented monotone sequence. There just needs to be a (reversible) function in order to have reproducibility of the event when the action is reproduced.
There is a profound performative difference in live experience between a a fixed curve -- a graph which is traced from left to right in order, and a f[t] = Sin[t] ready to be evaluated given any input.
In the example above, "t" is the INDEPENDENT parameter. y = f(t) is the DEPENDENT parameter. In a realistic system, there is no reason to presume that the world runs on only one independent parameter. (the "unidimensionality" fallacy)
• Functions
There is no contradiction with the graphs that J drew. In fact we use this in many places in Ozone code for 10 years in the form of Max function object (you draw the curve yourself). Jerome could in fact use Morgan and Navid's function-clocks instead of re-inventing the wheel :). But we called those abstractions "fake state" because we knew that they simply imposed a uni-dimensional sequence on the entire event.
Indeed we can write in any number of FUNCTIONAL, even REVERSIBLE (invertible) relations at the parameter level , yielding an arbitrary number of dimensions of deterministic relation between parameters, I.e. optical flow and number of particles; Color of input and wind (potential) force on fluid (MF : red => heat => flow up against gravity); scratchiness of sound and brittleness of floor. ALL of these can be functions of action, and even of each other. That way, the human can do richly nuanced action, and even drive the action in a fully definite manner because the parameters are deterministically coupled to action. But the relation is mapped from action in as many dimensions as the instruments can sense (either as raw or cooked sensor channels).
See Ozone documentation by Mani Thivierge on TML Private WIKI for precise description. Since we are short on time, I propose that composers read the Ozone document merely for the notation and the approach. In this workshop, I propose we try only this notation "on paper" as a way of thinking about composing an event. If the composers have time, they are welcome to write state engines, but that is not necessary this round.
• COMPLEXITY vs RICH, COHERENT ACTION
We do not control complexity by imposing a small number of independent parameters. In fact, as long as we can engineer functional relations, then the human and nonhuman agents can drive the event by ACTION. Actions can be compact and coherent -- e.g. Everyone huddle together and stay huddled together in one place. OR everyone huddle together but move about in a compact group around the floor. Etc. Even if this maps to multiple parameters there should be no need for us actors / inhabitants to think in terms of parameters as we act.
SCRIPTED CONTROL vs LIVE ACTION
There's a fundamental difference in attitude between code state as a trace of what's going on, vs. code as a driver of action.
There are at least three modes of agency: script (machine), human, and medium.
(A) Clock drives event
For example, some software code animates a light simulating the sun rising in the course of a day. The shadow of a pole shortens lengthen as a function of clock-time.
(B) Human drives event
For example: human lifts a lantern. Overhead Camera sees shadow of fixed pole shorten on the floor. Code uses length of shadow to move an image of the sun...
A & B may look quite similar. Downstream media code may even be identical, driven by OSC -- that is via a FUNCTIONAL, hence DETERMINISTIC dependence. But the KEY difference is that A is driven by a clock, and B can be nuanced by LIVE action. The actor can "scrub" through the event by moving his her arm up or down in any manner.
• (C) MAKING A MEDIUM rather than a movie of a medium's particular action.
Nothing precludes programming a zone or instrument as a living medium with its own dynamics -- think of creating not a movie of a ripple spreading across the floor, but a whole sheet of "water" that ripples in response to any number of fingers or toes or stones doing any action in it.
• An embodied second order EVENT DESIGN METHOD
(inspired by Harrry Smoak, Matthew Warne's Thick/N 2004)
NOT as actual scenography, just as a design method: lay out several ZONES on the floor of the Blackbox, each with its own dynamics. Then we can try walking from zone to zone in many different sequences, to get a feel for what transitions might feel like. Imagine what players / inhabitants should be doing in order for the state of the event to change from zone A to zone B. THEN we can design a state topology of those as POTENTIAL transitions, that actualize only when the inhabitants and the system actually act accordingly (as picked up by the sensors).
(The Topological Media Lab's Ozone media choreography architecture as coded in Max / C already does this.)
REFERENCES
Henri Bergson, Creative Evolution, Dover 1998 (1907), Chapter 1: “The evolution of life – Mechanism and teleology”; Chapter 4: “The cinematographical mechanism of thought and the mechanistic illusion – A glance at the history of systems – Real becoming and false evolutionism.”
Broglio, Ron, “Thinking about stuff: Posthumanist phenomenology and cognition,” in Special Issue on Poetic and Speculative Architecture in Public Space, AI & Society 26.2, 2011, p. 187-192.
Humberto Maturana and Francisco Varela, Autopoiesis and Cognition: The Realization of the Living, Reidel 1980.
Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception, tr. Donald Landes, Routledge 2012 (1945).
Sha Xin Wei, Michael Fortin, Tim Sutton, Navid Navab, “Ozone: Continuous state-based media choreography system for live performance,” ACM Multimedia 2010.
Sha Xin Wei, Poiesis and Enchantment in Topological Matter, MIT Press, forthcoming 2013. (Preface and Chapter 1).
_____, “Theater without organs” (2013),
]]>(March 2013, updated for Synthesis Workshop February - March 2014, ASU)
SCENARIOS
Scatter / gather
Your shadow splits. The shadows run way from you. The shadows quiver with tension & intention.
Follow spot lights you up. Other spots lurk in the shadows, come after you with persona.
(Use Julian's rhythm abstractions to record corporeal/ analog movements, and playback. Use analog rhythms as cheap way to get huge variety of very subtle NON-regularity to avoid dead mechanical beats. Also can improvise. )
Freeze
Deposit snapshots of yourself.
Use "flash" timing : charging increase in tension. Snap!
Alternatively: NO tension, just fill zone with flashes.
Use MF VP8 to take webcam images and project them kaleidoscopically throughout zone, with time warp, delay, reversals.
Sutures
The world is fissured, and sutured: as you walk you see/hear into discontiguous parts of the room.
Portals! Use MFortin's VP8, + Jitter intermediation, eg timespace to introduce time dilation effects).
Motion, oil slick, molasses
Every action is weighted down, slooooooowwwweeedd asymptotically but never quite stilling. Every action causes all the pieces of the world to slide as if on air hockey table, but powered so they accelerate like crazy : Map room to TORUS so the imagery is always visible. Use zeno-divide-in-half or any tunable asymptotic (Max expr object) to decellerate or accelerate.
Blur wind
Fray actions, images, sounds into noise
(e.g. ye olde jit.streak + feedback example )
Vortex, dizzy
Spin the world -- every linear movement or "line" of sound becomes drawn into a giant vortex, that sucks into the earth. OR reverse.
Stepped video-strobe in the concentric rings, tunable by OSC + Midi sliders like everything.
Brittle, crack
Need to step carefully. If not, hear and see pending catastrophe: cracking ice underfoot ...
Or sometimes pure acoustic in darkness or whiteout strobe.
Use Navid’s adaptive scaler to shrink sensitivity down to smallest movement causing catastrophe in strobe + massive sound. Use subs to add pre-preparatory sound like Earth grinding her teeth before breaking loose.
Stasis ( hot or cold )
Sitting in the bowl of the desert (Sahara or Himalayas )
No-time sonic and field. Noise-field, snow blindness video (black or white majority), or BillViola ultra-slow-mo? (better than 25-1 speed reduction, with no motion-blur)?
Use heat lamps or fans, to subtly add heat or cold ?
Repetition
Visual -- take video from a given location, but send to multiple locations (using VP8 + repeated stills) or map to OpenGL polygons...
Audio -- use OMAX, with coarse grain
Infection / Dark Light
Use video, e.g. use particles -- thickened as necessary -- as sources of light. Cluster around movement or around bodies presence as source of light.
MECHANICS
IMPORTANT OZONE ARCHITECTURE (Julian with MF, working with Navid, Jerome, Omar’s instruments): Each of your instruments should expose key parameters to be tunable by OSC + Midi sliders, so someone OTHER than programmer can play with the instruments qualitatively. OSC gives access to handheld MF’s Max/iOS client so we can walk around IN the space under the effects and vary the instruments IN SITU, LIVE.
ALSO: Crucial that any TML experimentalist can walk in with her / his laptop, tap into the video feed, and emit her own video into the projectors, and control where her video shows up, an with what alpha blend. S/he must be able to do this without Jerome babysitting on call 24 x 7.
Ditto sound & lighting & OSC feed -- Julian’s got good design for this. Navid for sensor channels. I hope the sensor channels work transparently on top of Julian’s OSC resource discovery code.
]]>
"Sara Reichert" <sarareichert@web.de>
For every one of his fantastic shots, photographer Peter Funch stakes out a busy New York City street corner, capturing hundreds of moments over the course of several weeks from the same spot. Then, he digitally combines real scenes into one surreal super scene. Suddenly, all the people who passed him while dressed in black re-appear simultaneously. Every single person in Times Square is a picture-snapping tourist. Everyone on a Lower East Side street has a little dog. Everyone is yawning. Everyone has balloons. The happenings in his “fictional documentary” series Babel Tales aren’t lies, they’re truths exaggerated. Enjoy the views in our gallery.
Cheers,Jérôme Delapierrewww.delapierrejerome.weebly.comPhotography / Graphic & webdesign / Video / Interactive design
Cell : 5147467818
http://www.monumenta.com/2010/monumenta/Monumenta-2010-en-images.htmland
]]>Hi Michael, Harry, Jerome, Navid,The SSHRC does need supporting material for the RC grant. So please do post links to your videos / sound that we can sift together into a portfolio. Can you get your samples to me by end of this week?Ideally morning THURSDAY Oct 14, so we can sift through it in the TML.Self-contained video files of 2-3 minutes could be useful. Audio narration could be ok but I think it would be better to supply sufficiently extended captions to explain significance and relevance to ED. I think we should pick Option 1, up to 3 excerpts. Of course Frankensteins Ghosts would be great. Some non-allegorical, non-representationalist, and striking ambience conditioning would be great.I cc Saulo and Lina as readers and potential editors of the SSHRC package. We need someone to step up to do the final assembly. Michael and I can pay for this time.Cheers,Xin Wei[yes it's already in the SSHRC online]From: Lyse Larose <Lyse.Larose@concordia.ca>
Date: October 9, 2010 10:57:38 AM EDT
To: Sha Xin Wei <shaxinwei@gmail.com>, Michael Montanaro <mgm@alcor.concordia.ca>
Subject: Re: Einsteins Dreams SSHRC Research Creation in capsule
Hi Xin Wei: Thanks for keeping me in the loop. Are you and Michael co-applicants?I’m looking forward to your grant. As for support material, yes, it’s required. The specs for it are below. Perhaps you could designate someone on the team to be charge of getting it together and in the format they require? Support Material (SSHRC RC)
List any samples of work you are submitting to illustrate your qualifications as an applicant or as a team and/or to illustrate the nature of your proposed research/creation. The instructions below explain exactly how you must present the support material. Samples will be sent to external reviewers in the eventuality that external reviewers are requested by the adjudication committee. However, due to technical challenges SSHRC cannot guarantee that the samples will be viewed. The adjudication committee will normally have very limited time per application to view, read or listen to samples of work provided. It is important, therefore, for applicants to present their material in the most effective manner: indicate clearly the order in which the material should be viewed by the committee and, where possible, present all of your material on a single CD, videotape, etc., edited in viewing priority. Note: Wherever feasible, written material (e.g., creative writing samples) will be sent to the adjudication committee for reading before the adjudication meeting. Choose one of the following arrangements:
- provide up to 3 works or 3 excerpts of works on videotape (VHS or SVHS), audio cassette, DVD, DAT, CD or CD-ROM. Note: Select the medium you feel best captures the work of you or your team;
- provide up to 20 slides;
- provide up to 3 excerpts of written material (overall maximum of 15 pages) drawn from a book or books, a manuscript, a catalogue, etc. (you may specify certain pages within publications that cannot effectively be photocopied).
Note: Any other samples or combinations of samples must be pre-approved by the program officer. Samples exceeding the stated types or limits without pre-approval will not be shown to the committee. Note: A specifications guideline for the multimedia platform and new media formats is available upon request. Presentation of samples
- Labeling: Clearly label your support material.
- Viewing order: List the material in order of suggested viewing priority.
- Link to assessment: Explain briefly how the material supports assessment of your application - both your proposed program of research/creation and your (or your team's) record of accomplishment.
- For videotapes, films, audio cassettes, CDs, DATs, CD-ROMs: Identify (1) the title of the piece/work; (2) the role of the applicant(s) or team member(s); (3) the medium; (4) the duration of the piece; (5) the year of production/creation; (6) which part of the material is to be presented to the committee; and (7) any special instructions or notes for viewing.
- For slides: For each slide, identify (1) the title of the work; (2) the role of the applicant(s) or team member(s); (3) the date of creation/production; (4) the medium; and (5) the dimensions of the work (where applicable).
- For print material: Label material with your name and identify (1) the title of the work or publication; (2) the role of the applicant or team member; and (3) the year of publication/production.
No. of Copies: Include at least one copy of the samples with your application. Return of material: A postage-paid and self-addressed envelope or box should be made available if you would like the the samples of work returned. Any samples of work not re-claimed in this way will be disposed of by SSHRC once the competition cycle has been completed.
Best,
Lyse
On 10-10-09 9:49 AM, "Sha Xin Wei" <shaxinwei@gmail.com> wrote:Hi Lyse, Michael Montanaro and I have been working over the past months on Einsteins Dreams for the SSHRC Research Creation competition due Nov 5. Here's our timetable and basics. TIMETABLE:
Monday Oct 11, end of day:
Done Draft treatment
Fill in SSHRC template Saturday - Sunday Oct 16-17
Everyone : Meet to work in MM cottage Monday Oct 18
Deliver to Office of Research Production Team:
Sha Xin Wei: concept, technical
Michael Montanaro: concept, movement
Jerome Delapierre: video
Navid Navab: sound
Harry Smoak: lighting
Paul Ahad: mechanical / stage design Support Team:
Lina Dib: Research -- time and memory, cultural studies of science and technologies of time.
Saulo Madrid, JC Nesci: Communications, print documentation
(Jhave Johnston): Communications, media documentation
(Katie Jung), Project administration
2010-2011 (Year 0)
Workshops
Discussion of temporal experience, temporal consciousness, rhythm, memory
Movement workshops: TML @ Bain St Michel Montreal (March / April 2011), Berkeley (April 2011)
2011-2012 (Year 1)
Workshops
Discussion of temporal experience, temporal consciousness, rhythm, memory
Movement workshops: Hexagram Concordia, Berkeley Wymore movement lab, New York (), Paris (le cube) 2012-2013 (Year 2)
London, Dana Centre, Tate, 2013-2014 (Year 3)
Paris, Berlin?
Montreal: Gas Works, Hangar Old Port, old Cirque Eloise It'll be for the max allowable $ amount. I've put in a placeholder on the SSHRC website. Need to change the title etc. We have idea, timeline, team, allies, etc. sketched, and are now assembling, Although the SSHRC RC does not take portfolio (right?), we plan to poset a video / presentation on the web. Cheers,
Xin Wei
Lyse Larose, BFA, M.Sc.A.
Facilitator
Research, International Relations and Graduate Studies
F a c u l t y o f F I n e A r t s Concordia University
Office of the Dean, Fine Arts
1455 ouest blvd de Maisonneuve,
Room EV 2.736, MTL, QC H3G 1M8 Office: 514-848-2424 x5632
Fax: 514-848-4599
Email: lyse.larose@concordia.ca
[yes it's already in the SSHRC online]From: Lyse Larose <Lyse.Larose@concordia.ca>
Date: October 9, 2010 10:57:38 AM EDT
To: Sha Xin Wei <shaxinwei@gmail.com>, Michael Montanaro <mgm@alcor.concordia.ca>
Subject: Re: Einsteins Dreams SSHRC Research Creation in capsule
Hi Xin Wei: Thanks for keeping me in the loop. Are you and Michael co-applicants?
I’m looking forward to your grant. As for support material, yes, it’s required. The specs for it are below. Perhaps you could designate someone on the team to be charge of getting it together and in the format they require? Support Material (SSHRC RC)
List any samples of work you are submitting to illustrate your qualifications as an applicant or as a team and/or to illustrate the nature of your proposed research/creation. The instructions below explain exactly how you must present the support material. Samples will be sent to external reviewers in the eventuality that external reviewers are requested by the adjudication committee. However, due to technical challenges SSHRC cannot guarantee that the samples will be viewed. The adjudication committee will normally have very limited time per application to view, read or listen to samples of work provided. It is important, therefore, for applicants to present their material in the most effective manner: indicate clearly the order in which the material should be viewed by the committee and, where possible, present all of your material on a single CD, videotape, etc., edited in viewing priority. Note: Wherever feasible, written material (e.g., creative writing samples) will be sent to the adjudication committee for reading before the adjudication meeting. Choose one of the following arrangements:
- provide up to 3 works or 3 excerpts of works on videotape (VHS or SVHS), audio cassette, DVD, DAT, CD or CD-ROM. Note: Select the medium you feel best captures the work of you or your team;
- provide up to 20 slides;
- provide up to 3 excerpts of written material (overall maximum of 15 pages) drawn from a book or books, a manuscript, a catalogue, etc. (you may specify certain pages within publications that cannot effectively be photocopied).
Note: Any other samples or combinations of samples must be pre-approved by the program officer. Samples exceeding the stated types or limits without pre-approval will not be shown to the committee. Note: A specifications guideline for the multimedia platform and new media formats is available upon request. Presentation of samples
- Labeling: Clearly label your support material.
- Viewing order: List the material in order of suggested viewing priority.
- Link to assessment: Explain briefly how the material supports assessment of your application - both your proposed program of research/creation and your (or your team's) record of accomplishment.
- For videotapes, films, audio cassettes, CDs, DATs, CD-ROMs: Identify (1) the title of the piece/work; (2) the role of the applicant(s) or team member(s); (3) the medium; (4) the duration of the piece; (5) the year of production/creation; (6) which part of the material is to be presented to the committee; and (7) any special instructions or notes for viewing.
- For slides: For each slide, identify (1) the title of the work; (2) the role of the applicant(s) or team member(s); (3) the date of creation/production; (4) the medium; and (5) the dimensions of the work (where applicable).
- For print material: Label material with your name and identify (1) the title of the work or publication; (2) the role of the applicant or team member; and (3) the year of publication/production.
No. of Copies: Include at least one copy of the samples with your application. Return of material: A postage-paid and self-addressed envelope or box should be made available if you would like the the samples of work returned. Any samples of work not re-claimed in this way will be disposed of by SSHRC once the competition cycle has been completed.
Best,
Lyse
On 10-10-09 9:49 AM, "Sha Xin Wei" <shaxinwei@gmail.com> wrote:Hi Lyse, Michael Montanaro and I have been working over the past months on Einsteins Dreams for the SSHRC Research Creation competition due Nov 5. Here's our timetable and basics. TIMETABLE:
Monday Oct 11, end of day:
Done Draft treatment
Fill in SSHRC template Saturday - Sunday Oct 16-17
Everyone : Meet to work in MM cottage Monday Oct 18
Deliver to Office of Research Production Team:
Sha Xin Wei: concept, technical
Michael Montanaro: concept, movement
Jerome Delapierre: video
Navid Navab: sound
Harry Smoak: lighting
Paul Ahad: mechanical / stage design Support Team:
Lina Dib: Research -- time and memory, cultural studies of science and technologies of time.
Saulo Madrid, JC Nesci: Communications, print documentation
(Jhave Johnston): Communications, media documentation
(Katie Jung), Project administration
2010-2011 (Year 0)
Workshops
Discussion of temporal experience, temporal consciousness, rhythm, memory
Movement workshops: TML @ Bain St Michel Montreal (March / April 2011), Berkeley (April 2011)
2011-2012 (Year 1)
Workshops
Discussion of temporal experience, temporal consciousness, rhythm, memory
Movement workshops: Hexagram Concordia, Berkeley Wymore movement lab, New York (), Paris (le cube) 2012-2013 (Year 2)
London, Dana Centre, Tate, 2013-2014 (Year 3)
Paris, Berlin?
Montreal: Gas Works, Hangar Old Port, old Cirque Eloise It'll be for the max allowable $ amount. I've put in a placeholder on the SSHRC website. Need to change the title etc. We have idea, timeline, team, allies, etc. sketched, and are now assembling, Although the SSHRC RC does not take portfolio (right?), we plan to poset a video / presentation on the web. Cheers,
Xin Wei
Lyse Larose, BFA, M.Sc.A.
Facilitator
Research, International Relations and Graduate Studies
F a c u l t y o f F I n e A r t s Concordia University
Office of the Dean, Fine Arts
1455 ouest blvd de Maisonneuve,
Room EV 2.736, MTL, QC H3G 1M8 Office: 514-848-2424 x5632
Fax: 514-848-4599
Email: lyse.larose@concordia.ca
just started reading:
Graham, Beryl and Cook, Sarah, Rethinking Curating: Art after New Media, MIT Press, Cambridge, 2010, 354p. a few notes on what matters (beyond the technology):lina
]]>
OK let's meet12:30 - 2:30TMLThis way Navid can come for an hour.Harry can overlap at end at 2 (and can continue with me for an hour)I will work with Michael to try to circulate some text prior.Xin WeiOn 2010-09-28, at 9:50 AM, Sha Xin Wei wrote: > Hi,
>
> Just to let you know that we've had an http://einsteinsdreams.posterous.com blog for a while.
>
> Now with added energy, fresh ingredients yet to be blogged, and thanks to a model from one of Chris's successful SSHRC proposals, I think we can make a push on the proposal. I have a template filled in with a lot of blah-blah filler. What we would need are:
>
> (1) Info about MM and SXW as leaders.
> (2) How students would be involved.
> (3) Sexy account of the time-machine concept. (See blog, later.)
> (4) How this benefits people in everyday life, society.
> (5) Budet justification.
>
> I'll send Michael the template filled in. We'll need to meet soon in the coming week. Harry's in RPI for the installation / performance. But we can meet once soon, and again after Oct 4, ok?
>
> More anon,
> Xin Wei
>______________________________________________________________________________Sha Xin Wei, Ph.D.Canada Research Chair • Associate Professor • Design and Computation Arts • Concordia UniversityDirector, Topological Media Lab • topologicalmedialab.net/ • http://flavors.me/shaxinwei______________________________________________________________________________
On 2010-09-28, at 9:50 AM, Sha Xin Wei wrote: > Hi,
>
> Just to let you know that we've had an http://einsteinsdreams.posterous.com blog for a while.
>
> Now with added energy, fresh ingredients yet to be blogged, and thanks to a model from one of Chris's successful SSHRC proposals, I think we can make a push on the proposal. I have a template filled in with a lot of blah-blah filler. What we would need are:
>
> (1) Info about MM and SXW as leaders.
> (2) How students would be involved.
> (3) Sexy account of the time-machine concept. (See blog, later.)
> (4) How this benefits people in everyday life, society.
> (5) Budet justification.
>
> I'll send Michael the template filled in. We'll need to meet soon in the coming week. Harry's in RPI for the installation / performance. But we can meet once soon, and again after Oct 4, ok?
>
> More anon,
> Xin Wei
>
From: BIRS Scientific Director <birs-director@birs.ca>
Date: July 14, 2010 5:37:35 PM PDT
To: sha@encs.concordia.ca
Subject: Call for proposals for the Banff International Research Station 2012
]]>La version française suit ci-dessous.
The Banff International Research Station for Mathematical Innovation and Discovery (BIRS) is now accepting proposals for its 2012 program. The Station provides an environment for creative interaction and the exchange of ideas, knowledge, and methods within the mathematical, statistical, and computing sciences, and with related disciplines and industrial sectors.
Full information, guidelines, and online forms are available at the new BIRS website:
http://www.birs.ca/
BIRS is hosting a 49-week scientific program in 2012. Each week, the station will be running either a full workshop (42 people for 5 days) or two half-workshops (each with 21 people for 5 days). As usual, BIRS provides full accommodation, board, and research facilities at no cost to the invited participants, in a setting conducive to research and collaboration.
The deadline for 5-day Workshop and Summer School proposals is September 27, 2010.
In addition BIRS will operate its Research in Teams and Focused Research Groups programs, which allow smaller groups of researchers to get together for several weeks of uninterrupted work at the station. September 27, 2010 is also the preferred date to apply for these programs. However, proposals for projects involving Research in Teams or Focused Research Groups can be submitted at any time -- subject to availability-- they must be received at least 4 months before their requested start date.
Proposal submissions should be made using the online submission form.
Please use:
https://www.birs.ca/proposals
Nassif Ghoussoub
Scientific Director, Banff International Research Station
**********
La station internationale de recherche en sciences mathématiques de Banff (BIRS) lance un appel à projets pour son programme de l’année 2012. La mission de BIRS est de mettre à la disposition de la communauté scientifique internationale un environnement de recherche qui favorise les interactions et les échanges d'idées et de connaissances entre les membres des communautés mathématiques, statistiques, informatiques ainsi que leurs applications dans les sciences et dans le secteur industriel.
Des informations complètes ainsi que les formulaires à remplir en ligne sont disponibles sur le site Internet http://www.birs.ca/
Le programme scientifique de BIRS pour l'année 2012 sera composé de 49 semaines, chaque semaine consistant soit d'un atelier standard (42 personnes pour 5 jours) soit de deux demi- ateliers (21 personnes pour 5 jours). BIRS fournit aux participants invités l’infrastructure de recherche appropriée, ainsi que le logement et les repas dans un cadre convivial, propice aux échanges d’idées et aux collaborations scientifiques.
La date limite de pot des dossiers pour les ateliers et les écoles d'été est fixée au 27 septembre 2010.
De plus, BIRS continue de mener ses programmes de Recherche en Equipes (RIT) et de Groupes de Recherche (FRG), qui permettent à des équipes de chercheurs de se retrouver dans la station pour plusieurs semaines pour mener à bien un projet de recherche en collaboration. Les dossiers de demandes pour ces programmes doivent -de préférence- être déposés aussi avant le 27 septembre 2010. Cependant, les dossiers concernant ces deux derniers programmes (FRG et RIT) seront également acceptés à tout autre moment à condition qu’ils soient soumis au moins 4 mois avant la date à laquelle le projet est supposé débuter.
Les dossiers de candidature doivent être soumis sur Internet à l'adresse suivante:
https://www.birs.ca/proposals
Nassif Ghoussoub
Directeur, Banff International Research Station
_______________________________________________
To remove sha@encs.concordia.ca from this mail list, visit:
https://www.birs.ca/unsubscribe/announcements/sha@encs.concordia.ca
This is a raw outline for a fresh start, based on Michael's notes for the CCA-NSERC new media program last year.
1 WHAT is it?
1.1 Einstein's Dreams is an environment in which visitors encounter performers in responsive fields of video, light, and spatialized sound, in a set of tableaus Each tableau is inspired by a vignette from Alan Lightman's novel, Einstein's Dreams, set in Berne Switzerland, in 1904, the year that Albert Einstein received the Nobel prize. Or rather, a set of parallel 1904's, each of which is a different kind of time: in one, time slows to a halt as you approach a particular place; in another there is no future; in third, time sticks and slips; in a fourth age reverses and what is rotten becomes fresh as time passes.1.2 In one concept, a large theatrical space (24 x 20 x 8m) will contain multiple tableaux, each with room for 6-12 people in its own pool of light and sound. Visitors and perhaps performers can move from tableaux to tableaux. The performers' actions will evolve in concert with the dynamics of lighting, sound, and visitors' expectations in order to create different kinds of time, inspired by the novel's vignettes. Sometimes a performer will walk from a location, dragging the pool of conditioning light and sound. The pool mutates or merges into another pool with a different type of time.
2 A literature review and/or historical contemporary understanding of the context for the research
2.1 One hundred years after the two epochal advents in physics of relativity theory and quantum mechanics, we are still reverberating with the consequences. ED is not a biography or a didactic allegory, but a poetic exploration of our consciousness in time.2.2 There is huge volume of elaborations and didactic works about the theory of relativity and quantum mechanics, including Einstein's own popular essays, and the canonical scientific / philosophical works by Hermann Weyl, Alfred N. Whitehead Principle of Relativity, Henri Bergson Duration and Simultaneity. In the arts, there have been some distinguished works that treat the theories and the theorists in an externalist way, as icons or as social phenomena. But what we propose is to work directly with the spectators' felt experiences of time.2.3 What Alan Lightman evoked in his novel was a poetic variation around the felt experience of time, not the "actual" physics of time, but alternatives of time, those hypothesized modes of living in time that could have been imagined, or that never were. By foregrounding how time works in these worlds, the vignettes foreground movement, which is the temporalization of the body. These movements are embedded in everyday life, made marvelous by poetic conceits of time. This fits perfectly with both Sha and Montanaro's own artistic research into the charging of movement and gesture, of finding or evoking marvelous configurations of movement in the everyday.2.7 The core concerns of ED circle around the relationships set up in a performance, or an event in which at least momentarily the intents of creator (author, composer, choreographer) entangle with the intents of the performer and observer. For Montanaro, performance at its heart is a relational triangle: performer - choreographer/director - observer. For Sha this suggests fresh insights into questions raised in relativity and quantum mechanics about the how the observer is implicated in the construction of phenomena. In relativity, the fundamental relation is between two frames of reference, one at rest with respect to the observer, and another in motion. In quantum mechanics, the observed parameter is replaced by the notion of an expectation value which is the symmetrical inner product of the state of the observer with the Hermitian acting on the state of the observed. We can never directly measure the state of the observer or observed.
[FIGURE 1. Performance is relational triangle: performer - choreographer/director - observer]
2.8 Remove if-then logic at macro (human) scale as well as CPU scale =>
realtime concurrent programming vs "object-oriented programming" (OOP)texture programming vs. OOP.
2.9 Performer <-- act-on --> environment; but also self-act-on as well. concurrency and distributed agency =>
need new movement structures <----> continuous state-based media choreography. the experiment is to test the reach and adequacy of the Ozone as a compositional technique2.12 The question is how can we bring the observer inside the event? how can we induce altered, or alter ... temporal consciousness, according to Einsteins Dreams?
2.13 The role of the observer
In an interactive performing arts event a large part of the observer’s perception, understanding and appreciation is third person reliant, resting heavily on the performer’s interpretation of the creative artists dialogue as well as the performer’s physical and emotional relationship to the environment. Even though the observer and performer have access to the same audio and visual information the observer’s physical connection with the material is, experientially speaking, vicarious. Though this separation exists in traditional live performance the difference is amplified many times over with the introduction of the technologically enhanced or intelligent space. It is here, at the point of divergence between performance and non-performance based forms of interactive artistic expression, that my interest and current research lie. Performer or voyeur, the separation runs deep2.14 Parallel with relativity and modern physics:
The idea of the observer that both relativity and QM brought explicitly into the frame : see next sections 3 The underlying technical/scientific issues or complexities, along with an explanation of how they will be resolved 3.1 Temporal textures 3.2 Think of filters rather than projections of image or sound-field. We create realtime systems that sample the existing sound or lightfields (eg from arrays of microphones and cameras), and re-synthesize them and send them with meaningful spatial or temporal transforms back into the given tableaus. Simple techniques, such as temporal delays that we can regionalize down to individual pixels or fixtures with resolution from milleseconds to hours, based on high resolution cameras with high frame rates (120 to 600 FPS) already can provide rich effects. But additionally we propose to leverage the TML's 5 years of experience adapting computational physics techniques to create temporal textures that have the qualities of physical materials -- smoke, water, syrup, ice, etc. We are investigating how to leverage the person's tacit knowledge of physical materials to give a sense of tangibility that cuts across sense modalities. This is an example of user interaction with "interfaces" so dense (like cloth or elastic controllers) as to require continuous models and a phenomenological rather than cognitive approach. 3.3 Continuous State-based Media Choreography 5.1 WHERE will it be done?
Montreal Usine-C
Tate Modern 2011
Harvard Biochem building (Galison)
Under Brooklyn Bridge
San Francisco Presidio
7.1 Montanaro has worked for years with dance and
fresh ways to choreograph, other than usual action (dancer) reaction (system) 7.2 Xin Wei: new ways to understand time and sense of time, ways to create temporal texture : field-based ways to 7.3 Opportunity to working together experimentally,. Have done it voluntarily on our own time for 5 years, now wish to do it funded.
8 Plans to manage intellectual property and copyright issues related to the proposed project
9 How the collaborators will evaluate their collaboration and research outcomes
9.1 production 9.2 publication in relevant journals: ACM Multimedia, Smart Graphics, Ubicomp, TDR,10 How the project results will be disseminated
10.1 performance 10.2 workshops with students in dance and media systems 10.3 in publications 11 The project’s impact on the broader artistic and scientific communities, and the social, cultural, economic or environmental benefits to Canada. 11.1 lighting and movement]]>“In a world where time is a sense, like sight or like taste, a sequence of episodes may be quick or may be slow, dim or intense, salty or sweet, causal or without cause, orderly or random […]” (Lightman 1993: 89)
In the real world memory and the sensory register are affected by fully embodied experiences that take place within a very specific time and space. What if these fixed variables of time and space were to be disturbed? In a series of short poetic vignettes, Alan Lightman’s novel, Einstein’s Dreams, presents such worlds where time and space behave differently. In one, time is an infinite loop, in another, the higher you go the slower time is, in a third, there is one place where time comes to a halt, and in another everyone knows the world will come to an end at a particular date and moment.
]]>