Traffic Calming Measures

Further adventures in pursuit of the roundabout; this time down in Wainscott in Kent. To see the suitably spun movie click here

Hair of the Dog

If by some chance you find yourself in Santa Fe today then why not visit the exhibition Hair of the Dog where you will find work by yours truely in a gallery show that: "investigates the vocabulary, limitations, and mythology of the medium of painting through modern art history and into the 21st century." Rest assured "no artists in the exhibition will apply pigment to canvas in the traditional manner; some will not use paint at all. Portraiture, landscape, and narrative are some of the structures within the language of painting to be engaged." Having been screening for the last 5 years it will be nice to be exhibiting again.

Instant Kitten (The Application)

Today a piece of software no less! This is the Instant Kitten Application I built in Max/Msp/jitter a couple of years ago and which is the brains behind Fleshtones and SkyPoint.

Basically the app provides an instant audio accompaniment to any movie. So how do you use it? OK firstly download the zipped file here.. Unzip it and then double click on the Instant Kitten application inside the folder. It takes a moment or two to warm up. Once going switch it on using the big blue button. Click on the "read" button to open a movie file. Ideally the film should have no soundtrack. It doesn't matter if it does just the existing soundtrack and the new one might get in each others way. OK so the movie is playing. Next click the midi button and change it to QuickTime (unless you have some fancy midi app you want to drive instead). The sound defaults to piano but you can change the instrument in the "change instrument" box to xylophone, flute etc. The duration of the note is set to standard decay but if you want long sustaining notes in the "dur" box enter say 1,000 or even 2,000. You can slow the movie down using the speed box. 0.5 is half speed etc.

Sensitivity sort of controls the response; experiment. To get full screen mode hit the escape button, hit escape to get out of full screen mode as well.

OK it only works on Macs. I've tried it on both PPC and Intel and it seems to function fine though no doubt your computer will immediately break down and crash when you try it.

Bathing Beauty

The third and final of the Standard 8 films shot in 1990-1991 finds us in Cornwall with a little Bathing Beauty.

Old Poster

In the late summer of 1981 to coincide with the release of Snatch 3 an A2 poster was screenprinted. My design was heavily influenced by Theo van Doesburg's cover for the Dadaist magazine Méecano. It was around this time that I started recording with Michael Denton and much of the the execution of the poster (done at the Albany screenprinting workshop) and especially the colour selection was down to him. The pink and turquoise inks were subsequently used for the labels for Snatch 3. Here is the last known remaining example.

Fishing line

For a short while in the late 1990's and early naughties I sent out an occasional fax sheet called Fishing Line. The subject of this one sheet newspaper tended to be fine art topics of the day combined with scratchy drawings. The faxes were sent unsolicited to various art mags and galleries. All looking rather quaint now here is an example or two.

Quadrangle (unedit)

Slightly to my surprise I am still getting requests for the Quadrangle video. Paradoxically the piece was not originally conceived as a stand-alone piece of fixed duration but as an installation. The synchronised music and image movements are produced by a quasi-random algorithm (quasi random in that its output is more akin to an improvisation based on certain parameters). Once running the piece will produce variations indefinitely with no obvious beginning, middle or end. Some intervention on the part of the artist was required to change the visual parameters on the fly, though with some max/msp jiggery pokery these too could be randomised.

I had the work running in such an ongoing fashion when visited one day by Prof Cheese who being in the throes of programming for the Island festival asked for a small slice. I duly obliged recording a section, taking some choice cuts and very quickly assembling a short self-contained piece. Here today though is the whole cut. This is in itself really an extract from the infinite unseen but gives a feeling for what an installation version might be like.

The Face of the Earth

Arteries filling up with sedimentary lust....A little topotopical for the season.

Clouds

The anti-illusionist project engaged but still not married to form. A form that ultimately is that of an essential nothing, either on or in or indeed on top of the screen.

Product Recall!

We are pleased to announce a unique new premier product for that milestone once in a lifetime occasion such as an anniversary, birthday, wedding or as a gift for that someone special. The product is made of an alloy glass and onyx compound that changes shape to fit the wearer and the occasion. One moment it is a ring the next a ceremonial dagger; it is wahtever the wearer desires. View a prototype sample above.

Sound Projector

The latest issue of the very fine Sound Projectior magazine is out featuring an interview with yours truely about this, that and the other. Not to mention a review of the Storm Bugs LP and lots more!

Stanley Green

Excellent scan of protein man Stanley Green's publication over at Another Green World

Gillespie, Kidd & Coia.

The post war church posed an interesting problem for architects. On the one hand a commission to build a new church offers a perfect opportunity to create a landmark building; indeed the history of architecture is inextricably linked to the building of places of worship. On the other hand for many the church is a place of tradition and ritual and as such the inclination among a lot of both congregations and clergy was towards commissioning something that was recognisably church like. This paradox led to some dynamics such as the example below. A German post war church, which maintains all the traditional features of tower, bell and clock but is built in a self consciously sparse modern style.

Brought up as a Catholic my own parish church as a child was the English Martyrs in Kent, an interesting design, lacking any steeple and having sweeping sloping roofs but retaining the traditional stained glass window.

For truly dynamic modernist designs one has to look to the Catholic Church in Scotland who commissioned a series of daring original buildings from the architectural firm of Gillespie, Kidd & Coia. Believing that the post war Catholic community north of the border would increase considerably after the war a number of new churches were commissioned as well as a seminary. All feature uncompromising modernist designs. Despite a decline in church attendance many of the buildings are still in use though some have been demolished and the seminary abandoned. An exhibition at the Lighthouse from now until February will display the pioneering work of Gillespie, Kidd & Coia.

Subversion

Last night went to the Horse Hospital for the launch of Duncan Reekie’s new book Subversion –The definitive History of Underground Cinema. Less your usual drinks and canapés book launch this was more of a screening programmed by Duncan with as one might expect contributions by Exploding Cinema stalwarts.

But what of the book itself? Well in these quarters the publication has been much anticipated as an alternative to the recent wave of books by those working inside the artists film & video sector. Whilst not without their merits as Duncan points out the publications by Al Rees and David Curtis do suffer from an "adopted objectivity". When talking of key UK films & videos they often omit to mention that it was they who through stewardship of the awarding committees ensured that these films were made in the first place. Now nobody would fund work which they thought to be of poor quality but subsequently to publish critiques which endorse and celebrate such work is a little like writing your own children’s school reports. Reekie in contrast as something of an outsider brings to bear a different perspective (if not quite objectivity) and this is refreshing.

But is this the definitive history? Well maybe not – Duncan is rather enamoured with the  radicalism of the low or no budget underground cinema. Spending taxpayer’s money does confer upon the recipients a responsibility to spend that money in an accountable and for want of a better phrase a democratic manner; something, which the established film & video sector has always shied away from. It does not necessarily follow however that because one funds one's own productions or organises screenings on a collective basis as the Exploding Cinema has done for a number of years that one can always adopt the higher moral ground. An open screening/access policy and collective decision making meetings do not always ensure the objective they purport to support. Indeed for many years the LFMC had such a policy and this actually did little more than perpetuate the distribution of work by just a handful of filmmakers such as Malcolm Le Grice and Peter Gidal.

The self-conscious radicalism of Duncan's prose can also veer into indignation, especially when talking of the failed Lux project. The demise of the Lux was a tragedy and should not have been allowed to happen but the £4.5 million spent is by Lottery standards rather small beer. Indeed that the Lux was allowed to collapse for such relatively small sums shows the establishment’s lack of commitment to artists film & video at the time. One might recall that the Royal Opera House gets some 27 Million every year for its minority art form from the Arts Council and one wouldn’t even want to start adding up the Lottery millions the Film Council has wasted on trying to kick start the UK film industry. Alongside the lost money one might bemoan the hours of low and no paid work put into the project by staff and board at the LFMC particularly in the ten year run up to the opening of the Lux. When I worked there for about 8 months in 1997 most of the staff were being paid 15 thousand a year and putting in a 50-hour week. The LFMC at the time was getting roughly £46,000 a year from the funders. Compare this with the AHRC award of £148,000 given in the last three years to simply establish a database of key documents and narrative chronologies of artists’ film and video distributors.

Nonetheless despite these caveats Duncan’s book does contain many fresh and distinctive insights and is a very welcome addition to the literature on the sector.

The Art of Fly Tipping

Criminally underrated, Fly Tipping displays all that is best in contemporary sculpture. A relaxed an un-premeditated arrangement of forms that rivals early Bruce Mclean or Anthony Caro, Fly Tips are the ultimate in public art. At ease in both rural and urban landscapes these seemingly effortless compositions stand out in any location. Fly Tips have not always met with a warm reception; described as hideous and ugly by some nevertheless a small but committed number of aficionados are beginning to appreciate their latent beauty and seek to have the best works preserved. A short Fly Tip video is here .

The Unnecessary Object of Desire

Standing at the roadside it is hard no to be transfixed by the slow motion collapse of the record industry. This high rise building that once dominated the skyline and mediated the listening habits of all that it surveyed is now sinking in front of us as artists begin to give away their music with newspapers or make it free to download.

In a blog entry almost two years ago I asked “how long will we cling to the wreckage of these outdated forms? “In its death throes the record industry at all levels form tiny companies releasing 500 copies to the majors have tried to counter the transparency and weightlessness of the download by making the physical releases self consciously tangible So rather than a single disk in a plastic jewel case one gets a box set complete with remix disks, limited edition posters, booklets, t-shirts anything and everything to give us some excuse to buy the thing even if we will probably rip or download the music to play digitally anyway. A good mainstream example of this is the recent EMI re-issue of the first Pink Floyd album, The Piper at the Gates of Dawn. In a 3CD box set one gets the stereo mix, the mono mix, a further disk with obscurities and previously unreleased tracks and mixes and of course - “The album is packaged in a cloth-bound book format, that will include an expanded 12 page redesigned booklet, plus a reproduction of a previously unseen Syd Barrett notebook from 1967 that contains personal artwork and lyric ideas.”

In the small backwater that is experimental and electronic music, vinyl still holds a certain sway. Vinyl’s sheer physicality gives it a head start on the purchase front as it engenders a strong sense of ownership and the large twelve-inch cover provides a good platform for artwork. There is also something highly ritualistic and fetishistic about having to remove the record from its sleeve, wipe it with a cloth, place it on the turntable (and then only twenty minutes later turn the record over) that further emphasizes the physicality of the whole experience.

One of the key micro companies re-issuing electronic and avant-garde music is the German label Vinyl on Demand. Last year indeed a Snatch Tapes compilation and this year a Storm Bugs record came out on the label; both releases on heavy weight vinyl with textured and embossed sleeves. But these releases are quite modest by the label’s usual standards as lavish 5 LP box sets with inserts and accompanying 7 inch singles and T-shirts etc (for subscription members) are more the order of the day.

Such releases are quite wonderful, bringing together previously obscure and unreleased recordings. Vinyl on Demand is single handedly doing much to archive and preserve music that would otherwise be potentially lost or at the very least go unheard. In a world of dwindling resources though it can seem hard to justify this sheer level of physicality when the essential component - the music could be reproduced as a tiny digital file.

Arguably the actual resources and energy needed to make and ship a 5 LP box set are in the scheme of things not that great (particular as unlike the Floyd re-issue most Vinyl on Demand releases are limited to 500 copies); we probably all throw away/recycle more cardboard and plastic from our weekly shop and if one had a choice it would seem to make more sense to use these resources for the reproduction of art rather than a simple packaging for everyday consumables.

That more energy and resources are being wasted elsewhere of course doesn’t detract though from the slight absurdity of both the Floyd cloth bound CD and the vinyl 5 record box set. Perhaps though we should cherish this last lavish and excessive baroque fling of the record industry (an industry almost synonymous with excess). In ten years when resources are just that bit closer to complete exhaustion, when disposing of items becomes as expensive as acquiring then, when the cost of shipping reflects its true environmental impact then the price of box sets will be prohibitive and they will be seen as a wonderful and deliciously wasteful fin de siecle excess.