The Architect?

I have been watching alot of sci-fi now I've been thinking about this project and have been noticing some issues that seem to reoccur. Firstly, the skepticism and suspicious way authority is questioned, secondly the faith in humanity or the faith that man-kind will always have a saviour.

After a session with Jonathan and a tutorial with Lamberto I have a thought of a way of realising the concept. I am going to enclose 'the artist' or 'the saviour' in perplex screens shaped in an octagon (represent the cacoons from the matrix that kept the humans alive in the human farms!!) separating the artist from the spectator. Inside the octagon the performer has the role of the generator - triggering and/or reacting to the audio and visual material. The octagon will be rigged up to infra red proximity sensors (I have chosen these because they emit a single beam which can actually be shown to the audience by means of a laser pen- smoke will have to be involved!). There will be visual material presented by CCTV monitors- there will be 4 to 8 of these screens and the signal to them will be controlled by the performer. I propose to scramble the signal of all of the video streams until the performer gets into close proximity to the associated sensor then the signal unscambles the closer the performer gets to the sensor. The visual material and audio material will not be from the same source.

The original idea was sculting space in order to sculpt sound, after a tutorial with Lamberto we approached this issue and came up with ideas about a block of sound would begin the performance and the sculptor would use movement (detected by the sensors) to add and subtract audio elements. Revealing sounds hidden under the wall of sound, adding or subtracting certain sounds to the mix. We also discussed generating pulses or rhythms by the movement which I feel will be interesting in a real time interaction. I recently read somewhere that the city hums at 50Hz due to the AC-powered equipment- perhaps I will start with this.

Technically I am apprehensive about the project and there are a few problems with the arrangement of the piece that will need to be experimented with. such as the location of the CCTV monitors - it is important for the performer to see them in order to interact but as the performer in behind the screens this proves problemmatic.

For now I am going to gather sound material to experiement with and attempt to produce a mock-up of the installation in order to begin composing. I was also thinking about the idea of site-specificality and thought it would perhaps be benficial to compose in the Recital Hall for the recital hall to enhance the piece as it would be tailored to the space.

Concept 1

Over the course of the last few days I have been developing an initial concept for the performance I below mention involving sculpting space in order to control AV. The idea is still in its early stages and I haven't much idea of how I would realise the concept- I will jot a few ideas down here but maybe I should intend to experiment with the technology in order to fall upon a way of realising the the idea. So to experiment with technological process in order to fall upon a way of representing the idea?

I was reading a book (recommended in the reading list) called 'The Edge of Art' The text used case studies mainly in the field of internet art to demonstrate the analogy presented in the introduction that technology is a virus and art provides the antibody. Upon reading this text I began to think about this analogy and the seemingly cultural facination with the 'dangers' of technology that much science fiction explores. The moral dilemmas surrounding genetic research come to mind when thinking of technology as a virus. I often wonder whether we take ourselves too seriously and we are actually scared of losing our 'humanness' or perhaps in reality the meddling in genetics could only lead to grotesque results. What really interested me is the concept of technology turning on the human race as in the Matrix films and the Terminator series. I believe that the paranoia that seems to surround new technology and implementing it into our social conventions is borne from the science fiction we encounter. I cannot say that I understand how most technology works and that maybe it is alarming how something that alot of us don't understand can have suc a bearing on our lives. There is a fear that it evolves so quickly most of us have lost control and we are left vulnerable, computer hacking could provide an example of this.

The piece could be a parody of the science fiction mentioned, it could also comment on social issues of implementing technology into our lives in the way of CCTV, GPS, internet social interactions and generally the complex systems we now live by, for example the production line and the network of economics.