Japanese Contemporary Media Art

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Artist: Fontosaurus
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"Thus what art means to society is subject to change within the network of influences." - Device Art: A New Approach in Understanding Japanese Contemporary Media Art by Machiko Kasahara
This statement is quite intriguing because it suggests that even though artists create pieces that represent their views on society, society determines what "art" is. This means that as new technologies develop, the way society views and interprets art will change. Therefore, a piece that may have been viewed as successful years ago might be viewed by someone today, who is technologically savvy and unfamiliar with older artwork, as unsuccessful. In addition to how art is changing, there is no longer a distinct border line between art that is for entertainment or for commercial purposes.
Just as artists from the West approached the making of art, Japanese artists also followed the same concept. This was and is to question value systems that exist and to create a new way to deal with the changes that are occurring in society. It is interesting to note that the "notion" of art being something other than visual fine art did not exist until the second half of the nineteenth century when Japan began to become modernized by Western influences.
Later on in the 1970's, with the modernization of art in Japan, confusion accompanied a type of art called intermedia art which was confused with technological art. By the 1960's Japanese art stylistically represented Euro-American art. Japanese art resembled that of Western art by means of the modernization that occurred after the 1940's.

Final Project Draft Details

Summary:

My piece will focus primarily on how touch and vision, seen outside of an everyday occurrence such as a person giving a hug or handshake, can be "relocated" to a different part of the body (such as the arm) in order to be translated into an emotional and physical response that would otherwise be seen as awkward or abnormal. Since these senses are important to understand both physically and psychologically, the primary objective of this piece will be to get the participant involved by having them activate their senses allowing them to better interpret the "norms" of society for what they really are: Rules or traditions. The point: I intend to make the viewer / participant psychologically digest the information given in order to determine for themselves what is actually normal.

Conceptual Questions:

- Could the piece be viewed as a mean of display; such as an animal displays its colors to show off or protect itself?
- Could it be seen as an individualistic performance where it is about one individual acting or participating at a time or could multiple individuals participate?
- Could it convey or express an emotional or physical bond between two people?
- Could it portray the fact that dance is a form of bonding and that it is / or can be activated through touch?
- Could it be perceived that even though this is not a dance piece, that that art of dance is still present? The question would then be, "Is the participant supposed to dance or react in a certain way?
- Should the piece be taken at face value or analyzed to explore a deeper range of understanding?

Technical Challenges:

- Can I use a variable resistor to control the amount of electricity flowing out of the Pico Cricket? In other words, if I use a variable resistor, how much electricity is needed in order to power on a light? Maybe I could use an LED light and have the color of the light change depending on how much electricity is being passed through the variable resistor. The Pico would have to read the output voltage and change the light color based on the values that I set for it.
- Should a value be set for the length of time that the Pico would run the program or should the program run only upon direct human connection? That is, when someone touches the "activation area" (metal sheet) the program would run, and when the participant removed their hand, it would stop? - OR - The program would run for a minute even after the participant has removed his or her hand?
- Will I need 6 Volts of power to activate the transmitter? Is that power needed for distance transmission?
- Can I complete the circuit and activate the transmitter with only 4.5 Volts?
If I cannot activate it with the 4.5 Volts, then I may need to attach an switch that would allow for higher power to be accessed. I could then use the 6 Volts of power and use the switch to control the flow. I would be limited to either an on or off position, but that would be ok. I believe it would be risky and that something might short-out if there wasn't a direct circuit with an either constant flow of power or none at all.
- What is the output voltage from the Pico through the alligator clips?
- How many LED lights can be connected together and operating from one power source... specifically the Pico?

Needed Materials:

- 1 Pico Cricket
- 1 Omega module
- Possibly 2 alligator clip pieces
- 1 transmitter
- 1 receiver
- 1 disco ball
- an AC outlet
- 1 extension cord
- Possibly 1 large rug (for people to get electrically "charged up" for a better interactive experience)
- Possibly 2 variable resistors
- 1-2 LED light(s)
- A black trench coat or soft robe (not sure which one I want to use yet)

Production Schedule:

4-2-09 (In-process critique) Find out if my ideas will fly or flop.

4-9-09 Discovering the specific functions of the Pico and what it's limitations are relative to what I want to accomplish. Technology, technology, voltage. Bring in variable resistor (maybe Professor Colleen has one that I can borrow) and test.

4-16-09 Build costume / attach wires where needed for safety and conductivity. Decide which article of clothing works best.

4-23-09 (In-process critique) Continued working on costume. Tweaking...

4-30-09 Rehearsal. Adding finishing touches to design / Emergency Maintenance

5-7-09 Everything is completed. Ready to Roll!

Literalist Art and Theatrical Presentation of Art

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Artist: cliff1066
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Robert Morris and Donal Judd are both literalist artists. The concept that a literalist artist follows is one of exact representation. Therefore, the ideas of being universal, ubiquitous and forms of illusion are eliminated from their practices. However, something that both men see as crucial to the development of an art piece is shape. I believe this is not speaking exclusively about how a piece of art "looks" after it has been assembled as a whole, but also of the shapes that went into creating the structure or art piece. In the article, "Art and Objecthood" Fried says that the pieces that go together to create the piece are as important or more important than the object that is created when joining them together. He states, "...I want to say, in the mutual and naked juxtaposition of the I-beams, girders, cylinders, lengths of piping, sheet metal, and grill that it comprises rather than in the compound object that they compose. This is interesting because attention is normally drawn to the completed object made and not the elements that were used in the creative process.
Included with the concept of shape is the size of it as well. Using the shape and size of an object to create a situation that attracts attention to both the object, space, and the viewer is also part of literalist art.

The "Art" of Communication

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Artist: saschapohflepp
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The artwork of Rebecca Horn combines both the physiological and psychological to create art that can be invested in by the artist and the viewer. To explain, Horn used items such as sticks to extend the "feeling of touch" that is made when a human interacts with an object. She states that she can feel, grasp, and touch them while maintaining her distance. This extension of the body includes literally adding to the physical state of the body in order to simulate that of touch. The physical and psychological aspects are seen in a film Horn produced titled, "Berlin" where two people had magnets attached to their legs. The physical connection that was or was not made, depending on the individuals placement to each other, resembled the difficulty that we, as humans, sometimes have with direct physical contact and communication. In correlation with this concept, the reason that touch and direct communication can be difficult to engage in is because of the fear of how that person might react (or how we are supposed to engage). This was another concept that Rebecca Horn was interested in and was reflected in her film titled the, "Eintazer."
Dialogue was also something that Horn found intriguing. Instead of using it in what is considered the normal form (which is the conversing between to individuals), she used objects to to paraphrase her meaning, or introduce a new way of speaking. Specifically, she used two swings that would sway in the same motion therefore trying to symbolize the act of clear communication between two individuals. This process of exploration shows how the act of communication between non-living objects results in finding the idiosyncrasies as well as the complicated issues of communication that we (as humans) deal with every day.
Rebecca also tried to determine the type of communication that takes place when masks are used. She sees them as tools which symbolize, "...the loss of facial identity through the necessity of rejecting oneself as well as of being in complete possession of oneself." I believe this means that there is a process that must take place when an individual puts on a mask. The "rejecting of oneself" indicates that the individual wearing the mask must take on the characteristics of it. That the identity of the person wearing the mask must subject themselves to its full symbolic state by loosing their own identity. When speaking of, "being in complete possession of oneself," I think this is simply in addition to what was just said. Namely, that when a mask is put on, a person becomes that of the mask. Therefore, one can put on a mask and still be in complete possession of themselves because the mask is then their identity. I may have over analyzed this, but the subject matter discussed here intrigued me. These are my thoughts and therefore they may not accurately reflect what Horn was trying to convey.
Implementing the experimentation of simple concepts, such as the oddities that take place within communication into artwork, can reveal a multitude of amazing results that we either take for granted or never realized exist.