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Today's Document
Aqua Utopia｜海の底で記憶を紡ぐ
he wasn't even looking at me and he found me
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@updatetooltip-blog
This article is a testament to the fact that the days of writing a single slogan or tagline for an entire audience are long gone. Now, each and every image you see in Netflix is personalised to you and what your tastes and viewing habits are. Insanely complex, and a little freaky, but all the same kind of exciting, no?
An exhibition at Sotheby’s in New York betrays a broad generational anxiety about the technological future and the role of humans in it.
These works encapsulate so many of the same themes as my own work—particularly that of Ashley Zelinskie (“Android Platonic.”) and Jamie Zigelbaum (“Doorway to the Soul”).
Node.js® is a JavaScript runtime built on Chrome's V8 JavaScript engine. Node.js uses an event-driven, non-blocking I/O model that makes it lightweight and efficient. Node.js' package ecosystem, npm, is the largest ecosystem of open source libraries in the world.
Might use this for my major project! It would greatly simplify many aspects of setting up and running a server—though JavaScript is poor (though for good reason) at interfacing with core device functions, which could affect the ability of the server to queue printing jobs.
Print test, using FPDF, a shell script, and Python.
It’s alive!! Took a good few hours, but, you know, it’s worth it.
Shell script:
#!/bin/sh lpr print.pdf
My major project looks at mental illness in the context of our hyper-connected and -digital world. Specifically, I'm interested in the psychology behind ever-more frequent notifications, the effects of instant messaging and social hyper connectedness on those with mental illness, and methods of digital catharthis, so to speak. This article has provoked quite a few thoughts on how technology is so obsessively reward-driven, and some avenues of exploration for providing a counterweight to such an obsession.
Major Project WIP The screenshot above is of an Android app that I’ve developed to record all notifications that my phone receives, and to record when those same notifications are dismissed by me. This is a crucial part of my data collection efforts for my Major Project.
The application makes use of an API called NotificationListenerService, which I subclassed and wrote custom onNotificationPosted and onNotificationRemoved methods for, which trigger whenever to my phone’s notification centre a notification is posted by an app, or removed by the user, respectively. Both methods then write the notification’s data, including a unique identifier (key), the time posted (in UNIX time), and the app that posted the notification, to a CSV file stored on my phone.
I’ll then use this data in some kind of time-based visualisation, visually creating and destroying some kind of object, one each that directly represents each notification. Or, as Karen suggested, I may create a real-time responder, for example a mood ring whose colour is directly related to the number of notifications left unresponded to.
The user interface above simply allows for the viewing of that CSV data, or the clearing of that data, as need be. Notification collection and recording occurs regardless of whether the app is open or not.
Development was quite easy, mostly given the wealth of online resources and StackExchange queries (where honestly most of my code comes from). I have also had experience in Java, and that made things easier.
Python skills project: Melbourne Public Transport Map
Both to explore the data provided by PTV (found here), and to develop my Python skills, I created a map of all public transport in metropolitan Melbourne. The map labels all bus, tram, and train routes, at each of their termini and along their routes at PTV-defined travel pattern termini, and according to the colour scheme utilised by PTV.
As I said, I did this project to explore and familiarise myself with the data provided by PTV, as I may potentially use the data in my major project.
The entire project can be accessed and downloaded here.
A full-resolution vector of the entire map can be viewed using this link.
Week 4: Framing exercise
For this exercise, we created paper cutouts, and went out into the big, wide world to find and document data. I chose to create a two-part frame, which I then used to document textural contrasts between close-proximity objects (a fancy way of saying I found things close together that looked different).
Rather than focussing on the thing itself, my frame focuses on the difference between things, and how that difference can colour each thing’s respective identity.
Art Palette By Simon Doury & Etienne Ferrier
Art Palette works as a search engine that finds artworks based on your chosen color palette. Using this tool, you can explore how the same five colors from Van Gogh's Irises can be related to a 16th century Iranian folio or Monet's water lilies.
Art Palette can help creative experts in art, design and beyond to make informed choices regarding color palettes, understanding the context and history behind each one.
—from https://experiments.withgoogle.com/arts-culture/art-palette
This experiment, hosted by Google Arts and Culture Experiments (https://experiments.withgoogle.com/arts-culture), executes an incredible and quintessentially Google concept in an extremely thought-provoking way. Simultaneously an art project and invaluable design resource, it brings together the world’s art and mixes it all together, transcending geographic, cultural and political boundaries in favour of something much simpler and more universal—colour. It reveals connections, relationships, in totally unexpected ways, and in doing so manages to highlight the strength of computers in assessing, so to speak, art in a way a human never could.
That said, in some ways I think it also speaks to the limitations of computers: whilst of course it was never designed to do such a thing, it highlights that technology is still by and large limited to pixel analysis, and at least for now does not see art in the same way a human would—a way that is arguably defined by bias. The project also almost strips the art of that which makes it art, but does so in such a thought-provoking and unexpected way that it’s hard not to be blown away.
Give it a go here: https://artsexperiments.withgoogle.com/artpalette
Alejandro Almaraz’s Places I’ve Never Been
Whilst not strictly data visualisations (or perhaps they are?), I absolutely love the concept behind this series of work. I love the intellectual weight of the usage of images from around the internet to represent places he has never been to, the questions of physical vs virtual reality it provokes, and just how quintessentially internet age it all feels—not to mention the aesthetically stunning, dream-like quality each image possesses.
This work provokes so many questions about the nature of physical space, and what ideas of physical experience, travel, and even time and space mean in the digital age. The images themselves are almost ghost- or dream-like, and so incredibly specific and timeless, as though you’re simultaneously experiencing the spaces, whilst having them sit in your mind’s eye like a word on the tip of your tongue. And the use of images from around the internet brings to the fore such a feeling of universality that I absolutely love.
Less whimsically, I find the democracy, so to speak (in that the images were gathered in a way that amounted to crowd-sourcing), and that aforementioned attendant universality, to be an extremely interesting quality. Especially in the creation of data visualisations, that accessibility accompanied with a clear emotional and/or intellectual narrative is extremely important to the salience of a visualisation, and this piece has demonstrated to me the power of crowd-sourced data and/or imagery, when used correctly. Perhaps I will integrate something similar into my future work, though I can only dream to do it as seamlessly and effortlessly as Almaraz did.
Reflection on A1: Group visualisation and presentation.
Week 2 Studio
To be perfectly honest, this was as far from my expectations as any class could possibly be—but I wouldn’t change it for anything. I really enjoyed the deep conceptual exploration of the concept of data, and especially that that exploration was clearly rooted in an effort to prepare for further assessments.
In the above photo, taken in class, is a hand drawn map of the intersection where I catch the tram. Whilst it has been a constant in my life for over a year, almost every day, in drawing it I found myself unable to remember so many details, from the shape of various sidewalks to the positions of posts and crossings. And that phenomenon is extremely fascinating to me—how can it be that the details of something so familiar to us can slip away so easily, like water in our hands, when examined more closely in memory? How is it that we can conceive of something in the whole, only to lose so many other aspects when another is more closely examined?
More broadly, these questions raise more lines of inquiry into the subjectivity of data, and the nature of our memories. What determines which properties of an object we remember? What significance to we have to assign to a property before it can be remembered? And, most interestingly, is it ever possible to attain such a thing as objective data?
This tumblr is now used for VART3633
Yup, that’s all, folks.
Instructions About GMT
After a short consultation with Andy on last Friday (unfortunately i was the only one presented so I need to reinform my team about what’s going on), our team sort of alter our aim which we were supposed to introduce uses of technology in organic means – using FaceTime/Skype to share our experience on the actual event with others, so as to expand our community, into some thing more practical.
What was suggested is to frame our idea into actual actions, and with our core concept of bringing people together by the positive means of phones/pads, what is more important than to simply set up stands is to really communicate with the focus on doing same things altogether in one specific moment. So finally we decided to leave it to our cohort to decide whether they gonna do it or not, our team will just concentrating on the method we convey this concept.
So what we have now is planning to design a printed piece with some instructions and illustrations on it. Since Andy has seen some of my artworks on Bechance he suggested we can really use our strength to make contributions, as for me, I could use my drawing skills to do the illustration part and my team members could work with the content and structure of the whole printed matter. We still need to discuss more about the details later in this week.
And we got a sketch prototype of what the final print may look like. We were thinking of doing folded zines with probably a phone appearance? And because there will be a chance of using risograph in week 12 we planed to finish the work before that day.
Semester 2 Week 9 Rapid Prototyping
From top to bottom, per row: ~ a quick and dirty model of a potential phone stand, for our GMT (Global Meal Time), where we have a meal while Skyping/FaceTiming a relative or friend ~ attempting to recreate various Subway products, from ingredients kindly given to us individually by some very confused Subway staff ~ the final reproductions... I think we did pretty well, all things considered ~ what the final reproductions were meant to look like ~ us executing a GMT, while eating our almost-as-pretty Subway sandwiches
Overall, both of our speed runs went extremely well! When trying to recreate the subway products, we worked together as a team in an energetic and collaborative environment to deconstruct and challenge modern food advertising beauty stands—and ended up with some pretty decent looking sandwiches! They didn’t taste so great though.
Next, we ate those sandwiches as part of trial GMT run. We discovered it was rather hard to eat and hold our phones, as anticipated and somewhat alleviated through our rather ingenious phone stands. Just as we’d hoped, the meal very much challenged popular notions of technology creating “inauthentic” or “fake” interactions and bonds, as we had a great laugh and fantastic meal in spite of geographic differences.
It’s the 21st century, who says physicality is a prerequisite for being present! (oh, I quite like that. That should be GMT’s tagline)
Thanks @oh-ok-ok, @yusacui, and @glowingbulb! You guys rock :D
Interview Reflection
This was perhaps one of the more stressful assessments I’ve done, the whole contacting a creative we admire perhaps left me feeling a little daunted. Which is why I kind of kept putting it off at first. It didn’t help that the first person on my list was David Lynch. It was more of a thought experiment though, there was no chance that he’d actually reply but it would’ve been amazing if he did. (Better he didn’t, I can’t imagine what I would even ask… How’s Annie?)
I also tried contacting the designer Peter Saville and the musician St. Vincent, both didn’t have public email addresses, and I felt uncomfortable requesting an interview via Facebook/Twitter/Instagram. Not hearing back from their managers after a week I made the decision to jump down to the last person on my list, my mum’s cousin Silvia.
She’s an art teacher and visual artist, but she also curates a café with her husband that doubles as a small gallery space. Having these three different viewpoints on creativity and art I thought it would be really fascinating to interview her, I wanted to pose my questions around these three roles, how they intertwined and related to each other. While having someone famous could’ve been nice (I had the idea of presenting the interview as a CD case and lyric/questions booklet as the above two have connections to music) I felt that this was a great opportunity nevertheless.
I decided to conduct the interview over the phone, that way we could have a discussion around the questions, something that flowed naturally rather than just a straight question and answer format. Unfortunately my laptop’s microphone kept dropping out, meaning every so often I lost a sentence or two from her responses. I was able to fill most of it in from memory (or at least approximate what she was trying to say). Other than that I chose not to edit her responses too heavily, keeping in most of the “You know"s and "I think"s as I wanted to keep it as natural as possible, to make it sound as if the reader was conversing with her themselves. Part of this assignment was the challenge of figuring out how to convey a sense of the subject in a visual medium, and for that reason I chose to present it as a zine (even though just about everyone else did the same). Seeing as Silvia often works in collage I also wanted to bring that across.
Questions I asked:
How instinctual do you find your creative process, or do you feel the need to rationalise certain aspects?
Where do you feel that art education exists today. What does it provide that other subjects can’t?
You work in a number of different mediums, how do you feel that affects your work? Do they inform certain qualities?
To what extent do you find it necessary to discuss your work in terms of identities, so being a mother, being a woman, your heritage etc? Is it something you find that consciously informs your work?
What drove you to establish a space to display and support other artists, at the café? How does that connect to you being an artist, educator, and mother?
I was able to go past her house and take some photos of her studio and working space. I wanted to provide some context to the text and I believed that the space carried a sense of who she was and how she worked. Being a mother the studio often bled into the rest of the house, such as the kitchen or lounge room, and it was this notion of the mother and artist, domestic and creative aspects merging together that I wanted to capture in my publication.
My initial attempts to lay out the booklet on InDesign didn’t quite achieve the tone that I wanted, so I decided to ‘unmake’ my designs by printing out the text, some images, a grid layout and essentially 'collaging’ the zine (similar to the idea of 'paste-ups’: how designers created page layouts before desktop publishing). My shitty 20 year old black and white laser-jet printer often produces faded prints, and that helped add some warmth to my designs. I found working this way quite fun, and despite being limited by certain aspects I found I was able to create much more exciting layouts than what I was attempting on screen. (The only problem is you can’t fix spelling errors you missed!) This way of working probably isn’t for everyone, you’ve got to be happy with a lot of imperfections, but I would defiantly recommend it even just as an alternative to sketching.
Having completed the collage/layouts, I scanned them back into an InDesign document to arrange them as a booklet. I also added some more imagery, this time with a duotone red-orange filter and multiply blending mode, which almost resembled a screen-print. It was this sort of hand-made, lo-fi aesthetic that I wanted to pursue as it felt in keeping with her artworks and style. Speaking with Andy and Bronwyn I decided to try and print on newsprint paper, or at least something similar, so that the finished product would retain at least some of the softness I had tried to carry through. Unfortunately most printers are wary about printing onto such thin paper as it tends to stick to the rollers, fold over itself, or not take ink very well ( A+ quality paper it is ;P). However the thin recycled paper I had sourced worked well enough at Dinkums. I would have liked to try inkjet as it produces a less shiny image, however commercial inkjet inks are quite thick and this paper wouldn’t absorb it quite well (It’s also more expensive).
Despite my initial hesitations I found this to be a really fulfilling experience. I enjoyed the process of interviewing a creative and then attempting to interpret what they had said into a visual form. Also I was just in a book-making headspace (100 Qs book coming soon. Hopefully) so that was nice too.
ASK ME ANYTHING
VISUAL ARTIST | BLAKE KATHRYN
Blake Kathryn is a visual artist based in Los Angeles. Her initial studies and work in illustration paved the way for her eventual explorations in computer graphics. Her work, which sees the use of a colour palette consisting of dreamy pinks, artificial-like blues and gradients, reflects the style of early CG art, avoiding the more modernist approach to hyperrealist rendering.
I am in awe of her delicate application of colours, that are somewhat of a fantastical and illusory nature. In conjunction with her three-dimensional forms, such as the figure and common objects, Blake’s work enters a surreal and dimensional atmosphere, surrounded by vivid hues and shapes afloat.
