Time Arts II

In Ariella Azoulay’s article, she talks about the concept of the “citizen of photography.” She explains that everyone, whether they know it/consent to it or not, is a citizen of photography. All you have to do to become a citizen is give up “ownership of your image” and your right to decide if and when you are or aren’t photographed. Azoulay also talks about the “ethical observer, and the role of their presence in a photo. She explains the importance of the “spectator’s eye,” and how it has the power to turn photography from a simple means of producing images, into an instrument of huge cultural/societal power.

The spectator’s eye does this by being witness to the events in the photograph; if the goal of a photograph is to instigate change--whether in a political situation, a cultural one, etc--it’s only going to be successful if other people see it. Azoulay describes this as the “spectator’s responsibility to what is visible.” She also discusses the res publica--the common interest. This section of the reading was a little hard to wrap my head around; regardless, Azoulay seems to think that photography is one of the last few sites where there’s still a discourse on the res publica. Lastly, the author also discusses how being a citizen of photography can be empowering to those who have been denied citizenship elsewhere; she uses the Palestinians as an example of this. The section ends with Azoulay explaining that despite the data collective/documentary goals of photography, there’s still a gap between those intentions and what actually happens when a photograph is taken. That gap, she says, is where one can become a citizen of photography.

Robert Flaherty’s “Man of Aran” was a little confusing to me, but I’ll do my best to summarize it. The film takes place in the Aran Islands. It depicts a series of conflicts and interactions between the islanders and the sea than they both depend upon, and are at the mercy of. What first struck me about the film is that, while there are plenty of shots of the people themselves, there are at least as many--if not more--shots of the ocean and shoreline itself. Throughout the course of the video the camera cuts from the people and their struggle back to the turbulent waters that they find themselves up against. Interestingly enough, the form and movement of the water ended up becoming almost more engaging than the characters themselves. In terms of storyline, he film starts out with the actors on land, with shots of their homes, and of the island itself. A woman and a child look out over the ocean, where they see three people rowing a small boat through turbulent waves. Eventually, with the help of the woman and child, the men in the boat make it to shore. All five of them go to lift the boat to carry it away, but at this point, the camera zooms in on a hole in the boat. The islanders then notice that their fishing net is about to be washed away by the waves, and they run into the water to retrieve it. After that, things got a little confusing for me. In the 2009 version, I think there was even less of a specific story. Whoever edited the video seemed to use Flaherty’s shots largely for their visual appeal and effect. It also painted a more light-hearted picture of life on the island. The same shots of conflict between humans and nature were shown, but they were cut together in a way that minimized their negative implications.

Regina José Galindo (pg. 215)

In the first reading, the interview with Regina José Galindo, the artist discusses her work in the context of it being a response to the violence and atrocities being committed in her homeland of Guatemala. However, she also talks about her work in a more personal context. Francisco Goldman brings up several specific pieces by Galindo, starting with Quién Puede Olvidar Las Huellas. (As a side note: I looked up the title of this piece because I thought the translation of “olvidar” to “erase” was odd; it turns out that the piece was largely referred to as Quién Puede Borrar Las Huellas. This discrepancy is probably just the result of inconsistent translation, but I’d be interested to see how people’s interpretations of the work changed when it was presented to them under a different title.) The work itself consisted of Galindo walking down streets to the Palacio Nacional, carrying a basin of human blood that she dipped her feet in to leave a trail of bloody footprints. Some of the other projects that Goldman mentioned were Himenoplastia (which involved exactly what it sounds like) and Angelina (in which Galindo spent several days dressed as a maid, evaluating the impact it had on how she was treated). Overall, the article served to highlight just how bad things really are--and have been for a long time--in Guatemala, and take apart Galindo and her work in the context of that.

Hasan Elahi (pg. 221)

The second reading is an interview with Hasan Elahi; I didn’t immediately recognize his name, but as I read about his work--Tracking Transience in particular--I realized that I had learned about it previously in another class. The project started when Elahi was wrongfully detained (and further hassled) at an airport, an encounter which resulted in him erroneously being put on a terrorist watch list and subsequently subjected to increased surveillance. However, rather than try to conserve his privacy, Elahi did the opposite: he started doing the surveillance himself. Through photos, videos, credit card receipts, and time stamped GPS locations, he documented his existence in far more detail than any government agency could have--and, indeed, far more detail than any government agency wanted. By digitizing and publicizing every aspect of his life, Elahi overwhelmed his would-be surveillors with information, making it hard to find any one piece of data, and simultaneously providing Elahi himself with a 24/7 alibi.

Regina José Galindo’s Work

The first of Galindo’s pieces that I chose was Sangre De Cerdo, or Pig’s Blood, from 2017. In the piece, Galindo stands naked under a bucket of pig’s blood suspended via a wooden structure and a rope that’s part of a pulley system. The rope runs from the bucket itself down to the floor, where a group of onlookers must make the choice to either pull the rope, dumping the blood all over Galindo, or do nothing, and leaving the rope hanging free until someone else decides to pull it. The artist used the iconic pig’s blood scene in Carry as a reference for the visuals of this piece, but conceptually, much of her inspiration came from the US’s political climate. Galindo likens the situation in her piece to the choice that many Americans face today: tolerate the acts of racism and misogyny supported and committed by our president, or stand our ground and continue to do what we believe is right. Sangre De Cerdo documents this conflict, and calls viewers to do what they can to intervene.

The other piece that I chose was Galindo’s 2015 work Estoy Viva, or I Am Alive. In this work, the Grace Chorale of Brooklyn interpreted and performed a composition which consisted only of the words “I am alive.” The piece as a whole seems to intervene in the act of taking life for granted, instead challenging the viewer to acknowledge life and revel in it, to become fully aware and conscious of it. Galindo’s work promotes a sense of awareness of one’s own life, but also the lives of others. In terms of what this piece documents, I think it preserves a specific moment in Galindo’s consciousness, a specific moment of realization and awareness.

Hasan Elahi’s Work

At last Friday’s lecture at the Beckman Institute, Judith Pinar gave a presentation where she talked about interactive fiction--particularly gaming--with a focus on hodology and meta-hodology. The talk was surprisingly entertaining, refreshingly unpretentious, and, in my opinion, one of the best academic lectures I’ve ever attended. The lecture itself was accompanied by a hilariously self-aware PowerPoint presentation full of randomly placed pictures of dragons, and phrases like “bullet points are the ramen noodles of ontology.”

In terms of content, Pintar set out her discussion points right off the bat, taking apart the mouthful of a title on her intro slide: “The Appeal of an Endless Horizon: Collaborative Game Design as Meta-Hodological Play.” She kicked things off explaining to her audience exactly what “meta-hodological” meant, describing it as an “awareness of the contexts that shape the paths through which methods are created.” She mentioned structural inequalities, such as Robert Moses’s design of the Long Island bridges, and how that had the effect of giving objects (the bridges) agency.

In the next section of her talk, she discussed game design--collaborative game design, in particular. He described hodology from the player’s perspective as the path they take through the game (this can be referred to as a “desire path”). Meta-hodology--from the game designer’s perspective--would be the awareness of every potential path the player could take. Pintar also mentioned Richard Bartle’s four player types: killers (acting upon players), achievers (acting upon the world), explorers (interacting with the world), and socializers (interacting with other players). One real-world example she referenced was the “Quad Game” she has her students work on.

In the section of her talk about “endless horizons,” Pintar explained that “social context of narratives, relations, practices are often invisible except to designers, dedicated players, and game critics.” An important part of how a game is perceived is the manner in which it’s presented--or, if you’re creative enough, the manner in which you think about it. She used the example of dodgeball; it’s supposed to be this great childhood game, but a lot of kids actually hate it because it’s an easy opportunity for bullying, and some kids just want to hide. But if you change the narrative from “hiding is weak, get out there and throw balls at kids!” to one where different people have different jobs--some kids throw balls, others shield people, etc, then the narrative becomes very different.

In the first section of the reading, Joan Fontcuberta talked about the relationships between photography, documentary, photomontage, and perceived truths. He discussed the idea that one can generate some of the same effects of a photomontage--the shocking and thought-provoking juxtaposition of different images, for example--through what he calls scenographic montage. The example that Fontcuberta refers to is the dissected lion on display in the Zoological Museum of Barcelona. He explains that the dissonance of the dissection in the context of the museum’s modernist architecture is an “already made” photomontage; the environment has done the work for the artist, and there’s no need for him or her to edit multiple photos together to generate an effect. The artist also examines the idea that photography can’t be accurately defined as a technology, or a physical processed. Instead, he references Rudolf Arnheim’s statement that photography is defined by its verisimilitude; it’s defined by the idea that people accept it as fact.

In the second section, Kutlug Ataman discusses his interest in how a someone telling their story affects their life. He also investigates the idea of the truth, stating that sometimes a lie can tell more than the truth, and is almost always more interesting. In his piece “Never My Soul!” the viewer can never quite tell if what they’re seeing is real or a construction, and whether the director is “an artist or a journalist” (although personally, I’m not that that’s the right question to be asking, as it implies that being an artist and being a journalist are mutually exclusive).

In the third section of the reading, Sean Snyder investigates the effect that recreation and reenactment can have on the events they’re based off of. He also talks about the relatively new phenomenon of lower quality footage being considered more true or believable. This concept is not unlike the found footage horror movie genre; the fact that the footage appears unprofessional implies that whoever shot or provided it is also not a professional, and therefore wouldn’t actually be capable of faking the footage. There’s also an implication that if someone was going to go to all the trouble of editing footage fabricate an event, they might as well put in the effort required to get higher-quality footage.

The fourth section of the reading is an interview with Omer Fast, who has a particular interest in reenactment, and is interested in making films/documentaries based those reenactments. Fast talks about his work as “[exploiting] the ambiguity” of subjects’ roles and experiences in both reenactments and actual events. One of his pieces, called “The Casting,” involved having actors participate in reenactments, but only filming after telling them to stop. In other words, he would tell them to act out the scene, then have them freeze, and film the actors whatever position they were in when he told them to stop.

The last section was an interview with Walid Raad, and discussed his work in the context of the Atlas Group. The Atlas Group is a fictional organization created by Raad, under which he creates art; he credits his work as being produced by other people, or Atlas Group in general, or even anonymous creators. He expresses the idea that facts are not “self-evident objects” (page 194). He also mentions the idea that “history is never on time” (page 196), which has interesting implications for the connections between the past and the present, and the way that certain events and recollections of those events link them.

My idea for this project is to focus on and examine the way a memory changes or degrades the more it is accessed. In this instance, I’ve chosen to ask people about dreams they remember having. The idea of a memory changing is very interesting to me, because the things we remember are such a fundamental part of who we are--and yet they can be very fragile. A memory is vulnerable to suggestion, mental and physical trauma, even old age. In this experiment, I’m investigating whether the simple act of recalling a memory can have an effect on what that memory is.

My plan is to ask the person to think about one part, scene, image, etc from their dream, and try to remember as many details as they can--but don’t say it out loud. I’ll then ask the person to draw this part of their dream in as much detail as possible, including everything they can remember; they can do as many or as few drawings as they feel are necessary to best represent the dream. During this time, I’ll be behind the camera. I’m not sure yet what kind of angle I’ll film the drawing process from; I like the idea of filming the drawings as they’re being created, a sort of over-the-shoulder-type shot. However, I think it might be difficult to get a good view of the drawing in its entirety. Because of this, I think I’ll just shoot the person head-on.

After the person is done drawing, I’ll take their images and place them somewhere off camera where neither of us can see them. At this point, I’ll ask the person to think about the dream a second time, once again trying to recall as many details as possible. I’ll then ask the person to explain the dream to me out loud. All of this will be done on-camera, but the audio of the dream retelling will be particularly important, and I might switch to a different camera angle for this, possibly closer to the subject. After they tell me everything they can remember about the dream, I’ll repeat the first step: asking them to remember the dream, then draw it. I won’t let myself or the person see the original set of drawings until after the second set is completed. If necessary, I might repeat this process to get a third set of drawings.

Steyerl defines a “thing language” as one which “[consists] of the things themselves,” and in which speakers are supposed to “show the thing as such.” I’m not really sure what this means, though. Like, would that mean holding up a dog every time you wanted to talk about dogs?

It seems that some of the “things” which make up transnational documentary are facts themselves, as well as emotions those facts may cause--fear, dread, anger, etc.

The “language of documentary” can sometimes make it hard to tell fact from fiction; Steyerl attributes this to the fact that modern documentaries often “short circuit” negative emotions, preying on an audience’s feelings of doubt, suspicion, anxiety, etc to work them into such a frenzy that they overlook any potentially untrue aspects of what the documentary is saying. For example, if viewers hears that 70% of Americans believe their country is on the brink of a nuclear war, those viewers will likely become scared, and, if enough people are scared, they might start believing the same thing. At that point, even if the original 70% statistic was untrue, it’s still likely that many Americans actually do believe their country is on the brink of nuclear war. Through this process, fiction becomes fact.

Steyerl seems to define the “non-public public sphere” as one which gives the illusion of being open and accessible to the general public, while actually being closed off and unreachable. When the author refers to the documentary sphere as an example of this, I think she’s referring--at least in part--to media sources such as TV news. They present themselves as a window into what’s happening in the real world, simply reporting on events caused by real people--like the viewers themselves--when in fact the viewers have no control over what they see on the news. They can’t hold a vote to determine what tomorrow’s 24-hour news cycle will include.

At this point in the reading, I am so overwhelmed by the posturing and pandering that I find myself unable to continue answering questions. I have read the text in its entirety, yet it is so deliberately convoluted that, although I am able to, I cannot bring myself to decipher its meaning; I cannot rationalize spending my time on something so contrived. I realize that there is probably valuable information buried beneath the bullshit, and that I could undoubtedly find it if I were to wade through the verbal excrement that seems to characterize “academic” texts. However, my strength is failing; with every step I take, I sink deeper into the cesspool that is this reading. And so it is for my own mental health that I cease my analysis here. I fear that if I attempt to continue this assignment, my loathing for this farce will be turned inward, and I am unwilling to sacrifice my own wellbeing for a poorly written, self-congratulatory piece of garbage.

You may think that my reaction here is extreme, or disproportionate. It probably is. But I need an outlet for this baffling rage, and what better place to vent it than in a reading response?

Lastly, please do not take offense at this. I realize that, sadly, “academic” writing is a part of the tried and true college curriculum, and I can’t expect you to lead a revolution against it.

(I may come back to this reading response later on and edit it.)

https://vimeo.com/295439603

Dynamic or condenser? Or something else.

Shotgun microphones are condensers, sensitive to loud noises

Most USB microphones are condensers, but are there are some that are dynamic and used for vocal applications specifically.

No modern lavelier mic is dynamic. They're very small and they’re condensers

Does the mic have phantom power?

Phantom power is necessary for all condenser mics. Any dynamic mic does not.

Describe the mics frequency response. Is it flat or shaped? What frequencies does this mic pick up the best?

Shotgun mics have a shaped response which is why they are used for music. Deep bass and energetic treble

USB mics can technically be both. I would say mostly shaped because people buy USB mics for their portable studios on their computer

Lav mics are quite flat which emphasizes vocals. This is why they are often clip mics used for film, interviews, and other vocals.

Does the mic have a roll off switch?

Most condenser mics including all three of these do infect have the roll of switch to take away the proximity effect. This is when you speak close to the mic and the bass rises too much

What is the mics polar pattern? Where would you place this mic in relation to the sound source?

Shotgun mics have a very tight polar pattern because they are very one directional. For example, I would place one of these pointing at the persons mouth if I were in a room with them questioning them at a table.

Lav mics and some USB mics that are more omnidirectional have a looser polar pattern because they pic up noise from all around. These are better for interviews or other instances where you want to pick up many sounds around the space.

How sensitive is your mic (in dbVs)?

Shotgun mics are fairly sensitive, they can pick up quiet sounds from far away which is why they are widely used for sporting events and broadcasting.

Most USB mics used for recording music in the studio are a little less sensitive because they are meant to be close to the sound source.

Lav mics are similar in a sense… But with most condenser microphones the pick up is fairly sensitive. It is with dynamic mics where they have lower sensitivity

Describe your mic’s impedance?

Generally shotgun mics have a high impedance because they need to pick up distant subjects

Most USB mics do swell because they’re meant to pick up loud sounds from instruments and such.

Is you mic balanced or unbalanced?

Not too sure

If you have a condenser mic, what is the maximum SPL?

In this week’s reading, Marta Zarzycka talks about the relationship between photographs and sound, as well as their impacts in relation to one another. She explains that, though a still images itself does not produce physical sound, it is very capable of implying sound--whether that’s through the image’s subject, or through the very lack of sound it provides. One point that she brings up is that, unlike an image, sound is unavoidable. It is a physical force, a series of vibrations that can’t be shut out by closing your eyes, or even really covering your ears. This results in sound being a very forceful, confrontational form of sensory input. I was particularly intrigued by this section of the reading, as I have also thought about sound in this way. I’ve been very interested in the way including audio in a project forces the observer into a certain situation or experience.

Another aspect of this topic that Zarzycka discusses is that of the effect of silence. She describes silence as, “not a neutral emptiness, but ‘the negative of a sound we’ve heard (or imagined) beforehand’” (page 173). She states that the only quality silence and noise share is their potential for duration. That said, the author seems to come to the conclusion that sound--whether it’s music, voiceover, native audio, or something else--can be a very effective tool in manipulating the impact an image has on the viewer. However, at the very end of the section, she cautions the reader: she warns that, in some cases, the combination of images and sound can be so effective, so convincing, that it distances the observer from the horrific nature of what’s actually going on in the images. Essentially, there is a danger of only perceiving the artistic, aesthetic aspects of the combined audio and visual information, leaving their actual content unexamined.

The three types of listening that Michel Chion describes in the text are causal listening, semantic listening, and reduced listening. He describes the first of these as listening to something with the goal of determining its source or cause. Chion explains that we practice causal listening all the time without even realizing it. In fact, most times our first, most instinctive response to any sound is to try to identify what’s causing it. Chion explains that, when participating in causal listening, we can identify (or attempt to identify) sounds and their sources with varying degrees of uniqueness or generality. To explain causal listening at its most basic, he uses the example of a “scraping” sound. When we hear this type of sound, we can identify it as the result of some sort of friction or movement, but we usually can’t determine the specific source (a snow shovel against a driveway versus dragging a metal trash can, etc.) with any kind of consistent accuracy. Other types of sounds, though, we can identify more successfully. Chion uses the example of a radio announcer’s voice. You can recognize both it, and its source, when you hear it--you know it’s a human voice, and you can attribute it to a specific individual--but you can’t put a face, or maybe even a name to it. The last, most unique type of causal listening Chion describes is that in which you can physically see the source of the sound you’re hearing. This allows for the most specific, most accurate attribution of the sound’s cause. You can see your classmate talking, and the sounds that you’re hearing are consistent with your perception of the person’s voice. Chion also makes the important assertion that, while causal listening can be very useful in understanding our sonic environment, it’s also very easy to manipulate. Movies, he explains, do this all the time, and are usually very successful in deceiving us.

The next type of listening that Chion discusses is semantic listening. He describes it very aptly interpreting a code--whether that’s morse code, spoken language, etc. Chion also makes the distinction that this type of listening is “purely differential”--semantic listening requires you to interpret the language you’re hearing as a system of sounds. Each individual phoneme has meaning only because of its existence in the context of a whole (a whole language, code, etc). Chion makes the point that, because of this, we can correctly interpret such languages despite slight differences in pronunciation. On a personal note, it was interesting to me that even though the author describes semantic listening as “[functioning] in an extremely complex way,” it’s the type of listening that he talks about the least.

This week’s reading by Trinh T. Minh-ha seemed to focus on several aspects of documentary, as well as different ways of viewing/categorizing it. The author addresses the concept of the documentary as a work of art in itself, as well as the concept of documentary as a style of filmmaking.

One topic Minh-ha focused on was the idea of documentary being inherently not true or realistic. The moment that you construct a film, the moment you edit it, the moment you frame a shot and start filming, the “truth” that the documentary becomes distorted. The author quotes William Stott, saying “Documentary--the presentation of actual facts in a way that makes them credible and telling to people at the time” (page 70). Another subject that Minh-ha discusses is the “socially oriented filmmaker” (page 71) and the problems associated with them. She explains that such filmmakers tend to end up simplifying their subject matter, defending it by claiming that their films are for, essentially, more simplistic audiences. This brings up the problem of the us vs. them mindset. Minh-ha uses this, as well as other examples, as evidence of the problematic view of people who create art and people who consume it as being completely separate; artists are on the “inside,” and viewers are on the “outside.”

I had mixed feelings about this week’s reading. There were parts of it that I really agreed with, and (as usual) there were parts that I found hard to stomach. Overall, once I got past the wordiness and pretentiousness, I thought that Minh-ha made a lot of good points. One of my favorite parts was the section in which she addresses the idea of documentary being manipulative; I particularly liked the idea of manipulation being creative. I think that in the past, I’ve tried to address manipulation in my own art, to some degree, whether by attempting to manipulate my audience, or by attempting to show them they’re already being manipulated. But Minh-ha came at it from angle I hadn’t really considered: the idea that, in order to be acceptable, manipulation must be subtle; the consumer mustn’t notice it.