neonascent

Well, I’ve had my last assessment on Thursday, cleaned up the studio space Friday, and had bye-bye drinks Friday night. Now I’m entering a twilight zone of pre-Englandness. Still a few interesting things happening before I go though:

• Finish producing something great to go into the Material Satisfaction exhibition, which opens 22 November at Kudos.
• Farewell party for Grace on 5 Dec - Grace is leaving for England about the same time I am.
• Possibly the Pete Ridge festival…

Okay tired betime.

The Java and Web software blog Simple Thoughts has posted a list of 10 Simple Tips for Better Blogging. I know that there are a few avid bloggers who read muchmojo (though I’m not suggesting that they read it avidly!), and I thought I’d link to it.

Ironically the entry on the original blog is so noisy from Google ads and the like that I feel it would be better to just quote it here. As it leans towards informing “professional bloggers” who are aiming at a blog income, I have trimmed off vestiges of capitalist-whoredomery and cut it down to 8:

1. Blog about topics which are truly interesting to you. This will help you succeed in the long run.

2. Host your blog on your own server with your own domain name. Avoid free blog hosting on blogspot or wordpress.com (unless you are Robert Scoble). It provides better perception to your blog and more configurability among other benefits. Use a Blogging software like WordPress or Movable Type. I use WordPress.

3. Post with a fixed schedule, preferably once a day or once every two days, if possible. Missing the weekends is fine.
Note: Do not be afraid to take days off. Blogging shouldn’t be a chore.
Disclaimer: I sometimes break this rule.

4. Try to write in proper polished language, unless you are blogging solely for highly targeted audience like gangsters.
Note: Personally I hate reading blogs with poor english. It casts a bad light on the author.

5. Choose a decent theme for your blog matching the target audience. Don’t choose too bold colors for business blogs. In general all standard web design principles apply.
For example if you are targeting teenage girls (as audience) then a smattering of pink may not be out of place.

6. Track what your audience wants and deliver more of it.

7. Unless it is a personal blog stay away from too many “had a hangover today” post or talking about your personal life.

<snip , snip!>

10. Provide an interactive experience. Allow comments in your blogs. Respond politely to comments.

Muchmojo seemingly “score” around 5/8 - I guess I should be happy. Of course the list is just a guide, and there are always exceptions to the rule. Without any financial interests in the blog, it will most likely be unrealistic to expect personal blogs to be on dedicated servers instead of free services - Muchmojo has this luxury mainly because I’m a geek.

I have received a College of Fine Arts’ Students’ Association grant with which to setup an online emergent art gallery. Here’s a snip from my proposal to give you an idea of what it is:

The aim of the project is to set up an online gallery/exhibition platform for emerging digital and interactive artworks. It is intended to act as a showcase for such works, as well as providing a forum for related discussion. The name “neonascent” has been chosen for the gallery, being both a synonym for “newborn” – sympathetic to the type of artwork to be featured – and “neon ascent” – a toung-in-cheek evocation of glam sci-fi.

<snip>

…Promotion will involve an email campaign directed at Fine arts mailing lists and academic staff, postering appropriate areas, and finally holding a quasi-opening for the gallery and its exhibitions.

Of course the opening is essential for any gallery, regardless of whether it is online or not!

I’ve created a photoset on Flickr for related images, but at the moment it’s just got me hamming it up for a faux-official giant cheque giving ceremony.

Pet names is a collaborative photo work I’m doing with Maja Baska. Truth be told she is doing all the work and having a horrible time working with cockroaches, etc. I had the initial idea on which the images are based.

The idea is based on cliched pet names that couples have for each other, and a darker side to them. The possum was originally going to be a rabbit in honey (i.e. Honneybunny), and that would have given it a bit of a base desire aspect as well as the macabre through the theme of food.

The working images have been put on flickr. The possum’s tail is so cute.

Due to certain limitations and controls set on the Photomedia students’ first exhibition, Hayden and I felt there needed to be a parallel exhibition through which to allow free artistic expression. The Salon des Refusés of Paris being taken as a righteous presidence. Not only did the lecturers dictating the composition of the exhibition give a specific format for the prints, all images (around 25) had to form part of a single narrative.

An argument given to me was that it allowed the students to go through the motions and get to grips with arranging an exhibition, while allowing the final product to be coherent and professional-looking, instead of just a hodge-podge of unrelated images. I was initially taken aback by this response, assuming that my failure to hold the same priorities was just indicative of the rift between Photomedia and Sculpture. However I cannot accept these responses. We are studying Fine Arts and not Art Administration. The free artistic creativity of the photo students was being compromised for ease of presentation. I vehemently oppose the emasculation of the artist to a narrative they did not choose. The exhibition flew in the face of warnings against over-determination of art (commonly expressed through “less is more”), and reduced everyones work to a very static and liminal level of signification; The subtlety of those very good prints was lost to the explicitness of those arround them. One supporter of the exhibition had the cheek to suggest all was okay, because most people didn’t recognise that the prints formed a narrative!

Justification having been made, we set about transforming the front room of my shared house into an exhibition space. After measures of blood, sweat, and frustration the beast was done. Opening night was a huge success, with much high-arty enjoyment of free alcohol. Psychoacoustic performed an ambient set to the delights of all.

Images of the exhibition layout are on Flickr, as well as promotional/advertising material, for your interested eyes.

This little guy is the prototype for organic-looking latex “creatures” that plug into any computer via USB, and play and frollic with each other online. Think Tomogochi, then think a persistent online world in which they interact, using the modelled behaviour system of Boids (simulating the flocking behaviour of birds and fish). The name, Neonascent, is also the title of an online emergent art gallery I’m in the process of creating, and comes from the conjoining of Neo ( New; recent), and nascent (Coming into existence; emerging).

It may look a little primordial and far removed from an exciting creature dancing around, but that is the point. The physical “body” of the creature is intended to resemble a pre-stage creature; foetus or larvae/maggot. The beauty of the creature come once it has transcended its immediate body and is interacting on another level. This is not to say, similar to many SciFi conceptions of “virtual reality”, that it is an altogether seperate world or existence. The two are invariable and essentially connected through, for example, Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy of embodied perception.

On the tech side, the creatures self-affirm through USB via a PIC chip and RS232-USB chip. I’ve been having alot of fun doing Assembler level implementation of serial communications functions. It’s very hardcore and geeky, but at the same time incredibly beautiful - like building a sculpture by gluing grains of sand together one at a time.

More picture of the prototype creature are on Flickr.

A couple of weeks ago Hayden, Verity, and I took a trip up to the Newcastle Arts Festival in my Magna. It was a great trip involving:

• A stop-off in Woy Woy(?) for fresh fish ‘n’ chips, authenic Aussie music, and fun.
• Much singing along to CDs for the duration of the trip.
• girls dressed up as monkies bartering bananas for space cake
• Invigorating trip to the Forest of Tranquility (read: scary offroad adventure)

As I’ve just sold my car, this turned out to be a farewell journey for my car and I. It needed to be done, as she wasn’t being used at all, except by friends who would inevitably return it with one or two more scratches and dents than it had gone out with. I’ve stuck the last pictures of my car on Flickr, not that many people will be interested, but I will miss my little car.

The Electric Mushrooms (another working title) are a continuation on my study of light and ceramics. These little guys will come in a variety of colours and will interact with each other in a modular, scalable way (i.e. interesting interaction will take place with 2+ or them). I’m hoping to be able to fit the circuitry into them to make them sing and be sound activated, so that they will keep each other excited in a sort of feedback system of light and sound.

The effect I’m going for is a sort of psychedelic, hypnotic pulse. More news hopefully soon.

The photoset of the prototype mushroom is up of Flickr. Give them a squizz.

Ciracadian Definition is a study into both the use of light and the use of technology imbedded in ceramics. Originally I had intended to stuff it chock full of interactive circuitry - I realised I didn’t need to and that it wouldn’t say anything essential. So as of now it is a very simple object that reminds me of the Japanese aesthetic of maybe paper walls. I love it dearly - except for the name, which I’m not sold on - and it has led me into more work with ceramics and light (see the mushrooms).

Ceramics for me hold a great resonance with technology. The earliest known form of written language is the Sumerian clay tablets. I find the ostensibly incongruent act of mixing high-tech with ancient tech very appealing.

The photoset of this sculpture is up at Flickr. Go check em out!

This week in Biopolitics we have been looking at the concept of the Multitude, as well as an associated concept - Netwar.

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