Week 5 & 6 – DIY / DIWO / Maker Culture: Glitch Practices

Summary

Marc Garrett’s DIWO Lecture on 15 Feb 2018

See section below for more details on Furtherfield, London.

Questions to ponder:

  • How does DIWO relates to concepts which we have covered during the semester?
  • Looking back at your collaborative game, crowd-sourced artwork, telematic performance, and exquisite glitch project how does DIWO describe what we have been doing so far?
  • How does DIWO differ from DIY?
  • How does DIWO encourage collaboration across networks?

 

Introduction to DIY / DIWO Maker Culture: A study of Furtherfield, London

(courtesy Randall Packer)

Furtherfield is a gallery in London that has pioneered art of the social practice and activism since the 1990s. We will review their philosophy and work as essential to the emergence of Maker Culture, a form of collaborative thinking that has become prevalent in the art and design world today.

Marc Garrett, Guest Speaker

Marc Garrett and Ruth Catlow, co-directors, Furtherfield, UK

 

Based in London, UK, Furtherfield, co-directed by Marc Garrett and Ruth Catlow, is an alternative arts organization and website for exhibition, discussion and critical review with two physical spaces in the heart of Finsbury Park. The Furtherfield Gallery hosts exhibitions and pop-up up events and Furtherfield Commons is a technology and community space for discussions, workshops and informal residencies. Furtherfield believes that through creative and critical engagement with practices in art and technology people are inspired and enabled to become active co-creators of their cultures and societies. Art and technologies play a central role in the way we see and form our societies, and so it is important that programming and productions involve more diverse people at a fundamental level.

Discussion

Ruth Catlow and Marc Garrett “Do it With Others (DIWO): Participatory Media in the Furtherfield Neighborhood,” 2007

Garrett, Marc (2006) “DIWO (Do it With Others) Artistic Co-Creation as a Decentralized Method of Peer Empowerment in Today’s Multitude

Part I

The process is as important as the outcome, forming relationally aware peer enactments. It is a living art, exploiting contemporary forms of digital and physical networks as a mode of open praxis, as in the Greek word for doing, and as in, doing it with others.

This statement suggests that how we get there is as important as the final goal, the end product. In this class we are concerned with process, of doing, making, creating, interacting. In the interactive artwork, the the process is more fluid than say a finished object.

But, what if these artists prefer by choice to be part of an art world less based on hegemony; and are more interested in being closely connected with their grass root art cultures, and are less interested in art celebrity culture? What if the art itself consists in its make-up similar values to those musicians in the Indie Music scene? What if this art is asking important questions that deserve a dialogue which goes deeper than marketable products, and proposed celebrity genius?

And furthermore, the process is making is a shift away from the project as a marketable item. Process is more intangible, less finite, and more difficult to assign a value, other than the creative inspiration that arises from the act of doing.

Yet, when using a simple word such as ‘New’, it proposes as part of its meaning that it’s all about the ‘New’, as in, use of ‘New technology’ as an outright goal or a means to an end. This is a misleading term, and does not accurately reflect a field of practice incorporating crossovers and transdisciplinary understandings, uniting our engagement and experimentation with technology at a ‘variety of levels’, which also include ecological tendencies as well as social interpretations.

The statement refers to the new, or the fetish of the new as related to new products, rather the newness that results of experimentation, which is at the foundation of this course. How can we discuss new ideas, new concepts, new processes, through our experimentation with openness and interaction with one another and with the viewer.

Under capitalism control of technology is no longer in the hands of craftsmen but is transferred to the owners of enterprise and their agents.

This brings back to open source thinking in the sense that when we use “closed” products we lose control of what they do, rather than building tools and systems of our own. This openness means we have access to the source of our tools, just as making food from scratch gives us control over its ingredients and methods of preparation.

Peer critique and shared ownership of ideas have enabled small groups and communities to learn and initiate projects together.

Share ownership is the essence of open source thinking, allowing us to critique each other as peers, or groups, or communities so that we can learn and create together. Do it with others.

A willingness to transform our ideas and intentions not solely based on ‘proprietorial’ dependencies, and a fetish for the ‘New’, allows space for ‘different versions of the new’ and ‘old’ dialogues to evolve.

Proprietorial dependency is the opposite of open source thinking, it means that we are dependent on what is handed to us, something new, as opposed to what is created ourselves. This in turn allows for dialogue, interaction in a share process of making and learning. This class is a dialogue and a space for creation and making, not following pre-existing methods or structures, but rather inventing our own.

Control over one’s tools of creative production is now, as significant as having control over one’s creative ideas. And, media art as an art practice, has gained various attributes which allow processes of self-autonomy.

Having this control of our tools and the methods of creation gives us autonomy and self-reliance, freedom of established ways of doing things. Even when we are using proprietary tools, such as Facebook Live, we are using these tools in unorthodox ways that give us freedom from the proprietary methods that Facebook imposes on the timeline.

Part II

(or Diwo’s, or Diwo groups) Expanded from the original term known as D.I.Y. (Do It Yourself). D.I.W.O ‘Do It With Others’. Is more representative of contemporary, collaborative – art practice which explores through the creative process of using networks, in a collective manner.” (Garrett ibid)

How does DIWO differ from DIY? With DIY you do it yourself, with DIWO you do it with others, meaning there is an enhancement of collaboration, which is what we refer to as the social practice. We are used to making things ourselves, but this class explores how we can make things with others, an entirely different creative process.

DIWO (Do It With Others) is inspired by DIY culture and cultural (or social) hacking… Peers connect, communicate and collaborate, creating controversies, structures and a shared grass roots culture, through both digital online networks and physical environments. Influenced by Mail Art projects of the 60s, 70s and 80s demonstrated by Fluxus artists’ with a common disregard for the distinctions of ‘high’ and ‘low’ art.

Mail art by György Galántai, 1981

Why would mail art constitute a peer to peer form? Because in a sense it is an early form of networked communications art, in which artworks can sent from one person to another via the physical network of the postal system. And like the Internet, it is global.

“The purpose of mail art, an activity shared by many artists throughout the world, is to establish an aesthetical communication between artists and common people in every corner of the globe, to divulge their work outside the structures of the art market and outside the traditional venues and institutions: a free communication in which words and signs, texts and colours act like instruments for a direct and immediate interaction.“

Mail art also allowed artworks to be distributed and experienced outside established art venues, which constitutes another social act, as well as open source, in the sense that you are not relying on a controlled environment to distribute your work, but rather allow the art to circulate the postal routes without a curatorial gatekeeper.

“[…] art has become too narcissistic and self-referential and divorced from social life. I see a new form of participatory art emerging, in which artists engage with communities and their concerns, and explore issues with their added aesthetic concerns“

In this sense the we are concerned with ways in which the artist takes control and makes work that becomes embedded in the social life, perhaps as mail art, or street art, or Internet art.

“Online creation communities could be seen as a sign of reinforcement of the role of civil society and make the space of the public debate more participative. In this regard, the Internet has been seen as a medium capable of fostering new public spheres since it disseminates alternative information and creates alternative (semi) public spaces for discussion.“ [40] (Morell 2009)

The Internet now enables this kind of participation as an alternative public space for the creation and dissemination of art and design. It is a sphere where we can openly share and communication information. The Art of the Networked Practice Online Symposium is an example of this shift from the physical to the online realm of staging social spaces for live performance and critical discourse.

The foundations of the Do It With Others art context, that privileges FLOSS (free/libre/open source software) skills sharing and commons-based peer produced artworks and media over the monitored and centrally owned and controlled interfaces of corporate owned social media. This is the spirit of DIWO, if it’s centralized and controlled by a corporate entity, it ain’t DIWO.

DIWO is an act of freedom and liberation from centrally controlled structures, where we work together in peer situations to form what we might call “autonomous communities.”

Furtherfield Projects

Furtherfield is actively organizing projects that delve into contemporary issues that confront our digital world and the economic forces that impact society. Here is a list of recent workshops they have conducted that demonstrate how maker culture is used to initiate peer-to-peer cultural production.

Outline

Glitch Art

What is called “glitch art” typically means visual glitches, either in a still or moving image. It is made by either “capturing” an image of a glitch as it randomly happens, or more often by artists/designers manipulating their digital files, software or hardware to produce these “errors.” …

There are many approaches to making these glitches happen on demand, ranging from physical changes to the hardware to direct alternations of the digital files themselves…

Data manipulation (aka databending) changes the information inside the digital file to create glitches. Databending involves editing and changing the file data.

Like all files, image files (.jpg .bmp .gif etc) are all made up of text. Unlike some other files, like .svg (vectors) or .html (web pages), when an image is opened in a text editor all that comes up is gobbldygook!…

Related processes such as datamoshing changes the data in a video or picture file. Datamoshing with software such as Avidemux is a common method for creating glitch art by manipulating different frame types in compressed digital video…

Misalignment glitches are produced by opening a digital file of one type with a program designed for a different type of file, such as opening a video file as a sound file, or using the wrong codec to decompress a file. Tools commonly used to create glitches of this type include Audacity and WordPad

Hardware failure happens by altering the physical wiring or other internal connections of the machine itself, such as a short-circuit, in a process called “circuit bending” causes the machine to create glitches that produce new sounds and visuals … – source Glitch Art

Glitch artifacts as critical trans-media aesthetics

The role of glitch artifacts as critical trans-media aesthetics is twofold. On the one hand, these aesthetics media show a medium in a critical state (a ruined, unwanted, not recognized, accidental and horrendous state). These aesthetics transform the way the consumer perceives the normal (every accident transforms the normal) and describe the passing of a tipping point after which the medium (might) become something new. On the other hand, these aesthetics critique the medium (genre, interface and expectations). They challenge its inherent politics and the established template of creative practice while producing a theory of reflection. – Rosa Menkman, Glitch Studies Manifesto

Databending using Audacity

BEFORE

Original image before processing in Audacity
Opening image file in Audacity (a sound editing software), applying AUDIO FILTERS and exporting the edited sound wave as an image.

AFTER 

Apply amplify filter in Audacity
Image after applying AMPLIFY, AUTO DUCK, BASS BOOST effect in Audacity

Circuit Bending


Artworks: Glitch Practices

Nam June Paik, Magnet TV (1965)

Magnet TV (1965)

The magnetic field interferes with the television’s electronic signals, distorting the broadcast image into an abstract form that changes when the magnet is moved. – http://collection.whitney.org/object/6139

 

Mark Napier, The Shedder (1998)

At a time when the web browser struggled against print metaphors like magazine and newspaper to find it’s own identity, The Shredder revealed the “soft” nature of the web. Markup, text, code, images and links are scattered across the screen like an instant Jackson Pollack. The raw material of the web, revealed, torn and tossed onto a heap.

From marknapier.com – taschen.com shredded

 

Rosa Menkman, Radio Dada (2008)

The video-images are constructed out of nothing but the image that feedback created [I focused a high end camera to my screen that showed, in real time, what I was filming, creating a feedback loop]. Then I glitched the video by changing its format and subsequently exporting the video into animated gifs. I [minimalistically] edited the video in Quicktime. Then I send the file to Extraboy, who composed music for the video.

The composing process started with a hand held world radio. Extraboy scanned through frequencies and experimented with holding the radio in different parts of the room while touching different objects. Eventually he got the radio to oscillate noise in the tempo that he perceived the video to have. The synthesizer sounds that were added were played live to further build on a non-digital sound and rhythm. This was later contrasted with drums which were digitally synthesized and processed through effects with a very digital sound to them. Just like the video, the mixing of digital and analogue media and aesthetics is mixed into one coherent whole. – source: http://rosa-menkman.blogspot.sg/2008/04/radio-dada.html

 

Jon Cates, BOLD3RRR (2012)

jonCates reflects on Realtime across international timezones. Rendering Time in fragments, errors and overlaps, jonCates plays with recursivities. These feedback loops merge personal data and swim in associations from Chicago to Taipei to Boulder and back again. Realtime: Reflections and Render-times by jonCates (2012) was performed live via Skype for MediaLive 2012 at Boulder Museum of Contemporary Art, July 14 2012.

Mark Amerika, Museum of Glitch Aesthetics (2012)

Micro-Project

Micro-Project 4: Exquisite Glitch

Cadavre Exquis with Yves Tanguy, Joan Miró, Max Morise, Man Ray (Emmanuel Radnitzky) Nude (1926-27)

Cadavre exquis is similar to the old parlour game consequences – in which players write in turn on a sheet of paper, fold to conceal what they have written, and pass it on to the next player – but adapted so that parts of the body are drawn instead.

It was invented in 1925 in Paris by the surrealists Yves Tanguy, Jacques Prévert, André Breton and Marcel Duchamp.

For your Micro-Project 4, we will be creating a collaborative image-based exquisite corpse using various glitch techniques.

  • Form groups of 4.
  • Take a self-portrait. It could be an image of your face or any part of your body. Name the file “yourname_original”
  • Sign up for a Dropbox account.
  • Be sure everyone is logged into Dropbox and has installed the Dropbox application so you can use Dropbox on your computer.
  • Assigned a team leader.
  • The team leader will create a new shared folder and invite all members of the team to join.
  • Check your email to accept the shared folder invitation.
  • Place all the starting images into the shared group folder in Dropbox.
  • Before processing the image, make a duplicate and number the new one example: image_1, image_2, image_3, image_4, etc.
  • Each member of the group will then perform an image processing technique on the duplicate image that decomposes the image as glitch.
  • Each member of each group will choose a unique method of processing using Photoshop filters or any image editor.
  • It is important to use effects to their maximum in order to bring about an extreme alteration and decomposition of the image.
  • Images can be collaged, blended, rotated, flipped, etc. by each member of the group.
  • Any member of the group can decide to make the canvas size larger in order to extend the collage
  • Each time you are satisfied with the transformation for the image save the image with a new file name e.g. image_1_1 or image_1_2 or image_1_3.
  • After the image is passed around the whole group, the member who started the original image, will upload each iteration of the image onto OSS.
  • Write about the transformations on OSS:
    • Describe how this process of collective image creation and decomposition creates a glitch transformation.
    • How is each transformation creating a new form of its precursor?
  • Assign “Micro-Project” as the Category.
  • We will compare and discuss the composition and decomposition of each image in class.

Workshop

Arduino Workshop Part II

Creating your own Ibiza Box with Arduino

Click image to enlarge

 


 

Powering the Breadboard

Powering the breadboard

  1. Connect one column of your breadboard to 5V pin on Arduino.
  2. Connect the opposite column of your breadboard to GND pin on Arduino.

Connecting the piezo

Piezo Element

  1. Connect one pin of piezo element to GND. On some piezo, the shorter pin on the piezo is the (-ve) pin.
  2. Connect the other pin of piezo element to a 150 ohms resistor (or any resistor below 1k ohms) and to digital PIN 9 on Arduino.

Connecting Push-Button Switch 1

Push Button Switch 1

  1. Connect one pin of switch to +5V (+ve) on your breadboard.
  2. Connect the adjacent pin of switch to 10K ohms resistor and to GND on your breadboard.
  3. Connect the same adjacent pin digital pin 11 on Arduino.

Connecting Push-Button Switch 2

Push Button Switch 2

  1. Connect one pin of switch to +5V (-ve) on your breadboard.
  2. Connect the adjacent pin of switch to 10K ohms resistor and to GND on your breadboard.
  3. Connect the same adjacent pin digital pin 12 on Arduino.

Connecting LEDs

LEDs

  1. Connect the longer lead (+ve) of each LED to 220 ohms resistor and to digital pins 2, 3, 4, & 5 on Arduino respectively.
  2. Connect the shorter lead (-ve) of each LED to GND.

Connecting Potentiometer

Potentiometer

  1. Connect to middle pin of potentiometer to analog pin A0 on Arduino.
  2. Connect one end pin of potentiometer to GND on your breadboard.
  3. Connect the other end pin of potentiometer to +5V on your breadboard.

Connecting Servo Motor

Servo Motor

  1. Connect the black wire of servo motor to GND on your breadboard.
  2. Connect the red wire of servo motor to +5V on your breadboard.
  3. Connect the remaining white or yellow wire to digital pin 6 on Arduino.

The Code

  1. View code here

Consider variations of this Ibiza box …

  • Can you change the duration or sequence of the LEDs lights?
  • Can you change the pitch of the piezo element?
  • How about changing the rotation of the servo motor to move at different speed?