Final Project Updates II

As of now, I have decided to stick to my idea of a premeditated death using ritualistic effects. Using the three weeks, my schedule is as such:

 

Week 1/3: 3-9 hours long footage of a glitched image of my Facebook page

Actual fb page as viewed by a member of the public

The intention was to raise awareness of my Facebook page and hint that something larger is to be carried out in the near future, hopefully drawing in users. However, I have yet to figure out how to broadcast the laptop screen onto Facebook live, and will work on it.

 

Meanwhile, this week will also remain a testing week, whereby I’ll test out snippets of phase 2/3 and 3/3.

 

Week 2/3: Performance I – Birth of the virtual personality into real-life, and subsequent realisation of existential crisis

Process:

  1. The Birth
    The performer climbs out of a cardboard printout of a computer screen in a ridiculous manner.
    ~ symbolises the transition from text/image into a real being in the third space.

    A sketch

    2. Exploration
    A yawn, and a slow but tedious exploration of the space/place. Later, the performer walks around in circles aimlessly.

    A sample is shown below (but with different materials and location setting):

3. Baptism
The performer walks into the ADM pond waters and execute an elaborate self-baptism. The camera will follow her, and held offscreen by a helper.

(also seen in video albeit with a small tub)

4. Help
The performer later gets tired, and sits in the middle of the camera. She rocks her body silently, and writes a note, “what should I do now?”, and points it at the camera asking for help.

If someone replies -> do it, but half-heartedly as the performer is tired of everything
If someone does not reply -> starts to knock a wooden box rhythmically.

-end-

 

Week 3/3: Performance II – Death

  1. Restart with same sequence as performance I
    For continuity purposes
  2. Lights a candle and draw a :'( facebook emotion on a piece of post-it and stick it onto self/
    take a pencil and draw a x on all items in the surroundings
  3. Walk in a circle x 3
    Walks in front of laptop, draws x on self, end of video

-end-

 

Of course, these sequences are only tentative, I will try to improve on them.

Final Project Updates

Glitch Sample – using MaxMsp

Screenshot of Max patch: using jit.wake

I utilised jit.wake, to create the varied glitchy effect, and will set a timer that will increase the glitch accordingly. The glitch is still quite patchy for now, and I am trying to use smaller increments to let the glitch form slowly (not seen from video).

As for the project (concept’s) updates, I did think of using repetitive motion which would be boring for viewers, but at the same time would really poetically bring out my artistic stance. I will however, be changing the project’s layout due to the more flexible arrangement and feedback given by Prof Randall.

Project Hyperessay #1: Concept

The elaborate, premeditated death of Tania Tay on online (social) media

Overview
The performer Tania Tay would go through elaborate funerary rituals, albeit abstractly. She first builds a mini tentage, chants, dons on white clothing, and does superficial, ridiculous and elaborate walking rituals. Lastly, she sets up her final resting place, and lies down.

While the entire performance carries on, the screen slowly glitches. At the end of the performance, the glitch would be horribly glitched until only a slight semblance of the form can be seen.

Objectives
To celebrate, flamboyantly, the ceasing of Tania Tay’s online identity. It exposes the temporality of the constructed presence within the artificial third space, and deconstructs the artificial, artificially.

Interactive Component
The project having a set, definite ending (the death) that viewers are unable to disrupt or stop. However, viewers are still able to input their comments via the fb live comments, which would be read by the performer and acknowledged, but callously discarded as she continues on her death rampage. The project is a strong statement of the artificiality, and wishes to impact it on the viewer.

Technicalities
Two computers/screens would be involved.

The first screen would show the captured footage, but will further process it within max msp for the glitch to occur. The second screen will capture the entire processed footage from the first screen. The camera will be affixed to the performer, adopting a first person point of view shot.

Influences
1. Glitch

Glitch, as interpreted by Rosa Menkman as,

…a (actual and/or simulated) break from an expected or conventional flow of information or meaning within (digital) communication systems that results in a perceived accident or error.
– Rosa Menkman in The Glitch Moment(um), (2011)

Glitch is essentially, deconstruction. Deconstruction from the expected flow, which I felt was a suitable metaphor for death: the sudden break in living; the startling lack of continuity. After death, the body breaks down, a decade of living and progress unraveled. I find it noteworthy to continue on this idea of deconstruction, and felt that glitching the broadcast from start to the end finalises in the poetic allusion of the deconstructed constructed self.

2. Grand Theft Avatar by Second Front

In this artwork, I loved the idea of transposing a real-life ‘illegal’ situation onto a digitised world where the laws of the known world were later abandoned. Similarly, my project exists on a unstable platform, of combining both the physical world and digitised world onto the third space: the sole platform where the performer’s suicide can be accepted and executed.

Flamboyantly, the online characters commit suicide – like how I want my performer to be. However, I foresee my project adopting a more mellow approach towards death, accepting and welcoming it instead of diving headlong into it.

References
[i] Menkman, R. (2011) “Glitch Moment(um),” Institute of Network Cultures

 

The fishy prisoners / Glitched Aberrations

 

1st glitch
1st glitch
2nd glitch
2nd glitch
3rd glitch
3rd glitch

 

Side by side comparison of glitch:

Original Image

This photograph is of Hong Kong’s goldfish market, where small packets of fishes are arranged neatly in rows on a wall for sale. Trapped within individual pockets of water, the fishes swim circularly, unable to avoid their unknown fate. As the glitch process intensifies, the helpless creatures swirl and descends; their individual fates gradually sinks into a chaotic mess. This riotous disorder channels mix up the infinite possibilities of the fishes’ destiny, yet speaks of the choice-less fate they have to accept despite being in the world with limitless outcomes.

Riot: Alternative web browser / Research Critique (Week 5)

Overview
Riot (1999), by Mark Napier, is an alternative Web browser that constructs its pages by merging text, images and working links from recent pages that the Riot user has surfed. The composite then appears on a single page, with overlapping text and imagery in a haphazard arrangement. The browser can accommodate up to a total of three different sites compositions, with a unique composition per browser refresh.

A screenshot of Riot, compositing the web pages Zalora, Laneige and Newnation
A screenshot of Riot, compositing the web pages Zalora, Laneige and Newnation

Definitely, Riot fits the definition of glitch, as interpreted by Rosa Menkman as,

…a (actual and/or simulated) break from an expected or conventional flow of information or meaning within (digital) communication systems that results in a perceived accident or error.
– Rosa Menkman in The Glitch Moment(um), (2011)

On two different spectrums, Riot deconstructs:
1. visual imagery and text arrangement on the webpage; and
2. the idea of a singular web surfing experience

Shattering Boundaries: Physical and Digital
In allowing multiple sites to flow together, Riot forcefully expands the virtual environment – sites are no longer constrained within their physical boundaries of the digital medium. Traditional ideas of ownership, territory and authority, already transgressed by the new form of the web (where a percentage of online content has a shared viewership and authority), is further probed: through Riot, it becomes a public space.

The dismantling of browser arrangement in Riot can be perceived as an error to the everyday user; conversely, this ‘error’ also exposes the lack of control users have on the net. Despite the conviction that users are gradually having greater autonomy on the net, they are ultimately still subject to the set web environment. Only after experiencing the have-not, then do they realise what they are privileged with – ultimately a human condition of not being able to appreciate what they already have. As such, glitches can be used to,

…bring any medium into a critical state of hypertrophy, to (subsequently) criticize its inherent politics
– Rosa Menkman in The Glitch Moment(um), (2011)

References
[i] Menkman, R. (2011) “Glitch Moment(um),” Institute of Network Cultures