Posts filed under 'travel'
Nina and I recently attended the 4S – The society for the Social Studies of Science 2008 conference conference in Rotterdam. Nina exhibited objects and I gave a paper.
Nina’s objects first.
Two Tails
The companion species of Science and Technology Studies are proliferating. Here are two extracts – two tails of STS at this conference. The lion, appearing as a symbol of the Netherlands via the Rotterdam coat of arms, is reduced to a long stuffed tail. It is no longer threatening ‘Stronger Through Struggle’ – the motto of the Rotterdam lion – but rather has been reduced to being one end of a strange fabric entity made of only tails. Instead of a body, attached on the other end is a mass of fake coyote tail. In recognition of Donna Haraway’s formulation of ‘nature as coyote’, the coyote would surely appear on any coat of arms for 4S. Yet the coyote is most prized by hunters for its tail, shown as trophies and used to decorate hats. Here both tails are expanded, faked in synthetics, constructed so that they might almost function as cushions, or maybe allow a tug of war. They could perhaps be the remnants of a sewing class, now brought to be the new trophies for someone attempting to ‘act with’ STS metaphors.
My paper was on the role of mess in the making of WiFi.
The STS of visual representations in science, law and engineering clearly illustrate the sociological value of images and the practices that surround them. In these contexts, graphs, photos and sketches are seen as pivotal in understanding how practitioners construct knowledge, collaborate, reach consensus, recruit new members and do work. In essence, their persuasive power stems from the transformation of mess that occurs behind-the-scenes (raw materials, repetitive experiments and alternative interpretations) into finely honed, ordered, compatible and comparable visual accounts. The result is designed to omit the uncertainties and contingencies of everyday practice. Drawing on ethnographic observation and participation in a volunteer community wireless group in Australia I consider the visual methods members employ in the design of a wireless fidelity (WiFi) network. Specifically I focus on how they retain elements of multiplicity and unpredictability and show how they make WiFi because of uncertainty and ambiguity, not in spite of it. From this position I argue that mess is not a consequence of this fragile technology or the elastic nature of the volunteer community but a deliberate practice and core strength of the group, critical to how they innovate.
September 8th, 2008
After a summer break, our research project on ‘New Media Artists as Cultural Intermediaries’ continues with a preliminary visit to Helsinki beginning of November and a second one beginning of December. This time, Goetz has already retreated to Berlin concentrating on finishing his PhD and I am left to venture out on my own. Below a few excerpts from field notes during both visits:
01/11/07
Without a moment to really take in the fresh icy air and bare winter trees, I am drawn into a trail of encounters and interesting conversations at medialab (TAIK).
Chris Hales, usually based in London, is my guide for the day. He is currently replacing Teijo Pellinen’s teaching sessions at medialab, both interactive cinema/TV experimenters. Teijo was part of the US touring F2F exhibition in 2000 with the first ever interactive TV show to be broadcasted on national Finnish TV. He is still based at YLE (Finlands’ national TV) developing new projects.
I finally get introduced to media artist/ curator (ISEA 2004)/ researcher Tapio Mäkelä (key person in shaping new media art policy in Finland) and agree to meet next week at the famous m-bar, which he himself initiated in 1998. I then meet Mikko Lindholm, with pram and kid, who together with Perttu Hämäläinen and Ari Nykanen runs and created animaatiokone and their widely shown interactive embodied gaming experience ‘kick ass kong-fu’ (created with support from Helsinki University of Technology, Graduate School in Computer Science and Engineering and Nokia Foundation – a triangle new media artists often find themselves working within, that Goetz, Nina and I spoke a lot about after our initial research phase in spring). Based within Medialab, Crucible Studio, developing projects around digital narratives, drama and interactive storytelling, also operate within a similar triangle: Universities, private technology/media companies and EU/governmental funding, bringing together engineers, artists and designers. The studio is often mentioned for having produced interactive TV show ‘Accidental Lovers’ in 2003 (presented at several international conferences on technology/media/design).
04/11/07
Tallinn, Estonia: Ville Hyvönen shows us around Kulturfarbik, a derelict building to be turned into a cultural centre.
A little overwhelming, this visit turns out to be a non-stop ‘being in the field’ with hardly any time to reflect at all. The weekend I spend with Pixelache delegation in Tallinn, meeting with Estonian media initiators/ activists/ festival producers. Juha Huuskonen, Ville Hyvönen and Nathalie Aubert from Pixelache don’t cease to surprise me with their many activities and involvement in a number of different media festivals, events and programmes. I look forward to spending a bit more time with them in march for the preparations of Pixelache festival.
05/11/07
A first but long awaited meeting with Heidi Tikka becomes my first insight into the upcoming exhibition at Forumbox Gallery, where Heidi will be showing new work alongside Tuomo Tammenpää and Hanna Haaslahti.
It is a privilege to see the very first stages in the production of her piece. An initial and rather simplified description would be: ‘illogical’ garments (oddly re-seamed leather jackets) with wearable CCTV circuits embedded into them.
We spend the evening talking about her work, past projects and her thoughts about this upcoming exhibition. I decide to come back for the set up and develop a few ideas for some form of ‘audience feedback’. The next day I have another great evening with Tuomo (interactive designer and new media artist), at the Pixelache University event ‘dorkbot’, talking about work and the world. Closer to a critical designer then an ‘exhibiting new media artist’, Tuomo sees his work geared towards the context of everyday life, not the gallery environment. Thoughts on relevance of such work and the failing of technologies within new media art leaves me truly excited about the potential crossovers within new media art/design. For the exhibition at Forumbox he is working on ‘electrical toys gone wrong’ (again it seems, some form of rebellion against a predictable logic…)
07/11/07
Before my flight back to London, a last minute very interesting conversation with Perttu Rastas – a key figure in the collection, distribution (AV-arkki) and curation of early Finnish video and media art, based first as a curator now as head of media archive at Kiasma Art Museum – leaves me in a thoughtful state, with notes in form of big questions, not answers: … will, and if so, how can art institutions such as Kiasma play a role within new media art in the future? how can they be ‘appropriate’ facilitators? hosts? collectors? (what kind of) new media art is in fact ‘collectible’? (Hanna Haaslahti’s interactive installation ‘White Square’ was bought into their archive in 2003, her piece which she will also be showing at Forumbox ‘Time experiment’ has been bought and is on display at Nokia Mobile Zone in Oulu) what and how does the work ‘fit’ into gallery or museum spaces? does it ‘work’? ….
Perttu kindly shows me around the fascinating underground archive, digital lab and small library.
December 12th, 2007
27/11/07
I am back in Helsinki. This visit is mainly dedicated to the following exhibition of Hanna Haaslahti’s, Tuomo Tammenpää’s and Heidi Tikka‘s work, at the FORUMBOX Gallery, opening on the 29th of November and on until the 29th of December.
After a preliminary visit only two weeks ago – which had been packed full with interviews and events – this visit is much more channeled and concentrated. I spend my days within the walls of the gallery, trying to juggle between being a visual researcher: documenting sounds and images; that of the classic ethnographer: noting down observations, asking questions and recording conversations; trying to come up with a concept to creatively find a way of capturing visitors’ feedback, while, above all, wanting to be a helping hand in the setting up of the exhibition.
An intense period filled with physical construction, potential hick ups, delicate situations and some long winding crucial decision-making process stretches over three whole days. I spend the first two days recording, thinking carefully about relevance, discovering interesting moments, capturing dialogue (if not in Finnish..) between the three artists , between both Heidi and Hanna and their technical collaborators, and between the artists and their work that slowly takes shape within the huge space. It feels like a constant ebb and flow. All three have times of thinking, starring, observing, building and tweaking (the most significant of all it seems – working with unstable, complex and unpredictable technologies…)
Heidi – Hanna – Tuomo
29/11/07
The day of the opening I spend setting up a corner by the entrance to the gallery with a few ‘tools’ I brought with me. Despite initial doubt on part of the gallery director Tanja Saarto – saying that visitors (Finns) might be too reserved or shy to engage – the response, to her own surprise, is rather good. Visitors (in total probably about one hundred) are invited to take a disposable camera (to capture their own details of interest) and maps (to be marked with colour coded impressions/experiences, in response to the individual pieces in the gallery) as they explore the space.
A brief conversation with Tanja Saarto gives me the impression that the opening is definitely a success. She is surprised at how many people within the art scene are positively intrigued and complementary towards this fairly new adventure for the gallery into new media art. I myself am so involved in visually capturing the atmosphere of the opening and engaging with visitors gathering around the ‘feedback corner’, that I miss the opportunity to speak to a seemingly important art critic – whom I later briefly see curiously wondering around Tuomo’s piece with a pen and paper.
The opening happens to coincide with the opening of another New Media exhibition at MUU gallery of Andy Best & Merja Puustinen’s work. Both parties strangely end up in the same restaurant a few blocks down for dinner, which I guess is not surprising considering the after all rather small New Media Art scene in Helsinki.
(During dinner, someone pulls out his Nokia phone – a rather old model - to show us the noise level in the restaurant – what a great but strange thing to be able to measure, making sure you don’t spend too much time sound-polluting your ears) 
I meet Andy Best the next day at the gallery, adjusting, repairing and ‘tweaking’ his robots. We spend a few hours talking about the theoretical context of their installation and the way both, him and his partner Merja, are managing to juggle between producing new work, teaching and the family. Merja seems to be the one mainly involved in the funding side of things, so I later find out that this exhibition is supported by AVEK (one of the main funding bodies of New Media Art in Finland – whose funds curiously mostly originate from a special tax deriving from blank videos/DVD’s ) and the Finnish Arts Council.
1/12/07
I take part in Tuomo’s workshop organized by Pixelache University at FORUMBOX Gallery. Well prepared and patient, Tuomo shows a group of 6 how to mount and weld a simple ‘electronic music circuit board’ (the gallery attendants probably called them ‘noise tools’). With great enthusiasm I manage to make one myself, only to drop out once it comes to the final tweaking – making sure it actually keeps on working..
As I start taking down my bits in the gallery, looking through some of the ‘experience maps’, I see that a lot of dots marked ‘sad’ have ended up at Tuomo’s installation on the map. Only then do I notice a little sign next to two or three of his toys reading ‘they did not survive’. It reminds me of our initial conversation about whether, or what kind of media art ‘works’ in a gallery space, and what happens if not. Openly declaring a failure with this little sign seems to perfectly communicate the risk and instability involved in using complex technology in this context – but this then being ‘sad’ – not frustrating.
Frustration seems to undermine some of the thoughts Heidi has about her installation when I speak to her briefly that afternoon. The ideal scenario in terms of visitors’ engagement with the two wearable jackets (sewn in CCTV cameras and screens are placed in relation to each other) is for several people to be present at the same time, or of course for her to be there in person. The atmosphere at the opening encouraged a form of interaction with the piece that maybe is impossible to achieve outside some kind of ‘event’ structure? Audience instead of visitor? Does it need a different kind of public scenario? The question of context, audience and interactivity hovers above me as I sadly say goodbye to Helsinki the next day.
December 11th, 2007
a very lazy susan on the lounge…. it didn’t move at all.
and the last train back….. it stopped at midnight, which was half way across town for us and we had to get a taxi!.
July 18th, 2007
A rather wonderful irony at the conference was produced by it’s title (ubiquitous media) and the lack of functioning foreign mobile phones. Japan phones or ‘keitai’ use dual mode band which most western phones can’t access and only a few attendees bothered to rent local phones whilst in Tokyo for a short time. This meant that organising activities around the conference edges (and even getting lost at the conference) took on a whole new/retro dimension. Plans had to be made in advance, addresses had to be written down and maps drawn. Moreover alternatives in the form of back-up plans were discussed – “if I am late and don’t make it to the bar, then I will be at the hotel from 7-8pm”, “if I can’t find you then I will meet you at exit 4 at Shibuyu station near the vending machine” or “if I can’t find you for drinks, don’t wait for me, I’ll try to catch you for dinner or else I will see you tomorrow in session one”. Forget plan A or B, I heard people making plans C through to G.
Evenings were marked by a myriad of safety valves for a plethora of possibilities. Plans were less elastic and fluid and more maps of strategic contingencies. Paper, pens, maps and guidebooks took the place of the phone as weapons of mass organisation. Phones were relegated receptacles of static info about hotels or bars or simply rendered as clocks or alarms. It was really interesting how quickly all our old organising time/space/people practices slipped back into gear.
July 16th, 2007
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