R&J: The Set Up
Luminous Accumulation
Last night I travelled an unaccustomed route after leaving work. I took the F train from 34th Street all the way to Brooklyn, to the Carroll Street stop. I was surprised to discover that I had actually been in that neighborhood before, about a year-and-a-half ago. This happens to me fairly frequently in and around New York -- the sudden recognition of an environment when the maps and names of the area didn't necessarily ring any bells. I walked up Smith Street, enjoying the lights from dozens of nifty shops and restaurants and bars, then hung a left at Sackett and walked a long ways down that, over 278 by a short strip of bridging. When I got to Columbia Street, it took me a moment or two to identify what I had come that way for. Then I crossed the street and explored it, insofar as the chain-link fence surrounding it would allow.
It's pretty accurate to say that I am a huge fan of installation art, and an even huger fanatic about public installation art (i.e., installed in a largely uncontrolled, outdoor environment). I am lucky enough now to actually know an installation artist, and I hope she'll forgive me if that description limits her craft. Friend Natalia installed Luminous Accumulation on the corner of Columbia and Sackett a few weeks ago. I had intended to go to the opening, but it was rescheduled on account of weather to just out of my schedule's reach. Hence my solo journey to a dark corner of Kings on a Wednesday night.I was disappointed, yet not surprised, to find the display fenced off but my mood was already pretty contemplative and buoyant due to the walk over. As is my wont, I read Natalia's description right away. As you can see, I brought my camera with me, and these two choices are related. Some appreciate art and, in particular, contemporary art, best through raw experience and an immediate moment. I envy this approach. It rarely works for me, outside of perhaps architecture and murals. No, I get the most out of these experiences when I'm working to synthesize my experience with the artist's intention. I find it similar to my impatience with classical music -- I loathe misinterpretation, even when an artist tells me such a thing is impossible. (And how much more impossible can it be to "misinterpret" than with the personal experience of music?) So I ask for answers straight off, and interpret the work through my own lens however I can thereafter.
Luminous Accumulation is interactive with the weather. There are a serious of pipes that ever-so-gradually draw precipitation and condensation into a roofed basin. The pipes, though you can;t tell it from my photos, extend their open ends out just past the borders of the chain-link fence, integrating it into their structure. They also reach back about fifteen yards to form rectangular arches of varying height that occupy the rest of the otherwise empty lot. The basin is lit around its rim and from two sources above it, and it is sheltered to ensure that the accumulation of moisture comes largely from the pipes. (Although the basin is also made of clear plastic, so I was immediately reminded of a wilderness survival contraption for gathering dew as drinkable water.) The more moisture that gathers, the more light that is reflected from it. (Rather ironic, then, that the original opening was postponed on account of rain.*) Natalia cites an Eskimo practice of holding reading material, or any object that requires scrutiny, close to the snow fall, the better to light one's discoveries.%20US%20army%20FM%2021-76%20survival%20manual_img_68.jpg){kind=link}
It was frustrating not to be able to walk beneath the pipe arches, but only a little more frustrating than not being able to climb them -- they inspired that strong urge for me immediately, but never could have taken my weight, even if I could get to them. I have to imagine the ideal time at which to experience the exhibit would be a lightly rainy evening, just before dusk. You could (theoretically) walk beneath the pipes as they worked their gradual, inevitable work, toward the incrementally expanding pool, dipping your book/stone/lithograph into its light once there. It's a bit of a trip for me, but I may just do this some rainy night. I envy the people who get to experience this work on a semi-daily basis. Somebody has quietly transformed their environment for a few months, and it's an
ongoing transformation. I think that's very valuable work, no matter how little monetary or pragmatic gain it results in. I want very much to be awakened to new perspectives on the every-day, and I can easily forget how much I want this. Thank goodness there are people interested in doing this for us. No one can sufficiently describe their interior experience of art. It's too personal. I hope it's enough to say that I spent some quiet moments with Luminous Accumulations, and felt pleasantly changed by the experience.Well . . . maybe I'll just say one thing more. One of the best effects, in my humble opinion, a work of art can have is to invite us to carry its perspective with us into the world. We learn from it, in a sense, and carry it forward if not into our actions, then at least into our perceptions of everything else. This is part of the explanation for the genre of "performance art"; as with art, and unlike theatre, there is no definite end, no fallen curtain, to the experience, and it forces you to contemplate the possibility that the experience is simply continuing into
the rest of your life. In this way, these things have a very far-reaching influence indeed. As I walked the good walk back to a subway station, I enjoyed immensely the details of illumination all along the way. Effects produced by headlights, streetlamps, windows, grates and foliage were all accentuated for me, and seemed somehow new. It was akin to the feeling I new best on my first trip to Italy, or my first to New York, and a feeling that I find has diminished slightly every time I add another visit and the longer I live here, like I lose it one slow drip at a time. It's a wonderful feeling.*Perhaps it was apt, though; it must have filled the basin somewhat for the next day's appreciation.
Photo & manipulation by David Younce.
And the Award Goes To... (3)
is a sardonic sort of title for a 'blog. I recall that when Friend Younce started it, I was so out-to-lunch on the whole 'blogometric phenomenon that I thought,
that's odd; if he disdains the medium, why is he engaging in it?
The answer to my question was, of course, that he didn't disdain it at all, and understood it immediately, and saw possibilities for using it to his own ends and by his own means. He just wanted to be funny about it. That's how Dave is. And though it might not be immediately apparent from reading about his awesome family and game theory and distinction-making and his intense appreciation of a vast, ecclectic variety of (sub)pop music, Dave is also a mastermind type with strong creative leanings. This mostly gets expressed through gaming and online collaborations to produce real-world community and more game play, but to my mind, Mr. Younce will always be an aspiring author of fiction. Even if he never publishes a word of it.
I've known Dave since time immemorial. Well, since high school, at any rate. But we weren't exactly friends in high school. We had a few classes together, and were both involved in the theatre department, but the actual friendship didn't really crystalize until after graduation, when I suppose we both thought,
Hey, wait a minute. I knew some much cooler people in high school than I've met so far in college
. Thus was a really cool collaboration formed. Yet the roots extended back to that final year in the school of high, when even then there was a hint of the underlying creative current that would stick with us through college and missionary assignments and {shudder} adulthood. The photo atop this entry is from a project Dave did in that same time reinterpreting characters from the
Sandman
comics. At some point we geeks (we happy geeks) were backstage during some show or other discussing some thing or other, and Dave had this wild idea of people preserving their bodies past their normal lifespan by encasing themselves in a sort of radioactive gold. This in turn led to me having the idea of people who exponentially increase their intelligence by training themselves to experience a year's worth of living in a single night's dreaming. We discussed the possible overlap of our ideas, and Dave said, "You should write that."
I still haven't.
However, this kind of idea-swapping and assignment tradition continued as Dave and I reunited in the summer after our freshman years away at college. I didn't know it at the time, but the whole three months were extremely formative for me, as a person and as an artist, and Dave was around for a lot of that, giving me books to read and music to listen to and assignments to complete. It was reciprocal, this creative tête à tête, but of course I remember what I was assigned and absorbed more than what I offered up. Frankly, I remember being challenged by the effort to return in kind when it came to assignments and influences. Dave was, and is, a very focused thinker, yet seemingly without being overly linear, and the result is that he can pound out ideas and improvements upon those ideas while one is still sitting at the keyboard contemplating how you're supposed to punctuate "tête à tête." More recently, Dave has worked to connect me with the gaming community (see
), which I was resistant to and which probably stands alone as the experience most encouraging to my creative processes since reading the
for the first time (also Dave's doing).
Expatriate Younce has moved to jolly ol' England, which is bad for me, but great for
As If You Care.
Now, in addition to never knowing quite what you'll get when you sign into his 'blog, you also never know when it might be something wicked cool that you wouldn't have thought of today without it, like new random generators, observations on information diagramming or photos of Dave's adorable progeny clambering about on the heath. I'm particularly fond of Dave's
. If Dave ever does become an author, he will probably remind us of
in the efficiency of his prose, crossed with a
esque sense of humor and a
ish complexity of ideas. Dave himself is a big fan of
and
. Mercifully, he does not sound a bit like either. (You could write a respectable epic poem about Dave's efforts to get me to read
. "Don't you understand the amazing things this guy's doing?" "No Dave, I don't.") For all those influences, Dave writes things like, "When I was a young, cynical LDS missionary on the hardscrabble streets of LA, I would often see black plastic bags floating along the ground or in the air, or fluttering helplessly in a tree, and I would daydream of having a Nature-channel special that would follow them around, while a British narrator in hushed tones talked about what they were doing."
And so, this award goes to Dave Younce.
The COMPLEAT VICTROLA SESSIONS - Part 1
Yesterday I had my first of two days' filming on
The Compleat Victrola Sessions
, a really, really cool project that I'm feeling very lucky to be involved with (albeit in an unpaid, catch-as-catch-can sort of involvement). The project is to create a silent film, which will be accompanied in performance by the musician who is also starring in it, one
. It's directed by
, and the directory of photography is
, who is filming the whole thing in 16mm. Yes: 16mm. As in, film. The black-and-white, silent kind, on which you can only get 44 seconds of shot-time at a go. The only way it could be more authentic is if it were a hand-cranked camera. (Here's a taste of what the cinematography may look like:
.) Needless to say (unless, of course, this is your first time on ma' 'blog [in which case: Hi! You should know I can't get enough silent film. Wait. Where are you going...?]) I could hardly be more psyched to sit in on this process, much less act a (very) little in it.
I arrived horribly bloody late at yesterday's shoot location: a quite run-down
in Brooklyn off the JMZ. In a slight panic, I dashed up the stairs -- which are probably not exactly compliant with housing standards, but I was afraid I was already fired from my non-paying job -- and burst into a large room in which several people were . . . milling about. Looking quasi-purposeful. A couple were women in 1920s' dress, and they had the same expression of expectancy that I would be wearing for about the next hour thereafter. Here we are. What do we do?
Eventually all was made clear, but not before I went through a good period of feeling oddly awkward and guilty, standing there, in suspenders and vest (AND pants, you ruffians), reading my NYPL-loaned play, wondering if I had dressed up enough, if I should be doing something, if I was creeping people out by not making nervous conversation with anyone. Eventually, the room was set up to resemble a "speakeasy" (I so wanted to tell them it was more a "blind pig," but for promising myself not to geek out too much through the day) and the director finished working in another room and found her way to clear a few things up for we wandering extras. Between her needs and our costumes, she allotted us roles and, owing largely to my shirt sleeves and vest I'm sure, I was cast as the bartender.
It ended up being a great day, when all was said and done. It was intimidating at first because A) I didn't know a single person there, and B) the general atmosphere of the building could not be helped but to remind one of a disused crack den. I soon discovered, however, that everyone there was not only excited to be there but generally interesting and friendly. The leads were even psyched to have extras there, I think, for having new folks to talk to. It is true for film in general, I believe, that a lot of the time spent "working" is, for the actors, time spent waiting. Particularly true for a silent film that can only be shot for seconds at a time, with one camera. As a background player, the most taxing thing I had to do all day was to stand for a prolonged period of time. Which, as
has attested, ain't exactly easy. So it's good to converse with your fellow man as much as possible. Most professional movie actors have perfected the art of taking interest in what you have to say, I'd wager.
As to the film itself, it's hard to get a whole picture of it (so to speak) from my perspective as a relative hanger-on. I'll tell you one thing: It ain't a comedy. Our heroine gets addicted to . . . opium, for one thing (heroin not yet being in vogue), and for another, it would be a real SOB to film a comedy in this format. The which presents some interesting considerations for Yours Truly, and I wish I had more hats to take off to all the silent comedians of days gone by. At any rate, be it
, I was of course a little disappointed not to find a pratfall anywhere in the room. I had even brought a pair of Lloyd-like glasses with me in case a little visual homage were in order, but it was clear from the start that such was not the objective of this particular moving picture. So I wiped the bar down, and I made chit-chat with actors when their mark was nearby. A pleasant day. And hey: Free Thai food!
I return to shoot in a couple of different settings this Wednesday. One of these settings is a concert hall, and occasioned the purchase of a gray top hat. Why do you need a gray top hat? I don't. Not really. BUT NOW I HAVE ONE! Ahh. It really is the little things in life. There is also something of a possibility that more of my individual talents may be brought into play. When I originally sent my information to Winsome, expressing interest in the project, I highlighted my movement experience, which of course includes some stage combat. Apparently there is to be a scrap filmed on Wednesday, and she suggested I may be useful for that. I don't know if that means I'd be involved on film, or advising about movement, or what. We shall see. Whatever the outcome, it's exciting just knowing that I get to return to that world.
I'm in a silent film. God, I love my job.
OMG LOLcats r KILLINZ MAE
Srsly. I can has releef? Frum LOLcats nd all ther kaind?
I feel like such a freaking doof (read: doofus, only less significant). I was generally aware of the LOLcat phenomenon when it began to crystallize into what it is today, but then I forgot about it. I mean, it's pictures of cats, with blocky fonts applied. It will not affect my life. Or so I assumed...
For those of you not in the know, worry not:
. It includes gems of explanation for the LOLcat phenomenon like a link to the brief
Time
(get it?) article devoted to them, and paraphrasing their use grammar thusly -- "Common themes include jokes of the form 'Im in ur
noun
,
verb
-ing ur
related noun
.'" It also links me to
, which helps me to understand why I am so enamored of teh LOLcats. But I'm getting ahead of myself. First I must explain my love-hate relationship.
Everything about teh LOLcats seems engineered to piss me off. (For [nigh endless] examples, go
.) I mean
everything
.
First of all, it's pictures of cutesy animals, which reminds me utterly of those cat and/or dog and/or other-small-animal mavens one finds in any office of America. You know, she's usually a she, and she has a cubicle covered in pictures of baby ducklings or some such. It just reminds me of porn. Sick, I know, but it does. Those people covet animals like others covet wealth or sex or spiritual fulfillment.
Second, LOLcats are self-generating inside humor, which is just irritating. There's nothing quite so grotesque as when people revel in how "inside" their jokes are. Exclusivity is practically a disqualification from the category of humor, altogether! ("Exclusivity is practically...") Humor is a tool in communication, not exclusion, and though I'm not accusing the LOLcat-erz of intending to do so, they're nevertheless excludin' teh masses. But I lie: A running gag that is largely unappreciated is even more grotesque than a simple inside joke.
Thirdly, the spelling and grammar are intentionally wrong. Do you understand? THE SPELLING AND GRAMMAR ARE
INTENTIONALLY
WRONG. That is so messed up! I get irate over misplaced apostrophes, and I'm subjected to dialogue superimposed over cat photographs and written out in "texting" language and gobbledy-gook? Holy sack of hammers! I ought to be trying to eradicate all LOLcats and their makers, not writing a 'blog entry about them.
Yet. I love the LOLcats. It's driving me crazy that I can't get their syntax out of my head. They're responsible for a lot of time wastage of late. They are obnoxious, and not remotely cool, and they are inside and ridiculous, and I heart LOLcats.
I'm beginning to understand why, too. In the first, for reasons inexplicable by modern science, I've been wanting a cat lately. I have been an adamant dog person my entire life, and I still prefer dumb-and-loyal animals (I relate to them better), but cats are more appealing now. I don't know. Maybe it's living in the city this long. I want a pet who knows where to poop and how to get there. More significant for me, however, is this use of language in the photos.
Language is simply cool. In general. It rules. Language is fascinating and mysterious to me, and I enjoy anything that plays with it. Correction: Anything that plays with it
and contains an interior logic
. So people constantly confusing the uses of "take" and "bring" drive me up a wall, and a text message that says "ill talk 2 u later" (You'll talk to me later, or you're ill, and I should bring you soup?) drives me kabonkers. But LOLcats, partly through the profusion of them, have developed a rather complex psychology behind their lunatic ravings. They've even developed a mimic
. Stupid? Oui. Ma forse, anche genius.