A to Z: Visualising Every Word in the Dictionary in Alphabetical Order
(2022)
author(s): Dave Ball
published in: VIS - Nordic Journal for Artistic Research
This exposition focuses on my 35-year-long project to visualise every word in the Concise Oxford English Dictionary in alphabetical order, A to Z. Begun in 2011, the point of departure here is a particular moment in the unfolding of the project: the recent completion of the final D-word, “dystopia”. A to Z is premised upon the carrying out of a defined conceptual rule: a “tactically absurd” commitment to a lifetime of artistic effort, whose ostensible folly gives rise to an ever-expanding body of work that appears arbitrary, unwarranted, and nonsensical, but which, through its playful insistence, might also be understood as operating in a new and alternative realm of sense.
Registers of Disinhibition: Transferred Autonomy and Generative Systems in Artistic Research
(2021)
author(s): Matthias M Sildnik S
published in: Journal for Artistic Research
This exposition is a presentation of an artistic method that incorporates generative technologies in artistic intervention. The autonomy of the generative system is analysed not as an isolated capability of a technical object but as a specific configuration between the autonomous operations of the system’s creator, the system itself, and the individuals related to the system. The notion of transferred autonomy is proposed to emphasise this interrelated nature of an entity’s autonomy. In this way, a generative system is positioned in a broader socio-economic and cultural context. To make this interpretation productive in relation to artistic practice, interventionist tactics need to be reconsidered as well. The presented method uses an opinion poll format. The opinion poll is interpreted as a basis for collective individuation enabled by generative processes. The conventional opinion poll format is deformed and reconstructed according to an assemblage of enunciation, enunciative recursion, disinhibition, and individuation. Rather than being a scientific, generalising and analytic method, it becomes an artistic generative, interventionist medium.
Two related projects are presented: ‘Happy Space’ (2016) and ‘Midscape’ (2018). Each describes the specific way in which generative art techniques are adopted and developed. The former presents a case study based on a survey of working and living conditions, hybridising an opinion poll with a procedural genesis of three-dimensional environments. The latter explores the levels on which generative technologies can facilitate the dynamics of structures conceived in the previous project. These dynamics are encapsulated in installation elements, opening a dialogue between physical and social dimensions.
cONcErn: towards a 'mesology' of art, for art, and through art
(2017)
author(s): Cécile Colle, Ralf Nuhn
published in: Journal for Artistic Research
This exposition focuses on our current artistic project, cONcErn, which aspires to be both an investigation of the milieu of art and the creation of a milieu for art and through art. Concretely, the project revolves around a host space for artworks that for logistical reasons (transport, storage, etc.) are at risk of destruction, disposal, or abandonment. We begin by giving an account of our preceding artistic research from which the project emerged. Thereafter we discuss the conceptual framework of cONcErn, in particular its alignment with our understanding of the environment as an eco-techno-symbolic system. In this context, we explain our rationale for adhering to the rather unusual term 'mesology' and explore key notions, such as diversity and visibility, which inform the project on a theoretical and practical level. Finally, we provide a snapshot of the initial activities and practical experiences that cONcErn has so far engendered.
This exposition focuses on my 35-year-long project to visualise every word in the Concise Oxford English Dictionary in alphabetical order, A to Z. Begun in 2011, the point of departure here is a particular moment in the unfolding of the project: the recent completion of the final D-word, “dystopia”. A to Z is premised upon the carrying out of a defined conceptual rule: a “tactically absurd” commitment to a lifetime of artistic effort, whose ostensible folly gives rise to an ever-expanding body of work that appears arbitrary, unwarranted, and nonsensical, but which, through its playful insistence, might also be understood as operating in a new and alternative realm of sense.open exposition comments (0)