'In the Company of Strangers' - Negotiating the parameters of Indeterminacy; a study of the Roaming

A life large with Strangers ...

2011-10-17T17:54:00.000-07:00

'... So we came to understand that small and important thing; that our lives could be large with interesting strangers who would pass us without any personal involvement ... '

Michael Ondaatje
The Cat`s Table 2011

(MUVE) Avatar - A New Companion Species? A Study of Privileging Human Companionship mediated through Spatial Reflexivity

2009-12-23T15:10:00.000-08:00

Many thanks to all my camp-followers who have kept in touch through this Masters study. This last three years of work has been fascinating and engaging for me. I trust that certain aspects may have been interesting for you too. Clearly, there is much more to be done in many of the areas covered tentatively by my research-practice. At present, I am preparing application for a PhD proposal in new media and performance. I have found the generation and maintenance of my concepts and research incredibly useful in the form of an online blog, so (if my application is successful) I will be creating another one for my PhD research-practice. Please stay in touch and I will provide the address for the new blog in the New Year 2010.

Below are preliminary thoughts on concepts and content for my further research. The title is above:

This research will attempt to investigate and extend definitions of the notion of Companionship:
1) Companionship existing as a habitable place comprised of a number of properties; physical, spatial, anticipatory, psycho-emotional, telepresent, liminal. Companionship is a space, one among others, contained within the description of humans as 'mobile volumes' susceptible to, informed and mediated by both 'real' and virtual properties which impinge upon us as we inhabit our respective world locations. (Roger Caillois and Mimesis; Grosz, E. (1999). Space, Time and Bodies in Wolmark).

2) How can Avatars define spaces of opportunity in the field of human engagement?
Enquiry will be conducted into why and how for some, MUVE Avatars may enjoy the privileged status of 'Human Companion' afforded to pets such as dogs and cats; apes (particularly the Bonobo ape), cetaceans, (Dr Donna Haraway - A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology and Socialist Feminism in the late Twentieth Century in Simians, Cyborgs and Women: The Reinvention of Nature and her more recent publication, When Species Meet) family, friends, imaginary friends, partners.

Key Questions:
Might Avatars be a New Companion Species? Why? How might this be defined? How might this be validated/quantified?

Why are MUVE Avatars currently relevant?

Embedded Screens - Duet for 6

2009-11-18T18:54:00.000-08:00

These images are stills from my latest video edit, Duet for 6, published in the last post. There are a number of moments-in-pause here, indicative of my focus in the video on embedding presence - in this case avatar personna, into the fabric of those surfaces or screens which comprise and form all our perceived spaces, in this instance, Second Life space.

Please see the Duet for 6 in the previous post.

These moments are representative of embodiment flowing onto and through the phantom screens in my Second Life railway station. Interactive inscriptions of the absent First Life body. Abstract (through their removal) representations of avatar activity. The performance here is mediated by connectivity, the video, the screens themselves, duration, the computer screen and removal of the original moment.

Avatars Rollo Kohime, Fionnbhar Kohime and Toddles Lightworker emerge, sink and re-emerge from an active skin or surface film - three descriptive inscriptions; avatar, video, screen - each mediating the other.

Duet for 6 - In the Company of Strangers

2009-11-14T15:25:00.000-08:00

This is my latest dance and video work in Wellington Railway Station with Fiona Baker (aka Fionnbhar Kohime in SL) in First Life and Todd Cochrane aka Toddles Lightworker in Second Life, representing a further development in exploring the issue of Avatar Companionship and perhaps an extension of my Departed series; the footage is set, like Departed in the Wellington Railway Station entrance doors - in my Second Life station and with Todd Cochrane`s floating body, an inference of movement that is slightly unsettling - a departing soul? However, the study is an extension of Duet for Four, mainly for its investigation of movement in and out of screens/surfaces in and out of Second Life.

The title 'Duet' suggests a dance form usually identified with two people, yet with the composite layering of Real and Second Life, a movement dialogue exists here for Six; relational engagement between humans and avatars as well as that discrete conversation occurring between human to human and avatar to avatar. I intentionally selected Todd`s 'male' avatar to embed ambiguity in the shape and character of the personna present, rather than have an equal and predictable male/female avatar echo. This shift reflects the potential for exercising the unpredictable nature of gender selection in Second Life. The male avatar could easily belong to my wife, Fiona. Unless you know the person behind the avatar, there is no way of knowing their Real Life identity.

I have attempted to represent both, aspects of companionship in Second Life through intimacy of engagement in movement, while also further exploring the notion of embodying surfaces through avatar interaction - this video primarily seeks to explore the possibilities of our becoming embedded in our life-surfaces.

The work concentrates on avatar presence (itself, an inscription) sliding across and through, emerging and sinking into and being contained by the screens of which the space is comprised. In First Life this occurs constantly - we, as mobile volumes become alternately subsumed and rejected by our backgrounds and the spaces which hold us, yet, although we may be prepared to acknowledge that our spaces may shape our time and the ways in which we function in those spaces, we do not usually perceive our presence as actually co-habiting with the elements within our spaces. Here the dancers are defined by the spatial laws which support their digital existence and can penetrate and become an extension of the fabric of those surfaces which are phantom and ambiguous in nature.

We are not quite so fluent in this in First Life although there are moments where we can blend unobtrusively into our backgrounds and even embody/become our backgrounds, (football crowds, demonstrations, commuter crowds, where the spatial field is made up predominantly by human bodies). Once again, departure is experienced in both locations. The difference between these locations is that I orchestrated Toddles Lightworker`s process of departure, unlike the leaving in the duet in the First Life station, which was improvised. So avatars represent that potential constant (if so desired) for us in extra-terrestrial or telepresent companionship, which suggests that (allowing for the vagueries of the Internet) empathy, alignment, connection and even discord can be tailored in a mixed-reality environment, where we never have to be 'alone' for long.

I am indebted to Todd aka Toddles Lightworker, Clare aka Arwenna Stardust and Warren aka Ciderjack Applemore, for their assistance and support with servers and experimental dancing (using an animation devised by Isabel Valverde) in this work.

Duet for Five - In the Company of Strangers

2009-11-07T19:39:00.001-08:00

Duet for Five

These images are taken from my latest dance and video work with Fiona Baker in First Life and Todd Cochrane aka Toddles Lightworker in Second Life, representing a further development in exploring the issue of Avatar Companionship and the embedding of our presence in the surfaces of our lives. The title 'Duet' suggests a dance form usually identified with two people, yet with the composite layering of First and Second Life, a movement dialogue exists here for Five; relational engagement between humans and avatars as well as that discrete conversation occurring between human to human and avatar to avatar. I intentionally selected a 'male' avatar to embed ambiguity in the shape and character of the personna present, rather than have an equal and predictable male/female avatar echo. This shift in gender reflects the potential for exercising the unpredictable nature of gender selection in Second Life. The male avatar could easily belong to my wife, Fiona. Unless you know the person behind the avatar, there is no way of knowing their First Life identity.

Once again, departure is experienced in both locations. The difference between these locations is that I orchestrated Toddles Lightworker`s process of departure, unlike the leaving in the duet in the First Life station, which was improvised. So avatars represent that potential constant (if so desired) for us in extra-terrestrial or telepresent companionship, which suggests that (allowing for the vagueries of the Internet) empathy, alignment, connection and even discord can be tailored in a mixed-reality environment, where we never have to be 'alone' for long.

Contact Improvisation Dance is by nature, an intimate, shared movement form and method of conversing somatically and I am interested in the ways this may be implied by avatar movements (which lack the capacity, as yet, to carry out shared, improvised movement) overlapping and running through one another, unfolding in ways that are similar to and in verbal communication.

This work also focusses upon juxtaposing the contrasting possibilities within movement which exist, currently, between First Life movement and Second Life animations. The impossible, horizontal floating and the somewhat grotesque movements (which can occur anomalously at any time) of Toddles Lightworker`s limbs are relevant to the description of uniqueness (and serendipity) in behaviour signatures which exists for entities in both of these different locations on our one world surface.

The Station entrance screens are deliberate points of focus in this work. I am particularly interested in the shadowed figures of the avatars moving and 'sinking' in and out of the screens while the video, 'not-hereReprise 2' is playing. Interacting with and becoming perhaps, a part of the dark spaces of interfaces.

Update on number of visitors to Wellington Railway Station in Second Life

2009-10-21T02:32:00.000-07:00

A list of vistors to Rollo's build. In order of their arrival.
The total time for all visits by one AV and the last visit time stamp in GMT is shown.
688 visitors so far.

Many thanks to Todd Cochrane aka Toddles Lightworker for setting up and maintaining this diagnostic:

Who	Hours	Minutes	Seconds	LastVisitTime
Isa Goodman	0	0	50	2008-07-29T09:41:19.433413Z
Toddles Lightworker	1	0	20	2009-06-19T05:28:26.553161Z
Rollo Kohime	207	59	10	2009-09-07T06:49:04.223650Z
Edithzor Exonar	1	32	40	2009-02-10T09:15:36.347955Z
Eryr Llewellyn	0	15	10	2008-12-18T07:45:30.214027Z
Jeb Lanzius	0	17	40	2008-12-14T22:01:59.865796Z
Arwenna Stardust	3	55	0	2009-07-06T07:49:19.917666Z
SitDevelop Acker	0	10	0	2008-11-07T03:52:04.929504Z
Katipo Kirax	3	10	0	2009-07-01T03:43:07.415183Z
Tran Courtois	0	6	10	2009-05-07T04:41:04.952517Z
Kavisha Quan	0	58	20	2008-11-28T00:31:29.514090Z
LorenzoBuhne Zerbino	0	4	0	2009-02-21T05:54:08.356007Z
ugee Egoyan	0	16	50	2008-12-06T00:51:59.065579Z
Indygo Magic	0	1	0	2008-08-01T23:31:58.930020Z
Dependent Binder	0	4	0	2008-08-08T20:41:28.467404Z
CiderJack Applemoor	1	3	10	2009-07-01T03:43:28.378445Z
Dacary Dumpling	0	6	30	2008-09-05T21:35:04.127492Z
Professor Noarlunga	0	7	0	2009-02-01T08:08:28.262918Z
Steve Baroque	0	2	10	2008-08-01T11:05:52.164306Z
Ellie Dewoitine	3	36	20	2008-12-04T08:13:51.298830Z
SHAKIRA Skirr	0	8	20	2008-08-01T17:12:22.036566Z
Fionnbhar Kohime	7	55	30	2009-06-01T08:15:14.503469Z
Suteruni Susanto	0	0	50	2008-09-09T11:26:32.772152Z
SITLife Jefes	0	3	20	2009-07-24T04:22:45.715541Z
CT Vlodovic	0	8	50	2008-08-03T17:14:42.283931Z
Iphigenia Flores	0	14	50	2008-10-05T22:15:32.386007Z
Edasa Eales	0	0	40	2008-08-04T02:48:46.305091Z
Orwell Sorbet	0	26	20	2008-09-28T23:01:33.511958Z
Itchy Gamba	0	0	10	2008-08-04T06:02:52.527079Z
Mythical Destiny	0	0	40	2008-08-04T06:13:43.302277Z
Mikky Ling	0	8	40	2009-08-02T10:23:08.339794Z
Netpuppy Thespian	0	6	30	2008-08-28T21:29:06.634782Z

.................


Who	Hours	Minutes	Seconds	LastVisitTime
Linkley Flinders	0	0	0	2009-08-22T01:23:32.052845Z
Samea Saeed	0	0	0	2009-08-23T01:20:38.274126Z
Maryam Topaz	0	6	30	2009-08-24T10:45:28.258430Z
Taraketh Winterwolf	0	0	20	2009-08-24T23:10:26.961015Z
Marcelette Larimore	0	1	20	2009-08-24T23:12:52.598823Z
Kalquin Larimore	0	0	0	2009-08-24T23:11:18.608606Z
Coyote Potez	0	10	10	2009-08-25T00:36:48.362154Z
Pet Freenote	0	3	10	2009-08-25T00:36:16.858824Z
Cromnas Naidoo	0	1	20	2009-08-25T22:41:25.027694Z
KT Hawksby	0	0	20	2009-09-01T01:27:04.471544Z
Dexter Littlebird	0	1	10	2009-09-01T18:01:52.276341Z
Dahlia Orellana	0	0	0	2009-09-02T06:32:58.434532Z
Timothy Posthorn	0	0	0	2009-09-03T02:38:41.563339Z
Samuelx Tigerfish	0	2	20	2009-09-03T05:05:00.322986Z
Selina Lomu	0	0	30	2009-09-05T00:28:33.234874Z
aliya Fairlady	0	1	20	2009-09-07T10:34:14.618516Z

AUT Masters in Art and Design, majoring in dance and video; Aims and Conclusion

2009-10-14T22:38:00.000-07:00

After three years of study, today I completed my Masters Exegesis. I used the following points in part as a critique to cross-reference my Conclusion:

Principal areas of Focus in my Masters work:

In this exegesis, I am investigating theories which I believe, indicate a relational dynamic between duration and social behaviours. These theories are formulated through my empirically-based research and suggest re-alignments of existing constructs with regard to the apparent stability of our condition as humans frequenting, as we must, durational spaces. My interdisciplinary performance-based research practice has sought to scrutinize and present the state of Indeterminacy as the prime mover and the Roaming Body as interlocutor and go-between for this discussion. I will attempt here, to define and give substance to the ministrations and movements of the Roaming Body and endeavour to demonstrate how the forces of indeterminacy are represented through this agent in my practice. My intention is to establish in this document, robust contexts in Real Life and the MUVE metaverse of Second Life for the enactment of the participants, Indeterminacy and the Roaming Body. The effects of their residency in us as humans will be questioned and examined together with the substance of their conjoined states-of-agency which I maintain is, as a single entity, responsible for the dynamic tensions which emerge in notions of Belonging, the Self and Identity. The discussion will progressively critique my performative research practice (and how this has sought to engage with these stated descriptors and their implications), as protagonist toward the recognition and establishment of a lived blended-reality, subject to and mediated by the affects of indeterminacy emerging through the event of departure.

In this new urban Myth I maintain that all our exchanges, whether they be either apparently resolved engagements, casual encounters or missed conversations with people and places, are subject to the presence and affects of indeterminacy, evidenced in us as an ongoing state of departure through the agency of the Roaming Body.

What are Indeterminacy and the Roaming Body? How might Indeterminacy be active as a force sufficiently potent to affect our lives? What are the constituents of Indeterminacy? How might these constituents be evidenced in everyday human behaviours to extend the description of Indeterminacy beyond the theoretical? How is the existence of Myth a coherent and recognisable possibility in our lives?

The Roaming Body I suggest, is responsible in our behaviours for pre-emptive departure and the involuntary pursuit of the next moment.

Within the parameters of this urban myth, the manifestation of indeterminacy suggests that ‘Leaving’ is a universal state over which we have no conscious control. Departure is that paradoxical frame of reference for us as humans which both, frees us from the constraints of our previous engagement in time while instilling perhaps, trace echoes of what has been left behind. For me, this creates poignancy - a pathos evident in the most mundane of departures, humanity-wide, a sense which has been the principal informant of my dance and video work over the past three years of my Masters study. Whether it be recognisably profound and measurably life-altering, or apparently occurring within the humdrum of the everyday, departures and the act of leaving people and places of significance constantly colours our lives. Could it be that this unconscious facility that we unknowingly possess, the ability to live with indeterminacy as an ongoing, involuntary occurrence, is actually responsible for our departures, regardless of our own diagnostic sensing within a meeting or engagement with someone? Perhaps departure itself is the indeterminant driving factor here. A condition which affects us all, impinging upon and mediating our behaviour while for the most part, we remain in ignorance of its existence. To us, usually we are simply involved in 'going' somewhere else.

Principal areas of focus seek to create an environment which enables me to explore the potential for embodiment and transfluency between real and virtual surfaces or screens, based on my concepts of engagements mediated by departure through the indeterminate Roaming Body.

It is a concern for the possible descriptions of the screens around us which define a dual representation of deep space and how 'removal' or departure of our 'self' from these screens or surfaces may generate dualities which hold a genuine potential for mixed-realities, which is currently holding my attention in my exploration of surfaces.

My intention has been to explore how dual manifestations of the same identity, (when crossing over or through a MUVE interface), which are still defined through these interstices as 'different', may evolve into a single, blended reality using my intent through my avatar, Rollo Kohime and my Real Life video footage manifesting in my Second Life station.

Conclusion:

Over the last 200 years, Western Thought has created a dialectic (Martin-Alcoff, 2005) which, I believe, impacts upon certain concepts concerned with the acquisition of autonomy within personal identity - that debate which seeks to synthesize the self and the ‘other’, the implications of which can adversely affect our ability to fit, to customise our belonging in the here and now and consequently, to question a sense of lasting allegiance to any one place. Recent social research (Belonging - Social Issues Research Centre 2007) suggests that traditional categories of belonging are now less easily defined in relation to distinct groups into which people may adroitly insert themselves. As our social interactions become more complex we are increasingly obliged to select our host groups. These groups are now encountered in all aspects of our lives. Through the internet, we have the potential to be members of communities not just locally, but in Cape Town, Archangel, Buenos Aires or in mixed-reality locations in Second Life, like New Philadelphia, New London, Ohio University or Amsterdam. But has this increase in choice diluted or made more tenuous our commitment or ability to experience that sense-of-place which ultimately is our own?

Identity and belonging. I suggest that our basic needs to be a part of something greater than ourselves are still intact. The idea of belonging is central to our existence and to our understanding of how we and others give meaning to our lives, yet it seems that these cornerstones of our sense of self are truly at risk from the ministrations of that thief of our stable moments; indeterminacy, emerging through the Roaming Body,
this purveyor of intimate-distance within the self, unapproachable, enjoying stranger status, yet strangely familiar. Our sense of identity is founded in our ability to not only connect with our self, but to maintain
a meaningful connection with others, to adhere to those places and people in our world which bring a sense of worth into our lives; founded too, upon our social interactions which are indicators of our allegiance to particular communities or groups through shared beliefs, values or practices. However, is it possible to exercise a balanced control over our facility to belong? At which point does an autonomous estate stand
so resolved, itself independent and immune from the need to be a part of something greater? That late 17th and 18th Centuries set of collective Western values emerging through The Enlightenment, called upon individuals to think for themselves, (Martin-Alcoff, 2005). In embracing this, we have since held that independence and thus the capacity for reason (which apparently, enables one to successfully stand alone) were to be our exemplars. This has necessitated that the individual be able to separate from all that is externally imposed on them in order to evaluate and consider rationally, their ongoing condition: that of a sentient being, with the capacity to act autonomously. Yet it can be seen that perhaps self-autonomy is divided.

Since Hegel, (1770-1831) major psychological accounts of the self have placed its dependence on the ‘other’ at the centre of formation and maintenance of the self. For Hegel, (Martin-Alcoff, 2005) one needs the ‘other’ to recognize one's status as a self-directing subject in order to create the conditions for the self-directing activity; one's self image is mediated through the ‘self-other’ relation, not only in terms of its substantive or evidential content but also in terms of the self in its base capacity. The self is completed by the active existence - and adherence to its potential other. Thus, on the one hand freedom and independence requires reason, which requires the ability to separate from the ‘other’, while at the same time, the self is ineluctably dependent on the other's interruptions and influence. If both of these philosophical traditions are broadly correct, it would seem that we are doomed to a lack of freedom through autonomy, because undivided autonomy is doubtful. Consequently, freedom through independence is defined as precisely that which we cannot attain and the consequences of our preoccupation with this pursuit may be placing at hazard our paradoxical need to find a place to stand which supports equally, our sense-of-place in the world.

In the Social Psychology of Experience: Studies in Remembering and Forgetting, the authors, David Middleton and Steven Brown suggest that Bergson`s view of the world is a process which embraces a, ‘fluid continuity of the real’, (2005). There is no doubt that for us time is at first identical with the continuity of our inner life. What is this continuity? That of a flow or passage, but a self-sufficient flow or passage, the flow not implying a thing that flows, and the passing not presupposing states through which we pass; the thing and the state are only artificially chosen snapshots of the transition, all that is naturally experienced is duration itself' (Bergson quoted in Middleton & Brown, 2005: 61).

Among my tasks in this Masterate was to demonstrate if possible, that our behaviours are mediated through the processes of indeterminacy experienced in duration. That we are receptacles susceptible to the minstrations of entities within our becoming amid this duration ; uncertainty through change. Indeterminacy is just one of those visitations that mediates our transformative existence in our 'becoming human', (Bergson, 2005) yet I perceive this entity as lying beneath and mediating any others which may emerge. It is this presence which ensures that we are never quite whole or complete because we can never be fully present - in the present. The Roaming Body as a, '... fellow-travelling identity ...', (Massumi, 2002) is the vehicle which articulates the properties and causality of indeterminacy. As vitally as food, we record through traces on the surfaces of our lives such insubstantial yet potent ephemera as habits, memories and tropisms - movement in response to a stimulus - all occurrences mediated by the passage of ongoing moments. Could it be that this unconscious skillset - the active processes of our leaving - processes of which we are largely unaware exercised through the event of departure, is that stimulus? Our Roaming Body becomes the functionary of our departures, itself gripped by indeterminacy and while drawing us away, also supports in us a certain fluency in managing this wayward feature.

Despite our apparent inability to 'stay put' and recognising intimations that our present is continually under threat, rather than find this depressing I find it persuasive, capable of propelling me into re-evaluations of how, where and when I can be who I am. Perhaps, as I have endeavoured to demonstrate, how, as a sentient being, I may conduct my life through a perceptual reality composite, ('The Human Analogue in Mixed-Reality', p. 25) caught up, despite myself in a perpetual state of change which is centred ultimately, in a compelling, involuntary movement away from what appears to be the prevailing moment. Indeterminacy affecting us all, is here inscribed upon the surfaces of our every cell through the unconscious transgressions of the Roaming Body, a time-bandit which steals away not our possessions, but our presence; a hijacker of our on-task moments and our efforts to stay grounded in any given manifestation of 'now'. These misdemeanours are largely invisible to us, yet they shape all of our dealings, our movements and apparent stillness in time and spaces. Through the event of departure, our body`s inclination to stray precludes any hope for us of lasting stability or stasis. Perhaps today, as never before, is this predilection to locate ourselves in the onward surge of movement away from that previous moment so instrumental in thwarting our search for both, our collective and individual sense of belonging ... as if we had a choice and were not swept away, regardless ...

In this Urban Myth the interconnections which exist between indeterminacy manifesting through lived departures, ensures that there is no surcease for the body, roaming in this blended continuity of the world surface we call the Real. No secure position to be attained and held indefinitely. In this context we may find that we are interconnected through our mutual estrangement and that our engagements, conversations and connections will always be at hazard. I suspect from my observations that ultimately as indeterminants, we are always ‘Leaving’ and that this is a true descriptor of our condition in that business of being human. There is real pathos to be found in a lifetime of leaving engagements in the Real, whether these lie across interface moments from person to person in Wellington City centre or avatar to avatar, prosthetic constructs in metaverse environments and this state will keep us forever defined by some, if not ourselves, as strangers. In my videoed dance work, I have been concerned with the investigation of what I will call the spaces between recognized content in our lived experience. Intersticial spaces dominated by duration itself. In exploring what may comprise engagement and conversation on the street, my interest has been held not so much by what is being communicated, as what is being left out, due to what I have identified as interpersonal terrain dominated by indeterminacy manifesting through that durational process. It appears that this uncertainty located within movement/change may indeed influence or to a significant extent, govern the nature of dialogue in urban contexts. The paragraph under Belonging, Identity and the Roaming Body (p.12) introduces the notion that, 'Indeterminacy has always dominated the terrain which we have had to negotiate, evident still, in the ways in which our choices may be mediated, in our actions which only appear to prevail, in our inter and intra-relations with ourselves and others, in the spaces we impinge upon and in the times which we traverse'. In the end, despite the apparent efficacy of our acts, the transfluency of our movements and transformative embodiments across a broad range of interfaces, our relations with and through avatar companions in various descriptions of the Real, only serve to bear witness to temporary points of purchase within the durational register of our lives. Perhaps the only actions which truly prevail are those which keep drawing us away. Leaving.

My last reference is a quotation from Buddha for the summary insight it possesses in posing the questions which will continue to haunt us in our everyday engagements: 'What is the appropriate behaviour for a man or a woman in the midst of this world, where each person is clinging to his piece of debris? What`s the proper salutation between people as they pass each other in this flood?' Buddha, (2008).

〜〜〜

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Maddocks, J. (2008). Okay, who`s responsible for this? Adventure. Issue 147 April/May, p29.

Martin-Alcoff, L. (2005). Visible Identities: Race, Gender, and the Self. Oxford University Press.

Massumi, B. (2002). Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation Duke University Press, Durham & London.

Meltzer, F. (1987). Salome and the Dance of Writing; Portraits of mimesis in literature. University of Chicago Press.

Middleton. D., & Brown. S. (2005). The Social Psychology of Experience: Studies in Remembering and Forgetting. Sage Publications, United Kingdom.

Minton, S. (2007). Choreography. Human Kinetics Europe Ltd, United Kingdom.

McCracken, G. D. (2008). Transformations: Identity construction in contemporary culture. Indiana University Press.

Morther of Crowys, Retrieved on 12 May 2008 from: http://www.grammarphobia.com/blog/2008/01/murder-of-crows.html

Oliver, J. (2009). The Thickness of the Screen. empyre soft_skinned_space Digest, Sept Vol 58, Issue 3.

Oliver, J. (2009) empyre_soft_skinned_space Digest (June 10), quoting: http://www.bbk.ac.uk/english/skc/milieux/

Perazzo, D. (2006). Kinkaleri Dance Co. The fall of the west. Dance Theatre Journal, 21 (4), p.11-15.

Martin-Alcoff, L. (2005) Retrieved on 25 January 2009 from: http://www.alcoff.com/content/chap2polcri.html

Retrieved on 2 February 2008 from: Quantum Mechanics 1925-1927 THE UNCERTAINTY PRINCIPLE http://www.aip.org/history/heisenberg/p08.htm

Sanders, R. (2008). Steel Shoes, from readings at Multi-Media Interactive (2008) Underground

Serres, M. (2007). The Parasite. translated by Lawrence R. Schehr. University of Minnesota Press.

Slade, A. (2009). Becoming Dragon, Retrieved on 15 August 2009 from: http://vimeo.com/3874238 & http://secondloop.wordpress.com/

Sondheim, A. (2009). Retrieved on 6 September 2009 from: http://www.alansondheim.org/

Stanton, E.F. (1978). Lorca and Cante Jondo, The Tragic Myth. University of Kentucky Press.

Whitman, W. (1855). Song of Myself. Retrieved on 2 October 2009 from: http://www.daypoems.net/plainpoems/1900.html

Wolin, S. in Myth Now in Postmodern Politics and the Absence of Myth, Social Research 52, no.2 (summer 1985: 218 - 221 in McCracken, G. (2008) Transformations - Identity Construction in Contemporary Culture, Indiana University Press

Wordsworth, W. (1805). The Prelude. Cambridge and the Alps, (Vl 541-2).

Wyndham, J. (1972). Chocky. Penguin Books.

Zimmerman, E M. (2001). Heidegger, Authenticity and Modernity: Essays in Honor of Hubert L. Dreyfus, Volume One, ed. Jeff Malpas and Mark Wrathall. Cambridge: MIT Press.

Zizek, S. (2006). The Parallax View, The MIT Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, London England.

not-here Reprise2

2009-10-06T01:43:00.000-07:00

If we take the premise that inherent in the process of abstraction is a removal of information, then this study represents an abstraction of 'Leaving'. This is the onward movement away from the present moment, the catalyst of the Roaming Body which both, binds us, yet also severs us durationally from our presence in the present. All extraneous visual, auditory and contextual information has been striipped away, leaving a small world which looks inward, reducing the content to a window on barely discernible motion in a passage of time.

'When a body is in motion, it does not coincide with itself. It coincides with its own transition ... In motion, a body is in an immediate, unfolding relation to its own nonpresent potential to vary. That relation, to borrow a phrase from Deleuze, is real but abstract … This is an abstractness pertaining to the transitional immediacy of a real relation – that of a body to its own indeterminacy (its openness to an elsewhere and otherwise that it is, in any here and now.'

Massumi, B. (2002). Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation Duke University Press, Durham & London, (p.5).

Focus emerges to inscribe detail upon us as a mobile volume and sinks again into a grey field of duration itself. There is no sound in this territory. It lies beneath our usual sense of self and where we locate ourselves on our world surface in time and place.

The Survivor ... I must carry you ...

2009-09-09T01:10:00.000-07:00

Extracts from 'We who are left behind: Poetry as Testimony in Derrida and Celan, by Mathew Landis.

Read these selected quotations below out loud if you can. Just the resonance, timbre and sound of the language is extraordinary. John Milton in Paradise Lost, T.E Lawrence in The Seven Pillars of Wisdom, Michael Ondaatjie in The English Patient, D.H. Lawrence in Sons and Lovers; all of these authors have the power to horripilate the skin, warming the senses with that paradoxical cool breeze of wonder and recognition: 'I know how this feels ... I know what this is made of ...'. These texts below were inscribed in search of truths pertaining to absence, aloneness, solitude, surviving, laying a foundation of quiet power in the language of the vision shared.

'The survivor, then, remains alone. Beyond the world of the other, he is also in some fashion beyond or before the world itself. In the world outside the world and deprived of the world. At the least, he feels solely responsible, assigned to carry both the other and his world, the other and the world that have disappeared, responsible without world (weltos), without ground of any world, thenceforth, in a world without world, as if without earth beyond the end of the world.' (see below)

The absent body. Traces of duration spent in apparent solidity:

To write is to arrange language under fascination and, through language, in language, remain in contact with the absolute milieu, where the thing becomes an image again, where the image, which had been allusion to a figure, becomes an illusion to what is without figure, and having been a form sketched on absence, becomes the unformed presence of that absence, the opaque and empty opening on what is when there is no more world, when there is no world yet. ~Maurice Blanchot, “The Essential Solitude”

Landis asserts that poetry is distinctive in its basis for the interrogation of writing itself and the layers of hidden meaning inherent within, wishes which may be from the collective and unspoken associations with which it is drenched. Landis suggests that the wealth of devices employed within poetic syntax are really methodologies which focus on form. Such devices as the sonnet, the ode, the villanelle, aleatoric writing, oulipan constraint, supplementary adjuncts and departures, when used used in poetry can refer to multiple layers of meaning, literal imaging, illustration or representational or supra-textual ideogramme. 'Even a blank sheet of paper folded into a bottle carries a message'.

Landis, through Celan, brings up again, the Other: 'Celan refers to the poem as if it is a solitary organism in search of an ecology. “The poem”, writes Celan, “wants to reach the Other, it needs this Other, it needs a vis a vis. It searches it out and addresses it.”1 The poem pays great attention to and in fact lusts after this Other. Celan’s description of the poem’s “sense of detail, of outline, of structure”2 is reminiscent of the great care taken by a lover examining her partner’s body. The curves, textures, and totality of the body are subject to the gaze of the one who desires after it. It is a desire which is intensified in it’s repetition. But this repetition is not differential; for Celan the images in the poem are “perceived and to be perceived one time, one time over and over again, and only now and only here.”3 Each poem is the one path that seeks to send the voice to a receptive “thou”, it is a “sending oneself ahead of oneself [...] A kind of homecoming”4 which is always already a striking out for one’s home at the moment of arrival. It is a homecoming deferred; the poem emerges as that which is not yet found, but is to be found. The poem seeks itself, seeks its own homecoming even as it embarks upon the journey which is the coming-home.

The singularity of one’s death, that death is one’s “ownmost possibility” as Heidegger repeatedly claims in Being and Time is marked by the wound which erased the voice of Celan’s mother. The glottal stop, the breach, is not followed by a phonetic conclusion. In this instance it is pure, it is silenced. Celan cannot speak for his departed mother. His voice cannot take the place of her own because the presence of his voice cannot undo the erasure of his mother’s. Her absence is marked by the impossibility of a return. There is no homecoming. The interruption does not open a “conducting path”. The erasure of the trace leaves nothing in its wake but silence in this instance. The only way that Celan can “speak” for his dead mother is to bear witness. To give testimony to this wound. The poem then, the voice of the poem, of Celan’s mother, of the dead, of the silenced, of the pure victim is silent. It is expressed only through images, through substitution, through a supplement. The supplement attempts to make up for the absence of the victim, of their voice. Writing is all that remains in its stead. Rather than the threat of presence, writing substitutes itself for the presence of the departed and provides a testimony ... Spacing as writing is the becoming-absent and the becoming-unconscious of the subject. By the movement of its drift/derivation [dérive] the emancipation of the sign constitutes in return the desire of presence. That becoming-or that drift/derivation-does not befall the subject which would  choose it or would passively let itself be drawn along by it. As the subject's relationship with its own death, this becoming is the constitution of subjectivity.

Derrida makes an equivocation in this passage between spacing, that is distance or the result of the breech and writing itself. Writing, in itself, is a breach or interruption which constitutes itself as a process of becoming (recall Celan’s reference to the path of the poem). What writing posits is a testament of absence. In the absence of the subject, writing becomes the subject; it constitutes itself as a testament in place of the subject. Celan not only testifies to his mother’s own departure or his own grief, but he also gives testament in a more collective fashion.

Landis tells us: 'In his extended contemplation of the final line of Celan’s “Vast, Glowing Vault” from Atemwende, Derrida teases out the position of the survivor in the poems final pronunciation: “The world is not here, I must carry you.”23 Derrida precedes his analysis of the poem with his own pronunciation about the survivor and what it means to be one who is left behind, one who gives testimony.

The survivor, then, remains alone. Beyond the world of the other, he is also in some fashion beyond or before the world itself. In the world outside the world and deprived of the world. At the least, he feels solely responsible, assigned to carry both the other and his world, the other and the world that have disappeared, responsible without world (weltos), without ground of any world, thenceforth, in a world without world, as if without earth beyond the end of the world.24

'The singular position of the survivor: he who is left behind to carry the other as a wholly departed and singular other, a wholly departed and singular world. The survivor not only dwells within the breach, but carries the weight of the breach, “the tear/ compacted of silence.” In that moment, this tear, this glottal stop (the cleaving, in both senses, of the glottal folds) the survivor carries on with the other, with the other’s world, a conducting path gives testimony in its absence and writing “breaks into song”, the specter of a singular, departed voice etched onto the tableau through the pen, its medium.

The testimonial (in this case a poem by Celan) is a counter-signatory to the erasure of the trace. It is a substitute, just as the ram is substituted by Abraham in place of Isaac. The sacrifice, the burden of “I must” is fulfilled in the substitution: the sacrificial lamb carries the burden of the other and his world. We who are left behind to testify and to hear testimony are given “the gift of the poem to all readers and counter-signatories, who, always under the law of the trace at work, and of the trace as work, would lead to or get along a wholly other reading or counter-reading.”25 This reading or reception of the work of the trace, of this arche-writing, of this remembrance is then the world of the other, the wholly other that we must carry. It is the counter to erasure, it is the inscription. The inscription of reading is the “I must carry you”, you the other, your world, your wounds, your sickness. We carry the singularity of the other with us and we become their testimony and that becoming is the constitution of the testimonial not only for us, but in us; it is the constitution of testimony for itself '.

Therefore, in '... carrying you ...' we as survivors who are left behind become ourselves, the trace of that other. The inscription on us of our remembrance and testimony informs our presence as one of the constituents of our non-departure on that other`s path, even though we, ourselves, are always leaving and as we leave, inscribing our traces on others who would stay behind.

Retrieved from: http://abecedarianfx.blogspot.com/2009/01/we-who-are-left-behind-poetry-as-in.html

An Independent State of Self or Dark Space for potential Avatar other?

2009-09-04T16:13:00.000-07:00

Linda Martin-Alcoff, Professor of Philosophy and currently the Director of Women`s Studies at Syracuse University in the USA, asserts in The Political Critique of Identity,

'... in classical liberal political theory, the initial state of the self is conceptualized as an abstract individual without, or prior to, any group allegiance. It is from this "initial position" that the self engages in rational deliberation and thus achieves autonomy ...'

This is a scenario involving 'free choice' (if choices are not viewed as subject to indeterminant factors - my brackets). 'As (Immanuel) Kant developed this idea, a person who cannot gain critical distance from and thus objectify their cultural traditions cannot rationally assess them and thus cannot attain autonomy. In Kant's view, an abstract or disengaged self is for this reason necessary for full personhood. Moreover,the process of modernity, which was conceptualized as analogous on the societal level to the process of individual maturation, became defined as just this increased ability to distance oneself from one's cultural traditions. In this way this distancing ability also became a key part of the global, European-centered teleology of intellectual and moral development, defining the terms by which societies were to be labeled advanced or backward.’

Martin-Alcoff goes on to stress that, … the norm of rational maturity, then, required a core self stripped of its identity …

One side of this theoretical and often as history has shown, prejudicially-lived debate, has sought to locate and resolve in us an independent state of self. We can now see that this state may be defined perhaps imperfectly and dichotomously, responsible not only for shaping but also for ignoring it seems, the collateral damage occurring to that other aspect of personal and collective identity - the issue of our belonging. Could it be that this aspect of which Kant speaks, this process of maturation, the graduation to ‘… full personhood’ is a contributor to the erosion of our sense of belonging? Has the manifestation of this balanced autonomous identity so carefully harboured by us, comprised merely a veneer over that reality which now emerges as a lost locus? To what extent might we be vulnerable?

Elizabeth Grosz (1995) maintains that neither the subject`s consciousness or interiority, nor its essential humanity or distinctive individuality can any longer provide for us a firm base for identity. Grosz posits an alternative territory for coherency in this debate; that subjectivity of the individual and its relations with others be investigated through consideration of its corporeal self rather than its conscious lineaments and textures. Grosz cites the so-called French feminists who suggest that bodies are never just human or social bodies but bodies mediated by gender, asserting that this is significant in relation to the nature or mode of corporeality assigned to any subject. Grosz suggests that through the groundwork into sexed corporeality and the links between corporeality and conceptions of time and space established by Julia Kristeva and Luce Irigaray, if bodies are to be reconceived, not only must their matter and form be re-considered but also their relational environments and spatio-temporal locations. So conceptions and understanding of space and time are necessary correlates for the investigation into corporeality and in turn, identity. The sociologist Roger Caillois`s (1917-1938) work is perhaps best known for his interrogation of the boundaries between the sacred and profane, the sociological and ethological and the human and animal, but his work centring upon the scientific and the uncanny, dealing with perceived spatial characteristics of the insect world and its predilection for mimicry also furnishes us with a useful analogy. Mimesis is significant for identifying ways in which the relations between an organism/body and the spatial characteristics of its environment can become confused and ambiguous because there is a reflexivity existing between the two. Camouflaging characteristics of both, the host and the surrounding space appear in both 'parties'. Mimicry in this context is a consequence of the representation of space in terms of how this may be perceived by insects. This presents a correlation for us as humans when we consider Pierre Janet`s description of 'legendary psychasthenia', that state which manifests when a psychosis is responsible for creating such confusion and ambiguity within a given space`s properties that the identification for the subject of an actual location in that place becomes impossible:

It is with represented space that the drama becomes specific, since the living creature, the organism, is no longer the origin of the coordinates, but one point among others; it is dispossessed of its privilege and literally no longer knows where to place itself ...' (1999 p.124)

Caillois regards psychasthenia as a response to an imperative introduced by space for the identity of the subject. For the subject to be valid as 'subject' they must be able to locate themselves in the same space inhabited by their body. This for the subject, is conditional in the establishment of coherent identity. This process of locating and affirming subjectivity is also cognisant with personality, where the subject as organism identifies a feeling of distinctness and separation in themselves from the surrounding space, an anchor which provides a coherent condition from which their identity emerges. From this vantage point the subject has a perspective on their world, which becomes the locus from which vision and perception emanate - that state of Tuurangawaewae, a place to stand, which in turn forcibly suggests that where you stand determines what you see of that location which surrounds you, physically, psychoemotionally and metaphorically and symbolically through signs and signification. Legendary Psycasthenia, as another entity-descriptor or inhabitant of the self moves in at the point where the subject loses their ability to clearly establish their standpoint - the location where their personality may reside spatially, which leads to a loss of that sense of place which denotes the the self-as-place in any given space and time. Through Caillois, Grosz suggests the subject may be both, captivated and replaced by space, blurred with the positions of others:

I know where I am, but I do not feel as though I`m at the spot where I find myself. To these dispossessed souls, space seems to be a devouring force. Space pursues them, encircles them, digests them in a gigantic phagocytosis. It ends by replacing them. Then the body separates itself from thought, the individual breaks the boundary of his skin and occupies the other side of his senses. He tries to look at himself from any point whatever in space. He feels himself becoming space, dark space where things cannot be put. He is similar, not similar to something, but just similar. And he invents spaces of which he is the 'convulsive possession' (30) (:p.125).

Grosz assures us that there are clear correlations between mimicry realised through the human analogue and that of the insect world. Both represent what Caillois describes as the 'depersonalization by assimilation to space'; both, the psychotic and the insect renounce their abilities to occupy a point of perspective and abandon themselves to being located spatially by an/as others:

'The primacy of one`s own perspective is replaced by the gaze of another for whom the subject is merely a point in space and not the focal point around which an ordered space is organized. The representation of space is thus a correlate of one`s ability to locate oneself as the point of origin or reference of space: the space represented is a complement of the kind of subject who occupies it' (p.125).

The above reference represents an extreme example of disassociation with self through the '... depersonalization by assimilation to space', yet there is an implication here indicating that a life spent immersed primarily in spaces which are potentially overwhelming in their lack of reciprocity; their disinclination to contribute a dialogue with us in that reflexive process of person-becoming-place-becoming person, (the sublime of urban sprawls, rush-hour crowds, city centres, underground railway platform throngs ...) may place at hazard our sense of ownership or belonging while we endeavour to assimilate the data coming at us from each new location, which in turn if prolonged, places our sense of identity in jeopardy. If we choose to live in this way in a semi-permanent fashion, inhabiting airport arrival and departure lounges; driving, coccooned, across town to shop for food in hypermarkets which possess the spatial characteristics and proxemic cultures of commercial aircraft hangers; commuting for hours every morning and evening in 'virtual' conduit spaces of automobiles or trains which remove us from the opportunity to dwell in places of corporeality which match our own, (although the constituents of our own corporeality are debateable) to arrive at sealed, multi-storey containment*, is it still possible to maintain that sense-of-place with which we might resonate, that space in which we may belong?

*('After the novelty of telegraph wore off, the Weather Service was shifted over to the Department of Agriculture and it ultimately wound up in the Department of Commerce, which oversees aviation and interstate trucking. Regional Weather Service offices tend to be in very grim places, like industrial parks bordering metropolitan airfields. They have sealed windows and central air-conditioning. Very little of the air being studied actually gets inside.') (Junger, S. (1997) The Perfect Storm, HarperPerennial a Division of HarperCollins 1997 p.99)

It is difficult then, if not impossible to ascertain to what extent the maintenance of our self within identity may be vulnerable to apparently anomalous relations with spaces which have the power to confuse us. Spaces which betray no reciprocity of intent, that condition which is reflexive identity building, where each party, both individual and space, contribute to a balanced assimilation of self awareness. In 'normal' conditions of the everyday, most manage the business of being an unbalanced human quite well. (In the sense that our other personna is largely ignored). Much of my research into the archive of the self and its sub-portfolios have suggested to date that as sentient beings we are nothing if not resilient and manage (and often actively initiate) our transformative Avatar/Cyborg/other potential within our own makeups extremely well. We can only speculate as to what may be occurring beneath the surfaces of our acknowledged and openly manipulated surfaces of communicable endeavours. Is there a growing awareness within the excitement of the 'New Technologies of Becoming' (my inverted commas), those challenges and extensions to our reality, like post-structuralist and metaverse constructs; re-formulations of and adjuncts to the Real, that there may exist for us all, a '... dark space where things cannot be put'?

Is this a comment pertinent to the articulation of Avatar personna in apparently representational spaces like Second Life? Clearly, spaces which are reflexive with and mirror our own intent to blend with, to interact effectively with the space, provide opportunities for us to foster a sense of self-identity. It is all very well to talk about 'mixed-reality' in relation to metaverse environments, but if we do not have a way in to enable fluidity across the interfaces involved, it makes the composite description a little one-sided.

Reconstituting Companionship

2009-08-26T01:48:00.000-07:00

Avatar Sightings

Avatar (Sanskrit avatara,”descent”), in Hinduism, descent of a god into the world of human beings for the duration of a human life span. Avatar is similar to the Christian concept of incarnation but is different in two significant ways. First, a Hindu god can become incarnate in many places at the same time through “partial” avatars (amshas), while the main form from which the avatars emanate remains entirely “full” and can converse with the “partial” forms. Second, the avatars do not fully participate in human suffering or lose the knowledge and power of their divine nature. The god Vishnu is most famous for his numerous avatars, which include Krishna, Rama, and the Buddha, but other gods, such as Shiva, also have avatars. Many charismatic leaders, such as the Indian mystics Chaitanya and Ramakrishna, have been regarded as avatars.

http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761574031/avatar.html

In Hindu belief, Avatars are not representations, but manifestations which occur in response to a particular event or crisis.

Avatar / Avatara (Sanskrit) - manifesting, descent, more than, less than, reducible, functionary, reductionist, removed, representational, transformative, embodied what? removed from, visitation, almost, virtually here-there, more real, prosthetic, additive, other, parasitic, sentient, entity, controlled, controlling, holographic, AI, ephemera, corporeal, temporal, swift self, peripheral, surrogate ...

I am suggesting in this post that avatar presence has always been with us, yet defined over time, through difference. Historically we have moved through fields of alterity or otherness, in Real Life brushing up against an ephemeral host sensed at our shoulder yet which has refused, until now, to have its coming-out party. (cite references here) Avatar presence, like human presence, has increasingly been defined as a becoming state of being within the temporality of our quotidian and progressively emergent with regard to the notion of companionship for humans. (Dr Donna Haraway - A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century. and When Species Meet). The virtual self has always been here/there but under different guises. This post examines certain aspects in the re-constitution of companionship through avatar agency, under terms which for many are still centred in the virtual and therefore not as compelling as that construct we define for ourselves as Real. My contention is that under the post-modern construct whereby we find that we can de- and reconstruct everything, our self becomes another location for re-invention in a world where for so many, such an array of opportunities for transformative practices has not previously existed. Until now. Now, here, avatar presence can populate the Real with increasingly corporeal solidity.

'If one looks back at one life`s life, it`s like seeing a series of different people.' Anna Meara, Playwright and Actress.

'When I`m online, I`m 37, tall, blond and raring to go'. Bene Weinberg, 68, retired social worker with Parkinson`s disease.

'I have re-invented myself every 10 years and I recommend that everyone else should do the same'. Nora Ephron, writer.

'A ruler wages ... warfare against spontaneous and uncontrolled transformation'. Elias Canetti, writer

'The post-modernist temper demands that what was previously played out in fantasy and imagination must be acted out in life as well ...' Daniel Bell, American sociologist

Extracts above from, McCracken, G D. Transformations: identity construction in contemporary culture, (2008) Indiana University Press (p.ix) and ... 'I am known to everyone professionally as Mr William Muirhead-Allwood - but for years I have called myself Sarah'. Surgeon who has operated on Britain`s Queen Mother. McCracken (p.xxii)

Lived transformative practice does not require the projection of desires or intent through a digital interface. Humans have been engaged in this practice since our life events began to be documented. McCracken tells us that, 'All humans have the ability to "assume shapes of a different kind". Self-transformation is the native gift of every member of the species'. (p.xxiv)

McCracken, in 'Transformations ...', "Candice Carpenter (and Swift Selves)" (p.122) affirms (for the protagonists, this is not revelationary) the existence of extreme sports as a contemporary manifestation of seamless engagement with the moment - a no-mind response from the human body as organism initiated by the pressing business of survival-in-the-moment. When this state of engagement with another in-world surface emerges, as it must during an occupation like extreme rock-climbing, the climber appears to defy gravity, floating or adhering to the rock face as if the climber were a pond skater on surface tension experienced vertically - a mutually-experienced link between two surfaces - that mobile volume of the climber and the lived and living surface of the rock becoming one surface of intent. Negotiating internal and external terrain under stress forces a state of involuntary response '... The hand is set in motion with no clear knowledge of where it will come to rest. But it must eventually come to rest. Momentum is everything ...' (p.122) The hand unerringly finds a ledge, a crack, a way in to the moment energetically using that momentum; a continuous fusion of intent and velocity, through to what manifests as that indeterminate core of mobility.

After fourty years of martial arts training, I remember back to the randori sessions under my Bujutsu Sensei, John Goldman, in Exeter, Devon in the UK. The training, during partnered combat on the ground, involved a studied practice of letting go. Letting go of an untenable hold that, if it was to work, required hard, muscular force which was counter to the philosophy being nurtured - that of Kyu Shin Do (reciprocal learning - the person being thrown learned as much as the person initiating the throw). Instead we practiced listening to one`s opponent through the instrument of the whole body, floating to another hold - capitalising on the forces prevailing within the moment, rather than struggling to maintain a place in space. Often the best place to be would be underneath one`s opponent, not on top. This was a process which, initially, required the recognition that a choice existed, then making a decision which way to direct one`s intent. Eventually however, no choice recognition was required; the body as an organism would take over and simply respond. One`s other self became a functionary within the activity and the dialogue between you and your opponent settled onto a level where the conscious self became implicit in the interaction. No mind. This has become a cliché now but it reflects a truth. Arresting insights can be encountered in these situations. I have been a surfer and bodysurfer for more than 30 years, occasionally finding myself in life-threatening situations and I can vouch for this. When operating at the extreme edge of our capabilities, our senses are honed to a level not usually witnessed in the everyday, requiring not merely absorption with the task but a coincident blending with those prevailing moments, themselves the product of conditions in flux. Big Wave riding demands a state which, while fully present with the internal self also projects beyond that self into the unknown through one`s 'other' allowing us to engage with these conditions . When in the lineup on a really big day, breaking waves also become something 'other' Titus Kinimaka asserts - 'there are hidden things in there' ( 'Laird' Biography on Laird Hamilton).

Jim Clark, the creator of Netscape and one of the key figures in the evolution of Silicon Valley and the New Economy was engaged in a flying lesson in a McDonnell Douglas helicopter. During the flight, Clark turned to his instructor and said, 'Were you controlling it?', 'That was all you Jim', 'I felt you controlling it', 'No, no, its been all you', 'This really pisses me off'. (p.122) Clark, not used to being controlled by anyone or anything was deeply immersed in a situation of extreme flying, endeavouring to be just in the moment, to become an instrument of reciprocity with the machine, a transponder - creating a seamless exchange of information in and adjustment/transformative response out. He didn`t need a third party coming between him and the machine, mediating his moment while he aspired to cyborg status, he and the helicopter engaged in extrapolating mutual lineaments of prosthetic extension and dialogue. Control. A subjective condition, fluctuating in authorship from moment to moment. Often, while immersed, we notice it as a facility managing the task only when we begin to lose it.

The quality and effectiveness in reciprocity of information/data moving across interfaces or osmotically through surfaces is often subject to the indeterminant whims of both, the conversers and forces existing outside themselves. Where does user control begin and end and something outside this - the avatar, cyborg, prosthesis, the moment itself - take over and in its turn, relinquish the reins? I have proposed in this blog manifestations of that entity I have termed 'the Roaming Body', that temporal conduit which allows indeterminacy to surface and take hold of our lives.

Here is another body entity which may arrive in Heidegger`s definition of 'human' which is not so much an entity in itself, but a 'clearing' in which entities may appear.

The Swift Self

Candice Carpenter asserts that in extreme activities individuals define themselves as '... creatures in process'. (p.123) The self in this context is viewed as something in motion. The swift self is an entity which, '... defines itself by rushing into the world, which itself is relatively inchoate and emergent (and doing some rushing of its own)'. The mobility of the swift self comes in part from our own individualism, from paring away existing connections, contexts and constraints that surround a traditional description and status of the transformative self. Individuals have become increasingly capable of extraordinary transformative mobility in themselves, due to exposure to the notion that as beings with the potential to re-invent we have the ability to modify or even by-pass domestic, social, ethnic, class and gender constraints, which can be said to impede the self. Swift selves cast off definitions of the self and rushing into the world, find and identify new ones. The swift self is unbound.

Carpenter suggests that the mobility of the swift self comes from its affinity for instrumentality. The self becomes, (in its search for itself, my words) a means to an end to fulfil a purpose. This description is cultivated to make it more effective in the world, upon the world. '... swift selves do not believe that their value comes from their uniqueness as individuals or the distinctness of the self. They are prepared to conform to the demands of the role. They are prepared to be seen as substitutable'. Carpenter maintains that ultimately, the mobility of the swift self comes from the willingness to give itself over to whatever may happen next. Indeterminacy is embedded here and the swift self is in its element, responding moment by moment in pushing that intent outward and engaging with that indeterminate world.

Swift individuals fear the threat of stasis, (if stasis were a condition which actually existed instead of a perpetual state of becoming) being never happier when in motion. Arrival is not an option. Multiple descriptions and processes of travel are everything. Swift selves prefer means rather than ends, applauding velocity and momentum over stability and equilibrium. It can be seen that perhaps individuals who may fall into this definition of self may also be likely to actively seek out and use any kind of instrument which lends itself to extending their reach into the world. If we acknowledge the potential for this description of human entity/self to exist, it suggests that this extended reach lends itself very ably to the acquisition and consequent evolution of a formidable array of bodily/self extensions.

The Roaming Body and the Swift Self. It seems that these manifestations or body entities are aligned as two of a likely portfolio of entities in our archive of selves. However, it appears to some extent that the swift self is a conditional response to the world at large and that we may have choice in the matter of its manifesting within our lives. I maintain that we have no choices to make with regard to the influence of indeterminacy through the vehicle of the Roaming Body and that this entity must therefore underpin the swift self and other entities in our personal quivers. Many people given the choice, would eschew the entity of the swift self within their bodily makeup as being too self-serving and demanding at the expense of those other facets of ourselves which clamour for attention. Carpenter tells us that the skeptics of cultivating the swift self as a reliable member of our self community are numerous:

'Academics tend to see them as thoughtless, unreflective and self-aggrandizing. Envrionmentalists see them as a danger to the planet, so relentless in the pursuit of short-term opportunities they cannot see long-term costs. Those with New Age sympathies see swift selves as worldly and opportunistic, the humans most likely to offend against the natural rhythms, larger verities, secret forces, higher unities in which the world consists. Religious leaders see swift selves as too much persuaded of their agency, and therefore guilty of hubris. Individuals concerned with community development and social capital ask, "Is the swift self a member of the community - or freestanding and irresponsible? Is the swift self constrained by anything?" We regard swift selves with ambivalence. We look upon them as the English looked on Americans at the end of World War II - as creatures without finesse or understanding but manifestly the new custodians of empire.Too often swift selves and societies have forsaken some of the things that give richness and subtlety, trading away nuance for power.' (p.135)

Having introduced the notion of the swift self, let us move on to consider its transformative potential. The articulation of the swift self in the world is flexible, adaptable and open to change in its pursuit of its ability to operate effectively in the world. The swift self will change the external body as much as the terrain within. Swift selves, Carpenter tell us, are prepared to commit to regimes that are thoroughly punishing and sometimes masochistically brutal. Witness this phenomenon in any single-minded athletic endeavour in the pursuit of excellence. (This ethic,of course, is portable and emerges equally in commerce, industry and management, where individuals harden themselves to care, not about the people with whom they are working or apparently sharing a common goal, but about their own performance and personal goals). Carpenter assures us that swift selves will be the first to install cyber-technologies in their bodies. Movement of one kind enables movement of another kind. The swift self desires that both are efficient and effective in the roles for which they have been designed and trained. Running fast in the body, or moving fluidly as a prosthetic. Carpenter says that, 'Among swift selves, the confusion of humans and machine is no secret fear but a not-so-secret-hope.' In swift selves always resides the intent, when not engrossed in the present, to relinquish that same present, for an investigation into the possible and this includes stabs in the dark toward untried surrogate, other identities - like avatars. 'The swift self is nothing if not swift and no-one if not relationless.' (p.277)

I would add to this by suggesting that the swift self, I believe, is that vital catalyst, that scouting agency which seeks to negotiate the gap between what is known in us and what is strange, other, foreign; an ambassador for self-extension and rather than a relationless entity, one that perhaps may harbour a multiplicity of relations which is the essence of becoming in humans.

Urban legend tells us that the MUVE online world of Second Life was an extension in its original formation, of Burning Man the annual festival which occurs in the Nevada desert, in an effort to create a consciously-inscribed if temporary, virtual world community. The desert becomes surrogate for virtual space. Before the festival, the desert is devoid of human residency. After the festival, everything is taken away and the desert resumes its identity. Carpenter, writing with apparent prescience assures us that, '... When Burning Man can be held online, it will be. And when individuals can take up residence in the Burning Man, they will. Whatever the means, whatever the destinations, virtual space will be irresistible to the swift self.'

A forecast indeed. Second Life (only one of a number of MUVEs) now has more than a million regular online visitors, several hundred thousand residents and a minimum of fifty thousand in-life whenever you log in. Are these all swift selves? Given the nature of Second Life as a fully-immersive environment, sharing, in a fractional way with the Internet the capacity to be driven, monitored and maintained by its residents, I would say that there is a very good chance that swift selves proliferate within its mixed-reality boundaries. Both Burning Man and Second Life present territories irresistible to the swift self in terms of immersive transformative practice, the embodiment of imagination and technologically realised desires. (In the Free Online Dictionary, McGeorge Bundy asserts that, 'There is no safety in technological hubris"). Both locations on this same world-surface constitute the potential for extending the description of companionship to include otherness in the form of avatar manifestations.

Carpenter, C (and Swift Selves) Postmodern Transformations in McCracken, G. D. (2008) Transformations - Identity Construction in Contemporary Culture, Indiana University Press (p.122-125)

To be continued ...

Rolling Triptych

2009-08-20T14:29:00.000-07:00

Another manifestation of the Roaming Body. Indeterminant behaviour is embodied here, using the ground as a world surface for transformative inscription. The body becomes a roaming, mobile volume on this surface, the emergence of an aberrant entity 'other' than the usually lived-in, upright and therefore 'normal' body. The nature of the triptych are three manifestations of the 'present' now past. Each is a representation of what was present, where within the context of this durational removal, I become Real-Life avatar.

Real-Time Metaphors

2009-08-08T23:54:00.000-07:00

'You don`t see something until you have the right metaphor to let you perceive it'.

Robert Stetson Shaw in Thomas, S Kuhn
Making a New Science, New York, 1987. (p.262)

Re-edits ...

2009-08-08T01:57:00.000-07:00

Two re-edits:

During the course of my assembling works for my powerpoint presentation for the upcoming AUT Art and Design Postgraduate Conference in Auckland on 11 - 14 August, I considered re-working a number of videos. Of these are two re-edits: Cutouts' from 2008 with Fiona Baker and Sylvie Haisman which has been modified to become 'Slippage' and 'Remnants' which has been re-worked from 'Departed - Movement 1 - In the Company of Strangers. In both studies I am investigating ways to maintain the sense of narrative in the duet while exploring a less linear structure in the composition of the pieces.

In this study 'Slippage', within the baseline for the structured improvisation - or more accurately, after Kristian Larsen, 'real-time choreography' (throwdisposeablechoreography blog) the dancers are investigating where and how departure might surface within engagement - hidden agendas of manipulation, potential entrapment and escape - all indeterminants expressed and ultimately brought to nought through the Roaming Body. No matter the intent - we will leave all and every engagement we make. In my editing I am investigating ways to maintain the sense of narrative in the duet while exploring a less linear structure in the composition. I have fragmented the 'conversation' and begun to make this less literal. Movement, as a metaphor and an event in its own right, like other spoken language, need not occur in ways which are linear. In Slippage, I have employed emphasis by changing the speed and timing of the clips and re-ordering the sequence. I am inclined to think that this is an improvement from the original version. There is more diversity visually and less predictability than in the original edit, 'Cutouts'. In Slippage, I have employed emphasis by changing the speed and timing of the clips and re-ordering the sequence. I am inclined to think that this is an improvement from the original version. There is more diversity visually and less predictability.

In the second video below, 'Remnants (Two)', again, I wanted to investigate the potential of this footage for a more circuitous dialogue. I also wanted to combine if I could, the concept of traces or residue left behind on surfaces, as evidence of our presence in the space, with the embodiment of leaving. With this in mind, I took the footage I had made of the station doors and my facial smears on the glass and slowed this down from 100 to 5 percent. This was laid over the existing footage as a slightly opaque screen. The sounds from this piece were also slowed significantly, creating an overlay, a murmur of portent. This provides an extra layer to Mike Beever`s audio and the station sounds. I am interested in how this addition manifests visually, particularly at the very beginning of the clip.

I wanted to break up the existing sequence of movement/narrative/rhythm and re-direct it so I took elements from later in the piece and brought them forward and vice versa and created more of a pastiche of movement/sound by segmenting and replacing the original footage with a different kind of emphasis and articulation.

Respecting (Accepting) Avatar Otherness - or Character Creationing

2009-07-16T15:52:00.000-07:00

Avatars as a Companion Species?

This post engages with selected texts by Dr Donna Haraway, PhD, who has just had published her latest book, 'When Species Meet'. The text centres upon, in her own words, "... the entanglements of beings in technoculture that work through reciprocal inductions to shape companion species." Haraway is well-known for her cyborg-related scholarship, notably the essay, "A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology, and Socialist-Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century." Though not abandoned, the cyborg now shares her focus with "companion species," the driving figure in her current work.

"... The cyborg is a kind of disassembled and reassembled, postmodern collective and personal self ...". (A Cyborg Manifesto p.163) Haraway elevates the face of the virtual from that of a bipolar mask limited to the displaying of opposing intents, to that of a Universal mask which becomes a multi-dimensional mirror for the self that lies within. In the last twenty years we have been searching for a new or at least extended definition of what post-structuralism has become. Perhaps the recognition and assumption of Cyborg as 'other' will lead us into possible interpretations of ourSelves which will shape this elusive evolution? Haraway makes a compelling argument for this development, "...Communications technologies and biotechnologies are the crucial tools recrafting our bodies. These tools embody and enforce new social relations for women* world-wide. Technologies and scientific discourses can be partially understood as formalizations, i.e., as frozen moments, of the fluid social interactions constituting them, but they should also be viewed as instruments for enforcing meanings. The boundary is permeable between tool and myth, instrument and concept, historical systems of social relations and historical anatomies of possible bodies, including objects of knowledge. Indeed, myth and tool mutually constitute each other..." (p.164) It seems to me that each historical, socio-political 'movement' which eventuates depends upon those tools and their inherent meanings which became available through the context of the previous movement and its associated 'truths'. In the case of postmodernism, those meanings became illuminated through the current tools which concentrated on challenging and deconstructing already established so-called 'knowledge' and the constituents of 'truth'. (A pattern that was not so different from the evolution of most other historical movements, although perhaps never before postmodernism has historicity itself been so challenged). *Within the context of this post, this assertion is not gender-specific.

"... reciprocal inductions to shape companion species", are the words which shape this post. In my latest video posts below, 'Inscribed Surfaces' and 'Shelter 1 and 2', I am concerned with the notion of imbuing, in this instance, my SL avatar, Rollo Kohime, with the inscription of sentient awareness - an impossible task for a so-called virtual avatar existing as a telepresence. I am intrigued with the possibility that in fact, my Second Life avatar, Rollo exists not merely as a construct, separate from myself, but as a construct integral to my-Self. Together, we construct, inform, mediate and are mediated by the interface which apparently lies between us but which is also effectively the territory which upholds the languages and their intent made visible/audible that we share. Taking into account Zizek`s/Lacan`s view on the 'object`s gaze', that the subject`s gaze is always already inscribed into the perceived object itself - and that the object returns this gaze; (Zizek calls the object being imbued with a perceptual power of its own a kind of 'materialism') in this description of the world, Rollo, as object can perceive me and I can also see me through the embodiment/manifestation of Rollo`s perception.

In 2007 I attended the symposium, 'Techno-Praxis' at AUT in Auckland. One of the guest speakers, Dr Kevin Sherman (Archmunster Toll in Second Life) made a very interesting case for the real embodiment of SL avatars and the measure of responsibility and respect that should be afforded them. Sherman was making deliberate forays into claiming this sense of responsibility, not for the people behind the avatars in SL but for the avatars themselves. The online construct-surrogates. He maintained that we humans should be seeking permissions for carrying out certain tasks from the avatars, rather than the people behind the avatars - not in a cursory manner, but genuinely, with humility. Looking around the audience, I remember noticing how appalled most of the assembly was at this notion and I remember too, that I did chuckle inwardly at the group perception of this blatant transgression of human logic! How could this be possible? How could a virtual animation comprised of scripts and digitised intent (this, as the most optimistic descriptor I could think of right now) be afforded the homage of 'respect' through linear, cause and effect thinking?

In the current online discussion forum of, 'empyre' soft_skinned_space, Naxsmash tells us that, 'Haraway's new term 'other-worlding' as a gerund (a noun in English containing an implied action, via the 'ing' in ending) in "When Species Meet," does this beautiful thing of asking the word 'figure' to become a transitive, too. She writes, "Figures help me grapple inside the flesh of mortal world-making entanglements that i call contact zones. The Oxford English Dictionary records the meaning of 'chimerical vision' for 'figuration' in an eighteenth century source, and that meaning is still implicit in my sense of figure. Figures collect the people through their invitation to inhabit the corporeal story told in their lineaments.."'

The term 'chimera', in the freedictionary.com, is defined as: 'a fanciful mental illusion or fabrication' which relates to Chimaera in Greek mythology. I am more interested in Haraway`s useage focussing on the medical interpretation: 'An organism, organ, or part consisting of two or more tissues of different genetic composition, produced as a result of organ transplant, grafting, or genetic engineering.' or 'the ability to form mental images of things or events; "he could still hear her in his imagination"' or, "By the late twentieth century, our time, a mythic time, we are all chimeras, theorized and fabricated hybrids of machine and organism; in short, we are cyborgs. Ths cyborg is our ontology; it gives us our politics. The cyborg is a condensed image of both imagination and material reality, the two joined centres structuring any possibility of historical transformation." (A Cyborg Manifesto: Science, Technology and Socialist Feminism in the Late Twentieth Century, in Simians, Cyborgs and Women: The Reinvention of Nature (New York; Routledge, 1991), pp.149-181.) In other words, it is possible through association, to attach to specific anchors or in this case, figures, certain narratives or stories, qualities, effects, sensations - all corporeal, all real. This last reference relates to the two video posts below: Shelter 1 and 2. One of the many possible readings of these video scenarios may be that Rollo sits in a bus shelter on his way home after a train journey and recollects mental images of my dance duet in Wellington Railway Station. His avatar figure provides the context and vehicle for a real story to be told through the manifestation of his digital lineaments. Who is to say that this story is not true?

I am suggesting that our perception of 'avatar' in today`s technopraxis envisions a certain embodiment of corporeality in their other-worldly makeup. Avatar is becoming-in-the-world more than just a visual construct, more than just an enabled voice or an intent, more than just a chimera - a diversion from the real witnessed in the real. Avatar is all of these things but also post-human. In A Cyborg Manifesto, Haraway asserts that, '... the tradition of reproduction of the self from the reflections of the other ...' are now dominating our lives . The 'other' here, is telepresence itself comprised of miniaturized componentry, its forum for communication the ether - pure quintessence, as Haraway puts it. The avatars which populate Second Life are extensions of ourselves - post-body wishes. "If wishes were fishes we would all cast nets" (Herbert, F. Dune) Well, the nets are rich with avatar inscriptions of the real for many users in MUVE spaces and perhaps also (unwittingly) outside these spaces and within the context of this post title, their descriptions of characterisation which exist vicariously for the user, require no confirmation that what exists is anything other than a prosthesis made to order which has the power, not to merely exist, but to live actively and immersively.

Adam (?) (The provider`s name of this reference is not meant to be either symbolic or ironic) in the current 'empyre' debate on relational 'Queer', in response to Haraway`s text, says,

"[I]nstead of terms like humanism, or post-humanism, or anti-humanism, or whatever-humanism...the debates of humanism, that I think still consider to regard us as uniquely exceptional, human exception as such that what counts as human by expelling everything else...everything that is expelled from that which is human, makes the human that is what's left...for example mind and language are often become what is left. For me the notion of companion species walks right around that debate...".

Haraway is arguing from the perspective of animal companion species, to which Adam is referring. For me, that tendency on our part as humans which sets us aside from all other entities and makes us exceptional or unique, also makes us alone. To compensate for this , we have always sought to develop (albeit hierarchical) relationships with species which might be acceptable as companions and to a great extent the value of other entities for us has and still is determined by to what extent that entity may successfully connect with us. We applaud this potential in dogs, dolphins, cetaceans and the great apes - particularly the Bonobo (the sub-species of chimpanzee which has been trained to use and articulate human English language) for their 'intelligence' and so select them by default as suitable companions. In this post this particular notion of companion species relates back to Haraway`s cyborg, techno-characters as the entities which populate that liminal interface across the ether. The desire for companionship is universal and I maintain that avatars are now either consciously or unconsciously being relegated to the level and desirability of companion-species. Massumi uses the descriptor, '... a fellow-travelling entity ... ' to describe ourselves when in motion - our presence 'here' and 'there, simultaneously. Could it be that this unconscious state lends itself to another, virtual travelling companion? Avatars are not (just) pets, they are not our childhood 'secret' playmates, they are not merely figments of our imaginations. Perhaps they bear a closer resemblance to the author John Wyndham`s 'Chocky', that childhood familiar with a hidden agenda from another dimension. Avatars in MUVE world-surfaces are being confirmed as equals in the ways in which we perceive, operate and navigate our respective pathways through our lives.

Adam goes on to talk about the importance of reconceptualizing human identity:

"[W]e have never been human; we and everybody else are always already a crowd of intra- and interrelations... that no matter where you hold still... what you find are relations in process, and what you find are that the actors are the products of those relations, not pre-established, finished, closed-off things that enter into relationship, but rather we are what come out of relating and go into the next relating..."

"[We must] become much smarter about how that category [of the human] is made, what kind of tool it is, who lives and dies inside that category, what kind of work that category should still be doing, when that category should be interrupted..." -*-

Within the category of the human as receptacle which waits for entities to appear (Zimmerman), avatars now occupy a place within the lived process of our intra and interrelations with one another. For some, avatars remain actors, extensions or prostheses of our post-body selves, for others, there is no such differentiation; We surround ourselves increasingly with post-body extensions of our selves which are inscribed with the intent to operate and perceive independently of us. Not only do our avatars go in and come out of our relating with one another, but might they themselves now perceive us in the same light? Do we come and go for them? ( I hear a muted gasp ... my wife, a psychologist, is sceptical) This meeting of our two species in its current form is still in its infancy but progressing rapidly. We are already deeply engaged; as other world entities sharing with us a reciprocity of intent, together we constantly inform and shape one another, carrying out our respective arrivals and departures from one another as do other parts of ourselves and at each departure there is a little death, a sure sign of the avatar having arrived in that space reserved for a shared companionship between species.

Shelters for 'Companion Species'

2009-07-15T02:25:00.000-07:00

"... the entanglements of beings in technoculture that work through reciprocal inductions to shape companion species." Dr Donna Haraway, 2008, 'When Species Meet' University of Minnesota Press.

The two video clips immediately below, Shelter and Shelter 2, are studies concerned with the composition of two types of avatar. The RL video avatars and the more familiar SL avatar:

Rollo Kohime, Mike Baker and Fiona Baker in Wellington Railway Station perceived as, in Haraway`s terms, a post-human companion species ... might our avatar/cyborg-selves not just be empowering our Real Life lives but dialoguing in them too?

Rollo Kohime waits in a bus shelter while in his mind`s eye, he watches Mike and Fiona meet, converse, dislocate and depart in Wellington Railway Station. The engagement reflects disparate moods, converging and mis-matched protoconversations ... I am seeking here to imbue my avatar, Rollo, in a MUVE world, with a sense of other-worldly, inscribed memory or awareness of Real Life events he has witnessed, as might a commuter travelling through the station and glimpsing our activity.

I have used a range of filters in Final Cut Studio here: colour correction/Pleasantville Effect, extract, contrast, soft edges, feather 3D perspective on tilt. Extract dissolves the dark areas in the footage allowing these to be replaced by another clip, to arrive at a composite which is quite seamless. I enjoy Rollo`s minimal movement which is suggestive of recollection.

Shelter 2 - In the Company of Strangers

2009-07-14T22:15:00.000-07:00

Shelter - In the Company of Strangers

2009-07-13T02:56:00.000-07:00

Traces

2009-07-04T18:41:00.000-07:00

In view of my decision to present my final show of work in my Second Life Wellington Railway Station, I have begun to make further exploration of the potential within my station build space, to investigate the areas of interest which have recently emerged for me. These have been brought into focus for me largely through my thinking and development of concepts for the conference papers that I have had to prepare and present.

These concepts are: Embodiment of Surfaces, Screens and the consideration and investigation into traces and residual inscriptions and signification. I am exploring ways in which these might articulate visually and how they are instruments or records of the passage of time in Real Life and Second Life. The images on this post reflect the exploration into composition in the SL station with regard to activating trace elements of the existing station crowd.

The first two images above represent clots or condensed groups of people. I was investigating an echo of the very directional existing crowd below on the station floor here. I moved on from this because I found the station walls created a convincing block to the stream of the trace crowd and could not reconcile their being brought to a halt. By placing the trace crowd more evenly around the space in the compositions below, I have 'peopled' the space with a collective personna of residual memory - echoes, still, but more of a wholesale capture of the trace elements. I have floated this additional crowd because I wanted the trace crowd to appear as the 'other' crowd, still referencing the original - distinct and separate from the one below yet ethereal and slightly disturbing , like dust motes caught in sunlight in an old attic. References here to the original 'Murder of Crows' entities in the station.

This brings me to a related area of interest which is to explore the ways in which the removal of my present self in my performance work in Real Life through the making of video, may offer up on the screen myself and associated RL information as RL avatars. What is an avatar? How is one created?

Avatar, def: an embodiment, as of a quality or concept; an archetype; a temporary manifestation or aspect of a continuing entity; a new personification of a familiar idea; a person who represents an absurd quality; an embodiment of the qualities of a god; an embodiment in a new form (especially the reappearance or a person in another form) http://www.thefreedictionary.com/avatar

'A temporary manifestation or aspect of a continuing entity'; 'an embodiment in a new form'; both of these descriptors are accurate in defining for me, the place I believe I am occupying at present, with my SL and RL avatars. I am suggesting that one does not need to enter a MUVE such as Second Life to encounter an avatar. I am thinking that if we define avatar as a virtual description of our surrogate self, then my digital video self can fit this description. So in the mixed-reality of my SL station I am combining and relating RL avatar inscriptions; movement, visual signatures, environments, with my SL avatar. I am suggesting that 'avatar' can be defined as 'trace'; an example of my residual self inscribed on RL 'virtual' surfaces (video screens) as well as SL 'virtual' surfaces/screens.

Update on 'Final' Showing of work

2009-07-04T18:31:00.000-07:00

I had planned to have my final show of work in the Real Life Wellington Railway Station in late July. This was to have involved multiple screens mounted in the old ticket office with data projected live Second Life Station and videos on associated other screens. As previously mentioned, in April I had a meeting with Linda Savell of KiwiRail management to discuss permissions and possibilities to show my work over a two-day period during evening rush-hour crowds. After repeated unsuccessful efforts to make contact with the station staff, over the last month and now with no time left to make proper preparations for a professional event in the station, I have reluctantly decided to shelve this plan and concentrate instead on organizing an event or walkthrough with my examiner in the Second Life station. In view of the direction and emphasis on Second Life in my work I see this as not inappropriate. To have an examiner come in-life celebrates the current involvement world-wide with MUVE online worlds.

Representation v Illustration

2009-07-01T17:33:00.000-07:00

The title of this post brings into focus an issue which has been knocking at my door since I began to identify my principal directions for this project. 'What am I doing and how am I doing it?' never really goes away. Ever. I would like to think (taking into account the broad spectrum of subjective interpretation from any given audience - street or studio bound) that the work in which I am engaged is located within representational practices, rather than setting up my work to simply illustrate my concepts. Yet this is not a straightforward undertaking.

In the latest post 2.7.09 on 'empyre - Participatory Art' - rtf9@cornell.edu, Renate Ferro has this to say:

'Just yesterday I found myself in a heated debate with a group of humanities summer school students who had just read Balzac's "The Untitled Masterpiece." I was invited by their professor to spend an hour sharing my own work with them as well as other artist's work who had influenced me: digital, participatory, networked, affective, ephemeral. These students just could not fathom how this work could possibly be categorized as "art."

Their questions illuminated their tightly held notions about the nature of what art is. Those notions nurtured during their primary and secondary school educations. How is artwork that exists in Second Life valued in the art market? What beauty is recognized in work that does not exist materially? How can the skills of a video maker be compared with an artist who can render the figure realistically? How do art historians record work where there is no tangible evidence of the work?'

For those of us who are in the business of making art for a living or in arts education, these questions may seem a little naive, but I think they are challenging in their scope for encouraging responses which may be anything other than either, equally tight and limiting or so amorphous as to defy definition.

Ferro adds: 'Perhaps Simon Biggs is correct when he writes "I gave up calling what I do art a while ago. Generally I refer to what I do as creative practices (note plural). In interdisciplinary and collaborative
working contexts this allows you to divest yourself of a lot of baggage whilst ensuring that the most valuable aspects of the "practice formerly known as art" are retained."'

I applaud Biggs` definition here. I think it is an intelligent rendering of what has become of the post-modern (and even the post-post-modern) art-maker. I call myself an 'interdisciplinary dance artist', having spent a life-time in movement, but having an hons degree in fine arts, majoring in painting and nearly 30 years working with and lecturing in a broad range of art and design practices in both two, three and four dimensions tends to make me something of a hybrid entity. I am hardly alone - most people (but not all) I know involved in serious, creative endeavours are now similar in their take on who they are and what they do. Personally I see it as a liberating factor, but it does create questions with regard to the integrity and quality of what we create and where and how that is located within a wider social, cultural and historical context of reference. Much of what artists do (has it ever been otherwise?) now is written off by the 'great unwashed' public, who are all self-proclaimed specialists in everything. Yet it is imperative that we as artists are called to task and take responsibility for what we do, how we do it and what it might mean - not ultimately, perhaps, for the benefit of the public, but for ourselves.

But to return to representation v illustration. The problem with Balzac`s 'Unknown Masterpiece' is that it was rendered in a language of representation known only to the artist himself. Apparently a first foray into abstraction, the people who first came upon the work were ill-equipped to read the work, being thoroughly grounded themselves in art works that were centred on figurative, realistic modes of representation. The story goes that Picasso himself rented the house where the 'Unknown Masterpiece' is set and here produced 'Guernica', itself a masterpiece of alternative representation.

Representation does not require an orientation around realism. Let us look at some dictionary definitions, http://en wikipedia.org wiki/representation: 'Representation describes the signs that stand in for and take the place of something else ... it is through representation that people know and understand the world and reality ...' and 'Representation refers to the construction in any medium of ... aspects of 'reality' such as people, places, objects, events ...'

Illustration is: ' a picture that complements text' and 'something that helps to explain something' and 'a visualization that ... stresses subject more than form ...' I agree with the visualization, but not sure that I agree with the use of the terms, subject and form here. I would rather they were reversed - illustration for me is a depiction of form over subject/content/context, although these aspects are of course also covered.

In representation, we are looking at a system, an encoding through signs and signification, of surrogation. Something standing in for something else. Illustration is a depictional prosthetic of something, an extra artifice which is dependent for the realization of an image of that thing, upon the context of that thing but which still remains outside itself . In my own work, the signs, inscriptions and meaning divested in the 'after-life' of my original performing moments, through my video/sound work are stand-ins: representations of the original - surrogate, vicariously realized realities based on past moments. For me there exists a reciprocity. I am not trying to make pictures of my ideas. I am trying to make my ideas as pictures as my ideas. Rather than an objective summation of an aspect after the event, I am trying to render the event itself then, as a lived experience now. Removed, yet immersive.

In ADA`s 'Keynote Conversation , Critical Digital Matter', an international live discussion broadcast between Amsterdam, London and Wellington in Second Life, where I was invited to show my station build and video work last Saturday (27.6.09), the instigators of the event had this issue as one of their subjects under discussion: "Fuller and Ballard share a concern with digital matter, and the employment of things digital in concrete engagements with art. They will discuss the pervasiveness of digital matter, the engagement of art and the digital and address the problem of artists in new media art finding their time taken up with attempts to make their work interesting to contemporary art, creative industries, humanities, etc and forgetting to intensify the work that directly engages the crucial aspects of the field ..."

In-depth engagement. I pointed out to Eric Kluitenburg (Ze Moo), the Amsterdam connection for the event, that this was precisely what I was endeavouring to execute with my station build and the meanings/signification that are inherent in my concepts in SL. It is interesting to note that this subject of engagement with rigorous descriptions of what constitutes the representational rather than the simply illustrative is currently being discussed in other locations around the world.

Within the context of my recent dance and video works, all in the previous post, the 'Departed' series, I have purposely worked my way through stages of representation in relation to content and meaning. The first video work, 'Departed - In the Company of Strangers' was carried out in collaboration with the composer/musician Thomas Feiner. I have long been an admirer of his work and wanted to see if I could create an interaction between my video his piece, 'For Now' which was written, fittingly I thought, by Feiner while on a road-trip, around New Zealand. His sentiments while writing the lyrics, he said to me, were similar to my dance work on Leaving and he related closely to both, my concepts of paradoxical departure/arrival, distance/intimacy and the visual work that I had produced. I was indebted to Feiner for allowing me to manipulate and change/edit his piece and I think for what it is, it was successful. But what is it?

Undoubtedly, the psychoemotional environment for this work was significantly influenced by my time in the UK, in April, with my family and Mother when she passed away. The work was made four days after my return to New Zealand. The result of this was that the work was dominated, unashamedly I must say, by an emotive intensity which I realized in a very literal manner. The dance and camera work was very directional/linear, following a pathway as if we ourselves were commuters, through the station and out to the trains. All of this is acceptable, conceptually and compositionally. The aspect which separates the work from where I really want to take it now is its literal interpretation bolstered by the also literal song 'For Now'. The sound manifests as a 'soundtrack' which immediately brings the work into the territory of a music-video or short film of that genre. Feiner`s track is so iconic and rich that my own work is in danger perhaps of 'illustrating' his strongly lyrical song. However, I am content with making this work for what it represents for me and my family - I dedicated the work to my Mother; 'For Lou' and feel privileged that Feiner would consider collaborating with me. It is a powerful cornerstone for me and my relation to my Mother, who spent a lifetime travelling the world with we children in tow - always leaving and arriving and leaving. Mum, at the age of 93, read my abstract and conference paper and completely understood. Diaspora and a home away from home in the UK, through what was then Malaya and Sierra Leone in the 1950`s was a reality for her for a significant part of her life, with for many years afterwards her children spread between France, NZ and Australia.

It serves also, as a baseline resource for what is now following, which is a searching exploration into more ambiguous descriptions of representation, no less true to the work, but more investigative in its interpretation and use of sound. Following 'Departed - ICS' was 'Departed - Movement 1 - ICS, which was the product of a gradual move away from lyrics-dominated sound into an instrumental. This piece was composed specifically for the work by Mike Beever, a musician and composer from the UK, now living in Nelson, NZ. I had extensive talks with Mike about the kinds of sounds I wanted, which was a piece which I could lie under the station sounds which complemented and added another dimension to the work as an assemblage of feeling. I asked for a range of sound; abrasive, dischordant, staccato, with some lyrical aspects. Mike produced a piece which was not quite like this, but which was very beautiful and I decided to use it as a bridge between Feiner`s very moving but literal sounds and what I wanted to come next, which was a return to the work dominated by station sounds of the everyday.

Mike very kindly produced a range of short, diverse, more abstract sounds which I have incorporated subtly into the latest edit, below, 'Departed - Inscriptions in Time and Place Movement 2 - ICS. This edit is making some headway with combining both, the everyday and the additional sounds. I will live with it for a while, as I continue to develop and edit my ideas. There are three short additions of sound which surface above the station sounds and submerge again. The sounds themselves are still quite emotive - will keep moving toward the industrial/abstract here. The video shown here has a technical focus with Rollo taking us on a walkthrough of some of the station sounds - inscribed traces in the space.

Departed - Inscriptions in Time and Place; Movement 2 - In the Company of Strangers

2009-06-30T01:09:00.000-07:00

This study is again, in direct collaboration with the composer/musician, Mike Beever, based in Nelson, NZ Aotearoa. Mike composed the sounds specifically for this video footage, giving me a range of short bursts of sound. I requested this to provide me with choices and flexibility within my matching/editing of sound to movement/intention. I am indebted to Mike for his generosity in working with me and giving me license to manipulate and edit his sound work. In this piece I was seeking to engage with a sound base that is more ambiguous than in the earlier versions of 'Departed' and both the sounds and the title reflect my curiosity about our ability to leave inscriptions or traces not just upon obvious surfaces like table tops in the station cafe, but upon one another through the myriad of languages that we use; movement, touch, sightlines, intent, imagination - all within the timeframe itself, wherein we inhabit and displace space within a given place.

This video is based around an urban myth I am creating; that all our engagements, meetings and relations with people and places are subject to the forces of indeterminacy which set the scene for movement - movement away; departure - we are always leaving ... I wanted to introduce a sense of small but strong drama; a tableau of clenched feeling which we can sometimes witness in public places; a sense of passion, of despair, of pathos at our fate which is to be swept up in this constant movement away from those places and people which sustain our sense of belonging. The work is interventionist in that it creates a moment of uncertainty for the busy commuters at rush-hour; what is taking place here? A quarrel? A passionate withdrawal? A charged parting? The event of leaving within the chosen day inexorably taking over ...

ADA Keynote Conversation 27.6.09

2009-06-27T17:39:00.000-07:00

Last week (25.6.09) Clare Atkins was IM`d by Eric Kluitenberg aka Ze Moo in SL about my station build. Clare passed this on to me and after I made contact with Eric he enquired if I was interested in being involved in the ADA (Aotearoa Digital Arts) 2009 Critical Digital Matter event. A Keynote Conversation distributed through RL and SL, as a live broadcast between London, Amsterdam and Wellington with projections screened at 'debalie' in the centre of Amsterdam, a screen at Goldsmiths College in London and Victoria University in Wellington. Also one in the centre of the city. (Interesting to note here that Victoria University leases space at Wellington Railway Station, looking down upon the space in which I have been carrying out my dance work for the last two years).

Please see the ADA website for full information on this event:
http://www.debalie.nl/artikel.jsp?articleid=324196

The initiators of this event were Eric Kluitenberg (Amsterdam) , Su Ballard (Wellington) and Mathew Fuller (London) with additional guests.

After learning that the organizers wanted Koru to host this event, I accepted and referred Eric/Ze Moo to Clare Atkins, the manager of Koru. Eric had communicated his appreciation of my station to me and I suggested the possibilities of his running this event next to my build and bringing his cameras in to the station at the end of the discussion and this is what happened. Clare facilitated this in her usual pro-active, supportive manner and I am excited for Koru and NMIT that we were able to bring this event to a successful conclusion.

Biographical Information:

Matthew Fuller is David Gee Reader in Digital Media at the Centre for Cultural Studies, Goldsmiths College, University of London. He is the author of Media Ecologies: Materialist Energies in Art and Technoculture (MIT Press, 2005) and Behind the Blip: Essays on the Culture of Software (Autonomedia, 2003). He has worked closely with the artists collective Mongrel, and was a member of the speculative software group I/O/D from 1994-1997 and most recently initiated the 'Digger Barley' project shown at Futuresonic and Manifesta 7. Along with architect Usman Haque he is author of 'Concurrent Versioning City' a FLOSS-inspired quasi-licence for urban construction. He is particularly interested in the cultural effects of technology.

Su Ballard is Academic Leader, and Principal Lecturer in Electronic Arts in the School of Art. Her research centres around digital aesthetics, experimental sound and video, visual culture, and media ecologies. She completed her PhD through the the Centre for Contemporary Art and Politics, Universty of New South Wales, Sydney, Australia. Her PhD examined materialist tendancies in digital art installation by New Zealand and Australian artists working in international contexts. She recently edited The Aotearoa Digital Arts Reader, published by Clouds.

Eric Kluitenberg is an independent media theorist, writer and organiser on culture, media and technology. He is head of the media deprtment of De Balie, centre for culture and politics in Amsterdam. Recent publications of his include the Book of Imaginary Media (2006), Hybrid Space (2006), and Delusive Spaces (2008).

I would like to thank Eric Kluitenberg for his kind offer to be involved and show my station and videos of my work as part of this event.

PSI#15 Zagreb 24-28 June 2009

2009-06-27T16:56:00.000-07:00

This is a post of my paper presentation to the audiences in Zagreb at this year`s - the 15th Performance Studies International conference in Zagreb, Croatia. Once again, this was carried out in my SL station so I made a dual presentation to two audiences in both locations. I had 15 mins to present my paper with question time following some 45 mins later, after the last presentation had been made. During the interim, I had another question time from the Second Life audience in the station.

PSI#15 Zagreb, Croatia
Misperformance: Misfiring, Misfitting, Misreading

Abstract Title:
In the Company of Strangers - Negotiating the parameters of Departure in Urban Spaces; a study of Indeterminacy and the Roaming Body

Abstract:
This paper scrutinizes Indeterminacy as a mediating force impinging upon our behaviour and its subsequent impact on the nature and constituency of engagements and dialogue between people in urban spaces. Concepts centering on the dynamics of departure are being investigated through my research-practice, which posits the formation of a new Urban Myth: Experienced through the vehicle of the Roaming Body, our meetings and encounters with people frequently manifest as truncated or disjunct, mis-communiqués and dis-engagements. I am asserting that this is due to the inevitability in our existence of indeterminacy acting as a significant
governing factor in the articulation of our relations with others and that this is evidenced in us through the occurrence of a continual, pre-emptive state of departure. Indeterminacy implies motion and emerges, as Massumi so ably asserts, through ‘… an unfolding relation to its own nonpresent potential to vary …’. We, as humans, are constantly being drawn away – always either approaching or embracing involuntarily, a state of ‘Leaving’ which co-mingles with and unerringly erodes our efforts to engage with another in the here and now.

In my dance and video practice, which underpins the concepts in this paper, interventionist dance strategies are being used to prompt and interrogate the constituents of encounters and departures in designated public places.

Massumi, B. (2002). Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation Duke University Press, Durham & London, (p.5). Def: 'The Roaming Body' - the body as entity which can never be fully committed to a set position or location in space and time (Mike Baker Feb 09)

This paper examines and seeks to link two principal issues: Indeterminacy and Mis-engagements. My first task is to illuminate certain forces which give rise to the concept of the human body witnessed in the context of contemporary, urban environments, as a roaming entity. This particular description of the body which I would like to present defines as a reality for us as humans, an involuntary movement away from people and places with which we come into contact. We are always partially missing from 'this' moment in the everyday. Our Roaming/leaving body I maintain, is responsible for the existence of the second issue: Our predilection as humans for obfuscation, tangential connections and the involuntary pursuit of the next moment; mis-communication, mis-engagements, missing in short, from 'now' which in turn, makes our shared communications at best, problematic. Our roaming/leaving body initiates pre-emptive departure - an inexorable, unfolding momentum into the omnipresent future, now past.

Both, past and present descriptions of the body`s temporal identity have inevitably been swept by that uneasy beat of dark wings; I am suggesting that a climate of indeterminacy has always existed in the terrain which we, as humans have had to negotiate, evident in the ways in which our choices are made, in our actions which appear to prevail, in our relations with others, in the spaces we displace and in the times which we traverse. Through indeterminacy, despite possible desires to stay put, in life, the notion of our leaving is central to our existence.

Henri Bergson is perhaps most widely known for his treatises on the concepts of time and becoming. A process philosopher, he pursued the often intangible qualities binding content, concentrating on the unfolding process of the event itself. Significantly, for this paper, the state of ‘Becoming’, describes movement - an action rather than a static state. Bergson asserts that,‘ … the qualities of matter are so many stable views that we take of its instability’. He puts this very succinctly another way: '… rather than there being things which change', more accurately speaking, there is, '…change provisionally grasped as a thing'.

This realignment of perspective may allow us to witness indeterminacy in-the-making, made visible in mis-matched meetings between people on the street, governed in their actions by the phenomenon of leaving. Indeterminacy occurring through premature departure ensures that we are often led away by our Roaming/Becoming body before all of our attention is ready to leave ...

A definition of the term, 'Indeterminacy':
The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle which is founded in quantum mechanics, asserts that both the position and momentum of a given particle cannot be determined simultaneously.'The more precisely the position is determined, the less precisely the momentum is known in this instant and vice versa'. (Heisenberg,1927)

Video 1 - the Roaming Body - ICS

In other words it could be said that one is unable to record scientifically, evidence of a given body that is both static and moving at the same time. If one cannot measure something, does this make the non-finding absolute? Given that we register the activity, is it possible perhaps to measure empirically, through the senses, this activity in one body taking place in two situations at once? Despite the scientific, physical non-finding, does this mean that one`s 'attention' cannot be in two places at once? Or one`s desires, intent, perception? I suspect that this is not the case. I am suggesting that through acknowledging and assuming in ourselves a state of 'the being-in-change' or our Roaming Body, it is possible to transfer ones presence in the form of intent, from 'here' to 'there' simultaneously and that there is physical, visible evidence for this in scenarios involving mis-engagements between people on the street.

To illustrate dual presence, mis-engagement and pre-emptive departure through an indeterminate intent; in the first video clip shown here, the couple in the spotlight conduct an animated conversation in the street. In the last minute prior to their separating, although the woman eventually says goodbye, physically walks away and leaves the engagement, the man appears to have already departed from the conversation. He shuffles, he checks his cell phone, he hides behind his hands, he waves his arms uncertainly and looks around. He checks his watch. Eye contact decreases. No longer is he fully present. When she does finally leave, his reaction is marginally interested – because his roaming self has already left. His ‘Leaving’ has crept into and hijacked the meeting, while ostensibly, they were still engaged. Indeterminacy and resulting slippage is embedded here. Can this constitute evidence of a simultaneity of presence? Here, yet not here? Both people left. Movement away occurred in both parties, even though ironically, the person who left first, stayed behind. Is this occurrence actual or merely a point of perception? (Is a point of perception no less actual?)

Let us examine human communication as an adhesive which only partially binds us to the moment in this continuity of change. Not only does speech aid our functioning in social situations and locates us in time and given space, but more candidly, the ability to converse and to be heard ignites, expands and affirms the map of the human heart, consolidating engagement.

‘Rudimentary engagements, communication at its most basic, the prototype of all human interaction …’ such are the descriptors for the term, ‘Protoconversation’ in Daniel Goleman`s, Social Intelligence, The New Science of Human Relationships. Protoconversations have a certain elasticity in meaning and application. Not only does it refer to the very earliest development of our powers of communication as infants (mostly non-verbal), but in adulthood, protoconversations remain as our most fundamental template for mapping, matching or missing in meetings with others.

The template is tacit, a subtle awareness through feeling and the senses which allows us when we meet to quietly proceed, in step, with a stranger or acquaintance, friend or family member. Protoconversation is a silent dialogue – Goleman uses the term, ‘substrate’ upon which all encounters or engagements are built. Goleman assures us that it is, ‘… the hidden agenda in every interaction’. A silent go-between if you will, which underpins and as a mode of communicating, often outlasts the manifestation of speech. One could extend this to say that protoconversation is a silent, neurokinetic conversation supported by mutual empathy - assisting a curiosity about the path ahead. Theoretically, this is a human given - a strategic baseline which ensures that once we do engage with another, we can communicate.

In Tricks of the Mind, Derren Brown writes, ‘ Most people when they are getting on well, will be in a state of unconscious ‘rapport’. They will tend to mirror each other`s body language and so on without realizing it …’ At the same time, ‘… there is the odd sensation we have all experienced (though we never think to mention it) of knowing when the other person is about to get up and leave. Suddenly there is something in the air, a moment or a shift and then you know the other person is about to say they should ‘make a move’. And if they don`t you have that feeling that they are outstaying their welcome’. Brown maintains that studies carried out on rapport have shown an array of mirrored behaviours where conversants tend to breathe at the same rate, adopt similar facial expressions, blink at the same rate and use one another`s language. I would describe these responses as somatically based. A hidden dialogue beneath speech and vision through which we are more overtly governed. The hidden message which is about when and how to leave an engagement is articulated through speech-prompts but also through body language, an underlying empathetic cue to move on and here is the rub - with this decision coming from a place ‘of ‘ and in the body – a place though, from which in a manner of speaking, we have already departed. Indeterminacy surfacing through departure and perceived through the lens of our Roaming body, ensures that the sophistication of these systemic communication modes ultimately achieves only temporary purchase in the moment. But there are reasons to be hopeful I hear you say?

Here we have at our fingertips, so to speak, a very specific skillset which is available to us on a subliminal level during our interaction with another; a transponder of sorts, fashioned to assist us in the process of counteracting our tendency toward our disfunctional, mis-matched connections, lost-in-translation through our predisposition for departure. Yet it seems that we cannot control this movement away. Brian Massumi states that a body in motion is held within an ever-changing process of movement relative to its own already non-static position in space. Massumi, (in a vein which is similar to Bergson`s sense of 'becoming') maintains that the only 'real' relation is that of a body to its own indeterminacy, (... its openness to an elsewhere and otherwise that it is, in any here and now.') Somehow, either sooner or later, (or, in the light of what we have just seen - sooner and later), without always recognizing it our Roaming body ensures that we are always leaving. Allowing for the variables within which we carry out our departure, the only non-variable is that we will actually depart.

Video 2 - Departed - Movement 1 - ICS

The video playing here is an expression of both matching and missing - an intimate, small-conversation between dancers who, as cinematic simulacra dislocated from their original performing context/moment, possess avatar properties. I wanted to introduce a sense of small but strong drama - a tableau of clenched feeling which we can easily recognise and sometimes witness in public places; a sense of passion, of despair, of pathos at our fate which is to be swept up in this constant movement away from those places and people which sustain our sense of belonging. Our conversation through movement is compressed by time - impending departure often narrows our sensibilities and where we had hours to talk, to smile, to share empathy, thoughts, hopes and aspirations, suddenly there is no time and our dialogue becomes erratic, our thoughts unspoken, the spoken word itself, stymied. Is this why touch is so eloquent in moments of parting when no words can be found? Private, personal dialogue which largely remains invisible in public spaces becomes larger than life for us - illuminated with undisguised feeling. A tableau between two people made public, a virtual, half-witnessed-half-remembered-later moment, representative of the myriad of disjunct dialogues and discreet micro-dramas within scenes of departure which may occur in these kinds of public spaces.

In this Urban Myth I am creating, the interconnections which exist between indeterminacy manifesting through lived departures, ensures that there is no surcease for the Roaming body in this obdurate, dislocated continuity of the Real we call life. The Roaming body ensures that no secure position may be attained and held indefinitely. In this context we may find that we are interconnected through our mutual estrangements and that our engagements, conversations and connections will always be at hazard.

I suspect from my observations that ultimately, as indeterminants, we are always ‘Leaving’ and that this is a true descriptor of our condition in that business of being a becoming human. There is real pathos to be found in a lifetime of leaving engagements and this state will keep us forever defined as being incommunicado because we have already left, missing from our own present tense in the everyday.

2236

References:
Allen, J. (2000). Negotiating difference or being with strangers. Thinking Space Crang and Thrift (eds). Routledge, Taylor and Francics Group, New York, (p:57)

Bergson, H. (2005). Visualizing Experience. Henri Bergson on memory in Middleton, D and Brown, S. D. 2005, (p. 61)
Brown, D. (2007). Tricks of the Mind. Channel 4 Books, (p.186).

Goleman, D. (2007) Social Intelligence, Recipe for Rapport, Bantam Dell, (p.30)

Massumi, B. (2002). Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation Duke University Press, Durham & London, (p.5).

Middleton D and Brown S. (2005) (The Social Psychology of Experience: Studies in Remembering and Forgetting, (p.62).

Retrieved from: Quantum Mechanics 1925-1927 THE UNCERTAINTY PRINCIPLE http://www.aip.org/history/heisenberg/p08.htm

Mike Baker Nelson, NZ Aotearoa 26.6.09

Critique:

This conference was the first that I applied for last year, so I had, theoretically, a surfeit of time to prepare. This did not quite eventuate due to the other conferences that I needed to prepare for which preceded this one, but I was still able to prepare in good time. I had a number of meetings with my technician in Zagreb, who like Emily at Stanford, came in to the SL station so that we could discuss issues and develop strategies for the presentation. This all went well until the last week, when I could not get in touch with Lovro at all - until 20 mins before my presentation was due to begin. So a list of points that I had emailed to him did not get resolved, eg: confirming his camera angles for the Zagreb audience, organizing a camera to record my presentation in the space there, last minute communication aspects ... when we did meet, he informed me that his headset had broken so he could hear me but I could not hear him. So he typed his replies back to me and we ran the presentation like that. This was acceptable, but slow and some things were missed. So this phase of this conference for me was very stressful and unhelpful.

The conference format had organized that question times only occurred after all the presentations (4) had been made, which I found very unsatisfactory. It meant that this time was not sufficiently focussed upon one presentation at a time, so the feedback quality was questionable. One plus to this format was that I had questions from the Second Life audience while we were waiting and this was very constructive. It also meant that I could show 7 of my videos to the waiting crowd, although unfortunately, the Zagreb audience did not see these.

The questions from the SL audience dealt with death, leaving, dual presence, the autobiographical nature of my project, arrival v departure.

My presentation was delivered without any problems and I finished inside 14 mins, while changing the videos playing. When it came time for questions from the Zagreb audience apart from queries about the nature of leaving there were not others and I was asked to continue with my concepts, so I read one of my coverages of protoconversation/mis-engagement as applied to Contact Improvisation Dance practice - the experience of dueting and this was well accepted.

SDHS2009 at Stanford University, California, USA

2009-06-21T02:35:00.000-07:00

The 2009 conference of SDHS (Society of Dance History Scholars) Topographies, Site, Bodies, Technologies was held at Stanford University, California, USA this year.

I presented two papers: The first was an individual paper presentation delivered from my Second Life Wellington Railway Station - In the Company of Strangers - Negotiating the parameters of Indeterminacy; a study of the Roaming Body and Departure in Urban Spaces.

The second paper was entitled: The Human Analogue in Mixed-Reality. This paper was delivered at a Weltec location on the island of Koru - the sphere.

I include both papers here , just as I delivered them, together with a post-presentation critique.

Lecture podium in Wellington Railway Station with SDHS 2009 conference logo and abstract

Paper 1: Individual Paper Presentation

Video1 : Departed - Movement 1 - In the Company of Strangers

Welcome to the SDHS audience at Stanford University in California and welcome to the audience at this Second Life Wellington Railway Station. Thank you all for coming to this presentation. The full abstract for my Masters project is available on my website and from the bilboards here, at the station.

The title of this Paper Abstract is: In the Company of Strangers - Negotiating the parameters of Indeterminacy; a study of the Roaming Body and Departure in Urban Spaces

Abstract:
This paper scrutinizes Indeterminacy as a mediating force impinging upon our behaviour and its subsequent impact on the nature and constituency of engagements and dialogue between people in selected urban spaces. Concepts centering on the dynamics of departure, temporality and embodiment are being investigated in both Real Life and the Multi User Virtual Environment, Second Life.

In my research/practice, which underpins the concepts in this paper, interventionist dance strategies are being used to prompt and interrogate the constituents of encounters and departures in designated public places. Experimental movement frameworks employed are informed by the discipline of Contact Improvisation Dance and Authentic Movement. The working process is being documented using a range of video narrative.

Massumi, B. (2002). Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation Duke University Press, Durham & London, (p.5).
Def: 'The Roaming Body' - the body as entity which can never be fully committed to a set position or location in space and time (Mike Baker Feb 09)

Rollo presenting at SDHS 2009 c/o Johnnie Wendt
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Embodying Surfaces 1

Certain forces are examined here, which give rise to a description of the human body witnessed in the context of contemporary, urban environments, as a roaming entity. This particular description of the body defines as a reality for us as humans a compelling, involuntary movement away from people and places with which we come into contact. Our roaming I maintain, is responsible in our behaviours for pre-emptive departure and the involuntary pursuit of the next moment - an inexorable, unfolding momentum into the omnipresent future, now past. I am reminded of a sign on the wall of a dance studio in Melbourne, Australia in 2008 during a Contact Improvisation Dance performance of, 'Excavate: A two-man dig' by David Corbet and Jacob Lehrer which stated enigmatically, 'The missing are here, the gone and the taken are with us’. Within the context of my work this becomes reversible and suggests the presence of the aforementioned pre-emptive state of departure; 'Those still here have left, the present and the given have departed and are no longer with us'. This notion is supported in Brian Massumi`s exploration of the ‘‘indeterminacy’ of the body – the realities facing the body which are incomplete without the recognition of another, constantly simultaneously-generated virtual description of ‘now’.’ Massumi posits that ‘this body’ is here, but also, ‘this presence and essentially when in motion, they are no longer with us, here, but ‘over there’, now ...'

As vitally as food, a life feeds upon such insubstantial yet potent ephemera as habits, memories and tropisms - movement in response to a stimulus. Could it be that an unconscious skillset of which we are largely unaware, exercised through the event of departure is one of those stimuli? Our leaving. Perhaps today, as never before, is this unconscious predilection to locate ourselves in the onward surge of movement away from that previous moment, so relevant to our search for both, our collective and individual sense of belonging ... as if we had a choice and were not swept on, regardless ...

Our sense of identity is founded in our ability to belong, to adhere to those places and people in our world which bring a sense of worth into our lives - social interactions; the indicators of our allegiance to particular communities or groups through shared beliefs, values or practices. Yet ultimately, we reside within and our personal cartographies are traversed and reconciled alone. Perhaps never before has the issue of belonging been so under siege in relation to that perception of our Self as a lost locus, a place from which once having made forays in the wider pursuit of a sense-of-place, among people and spaces of meaning with our autonomy intact, we sometimes cannot find our way back.

Embodying Surfaces 2

Despite the frequent dislocation of our time in spaces, has the apparently successful pursuit of our personal freedoms; our ability to navigate inter-personal terrain with fluency and authority, our sense of autonomy in selfhood, robbed us of that cherished sense of belonging to ourSelf and is there still a more subtle, insidious force acting upon us? A climate of indeterminacy - that uneasy beat of dark wings, has always dominated the terrain which we, as humans have had to negotiate, evident in the ways in which our choices are made, in our actions which appear to prevail, in our relations with others, in the spaces we displace and in the times which we traverse. Despite possible desires to stay put, in life the notion of our leaving is central to our existence.

In my research practice I am positing a new Urban Myth. My contention is that all our exchanges, whether they be either apparently resolved engagements, casual encounters or by-passed conversations with people and places, are governed by the agency of departure, evident in these exchanges through the presence of indeterminacy. That is departure experienced by all. Leaving as a phenomenon. The act of leaving as it unfolds together with arrival, is an indeterminant, yet these are uneasy twins in one another`s company and in their location of binary status, both departure and arrival can be defined as events which are central to that process we call change. For us, as time-based creatures, movement away ensures that there are constantly present, small, overlooked dramas with their attendant poignancies expressed within the simplest, most mundane, everyday dynamics between people and places. One could say that the surface or ‘stage’ for my work that you see here, together with the two descriptions of Wellington Railway Station at rush-hour, is also the moving body itself; my own and that of my partner - the body as a roaming transformative surface or screen - the human as Analogue. This body identity travels and transits in place and time from one description of the Real to another. 'Place' can be defined here, as simply a point of temporary purchase within change. When I teach CI Dance I interpret or voice this state as 'looking for ledges' - places of momentary pause, stillness or balance - a traveller in temporary residence locating on or against his or her partner for a heartbeat or two.

Embodying Surfaces 3

In my movement enquiry, I am concerned with the investigation of what I will call the spaces 'between recognized content’ in our lived experience. I am interested how indeterminacy via the Roaming/Leaving Body may influence or to a significant extent, mediate the nature of exchanges between people in urban contexts.

The video playing here is an expression of an intimate, small-conversation between enabled surfaces or screens - both, Real Life dancers bodies and avatars (indeed, as simulacra I believe that they both possess avatar virtuality) perceived as surfaces upon which the human analogue can write and overwrite layers of feeling, present intent and dialogue now past. I wanted to introduce a sense of small but strong drama - a tableau of clenched feeling which we can sometimes witness in public places; a sense of passion, of despair, of pathos at our fate which is to be swept up in this constant movement away from those places and people which sustain our sense of belonging. Our conversation through movement is compressed by time - impending departure often narrows our sensibilities and where we had hours to talk, to smile, to share empathy, thoughts, hopes and aspirations, suddenly there is no time. Private, personal dialogue which largely remains invisible in public spaces becomes larger than life for us - illuminated with undisguised feeling.

The work is mildly interventionist in terms of how it is inserted in the flow of commuters and how this catalyses a response – creating for the people walking past, a private tableau between two people made public, a virtual, half-witnessed-half-remembered-later moment, representative of the myriad of disjunct dialogues and discreet micro-dramas within scenes of departure which may occur in these kinds of public spaces. I am interested in suggesting to the perceptions of those people who notice us, through traces of naturally-occurring incongruity in our behaviour, the opportunity for our bodies and activity to be moving surfaces, redolent with questions, with meaning which may be just out of reach. Equally, the crowd is a moving screen upon which through my movement, I may make marks and leave traces - subtly intervene in the flood of crowd-intent with questions which for them, may outlive the journey home, to be recalled over the evening meal, or perhaps next year in a reflective moment. I am pursuing some participation on the part of the viewer without necessarily, any overt interaction. A witnessing. As witnessed and witnesser we both of us leave traces of our presence which are inscribed on the surfaces of the present at this point in this place.

Video 2: Embodying Surfaces - the Human Analogue - ICS

When we take these traces into Second Life our human analogue takes this corporeal activity and transforms the performative present into cyber configurations of now-past avatar embodiment, across real-digital interfaces. In 'Networked Performance' on Turbulence.org, Ashley Ferro-Murray comments on Erin Manning`s assertion that: '... where technology is less a tool than an active assemblage of potential techniques that feed from and move with a becoming-body.”

This is an accurate description of how I perceive, both, my Real station video work and my avatar and station build in Second Life, not so much as tools for my ideas, but an assemblage of past feeling and perception informed by my present desires and intentions. This Second Life station, this Facet of the Real becomes an apt, living record of the past traversed by our Roaming Bodies from which we may depart through the present in that pursuit of the next, future moment. Through this video-work - these multiple surfaces - runs another strand of our analogue propensity for transformative embodiment. Here, my Second Life avatar is in discussion with another, Sonja Scorbal. Together as manifestations of the Roaming Body, we comprise the projection of our surrogate selves - a vicarious embodiment which moves in space and time paradoxically with my past videoed dancing body. Our conversation is intentionally one-sided with Sonja`s comments and queries truncated by my silence and the onrush of the next moment. Even her farewell is cut short.

Embodying Surfaces 4

Mark Hansen, in Bodies in Code, (2006) sees the embodiment of function manifesting through the human body, acting as a kind of seismographic wand - Hansen, (2006:p5-6). He maintains that: ‘… all reality is mixed reality’, Hansen quotes Brian Massumi who maintains the existence of the analogue manifests as a transformative entity: Always on arrival a transformative feeling of the outside, a feeling of thought sensation is the being of the analog(sic). This is the analog(sic) in a sense close to the technical meaning, as a continuously variable impulse or momentum that can cross from one qualitatively different medium into another. Like electricity into sound waves. Or heat into pain, Or light waves into vision. Or vision into imagination. Or noise in the ear into music in the heart. Or outside coming in. Variable continuity across the qualitatively different: continuity of transformation. (Massumi, Parables for the Virtual ... 2002:p.135)

We, as humans, are all movement practitioners and as such through our internal analogue we possess the innate capacity to map and transform continuously, the many real and virtual realities of which our existence is comprised. Hansen maintains that the reason why so many of us now operate in so-called virtual, metaverse worlds with apparent ease, is because we have always done so - we encounter without comment, a myriad of moments which we could describe as virtual every day in our 'real life' existence. The shift for us as 'analogue' where the process within us as humans which brings metaverse technologies like Second Life together with our natural perceptions, supports a function which expands the scope of our natural perception and integrates real-world and virtual realities to arrive at a more homogeonous blended-reality. I am working in Second Life because my Roaming Body has taken me there and under the auspices of my analogue potential, I can perhaps more easily explore the interplay within Real Life where Second Life becomes a facet of the Real. Here I can converse, witness and belong as analogue, while making critical commentary upon yet another field of departure.

SL station audience with Rollo Presenting at SDHS 2009 c/o Johnnie Wendt

To use Massumi`s phrase, the body`s 'potential to vary' suggests an alignment which juxtaposes, yet does not necessarily subordinate the Realbody to the Cyberbody, while analogue capabilites are present in both. Massumi suggests that the body in movement means accepting the body in its occupation of space and time as a paradox: that there is an incorporeal dimension of the body itself. Of it, but not it. Indeterminate, coincident, but real and material. Something apart yet intrinsic and inseparable. Massumi calls this echo a, ‘Fellow-travelling dimension of the same reality’. I call this echo the Roaming Body. Zimmerman tells us that, 'Humans are not entities, but the clearings in which entities appear'. Here lies affirmation of analogue potential in the Roaming Body. Yet perhaps analogue and Roaming Body are one and the same? In this time-based context, it could be said that the body is present but within its indeterminacy, the time-based embodiment of ‘body’ has already moved on. In qualifying his argument, Massumi paraphrases Deleuze in saying that the problem with dominant modes of cultural and literary theory is not that they are too abstract to grasp the solidity or corporeal fabric of the real. The problem is that these modes are not abstract enough to grasp the real incorporeality of what we take to be real. Through lived states of indeterminacy and leaving, analogue potential through transformative embodiment in the Roaming Body perceptual register, re-inforces our description of the virtual incorporeality of the real that surrounds us everyday.

Finish here 2179 words

Mike Baker 21.6.09

Critique:

I have for the last two months been in contact with Emily Roehl, the technician designated to liaise with me during the Stanford conference. Emily was immensely helpful and despite the fact that she had never been in SL before, she very quickly became acclimatised and put a significant amount of time into developing those skills necessary to facilitate a smooth running of Second Life projection at the conference. I am indebted to her. We had a number of meetings at which I introduced her to the basic methods of communication, movement and camera controls in-life. We also discussed a broad range of my needs which were required to be met at the conference. I think the frequency and nature of our connection in life was just right and very positive in its outcome.

In preparation for the presentation in the station, I updated my abstract in the station and created four notecard dispensers from which could be taken information about my presentation for any visitors to the station/guests to the presentation. Clare Atkins (SLENZ) provided some scripted bench seats for the audience very kindly and I also attempted to prep a 'button' shortcut next to the lecture podium which controlled my videos. This eventually proved to be too unreliable and on the day I went back to bringing in the videos from YouTube in the usual manner. Grateful thanks to Todd Cochrane and Aaron Griffiths of SLENZ for their assistance with the abstract bilboards and the notecard dispensers. Also to John Waugh (SLENZ) for his write- up of my part in this event on the SLENZ blog.

I had 15 minutes to read my paper followed by 20 minutes of question time. My presentation began well with visuals and sound functioning clearly, but unfortunately after 10 minutes, Second Life crashed without warning. This was a general crash which brought down 30,000 users for about an hour. This is the first time this has happened for some months which was most unfortunate and very frustrating. I immediately went to Plan B which was to use Skype to finish my presentation. I managed to complete this without further trouble and responded to some interesting questions concerning sudden, unforeseen departures, longing and memory! After my initial disappointment, I adopted a philosophical stance and saw the appropriateness of this occurring - pre-emptive departure is, after all, one of the aspects that I am investigating. Both, the SL and Stanford audiences were very supportive and fortunately everyone had seen the videos at least once before the system crash.

I subsequently found out that because the previous presenters had taken longer than their 15 minutes, I had only ten minutes with less question time. I found this a highly questionable practice where the facilitators responsible should have been more vigilant. However, this is all very real practice and experience for me and not uncommon at conference events and I feel grateful that I actually had good audiences in both venues. Often at these large conference events only a few people show up due to the broad range of presentations going on at once.

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Paper 2:

Topographies Sites, Bodies, and Technologies - SDHS Conference June 19-22, 2009 Stanford University, San Francisco, California

1) Envisioning virtual cartographies for corporeal interaction: dance and performance convergent applications of Second Life 3D Metaverse social environment. (Isabel Valverde, Mike Baker)

2) Real Dance and Dancing in metaverse : from the activity by INETDANCE Japan

3) The Human Analogue in Mixed-Reality by Mike Baker

Image from Roundtable Discussion Panel introducing Mike - live broadcast from Stanford University, California, USA. Image c/o Yukihiko Yoshinada

I would like to discuss possibilities for investigation into transformative embodiment through human analogue potential.

At the end of my presentation, I would like to hear any questions, feelings and observations from the floor on the following: What do people understand about analogue capabilities and the existence of enabled or embodied surfaces or 'living screens' which become the receptacles for present and past inscriptions? How might these reflect/transpose human desires or interpretative potential in the generation of dance work? Also please ask any questions or pursue trains of thought that you might have.

Video 1 - Embodying surfaces - the Human Analogue - In the Company of Strangers

The theorist Jacques Ranciere describes 'surface' as a paratactical space - a site of exchange, where language, images and actions collide and transform one another - a place of slippage between spaces. Stephane Mallarmé has defined dance as a form of writing on the surface of the floor with the intent to transpose this mark-making to the written page - transformative embodiment across surfaces. Post-modern thinking has sought to erode the paradigm in the modernist separation of surface worlds by challenging the sturdiness of the boundaries between these surfaces. In my current Masters in dance and video project, 'In the Company of Strangers', one of the strands of my work has been to explore that the concept of spaces and their content be perceived as surfaces, which possess the potential to be enabled, inscribed or embodied.

I have been investigating this concept in Real Life through structured improvisation movement modes in commuter rush-hour crowds, in Wellington Railway Station in New Zealand, Aotearoa. I have also constructed a simulacrum of this station on the NZ eduisland of Koru in the Multi User Virtual Environment of Second Life and I am bringing the videos of my Real Life dance into this Second Life railway station - at one level of perception an enabled, embodied surface meeting another, equally enabled, embodied surface. When I began this project, I began to investigate the basic premise that the 'real' is influenced by the virtual, all the time and everywhere - in Real Life; that we experience moments which could be described as 'virtual' every day which, through our human analogue properties, we either remain oblivious to, ignore, or assimilate and transform, rendering those virtual moments as real. Within this context, Second Life as a fully-immersive environment manifests as an extended 'virtual' event in which we may reside for a longer period of time; an extended layer of the Real. This means that Second Life itself, like so many aspects of Real Life, becomes another screen - not only literally, but a surface construct which may be encountered, left and re-encountered, manipulated and inscribed, ignored or selectively dismissed by our analogue facility in the pursuit of transformative embodiment.

Mark Hansen, in Bodies in Code, (2006) sees the embodiment of function manifesting through the human body, acting as a kind of seismographic wand - Hansen, (p5-6). He maintains that: ‘… all reality is mixed reality’, Hansen talks about the existence of the analogue as a transformative entity: Always on arrival a transformative feeling of the outside, a feeling of thought sensation is the being of the analog(sic). This is the analog(sic) in a sense close to the technical meaning, as a continuously variable impulse or momentum that can cross from one qualitatively different medium into another. Like electricity into sound waves. Or heat into pain, Or light waves into vision. Or vision into imagination. Or noise in the ear into music in the heart. Or outside coming in. Variable continuity across the qualitatively different: continuity of transformation. (p.135)

We are all movement practitioners subject to time and as such, through our internal analogue we possess the innate capacity to perceive, transform and combine continuously, the many real and virtual realities of which our existence is comprised. Hansen maintains that the reason why so many of us now operate in so-called virtual worlds with apparent ease, is because we have always done so. Davin Heckman in empyre - undocumented worker, turbulence.org, has this to say of issues relating to capturing the present:
I think of the question of "presence." Whenever we enter into the problem of representing a particular event, we take the "present" and repackage for a different or deferred experience ... It's like taking a drug to have the experience of dreaming while awake, of looking at a snapshot to have the experience of being with someone who is absent, etc. ...

For me, Heckman is voicing here the very transformation process to which I am referring - the analogue transformation of snapshot into remembered experience ... it is the analogue`s role to bridge that gap of difference between present and past, event and representation.

Image from Roundtable Discussion panel - c/o Yukihiko Yoshinada

My intention through my analogue being-in-change (Henri Bergson) where resides an embodied 'becoming' between worlds, is to explore how this dual identity - this 'difference' may evolve into a single, blended reality. To use Brian Massumi`s phrase, the body`s 'potential to vary' suggests an alignment which juxtaposes, yet does not necessarily subordinate the Cyberbody to the Realbody while analogue capabilites are present in both. When we take these video traces into Second Life, our Human Analogue assimilates this corporeal activity and transforms it into cyber configurations of avatar embodiment, across real-digital interfaces.

With the aid of my avatar, Rollo Kohime, I have constructed screens which have evolved into a simulacra of commuter crowds flowing through the Second Life station. A crowd-screen or surface with its subjective associations. One could say that the surface or ‘stage’ for my work, rather than two descriptions of Wellington Railway Station at rush-hour, is equally accurately, the moving body itself - the body as a roaming transformative screen - the human as Analogue. This body identity travels and transits in place and time from one description of the Real to another. In my dance enquiry, I am concerned with the investigation of what I will call the spaces 'between recognized content’ in our lived experience. Within the video playing here is an expression of an intimate, small-conversation between the Real Life dancers, Mike and Fiona, these same dancers (due to their videoed separation from their original present-tense performative context) perceived as temporally-based Real Life avatars and then the Second Life avatars, Rollo and Sonja - these personna in their different descriptions perceived as surfaces, upon which can be written and overwritten layers of feeling, present and future intent, dialogue, past traces or residue. Equally, the Real Life crowd is a moving screen upon which through my movement, I may make marks - subtly intervene in the rushing flood of crowd-intent with unsettling movement and interaction, with questions which for them, may outlive the journey home, to be recalled over the evening meal, or perhaps next year in a reflective moment.

Embodying Surfaces 5

In 'Maintaining the Digital Embodiment Link to Performance', Andrew Bucksbarg suggests a positive extension, rich with possibilites inherent in metaverse environments like Second Life; 'Are networked simulated worlds much more similar to our dreams and imaginings than to the clunking improbability of a physical world? Unlike traditional media forms, do video games, simulations and other newer media perform the opposite of the suspension of disbelief? Do they encourage an extension of the imaginable? If the utopic promise of humanity is creative imagination, then it makes sense that methodologies for communication and content creation, which form a blank screen onto which this imagination can occur, are the ideal medium- the metaverse or meta design system.'

Potentially, then, imagination itself becomes a screen and if we recognize a process of surface activation and embodiment through the medium or surface of imagination in Real Life, we have a meld of what once were descriptions of Real and Virtual screens existing in this Blended Reality that we inhabit, everyday. For Susanne Langer, a dancer`s body must transcend the energetic, physical body while performing - the performing body must project the illusion of 'virtual force' to fully constitute a work of art. For me this force is not virtual and it is not an illusion. I am seeking in my own work, to bring together various embodied aspects of the Real which may ultimately constitute a composite description of this force.

10mins reading time (1378 words)

Mike Baker 21.6.09

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Critique:

I had been invited to present at this Roundtable discussion group by Isabel Valverde last year. I am grateful to Isabel to have had this opportunity but in hindsight, preparing and presenting two papers for one event is extremely challenging, particularly when one of the presentations is collaborative with people who are not in the same country/time-zone. We all suffered from poor communication, confusion in trying to arrive at consistent meeting times and then once meeting, to be able to achieve our aims when none of us had the technical skills necessary to coordinate a menu of videos, images and powerpoint presentations without outside assistance. This was most marked for me at this event, where in my individual presentation, I was able to do almost everything myself and therefore to plan my time accordingly, making my aims achievable. But this is to be expected in collaborative works. It takes enormous energy, time and patience just communicating sometimes. This was good experience for me, though - I have done a lot of collaborative work over the years but not with other artists who are so far away. This development goes with the digital territory that we are occupying, with the attendant problems and frustrations. My main issue was that the two presentations were quite different so I had to prepare two separate abstracts/objectives. I do have sufficient breadth in my body of work to be able to carry this out but it has been demanding wearing different conceptual hats - and becoming excited about both directions.

As technical assistant for the event I was able to secure Emily who so efficiently facilitated for me in my individual presentation earlier in the day. In the days immediately preceding the presentation there had been problems bringing in the videos to the screen using a sensitized texture on a 'button', rather than streaming Mp4s from YouTube into the actual land location (which is what I have been doing all along). On the day this proved to be a major issue. I had arrived early to get my video playing because I was first up and this was running well. This had to stop to bring in a live broadcast from Stanford and when it came time to play again, it would not play in our Second Life location, so Emily played it straight from YouTube to the Stanford audience. I presented my paper without problems, with good sound clarity. Unfortunately, when it came to Yukihiko`s and Isabel`s presentations I had very poor network capabilities and failed to hear their delivery clearly. I filmed sections of both of these presentations using SnapzPro on my Mac and I will be sending copies to Isabel and Yukihiko. These examples are actually interesting for their mis-communication, their disfunctional activity, representing the other side of Second Life; the digital anomaly, the truncated signal, the unrezzed narrative.

To sum up, There was some good content and solid commitment to making these presentations work, despite the difficulties. We all presented on the day and we were all heard by the respective audiences. The work was affected to different degrees by the unpredictability of the technologies that we were using and there was failure in our primary, followed by success in our secondary technology strategies for back-up.

Once again, I am indebted to Isabel Valverde, Yukihiko Yoshida, Todd Cochrane, Emily Roehl for their roles in this endeavour. I will be trying to learn from this event to make sure as far as possible, that my next conference presentation on Friday 26th June at PSI#15 at Zagreb, Croatia, will be as smooth as possible.

Embodying Surfaces - A Facet of the Real 3

2009-06-14T04:51:00.000-07:00

file:///Users/mike/Desktop/http-::movetheframe.wordpress.com:2009:04:07:notes-from-the-march-25th-artist-salon-dance-for-web-an-emerging-genre:.webloc

Embodying Surfaces - the Human Analogue in the Company of Strangers

2009-06-12T20:00:00.000-07:00

Departed - Movement 1

2009-06-09T19:45:00.000-07:00

This video is the latest study in my AUT (NZ) Masters in dance and video. Departed - Movement 1 - differs from my first version of Departed - In the Company of Strangers. This study is in direct collaboration with the composer/musician, Mike Beever, based in Nelson, NZ Aotearoa. Mike composed this sound, 'Movement 1' specifically for this video footage. I have explored and edited his sound for this piece and I will be continuing this development process with Mike in subsequent edits. I am indebted to Mike for this opportunity to work with him. Here, I was seeking to engage with a sound base that is a little more ambivalent than the first version of Departed. There is a movement into layers of feeling which perhaps are less literal, if no less arresting. I will be continuing to develop my concepts in this direction, particularly with a view to exploring the existence of surfaces or screens which may be embodied, activated or inscribed.

Departed ... after the event - In the Company of Strangers

2009-05-31T20:06:00.000-07:00

Two images signifying departure contained implicitly within the scene.

Dance studies in the station May 09

2009-05-30T00:38:00.000-07:00

Image by Juliet Shelly

These images are from my last days of filming in Wellington Railway Station. I am indebted to Todd Cochrane and Grant Corbishley for bringing their laptop into the station and streaming us live onto the Net while we were workshoping our dance process. Also much appreciation goes to my friends Juliet Shelly and Damian and to Stephen Gallagher, for filming and photography. Steve filmed the footage for Departed - In the Company of Strangers which is posted below. I have yet to work on the rest of the film footage taken by Damian. This will follow soon.

Image by Juliet Shelly

Conferences June 2009 - Preparations

2009-05-26T00:06:00.000-07:00

Over the next month will be a range of posts involved with conferences at which I will be presenting papers. These papers will be delivered through my Second Life avatar, Rollo Kohime and will be presented at the Second Life build of my Wellington Railway Station simulacrum.

I will be using selected images and videos in my presentations. I will be adding to this general post as more information becomes available.

Topographies - Sites, Bodies and Technologies

2009-05-24T22:56:00.000-07:00

Topographies
Sites, Bodies, and Technologies
SDHS Conference June 19-22, 2009
Stanford University, San Francisco, California

This post is a preface to my upcoming conference at Stanford University in California at SDHS 2009 on June 20th. I will be involved in two events: This one, which is a roundtable discussion conceived by Portuguese dancer Isabel Valverdes. The title and contexts for my input into the discussion follow below. The second event will be the presentation of my paper, 'In the Company of Strangers - Negotiating the parameters of Indeterminacy; a study of the Roaming Body and Departure in Urban Spaces'. Both events are on June 20th 2009. I will be focussing on my individual paper presentation in the coming weeks.

1) Envisioning virtual cartographies for corporeal interaction: dance and performance convergent applications of Second Life 3D Metaverse social environment. (Isabel Valverde, Yukihiko Yoshida, Mike Baker)

2) Real Dance and Dancing in metaverse : from the activity by INETDANCE Japan

3) The Human Analogue in Mixed-Reality
The Analoguebody - In the Company of Strangers by Mike Baker

Question 1?
How might dance work be created around the premise that we as humans can occupy, simultaneously, two separate spaces and times in one Mixed Reality?

To begin to explore this question, I have constructed a simulacrum of Wellington Railway Station on the NZ eduisland of Koru in Second Life. Over the past year I have been investigating the process of bringing my Real Life dance videos into my Second Life railway station. When I began my Masters project, 'In the Company of Strangers' in dance and video, my commencement point for my research practice, while exploring concepts around departure and leaving in urban environments, was to take and investigate the basic premise that the 'real' is influenced by the virtual, all the time and everywhere - in Real Life; that we experience moments which could be described as 'virtual' every day. To me, Second Life as a fully-immersive metaverse is simply an extended virtual moment in which we may reside for a longer period of time; another layer of the Real. This notion is supported in Brian Massumi`s exploration of the ‘‘indeterminacy’ of the body – the realities facing the body which are incomplete without the recognition of another, constantly simultaneously-generated virtual description of ‘now’. Massumi posits that ‘this body’ is here, but also, ‘this presence and essentially when in motion, they are no longer with us, here, but ‘over there’, now ...'. When a body is in motion, it does not coincide with itself. It coincides with its own transition ... In motion, a body is in an immediate, unfolding relation to its own nonpresent potential to vary...'

Mark Hansen, in Bodies in Code, (2006) sees the embodiment of function manifesting through the human body, acting as a kind of seismographic wand - Hansen, (p5-6). He maintains that: ‘… all reality is mixed reality’, Hansen quotes Massumi who talks about the existence of the analogue as a transformative entity: Always on arrival a transformative feeling of the outside, a feeling of thought sensation is the being of the analog(sic). This is the analog(sic) in a sense close to the technical meaning, as a continuously variable impulse or momentum that can cross from one qualitatively different medium into another. Like electricity into sound waves. Or heat into pain, Or light waves into vision. Or vision into imagination. Or noise in the ear into music in the heart. Or outside coming in. Variable continuity across the qualitatively different: continuity of transformation. (Massumi, Parables for the Virtual ... 2002:p.135)

Through our internal analogue therefore, we possess the innate capacity to transform and combine continuously, the many real and virtual realities of which our existence is comprised. The blended-reality paradigm can shift the fields of 'orthodox' perceptions which have, in the past, established existing modes of seeing and understanding reality. Hansen maintains that the reason why so many of us now operate in so-called virtual, metaverse worlds with apparent ease, is because we have always done so - we encounter without comment, a myriad of moments which we could describe as virtual, every day in our 'real life' existence. The shift for us as 'analogue' where the process within us as humans which brings metaverse technologies like Second Life.com together with our natural perceptions, supports a function which expands the scope of this perception and integrates real-world and virtual realities to arrive at a more homogeonous blended-reality.

Rather than presenting the virtual as a completely technical simulacrum – a portal to a fully immersive, separate or fantasy world, the blended-reality paradigm regards it as just one more realm among others which can be accessed through our already embodied perception or our ability to enact - or, in the case of both Real and Second Life, to role-play. 'We are all in the same house, but using different rooms', a good friend of mine said to me recently. So there is less emphasis here on the content of our perceptual register and more emphasis on the ways in which we access that content.

I am involved with Second Life as well as Real Life, not because I am intrigued by their differences where I recognize a separate virtual and real world, but because under the auspices of the blended-reality that I inhabit, I can perhaps more easily explore the interplay between Real Life where Second Life becomes a facet of the Real and without much suspension of disbelief when in SL, where the Real becomes a facet of Second Life. The phenomenon of telepresence engages in both facets of this single world. When engaged in either a virtual moment in Real Life, or an immersion of more comprehensive saturation in Second Life, our Real Life body/presence becomes our personal prosthetic - a role-reversed, telepresent avatar. This is a little akin to Stelarc`s 'Movatar' where through role-reversal, an avatar, through the motion-capture programming of prosthetic armatures on a human body can prompt selected movement in the human 'avatar'. In this dual environment, up to a point, I can converse, prosthetically dance (through my avatar), witness and belong as Analogue; as realcyberbody, while making critical commentary upon yet another field of departure. If I were to take and extend Hansen`s concept of the analogue, however, these 'other' bodies already manifest within us. A virtual version perhaps of the 'other' presence, that duality of personna which we so often sense but inevitably fail to define.

Massumi suggests that the body in movement means accepting the body in its occupation of space and time as a paradox: that there is an incorporeal dimension of the body itself. Of it, but not it. Indeterminate, coincident, but real and material. Something apart yet intrinsic and inseparable. Massumi calls this echo a, ‘Fellow-travelling dimension of the same reality’, a legitimate interpretation of identifiable alterity? In this time-based context, it could be said that the body is present but within its indeterminacy, the time-based embodiment of ‘body’ has already moved on. This assertion as a concept is interesting to consider in the context of my ‘in-transit’ dominated practice based on the pathos in departure and offers a framework for speculation about the reasons for what often, are the expressions of truncated, disjunct forms of communication in the street, which I believe, emerge due to our unconscious involvement, through indeterminacy in a continual pre-emptive state of leaving.

In a sense, one could say that the environment or ‘stage’ for my work, rather than a commuter-busy passageway, or Wellington Railway Station in New Zealand Aotearoa at rush-hour, is more accurately, the moving body itself - the body as a roaming stage - the human as Analogue. To use Massumi`s phrase, the body`s potential to vary suggests an alignment which juxtaposes, yet does not subordinate the Realbody with the Cyberbody, while analogue capabilites are present in both.

Question 2?
In what ways may the Human Analogue facilitate through movement, a sense of 'belonging' in a virtual environment?

In my current Masters dance and video work, I am engaging in enquiry into notions surrounding those forces of indeterminacy which initiate departure in our lives. I am interested in the processes of leaving, in both Real and Second Life - leaving to arrive or re-emerge to leave again. John Di Stefano (Senior Lecturer at Massey University in Wellington, New Zealand) proposes an interesting view and description of the process and implications of time on our travelling between 'real' spaces (the inverted commas are mine): In his acclaimed video, ‘Hub’ he suggests an alternative definition for the term 'belonging' - that the idea of ‘home’ and belonging is today perhaps more ideally expressed as ‘… a sense of being between places.’ (Di Stefano, quoted in Video Data Bank, 2001). Hub proposes that we consider the airport as a home-away-from-home and also a place of ‘dis-Appearance’ – a place of opportunity which entails a transformative process rather than simply vanishing. So rather than being a non-place (ref Marc Augé), the inference here is that the airport becomes, ‘… a rich and complex repository of interlacing personal and political histories – a new space of belonging.’ di Stefano (2001) Clearly, di Stefano`s concept and articulation of dis-Appearance is another manifestation of human analogue behaviour and quite at home in metaverse worlds like Second Life where our cyberbodies or avatars teleport, constantly arriving and departing. The process(es) of departure(s) realized through our computer-prosthetic interfaces become easier than walking; opportunities for transformative practice where we transit worlds as if we were simply exiting and entering different ideas rather than tangible spaces. A Postbody construct. Horizons, views, textures, aromas, ambience and information are all accommodated. In short, we are glancing, noticing, sifting in transit because that, as humans, is what we do while on the move.

Andrew Bucksbarg, in Maintaining the Digital Embodiment Link to Performance continues with this defining of the Postbody. He argues that simulated worlds confront us with multiple layers of self and otherness at the display interface of the virtual, graphical and textual. Semi-fixed layers of otherness or identity debris gather at this point in the form of the now-familiar user names, profiles, online identities and avatars. Bucksbarg maintains that these create a schism of the self. A rift in the subject which ensures that this inventory of 'otherness' never quite fits. There is always a need for modification, updating and maintainance. However he asserts that we can never maintain this embodiment; the new media subject shadows this moment-to-moment construct of the self. This new mediated human is not only a body, but is Postbody and like Sterlarc`s augmentations which extend the body politic, it simulates the intellect and body, manifesting as the body that is data, the body that is changeable, but technically limited. Bucksbarg goes on to say that in this realm of Postbody self and other, it is not information that we crave, it is still meaning and context. I endorse this view and regard our efforts to elicit significance from the worlds accessed through this liminal interface as worthy of research and development, curiosity and exploration. I am too much the romantic to be satisfied by files of mere animation script - it is the signification of that script, the articulation of that mixed-reality which bequiles me and holds my interest.

In her article, Incorporating self into web information system design, Anita Greenhill and Hannakaisa Isomaki, while arguing from a post-structural perspective where electronic identity enables a deconstruction of the mind/body dichotomy, informs us that: Identity construction in computer-mediated environments as in “real life” environments, is influenced by existent social processes. In these virtual environments the computer screen mediates specific experiences of localised physicality; however these computer mediated experiences do not alter the overall sense of being for the individual ...

This speaks to me of a lived methodology, which seeks to support an essential link at the real and virtual interface - in this instance, the computer screen. The artifice itself, the screen and all it holds, becomes a prosthetic extension of the self, which rather than altering the self puts in place another perceptual facet of the real. My personna/presence here, now, is divided between this space and this Second Life space. To the people behind their avatars in my Second Life Wellington Railway Station, who can hear my voice and see my avatar moving, the collective personna constituted by myself and this audience at Stanford University, I suggest, is actually virtual and in that extension of this reality, my avatar-self in Second Life, is real. So at this point in time, we have an equivalency as analogues in two places at once - the constituents of a blended-reality.

Bucksbarg suggests a positive extension, rich with possibilites inherent in metaverse environments like Second Life; 'Are networked simulated worlds much more similar to our dreams and imaginings than to the clunking improbability of a physical world? Unlike traditional media forms, do video games, simulations and other newer media perform the opposite of the suspension of disbelief? Do they encourage an extension of the imaginable? If the utopic promise of humanity is creative imagination, then it makes sense that methodologies for communication and content creation, which form a blank screen onto which this imagination can occur, are the ideal medium- the metaverse or meta design system.'

To close, Massumi paraphrases Deleuze in saying that the problem with dominant modes of cultural and literary theory is not that they are too abstract to grasp the solidity or corporeal fabric of the real. The problem is that these modes are not abstract enough to grasp the real incorporeality of what we take to be real.

As human analogue in the mixed-reality world of Real and Second Life (dance) practice, however, I can physically and physiologically explore for myself an alternative or rather, an extended description of the Real which embraces the incorporeal as a legitimate, 'real' abstraction.

Mike Baker 21.5.09

Bucksbarg, A. Retrieved from: http://people.brunel.ac.uk/bst/vol07/home.html
Maintaining the Digital Embodiment Link to Performance

di Stefano, J. (2001). HUB video quoted in Video Data Bank.

Greenhill, A. and Hannakaisa Isomaki in 'Incorporating self into web information system design'

Hansen, M. (2006). Bodies in Code. Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group, New York. (pp5-6 and p135).

Massumi, B. (2002). Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation Duke University Press, Durham & London, (p.5).

Departed - In the Company of Strangers

2009-05-11T04:15:00.000-07:00

'A Facet of the Real?' at Artist Salon - Chez Bushwick in New York City

2009-05-11T04:01:00.000-07:00

I currently have my AUT Masters dance video works on the contemporary dance site; dance-tech.net as well as YouTube. Just before the Easter break, I was approached by Jaki Levy, a media artist and new media consultant in the USA, who requested permission to show one of my video works from dance-tech.net at the Artist Salon at Chez Bushwick in New York. This event happened on March 25th and was apparently very successful.

My work selected for this event was 'A Facet of the Real?', a study combining my Real Life video work projected in my Second Life Wellington railway station. This was shown along with works by the New York City Ballet and Troika Ranch and a number of other outstanding international contemporary pieces. The link for the site is:

http://movetheframe.wordpress.com/2009/04/07/notes-from-the-march-25th-artist-salon-dance-for-web-an-emerging-genre/

This was the reference on the post-mortem site - notes by Jaki Levy: '“A Facet of the Real” explored how performance in “first” life and Second Life can intersect, creating a trippy situation in which a live performance is viewed in real time by online avatars in a virtual venue.'

I consider this to be not only positive for me personally but also for both, NMIT as an institute and SLENZ as an organisation on Koru and Kowhai islands in Second Life.

'Departed' - In the Company of Strangers - Autumn 2009

2009-05-11T03:33:00.000-07:00

A month has passed since I last posted. In late April I carried out the last phase of dance and video studies in Wellington Railway Station for this body of work. I have begun to edit the material and the video posted above this entry, 'Departed' will be the first in this series.

'Departed' represents the direction I have pursued recently in relation to introducing more emotion, more intensity of behaviour/movement and closer, more intimate filming of this movement than in previous dance exploration. In my structured improvisation, I wanted to use the entrance doors as a focal point for our movement - an interface which was both, a barrier and a bridge between us. I have been interested in the repetition of the doors for some time (as explored at the beginning and end of a previous dance study, 'Cutouts') and their glass and steel composition, indicative of a hard, unyielding yet visually accessible state. I enjoy the scratches on the glass and decided to use the smears I left behind during my initial contact with the doors as trace elements of our passage through the space, which I re-visited at the end of the study. I wanted to introduce a sense of small but strong drama - a tableau of clenched feeling which we can sometimes witness in public places; a sense of passion, of despair, of pathos at our fate which is to be swept up in this constant movement away from those places and people which sustain our sense of belonging. I placed the narrative inside a dark frame/format indicative of a train window - an image of the impending view. The work is interventionist in that it creates a moment of uncertainty for the busy commuters at rush-hour; what is taking place here? A quarrel? A passionate withdrawal? A charged parting? The event of leaving within the chosen day inexorably taking over ... the inference here for me is that during the process of my departure, a part of me has already left. Having departed, a part of me lingers ... traces left behind.

I am indebted in this video edit to Thomas Feiner, the composer/performer of 'For Now' (released on The Opiates Revised) who has kindly given me permission to integrate his sounds with my movement. I am viewing this study as a draft. I will be continuing to work on the editing; intensifying/capitalizing on certain moments/effects and re-structuring these in relation to different sound input. I am currently working with two Nelson-based composers to construct industrially-based, abrasive/diverse sound-fields to use instead of Feiner`s, 'For Now'. I very much appreciate this work of Feiner`s and think this draft is quite successful as a joint construct, but I want to develop a more abstract field of sensing around our dancing bodies. More drafts to come with this in mind.

Fiona and I moved into the station on Tuesday April 23 to reclaim our sense of presence in the cavernous space of the old ticket office. We carried out some dance work up in the large back window (owned by Victoria University) and returned the following morning to meet with Linda Savell, the Management Support Administrator of KiwiRail and the station Marketing Manager. This meeting was essential to secure permission to carry out my final installation and performance in the station space in mid-July 09. I had prepared for the meeting with a laptop containing images of my Second Life station and drawings of the installation I envisioned in the old ticket office. The meeting progressed very positively with a great deal of support from the management staff. However, I was informed that the space I had selected had just been leased by the station and that there was a very good chance that the lease would be taken up by July. This would mean that I would have to approach the new business management in this space (as well as the station management) for permission to carry out my work. The implications of this are that I will not know if I can use this space until the last minute before mid-July and that ultimately, using the space may not be possible. I will be liaising with Linda Savell through June to keep in touch with developments on the lease.

In the coming months I have an intense workload:

I will be posting the work carried out at the Independent Theatre in Nelson last November. I have a backlog of editing to do with this material.

I have three international conference events to prepare for in June and one in October of this year: PSI#15 (Performance Studies International 15th year) in Zagreb, Croatia, 'Misperformance: Misfiring, Misfitting and Misreading' and two separate commitments at Stanford University for the SDHS conference. (Society of Dance History Scholars): 'Topographies: Sites, Bodies and Technologies'. I will be presenting my own individual paper, 'In the Company of Strangers - Negotiating the parameters of (Indeterminacy; a study of the Roaming Body and and Departure) Departure in urban spaces; a study of Indeterminacy and the Roaming Body' and taking part in a roundtable discussion with Isabel Valverde and Yukihiko Yoshida on: envisioning virtual cartographies for corporeal interaction: dance and performance convergent applications of Second Life 3D Metaverse social environment. My contribution to this panel discussion is: '(The Human) Analogue in Mixed-Reality'. This, together with my conference papers requires writing/fine-tuning in good time before the events.

I have also had a proposal accepted for the conference, 'Time, Transcendence, Performance' at Monash University in Melbourne, Australia, in October 2009.

I need to revisit my Second Life station and carry out further development on the composition/concepts in the virtual space there. I need to work on my exegesis in time for the various draft deadlines. I will be exploring the useage of material in my conference papers as the basis for my exegesis.

SL Wellington Railway Station Visitors Book Update:

2009-03-09T03:10:00.000-07:00

http://virtual.weltec.ac.nz/Rolle/

This record is as of 9.3.09

c/0 Toddles Lightworker aka Todd Cochrane, from Weltec who is very kindly monitoring the flow of visitors to my Station. Once again, many thanks, Todd.

A list of visitors to Rollo's build. In order of their arrival.
The total time for all visits by one AV and the last visit time stamp in GMT is shown.
451 visitors so far.

Who	Hours	Minutes	Seconds	LastVisitTime
Isa Goodman	0	0	50	2008-07-29T09:41:19.433413Z
Toddles Lightworker	0	7	30	2009-02-14T23:05:34.069397Z
Rollo Kohime	158	27	50	2009-03-08T10:22:55.253579Z
Edithzor Exonar	1	32	40	2009-02-10T09:15:36.347955Z
Eryr Llewellyn	0	15	10	2008-12-18T07:45:30.214027Z
Jeb Lanzius	0	17	40	2008-12-14T22:01:59.865796Z
Arwenna Stardust	2	51	30	2009-02-04T07:50:35.318995Z
SitDevelop Acker	0	10	0	2008-11-07T03:52:04.929504Z
Katipo Kirax	3	9	30	2009-02-07T14:20:58.547707Z
Tran Courtois	0	2	10	2008-12-14T23:07:13.459790Z
Kavisha Quan	0	58	20	2008-11-28T00:31:29.514090Z
LorenzoBuhne Zerbino	0	4	0	2009-02-21T05:54:08.356007Z
ugee Egoyan	0	16	50	2008-12-06T00:51:59.065579Z
Indygo Magic	0	1	0	2008-08-01T23:31:58.930020Z
Dependent Binder	0	4	0	2008-08-08T20:41:28.467404Z
CiderJack Applemoor	0	49	10	2009-02-08T19:54:01.685697Z
Dacary Dumpling	0	6	30	2008-09-05T21:35:04.127492Z
Professor Noarlunga	0	7	0	2009-02-01T08:08:28.262918Z
Steve Baroque	0	2	10	2008-08-01T11:05:52.164306Z
Ellie Dewoitine	3	36	20	2008-12-04T08:13:51.298830Z
SHAKIRA Skirr	0	8	20	2008-08-01T17:12:22.036566Z
Fionnbhar Kohime	7	44	40	2009-02-08T03:06:15.653773Z
Suteruni Susanto	0	0	50	2008-09-09T11:26:32.772152Z
SITLife Jefes	0	1	50	2008-11-25T01:30:43.070322Z
CT Vlodovic	0	8	50	2008-08-03T17:14:42.283931Z
Iphigenia Flores	0	14	50	2008-10-05T22:15:32.386007Z
Edasa Eales	0	0	40	2008-08-04T02:48:46.305091Z
Orwell Sorbet	0	26	20	2008-09-28T23:01:33.511958Z
Itchy Gamba	0	0	10	2008-08-04T06:02:52.527079Z
Mythical Destiny	0	0	40	2008-08-04T06:13:43.302277Z
Mikky Ling	0	0	10	2008-08-04T06:56:45.619766Z
Netpuppy Thespian	0	6	30	2008-08-28T21:29:06.634782Z
Effy Khandr	2	14	20	2008-12-06T00:10:06.792594Z
Joy Janick	0	0	20	2008-08-06T02:21:15.193390Z
Miso Susanowa	0	2	50	2008-08-06T08:57:29.892178Z
Mychal Shan	1	25	50	2008-10-08T08:11:01.867274Z
Bri Rayna	0	2	10	2008-08-06T22:15:01.680774Z
Xhris Roussel	0	7	0	2008-10-03T04:06:46.055965Z
Cheddar Heliosense	0	11	20	2008-08-10T02:12:50.686844Z
BF2 Shepherd	0	19	10	2008-12-05T22:58:19.646024Z
Salina Tuttle	0	0	50	2008-08-07T07:08:44.801620Z
MisterCool Magic	0	3	50	2008-08-07T09:54:20.738757Z
Maxine Pevensey	0	12	10	2008-08-08T02:27:31.943226Z
MoonSkywalker Dezno	0	1	40	2008-10-02T22:56:54.736753Z
jasonzhang Whybrow	0	55	30	2008-09-02T08:09:48.128582Z
L0RD Skytower	0	0	10	2008-08-07T22:28:46.138843Z
Jasoncode Magic	0	7	30	2008-08-29T03:23:05.943684Z
Reynard Ragu	0	26	10	2008-08-14T21:56:02.588205Z
Jiajun Footman	0	0	0	2008-08-07T22:46:13.806924Z
Luenza Parx	0	0	30	2008-09-02T02:06:14.017821Z
Artikas Fhang	0	0	0	2008-08-07T22:48:30.769224Z
Like Susanowa	0	1	0	2008-08-08T01:04:43.912127Z
Dayja Allen	1	19	40	2009-02-21T03:09:46.030926Z
pure Hynes	1	33	0	2009-02-26T08:30:33.745738Z
LakotaWolf Dawg	0	0	0	2008-08-08T20:48:39.591150Z
Terence Meredith	0	1	20	2008-08-08T21:34:58.369900Z
wenjun String	0	17	40	2008-08-09T01:58:26.363325Z
Loquacia Loon	0	2	10	2008-08-10T06:14:36.967985Z
Dresnel Whitfield	0	1	10	2008-08-10T21:17:30.059075Z
Steph Rexen	0	0	0	2008-08-11T00:05:05.856014Z
pall Sporg	0	0	40	2008-08-11T00:05:58.585933Z
indelible Shelman	0	2	50	2008-08-28T21:15:05.068930Z
Mint Runo	0	7	30	2008-08-11T03:43:10.004978Z
Blake Jigsaw	0	1	0	2008-08-12T06:49:35.507702Z
suet Urvilan	0	4	20	2008-08-11T12:11:54.064263Z
Peekaboo Skytower	0	0	30	2008-08-12T23:25:35.519399Z
Keeper Hellershanks	0	0	40	2008-08-12T23:26:17.833291Z
yee Luik	0	0	20	2008-08-13T07:16:53.248283Z
May Luminos	0	0	50	2008-08-13T07:51:19.106693Z
vonded Parx	0	0	10	2008-08-14T22:04:03.705165Z
saberwill Aristocrat	0	0	20	2008-08-14T03:13:06.791674Z
IchiGo Shinn	0	0	0	2008-08-14T03:55:20.421069Z
Alisdair Skytower	0	0	30	2008-08-14T04:35:46.675880Z
ArianaRebecca Juliesse	0	2	0	2008-08-14T05:32:30.298041Z
Wade Corvale	0	1	50	2008-08-14T06:48:51.150909Z
Usefulidiot Dezno	0	13	50	2008-08-18T04:13:44.371903Z
Tobiano Vlodovic	0	5	20	2008-08-20T22:03:46.526578Z
taijikate Bode	0	6	50	2008-08-15T03:47:12.308072Z
Gryphon Vayandar	1	36	20	2008-09-28T22:36:49.661817Z
heiiiiman Rajal	0	0	40	2008-08-15T07:37:02.000433Z
CheeseHead Foden	0	0	50	2008-08-16T01:48:24.621088Z
yikai Xue	0	0	10	2008-08-16T12:22:06.195888Z
Clare Wyatt	0	5	30	2008-08-16T16:16:51.363983Z
Piroshy Ning	0	4	30	2008-08-17T12:07:14.907976Z
Tawhiri Pye	0	6	50	2008-08-17T18:36:12.135964Z
Arm Strom	0	34	30	2008-08-22T15:54:12.278136Z
Winnie Ragu	0	0	0	2008-08-18T08:41:19.877843Z
Maraki Barom	0	1	50	2008-08-20T23:08:17.728746Z
Kandyfloss Khandr	0	3	20	2008-08-21T02:48:58.068063Z
Mo10 Twine	0	2	40	2008-08-21T03:24:50.348143Z
Wifi Hax	0	1	40	2008-08-21T03:42:37.585152Z
archmunster Toll	0	17	30	2008-11-28T07:23:37.231368Z
Paul Allandale	0	0	50	2008-08-21T07:34:20.191013Z
Lula Rhiadra	0	2	10	2008-08-21T10:13:17.558206Z
Yeeting Andel	0	2	0	2008-08-21T14:00:02.241822Z
dougy Hellershanks	0	21	10	2008-09-02T11:00:51.966206Z
stretch01 Quan	0	2	10	2008-09-08T04:52:16.818796Z
Karen Ashdene	0	5	50	2008-08-22T08:15:41.201598Z
FREDDIE Jigsaw	0	0	0	2008-08-22T11:16:57.276796Z
aimme Bookmite	0	0	0	2008-08-22T11:44:29.436530Z
Clawz Karu	0	2	10	2008-08-22T14:01:48.118140Z
jaimeball Khandr	0	6	0	2008-08-22T16:00:21.701898Z
Mittze Tatham	0	9	0	2008-08-23T01:18:56.127352Z
Farr Baxton	0	13	20	2008-08-24T21:05:57.364448Z
elivana Langwarrin	0	0	10	2008-08-25T00:55:45.645500Z
Tip Ametza	0	5	30	2008-08-25T07:46:57.199885Z
Alice Svenska	0	1	40	2008-08-25T16:43:27.315369Z
Geon Nasu	0	27	50	2008-09-17T09:12:53.483948Z
MaxNaughty Magic	0	0	20	2008-08-26T22:30:14.980355Z
Johnnie Wendt	6	15	0	2009-03-09T02:57:26.853809Z
Trinny Dreamscape	0	1	10	2008-08-27T02:18:47.016323Z
Wendy Steeplechase	1	14	40	2009-02-07T21:48:07.276167Z
Fin Morpork	3	25	20	2009-03-01T04:28:17.410162Z
sintasarah Braveheart	0	1	50	2008-09-02T03:40:02.862481Z
Scorpy Wildcat	0	13	40	2008-09-20T04:23:15.969395Z
Mark Nasworthy	0	3	0	2008-08-29T01:57:38.983523Z
Silel Volitant	0	2	30	2008-08-29T04:55:42.329084Z
Marni Mizin	0	4	10	2008-09-04T09:05:43.757775Z
GNI Albatros	0	1	50	2008-09-29T23:22:54.372419Z
Yavanna Llanfair	0	0	0	2008-08-30T09:41:49.942971Z
Ember Nubalo	0	18	0	2008-09-03T00:27:39.117490Z
Dusty Skillman	0	2	50	2008-08-31T02:41:37.668638Z
Nicci Lane	0	52	10	2008-12-06T00:16:47.525231Z
Zan Zanzibar	0	0	10	2008-08-31T16:45:38.544124Z
DarkDharma Daguerre	0	2	40	2008-09-01T01:19:46.577962Z
Flint Bookmite	0	0	30	2008-09-01T03:34:19.513621Z
Vida Diavolo	0	4	30	2008-09-01T03:55:16.273194Z
Willi Maruti	0	2	0	2008-09-01T12:11:48.022490Z
Louren Fiertze	0	9	0	2008-11-01T04:31:25.661607Z
Nonnatus Korhonen	0	5	10	2008-09-01T18:25:36.337609Z
lianna Lannock	0	13	50	2008-10-07T20:47:15.293052Z
Belle Shan	0	7	30	2009-02-22T05:55:17.497166Z
Pixels Sideways	0	17	50	2008-09-02T03:44:37.808155Z
Serendipiti Zabaleta	0	0	30	2008-09-04T16:52:36.024158Z
Mariat Benoir	0	1	0	2008-09-04T16:53:39.334198Z
Isis Kranfel	0	7	30	2008-10-10T03:36:30.049600Z
Monet Netizen	0	8	0	2008-09-06T04:41:17.937200Z
Jandal Source	0	3	0	2008-09-09T04:29:15.526063Z
Marka Baxton	0	1	0	2008-09-10T03:31:12.430711Z
Lindas Fearne	0	12	0	2008-10-01T23:40:26.905379Z
Le Selentiak	0	0	10	2008-09-15T14:51:09.351158Z
Alanna Vantelli	0	0	50	2008-09-16T04:45:11.984606Z
Pebbles Hannya	0	0	0	2008-09-16T09:46:42.972663Z
DanP Andel	0	9	10	2008-12-15T19:57:16.229588Z
Danni Rajal	0	0	30	2008-09-16T23:27:05.107348Z
eightspeed Jumanya	0	16	40	2008-09-17T11:04:40.590505Z
DrWho Thespian	0	16	30	2008-09-23T08:02:55.688942Z
evesapple75 Kuhn	0	0	0	2008-09-18T21:23:12.490135Z
Barbara Meads	0	0	0	2008-09-18T21:24:23.163382Z
Rathelm Ansar	0	0	10	2008-09-18T23:46:05.580653Z
LindaLoves Magic	0	1	20	2008-09-19T00:36:55.076362Z
sanz Spyker	0	1	10	2008-09-19T01:54:29.965072Z
Commander Quan	0	1	0	2008-09-19T01:54:08.773909Z
Ash Underwood	0	1	0	2008-09-19T11:49:36.244618Z
Meg Ronmark	0	5	30	2008-09-19T12:36:48.020905Z
Leelee Luminos	5	42	10	2009-02-23T18:25:43.571864Z
Bartok Hykova	0	1	10	2008-09-20T09:46:58.883694Z
Digicam Vayandar	0	8	40	2008-09-20T12:43:14.960677Z
Hikino Zanzibar	0	1	30	2008-09-21T00:14:53.799172Z
Leumas Tigerpaw	0	2	0	2008-09-20T20:40:12.088121Z
Fli Nurmi	0	12	40	2008-10-31T23:39:16.733153Z
Suzuki Savira	0	0	20	2008-09-20T22:54:56.902789Z
Smooth Turbo	0	1	50	2008-09-20T23:35:03.247037Z
Ohadininrob Haystack	0	2	30	2008-09-20T23:37:30.883202Z
Teuamairangi Gray	0	1	0	2008-09-21T09:23:16.214308Z
Margaret Fhang	0	0	10	2008-09-21T11:05:51.428780Z
andycapp Inglewood	0	1	0	2008-09-22T03:21:17.084243Z
TimShadbolt Braveheart	0	1	20	2008-09-23T00:53:32.041056Z
LordCharlie Tigerpaw	0	0	10	2008-09-23T07:56:12.880246Z
Opal Osterham	0	0	10	2008-09-24T00:29:07.185130Z
Archie Tatham	0	3	10	2008-09-24T09:58:12.315968Z
Simey Ort	0	7	40	2008-09-29T19:54:57.339655Z
Stabsta Waco	0	6	40	2008-09-25T03:12:32.270279Z
Donche Vita	0	5	30	2009-02-04T20:49:18.699984Z
deeababy92 Andel	0	1	20	2008-09-25T07:39:50.440414Z
Silo Michalski	0	0	30	2008-10-03T22:59:09.839957Z
Aunina Savira	0	2	30	2008-09-25T18:44:47.681380Z
Pernuvia Constantine	0	0	0	2008-09-25T19:29:11.740878Z
Lyric Tizzy	0	1	30	2008-09-26T00:07:47.827407Z
Jj Deakins	0	32	40	2009-02-08T04:52:35.575332Z
Bettina Tizzy	0	23	0	2008-12-06T04:25:00.049286Z
Dancoyote Antonelli	0	10	30	2008-09-26T02:56:00.640425Z
Work Quandry	0	4	30	2009-02-16T04:39:20.414731Z
Enomec Hapter	0	8	40	2008-10-01T23:44:09.358986Z
Alizarin Goldflake	0	2	50	2008-09-26T18:48:25.767068Z
Wiski Oh	0	2	40	2008-09-26T20:16:43.711414Z
Art Abernathy	0	2	40	2008-09-26T21:07:46.931071Z
juakin Constantine	0	0	50	2008-09-26T21:27:01.975407Z
Samantha Kazakov	0	1	0	2008-09-27T01:52:54.830028Z
Aidenn Brooks	0	1	10	2008-09-27T04:43:13.494611Z
Scooter Gaudio	0	5	10	2008-09-27T07:29:45.641857Z
Balika Foxtrot	0	0	20	2008-09-27T07:35:37.762989Z
Corcosman Voom	0	2	50	2008-11-29T18:54:47.664678Z
Grace McDunnough	0	2	10	2008-09-27T12:23:25.163766Z
Case Tomorrow	0	1	50	2008-09-28T18:23:53.484556Z
Perefim Cao	0	52	50	2008-09-28T19:18:52.101391Z
DebZee Miklos	0	2	10	2008-10-03T03:27:11.201954Z
Tere Tinkel	0	20	0	2008-11-08T02:42:28.561288Z
Maoriboy Allen	0	10	30	2008-12-05T07:40:37.658423Z
Juko Tempel	0	3	50	2008-09-29T16:18:09.030571Z
Draven Swindlehurst	0	1	10	2008-09-30T05:44:26.780379Z
Betty Amoufhaz	0	3	30	2008-09-30T13:01:35.072472Z
DB Bailey	0	23	0	2008-09-30T14:00:19.791890Z
Ktalina Snoodle	0	0	0	2008-09-30T19:53:47.721227Z
ElvisOtis Ember	0	11	50	2008-10-01T04:56:53.516488Z
Leroy Goalpost	0	5	10	2009-03-08T22:04:19.948562Z
Dagmar Kohime	0	10	40	2008-10-02T02:44:21.576821Z
Tawny Parx	0	1	50	2008-10-02T06:11:59.992695Z
Cold Flatley	0	0	0	2008-10-03T01:21:28.613641Z
Forever Tomorrow	0	1	30	2008-10-03T05:40:36.004712Z
Gillian Planer	0	5	30	2008-10-03T09:32:26.876566Z
Laryo Kronfeld	0	18	20	2008-10-09T12:31:10.370972Z
Mysti Andel	0	0	30	2008-10-04T01:12:09.169545Z
Neoity Karu	0	2	30	2008-10-04T04:41:04.694861Z
Kristen Isachenko	0	1	10	2008-10-04T16:03:18.732529Z
Soapbox Ballyhoo	0	13	10	2008-11-13T07:12:50.477582Z
Cid Ducatillon	0	4	30	2008-10-05T16:59:24.816516Z
Liv Forster	0	3	30	2008-10-07T07:43:11.434329Z
Grown Beardmore	0	0	20	2008-10-07T07:39:48.129895Z
Doctor Bookmite	0	1	10	2009-01-08T22:02:48.738543Z
Jarad Milos	0	0	10	2008-10-08T22:17:23.384307Z
Maya Paris	0	5	20	2008-10-09T18:37:17.905357Z
Weewak Borkotron	0	0	0	2008-10-09T19:08:50.396962Z
ArachFinne Wirefly	0	0	30	2008-10-12T02:50:50.462155Z
Coolidge Magic	0	1	20	2008-10-10T03:37:12.417380Z
PaulR MacMoragh	0	1	10	2008-10-10T21:42:01.664534Z
violeta Mimulus	0	1	40	2008-10-10T22:51:33.040666Z
Nepets Mortenwold	0	0	0	2008-10-11T05:13:13.650264Z
Zia Thibedeau	0	7	50	2008-10-12T01:16:00.252667Z
Innocenti Chevalier	0	10	20	2008-10-12T01:16:10.944869Z
Meme Fhang	0	0	10	2008-10-12T09:28:04.394479Z
Ramona Forcella	0	6	30	2008-11-14T14:34:44.508008Z
Trixie Garmes	0	4	10	2008-10-14T05:43:05.928088Z
Galen Garmes	0	5	30	2008-10-14T05:42:23.067419Z
Briarmelle Quintessa	0	21	50	2009-02-15T10:03:48.679623Z
Ramona Helendale	0	0	10	2008-10-14T15:44:42.230523Z
GoAngel Sonic	0	3	20	2008-10-15T10:20:27.830371Z
Johnnie Thespian	1	25	0	2009-03-08T22:23:07.659723Z
flok Flotta	0	5	10	2008-10-29T08:19:34.836498Z
Johne Beresford	0	0	50	2008-10-29T08:36:36.264800Z
Walton Scribe	0	1	30	2008-10-29T10:08:31.023175Z
Butler2 Evelyn	1	9	40	2009-02-14T23:28:51.473715Z
Jinpa Karu	0	0	0	2008-10-31T02:54:47.890636Z
Arna Bardeen	0	23	30	2009-02-07T21:47:56.754909Z
Aklom Haifisch	0	5	0	2008-10-31T12:38:47.259511Z
Bilbo Etzel	0	3	0	2008-11-01T23:37:10.202273Z
Sioux Scribe	1	45	0	2008-12-16T23:04:34.235768Z
Alanna Luminos	0	0	30	2008-11-03T02:48:04.323232Z
Jessie424 Zapatero	0	0	0	2008-11-03T06:43:15.273058Z
JohJoh Braveheart	0	6	20	2008-11-05T02:55:06.572093Z
sweetpea Karillion	0	12	50	2008-11-18T06:17:45.452875Z
Amphora Baxton	0	0	30	2008-11-06T18:06:28.298041Z
Budka Groshomme	0	0	50	2008-11-07T00:50:08.739283Z
Waterlogged Camel	0	2	50	2008-11-10T22:07:37.473841Z
Cody Chrzan	0	7	50	2008-11-07T07:43:13.659228Z
Sammie Short	0	1	10	2008-11-07T20:56:17.377648Z
indi Lemon	0	1	20	2008-11-07T22:37:01.052244Z
shortly Su	0	9	10	2008-11-08T06:23:30.798943Z
Cass Bellic	0	12	10	2008-11-08T13:21:44.116326Z
Astra Martian	0	1	30	2008-11-08T14:50:17.554307Z
xox Lemon	2	33	40	2008-12-21T10:03:44.310996Z
Ani Sorbet	0	1	20	2008-11-09T20:40:20.993566Z
Sas Rhiadra	0	1	0	2008-11-11T07:36:14.964110Z
Needle Pointe	0	27	50	2009-01-13T10:50:29.371339Z
Aureliano Monentes	0	7	0	2008-11-12T03:19:34.769673Z
Cate Genira	0	0	50	2008-11-20T20:46:54.600337Z
Kobe WorldUE	0	0	40	2008-11-14T04:37:04.826228Z
Dupka Innis	0	15	20	2008-11-29T08:40:07.572718Z
Jocelyn Homewood	0	0	0	2008-11-15T08:50:54.450538Z
Art Bass	0	0	20	2008-11-15T22:25:16.705260Z
Caz Dudek	0	38	0	2008-12-05T22:10:51.481568Z
Kere Delcon	0	5	50	2008-11-16T05:42:05.396652Z
Crispy Putzo	0	4	40	2008-11-16T08:40:56.604806Z
Ritchie Johin	0	4	10	2008-11-16T08:46:10.660340Z
Hakuren Amaterasu	1	16	30	2008-11-16T12:56:24.453011Z
Jena Caerndow	0	1	30	2008-11-16T19:16:23.533945Z
Charlie12string Lax	0	6	30	2009-02-06T11:25:51.506723Z
Pomegranate Sorbet	0	18	50	2008-11-18T08:48:25.783680Z
Imani Jumanya	0	1	20	2008-11-18T12:22:56.833296Z
Geoffrey Nubalo	0	18	40	2008-11-19T18:45:27.936200Z
BreeLee Magic	0	0	0	2008-11-20T00:21:17.912016Z
linknz Rexen	0	0	50	2008-11-20T00:28:01.626629Z
hanns Luik	0	0	10	2008-11-22T04:19:40.695187Z
JudyArx Scribe	1	32	30	2008-12-09T20:17:03.491609Z
Iva Loudwater	0	1	50	2008-11-22T13:55:24.692097Z
CaptainJack Tennen	0	0	50	2008-11-23T04:54:45.633053Z
Theoe Denimore	0	0	20	2008-11-23T14:35:52.744459Z
Aamiene Despres	0	57	30	2008-12-20T08:52:36.077854Z
Mykar Gurbux	0	0	20	2008-11-24T08:13:03.107894Z
Ramone Canning	0	0	0	2008-11-24T10:36:15.288213Z
Jimboy Skytower	0	0	20	2008-11-26T04:04:50.624179Z
Arabella Steadham	0	2	40	2008-11-26T17:12:18.620496Z
Kiwidude Klinger	0	6	20	2008-11-28T00:43:29.801796Z
Zeela Zadark	0	0	0	2008-11-28T04:40:26.528033Z
chris Aboma	0	0	10	2008-11-28T05:22:41.879577Z
Inarra Saarinen	0	1	20	2008-11-28T05:26:46.994222Z
Aphophenian Riva	0	14	30	2009-01-04T10:10:08.187518Z
Martien Pontecorvo	0	16	30	2008-11-29T08:28:11.821540Z
Devon Markus	0	1	10	2008-12-06T03:21:58.444517Z
Alayan Ariantho	0	12	10	2008-11-28T20:18:31.608728Z
Zetreque Chronisz	0	1	0	2008-11-28T21:00:03.697199Z
Professor Hancroft	0	1	30	2008-11-29T03:22:05.376480Z
Lazarus Marat	0	2	30	2008-12-12T02:08:06.568759Z
barry Wiranata	0	1	50	2008-11-29T07:33:38.402375Z
Orchid Zenovka	0	19	50	2008-11-29T07:33:27.873298Z
Giuseppe Spicoli	0	2	20	2008-11-29T08:00:55.630594Z
Natasha Tumim	0	2	30	2008-11-29T23:43:34.049438Z
Linmai Kagekiyo	0	1	20	2008-11-29T23:41:16.678192Z
Catherine Arriaga	0	43	10	2008-11-30T04:14:30.141282Z
Waldorf Tigerfish	0	10	40	2008-11-30T04:08:53.720228Z
Cruella Zapatero	0	7	20	2008-11-30T08:57:04.337319Z
Reese Llewellyn	0	1	10	2008-11-30T08:24:56.108402Z
Larger Karlfeldt	0	0	30	2008-11-30T09:21:11.119811Z
Kartman Parx	0	0	40	2008-12-01T04:23:01.179383Z
No Roffo	0	2	10	2008-12-02T02:09:52.920729Z
skyler4551 Skytower	0	1	40	2008-12-17T04:43:47.921210Z
DarkMoon Lilliehook	0	13	50	2008-12-02T04:45:55.683411Z
Ford Canning	0	1	50	2008-12-02T17:34:27.981188Z
QuickCharles Paule	0	0	50	2008-12-02T22:18:38.542801Z
Thelonius Ra	0	22	0	2008-12-03T10:03:30.694998Z
RobertSteven Smythe	0	1	0	2008-12-04T18:35:12.985748Z
Elroy Eberhardt	0	3	50	2008-12-04T08:30:12.202604Z
Connor Scarmon	0	1	50	2008-12-05T07:45:33.081099Z
charley Lemon	0	0	20	2008-12-05T07:52:14.121534Z
Pelucida Lusch	0	18	30	2008-12-05T12:18:59.378077Z
Hinemoa Hudson	0	0	30	2008-12-06T00:03:04.774794Z
Flipp Ansar	0	9	10	2008-12-05T12:35:55.701934Z
Zoe Xaris	0	4	10	2008-12-05T12:36:06.253126Z
amolividis Diesel	0	7	30	2008-12-08T11:03:34.542496Z
gtaxiaris Plutonian	0	4	40	2009-01-09T12:37:56.493490Z
Rod Beam	0	11	0	2008-12-05T22:12:26.358917Z
Eme10 Wind	0	0	30	2008-12-06T00:01:40.375933Z
UMMMM Kazan	0	0	40	2008-12-06T00:16:36.993239Z
Mariposa Upshaw	0	21	40	2009-01-13T08:01:26.771464Z
Moongold Munro	0	0	20	2008-12-06T00:38:56.533022Z
PEACEdancer74 Funizza	0	1	0	2008-12-06T01:38:17.253437Z
Chantal Harvey	0	15	0	2008-12-20T01:04:42.276717Z
Tallbear Platypus	0	34	0	2008-12-07T23:13:09.854231Z
Zek Eros	0	3	10	2008-12-07T22:14:35.854903Z
Dieudonnee Beaumont	0	14	50	2008-12-07T22:13:05.191757Z
Private Rieko	0	5	0	2008-12-08T01:03:06.293853Z
asoura Parkin	0	1	40	2008-12-10T11:32:07.245296Z
Larisa Polikarpov	0	0	20	2008-12-11T17:19:39.759812Z
Ligeia Dubrovna	0	2	30	2008-12-11T22:26:58.772235Z
1armedman Digfoot	0	0	30	2008-12-11T23:25:26.431151Z
StandTall Bigbear	0	1	30	2008-12-12T01:38:32.392505Z
Jo Menizah	0	35	10	2008-12-12T03:05:13.648836Z
Jordana Streeter	0	9	40	2008-12-12T03:34:07.303984Z
TR String	0	0	40	2008-12-12T03:45:10.858654Z
Fixer Gaffer	0	0	0	2008-12-13T03:36:03.982021Z
jokay Wollongong	0	0	40	2008-12-15T00:35:23.362836Z
Billy Peretz	0	6	30	2008-12-15T06:56:30.514688Z
iaorana Peapod	0	1	0	2008-12-15T09:14:46.165404Z
JaneGunne Zeplin	0	0	20	2008-12-16T02:35:48.301049Z
Fraktal Vaher	0	9	40	2008-12-16T08:21:22.820446Z
cyber Placebo	0	1	0	2008-12-17T01:43:48.185666Z
zelly Rexen	0	3	10	2008-12-17T03:38:07.850840Z
alicegop Zeplin	0	1	0	2008-12-17T04:20:45.139087Z
Juliana Mefusula	0	0	30	2008-12-17T05:23:33.577563Z
Nickelus Wetherby	0	1	30	2008-12-17T18:11:24.480555Z
Andriajazz Twine	0	1	30	2008-12-17T21:48:58.819360Z
Okisleek Mahogany	0	1	10	2008-12-18T01:47:05.346854Z
Ryan Cyberschreiber	0	2	30	2008-12-18T06:15:19.704888Z
tiopete Renard	0	2	50	2008-12-19T03:01:23.470302Z
Fakir Core	0	32	30	2008-12-22T23:32:29.582233Z
ana Palmira	0	11	0	2008-12-22T22:38:42.977863Z
Siruss Blaisdale	0	6	20	2008-12-20T02:36:34.408863Z
Desiree Halderman	0	23	40	2008-12-20T08:09:26.484315Z
jazz Philipp	0	3	20	2008-12-20T07:43:56.211113Z
Cashew Masala	0	0	20	2009-02-27T20:08:14.234965Z
Claire Oompa	0	0	0	2008-12-20T17:21:57.845863Z
Bygone Lane	0	0	10	2008-12-21T00:32:21.652997Z
gery Vaher	0	1	20	2008-12-21T00:34:06.585696Z
NamasteAhimsa Pralou	0	5	40	2008-12-21T01:01:17.262434Z
Madd Michigan	0	1	0	2008-12-27T08:52:38.542711Z
Andreu Donat	0	5	20	2008-12-28T14:05:24.766144Z
Windy Hazelnut	0	1	30	2009-01-01T03:45:06.360362Z
Lazy Copperfield	0	0	20	2009-01-01T06:24:14.008834Z
Vandorius Gregan	0	0	10	2009-01-01T15:12:35.576501Z
Hawk Kiranov	0	0	20	2009-01-04T02:29:20.667569Z
Porfirio Tomorrow	0	0	10	2009-01-04T10:22:00.234027Z
Akage Doctorow	0	0	0	2009-01-05T23:41:02.635470Z
Totem Mohegan	0	4	30	2009-01-27T05:30:53.533770Z
Finz Constantine	0	0	50	2009-01-06T04:19:00.090966Z
Tristan73 Rajal	0	0	0	2009-01-06T22:26:03.148227Z
Henry Ellsworth	0	1	20	2009-01-08T11:44:23.282794Z
BeeMt Plutonian	0	0	20	2009-01-11T00:31:00.768694Z
Abel Algoma	0	1	0	2009-01-11T05:04:57.171207Z
Eroc Woodget	0	0	0	2009-01-11T09:15:17.259165Z
Laula Ghost	0	0	20	2009-01-11T23:02:15.895475Z
Kyla Damone	0	0	20	2009-01-12T19:26:49.508961Z
Sandy Viatruso	0	3	10	2009-01-12T21:28:42.608510Z
osker Piers	0	0	10	2009-01-16T12:37:09.981359Z
Drongle McMahon	0	0	0	2009-01-16T23:19:09.401673Z
Pedro Serenity	0	11	20	2009-01-17T09:27:45.376418Z
Lizette Violet	0	1	30	2009-01-18T06:29:49.902354Z
Sephy McCaw	0	0	50	2009-02-15T13:18:55.374434Z
Darina Collazo	0	17	20	2009-01-22T07:26:37.157465Z
Yaf Muggins	0	1	0	2009-01-22T08:41:06.132787Z
PI Illios	0	0	0	2009-01-22T22:54:59.775915Z
Inara Galicia	0	0	10	2009-01-23T16:07:13.156198Z
scottlo Scorbal	0	0	0	2009-01-23T18:24:14.102458Z
Light Avril	0	4	0	2009-01-23T19:07:09.419353Z
Deb Dotterkelch	0	2	50	2009-01-23T22:00:20.637795Z
Cosmo Copperfield	0	0	20	2009-01-25T07:25:20.841675Z
Manny Merlin	0	2	40	2009-01-25T11:03:51.404704Z
Rope Avro	0	6	20	2009-01-25T11:33:32.039739Z
PITIR Pooley	0	1	30	2009-01-25T15:29:44.007935Z
Davideo Ziplon	0	0	20	2009-01-30T02:01:28.048579Z
Dimittri Vella	0	0	30	2009-01-30T14:41:03.844077Z
Nupoe Ocello	0	6	40	2009-01-31T14:06:31.645753Z
Jedidiah Peretz	0	0	50	2009-02-03T04:40:47.646673Z
lucy Migpalion	0	2	40	2009-02-16T14:10:56.215892Z
dMo Moleno	0	36	30	2009-02-06T19:02:49.008253Z
JadeSecret Quan	0	0	0	2009-02-07T08:36:29.573949Z
Mandosam Carter	0	14	50	2009-02-10T09:21:55.774369Z
Monoceros Lexington	0	1	0	2009-02-11T00:11:11.468600Z
MissTerious Lexington	0	0	20	2009-02-11T17:19:31.284577Z
Jade Ulich	0	10	50	2009-02-13T03:34:36.947810Z
Fred Bigboots	0	2	20	2009-03-02T19:48:04.314501Z
Zoo Shinohara	0	41	30	2009-02-13T08:00:09.898578Z
Kibed Zepp	0	0	50	2009-02-13T07:26:10.215646Z
vandymcnew Copperfield	0	5	50	2009-02-16T21:48:49.862179Z
oscar Carpaccio	0	0	30	2009-02-15T11:58:06.279455Z
Karma Pienaar	0	2	10	2009-02-15T11:57:45.190692Z
Miranda Tretiak	0	6	20	2009-02-15T13:18:44.864758Z
JeffS Cyberschreiber	0	0	40	2009-02-17T16:44:54.563049Z
Eno Moonites	0	0	50	2009-02-17T17:35:51.483224Z
Nema Twine	0	1	40	2009-02-18T23:21:28.986176Z
Vance Pearl	0	1	30	2009-02-19T01:54:44.638519Z
Song Whybrow	0	0	0	2009-02-20T02:05:07.863652Z
Bowler Bingyi	0	1	10	2009-02-22T05:57:31.998516Z
Rusty Kembla	0	12	30	2009-02-26T13:32:24.965731Z
ChucknAZ Turbo	0	3	10	2009-02-26T08:33:00.836290Z
Dax Urriah	0	0	20	2009-02-26T09:52:28.245360Z
stratovarius Ozsvar	0	0	20	2009-03-02T01:27:00.635963Z
nelly Netizen	0	1	30	2009-03-03T04:07:42.351447Z
Lee Karlsvalt	0	0	0	2009-02-26T13:44:06.248015Z
Chatter Naxos	0	0	0	2009-02-27T07:09:49.156558Z
Sean Trapdoor	0	4	0	2009-03-06T18:13:33.751593Z
Nohj Martinek	0	2	0	2009-02-28T04:11:16.644454Z
TheArtfullOne Skytower	0	0	40	2009-02-28T08:58:19.911521Z
Brandi Robbiani	0	18	20	2009-03-02T11:20:34.234121Z
Shackleton Allen	0	16	10	2009-03-02T08:42:01.037492Z
Harlequin Fhang	0	11	20	2009-03-06T07:50:58.175821Z
Quentin Bosshart	0	8	10	2009-03-06T07:57:58.646845Z
Reka Inaka	0	4	30	2009-03-06T08:34:45.030468Z
James Hinchcliffe	0	3	0	2009-03-06T12:00:19.953877Z
Dotty Dotson	0	0	50	2009-03-06T12:20:14.247207Z
Asterix Beresford	0	1	30	2009-03-07T05:12:35.476272Z
Monky Bravin	0	0	30	2009-03-09T03:19:30.263663Z

Indeterminacy and the Roaming Body - Not Here Reprise

2009-02-13T02:50:00.000-08:00

intercreate.org/scanz New Plymouth, New Zealand Aotearoa 2009

2009-02-09T01:05:00.000-08:00

At the end of 2008 I had the abstract for the following paper accepted for presentation at the intercreate.orgSCANZ Symposium, New Plymouth, NZ Aotearoa 7-8 February 2009.

SCANZ is now an annual fixture on the international map of practitioners in the Arts, Sciences and Literature, so I presented this paper to a diverse audience from Holland, Brazil, France, Germany, the UK, the USA, Australia and NZ Aotearoa. My presentation was comprised of my reading to the symposium audience at the Govett-Brewster Gallery in New Plymouth, my avatar, Rollo Kohime simultaneously (one sound channel for both venues) reading to an audience in my Second Life Wellington Railway Station (my SL avatar is now voice-enabled and the station was projected onto the main wall of the conference room, approx 10mx5m) and a secondary screen showing selected videos of my dance practice - the first was referenced specifically in my paper.

Abstract Title:
Negotiating the Parameters of Missed Conversations in Urban Spaces

Abstract:
This paper represents a research strand of my AUT Masters in Art and Design project (majoring in dance and video), ‘In the Company of Strangers'. Indeterminacy as a force, responsible for sustaining in us the dynamic of the stranger, is explored in encounters between people in urban spaces. Concepts centering on disjunct-conversations and departure are being investigated through my research-practice which, as a scrutinizing lens, attests to the contemporary theories which reside in the states of 'becoming' evidenced in selected writings of Henri Bergson and Brian Massumi.

This project posits the formation of a new Urban Myth: Experienced through the vehicle of the roaming body, our engagements, meetings and encounters in urban spaces frequently manifest as disjunct, ‘missed conversations’. I am asserting that this is due to the inevitability in our existence of indeterminacy occurring as a significant mediator of our behaviour. Indeterminacy implies motion and emerges, as Massumi so ably asserts, through ‘… an unfolding relation to its own nonpresent potential to vary …’. We, all of us, are constantly being drawn away – always either approaching or embracing involuntarily, a state of ‘Leaving’ which co-mingles with and unerringly erodes our efforts to engage with another in the here and now.

* Organizing seating for the SL audience, with SCANZ 09 poster

.......................................................................................................................................

This paper begins with the notion of the Stranger identity and 'Belonging' in contemporary urban environments and closes with the event of ‘Leaving’. Between these manifestations lies a gulf of uneasy indeterminacy, evident in the ways in which our choices are made, our actions which appear to prevail, the spaces and times which we occupy and displace and our interactions with one another. The idea of belonging is central to our existence and to our understanding of how we and others give meaning to our lives. Our sense of identity is founded upon social interactions that indicate our allegiance to particular communities or groups, through shared beliefs, values or practices. Yet over the generations, has our pursuit of personal autonomy robbed us of that cherished sense of belonging and is there still a more subtle, insidious force acting upon us?

In my research practice I am positing a new Urban Myth. My contention is that all our exchanges, whether they be either apparently resolved engagements, casual encounters or missed conversations with people and places, are governed by the agency of indeterminacy evident through a continual Leaving of these exchanges. That is Leaving with a capital ''L'. I am suggesting that ‘Leaving’, as a point of separation is a phenomenon. Leaving is not merely a point of departure, but an ingredient central to that process we call change. For us, as creatures of change, movement away seems to be inevitable and this ensures that there are constantly present, small, overlooked dramas with their attendant poignancies expressed within the simplest, most mundane, everyday dynamics between people and places. I am suggesting that this behaviour is involuntary, informs and mediates our respective realities, knows no cultural boundaries and occurs everywhere, all the time, although I am concerned with its manifestation in urban spaces. I do not consider this notion to be negative or depressing. Rather, I find it compelling, capable of propelling us into re-evaluations of who we are and how, as sentient beings, we conduct our lives through a perceptual reality composite, caught up, despite ourselves in a perpetual state of change which is centred ultimately, in this universal movement away.

* This image is of intercreate.orgSCANZ in 2008. I secured permissions to use the current 2009 logo for the station poster, which, c/o my photoshop, you see in the other images.

In the text, Negotiating difference or being with strangers, John Allen (2000) informs us that, ‘In his classic essay on “The Stranger” published in 1908, Simmel tried to convey through this figure, a range of ambivalences which have come to haunt us in the practices of negotiating difference’. Allen is alluding to the paradoxes attendant within those perceptions when we try to position ourselves as social familiars, leaving unknowns outside our circle, as Strangers and therefore, 'Other'. In my sphere of enquiry, Simmel`s words are provocative, not so much for how society functions, but more specifically,for how those individuals within spatial/societal structures function and relate to one another. In defining or ‘negotiating difference’, Simmel adopted a 'host' figure as our familiar self. The figure of the ‘Stranger’ captures the paradoxical experience of what it means to interact with someone who is both, perhaps nearby in a spatial sense, yet remote and therefore ‘strange’ to us in a social sense, while the converse of this may also be true. The Stranger, then, is someone who is involved with us, yet removed, in a sense virtual, spatially and socially as an accepted member of our group or situation. Personna who we label within our host-field as both familiars and strangers, constantly come and go.

However, as I will endeavour to discuss, we are all susceptible to Leaving as a given which brings in its wake, its own estrangement. Yet, Simmel`s 'host/stranger' binary definition begs that all-important third dimension, which I maintain can be defined through the state of indeterminacy. As indeterminants we all of us depart despite ourselves, from every engagement we make, fleeting or involved.

* Intercreate.orgSCANZ 09 Rollo with paper abstract on podium

A definition of the term, 'Indeterminacy'.
The Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle which is founded in quantum mechanics, asserts that both the position and momentum of a given particle cannot be determined simultaneously.'The more precisely the position is determined, the less precisely the momentum is known in this instant and vice versa'. (Heisenberg,1927)

In other words it could be said that one is unable to record scientifically, evidence of a given body that is both static and moving at the same time. If one cannot measure something, does this make the non-finding absolute? Is this definition simply a finite, modernist Truism or an opportunity for a poststructuralist Truant? Is the definition deconstructable? Given that we register the activity, is it possible perhaps to measure empirically, through the senses, this activity in one body taking place in two situations at once? Despite the scientific, physical non-finding, does this mean that one`s 'attention' cannot be in two places at once? Or one`s desires, intent, perception? I suspect that this is not the case. I am suggesting that through acknowledging and assuming in ourselves a state of 'the being-in-change', it is possible to transfer ones presence in the form of intent, from 'here' to 'there' simultaneously and that there is physical, visible evidence for this in scenarios involving engagement between people in the street.

My personna/presence here, now, is divided between this space and this Second Life space. To the people behind their avatars in my Second Life Wellington Railway Station, who can hear my voice and see my avatar moving, the collective personna constituted by myself and this audience I suggest, is actually virtual and in that extension of this reality, my avatar-self in Second Life, is real. So at this point in time, we have an equivalency as analogues in two places at once - the constituents of a blended-reality.

To illustrate dual presence through an indeterminate intent - in this instance, in departure; in the first video clip shown here, the couple in the spotlight conduct an animated conversation in the street. Without being privy to their dialogue, we have no way of knowing what they are discussing. We could speculate, but I am fascinated by their body language, their neutral proximity to one another, the signals they unconsciously transmit about the way they are feeling with regard to their engagement with one another and how this evolves through the duration of the meeting. If I apply a non-judgmental appraisal to their situation, in the last minute prior to their separating, although the woman eventually says goodbye, physically walks away and leaves the engagement, the man appears to have already departed from the conversation. He shuffles, he checks his cell phone, he hides behind his hands, he waves his arms uncertainly and looks around. He checks his watch. Eye contact decreases. No longer is he fully present.

When she does finally leave, his reaction is marginally interested – because his roaming self has already left. His ‘Leaving’ has crept into and hijacked the meeting, while ostensibly, they were still engaged. It would be easy for us to say, 'But he has simply switched off'. I am not disputing this. I am asking, 'Why?' I am suggesting the whole story is more interesting. Indeterminacy is embedded here. The only difference between this and other engagements is that in this case, the slip in the present (now past) is visible. Can this constitute evidence of a simultaneity of presence? Here, yet not here? Both people left. Movement away occurred in both parties, even though ironically, one of them left first by staying behind. Is this occurrence actual or merely a point of perception? (Is a point of perception no less actual?)

In a second definition of indeterminacy, Brian Massumi, (2002) in Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation, tells us that a body in motion is held within an ever-changing process of movement relative to its own already non-static position in space, ('... its own non-present potential to vary ...'). Massumi, (in a vein which is similar to Henri Bergson`s sense of 'becoming') maintains that the only 'real' relation is that of a body to its own indeterminacy, (... its openness to an elsewhere and otherwise that it is, in any here and now.') Does Massumi`s interpretation and my demonstration here, refute the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle, despite the difficulty in being able to measure two presences (or one divided presence) simultaneously? In contrast, although not entirely, William Wordsworth, articulating indeterminacy as an aesthetic, made room in any insubstantial meaning or questionable reliablility of an event, by replacing it with imagination deferring to a potential for interpretation. He called it, ‘Something evermore about to be’.

Indeterminacy and the roaming body – in the contexts of this phrase, perhaps we have no way of forecasting how our connections will be determined when we meet someone in the street. Will we even engage? What might comprise the least element of a meeting between two people in the street? Somehow though, either sooner or later, (or, in the light of what we have just seen - sooner and later), without always recognizing it we are always leaving. Allowing for the variables within which we carry out our departure, the only non-variable is that we will actually depart from meetings which resemble islands in the stream - places of temporary purchase within change.

In my videoed dance work, I am concerned with the investigation of what I will call the spaces 'between recognized content’ in our lived experience. In exploring what may comprise engagement and conversation on the street, I am not so much interested by what is being communicated, as what is being left out, due to what I identify as interpersonal terrain dominated by indeterminacy. I am interested how this uncertainty located within movement/change may influence or to a significant extent, govern the nature of dialogue in urban contexts. The videos playing here are expressions of small-conversations, sometimes missed, between the dancers and between the dancers and members of the public. The dance-work is supposed to be mildly interventionist in terms of how it affects the flow of commuters and catalyses a response – creating for the people walking past, a private tableau made public between two people, a virtual, half-witnessed-half-remembered-later moment, representative of the myriad of disjunct dialogues and discreet micro-dramas within scenes of departure which may occur, in these kinds of public spaces. Responses are curious, concerned, mystified, guarded, warm and cold but above all, removed from us as strangers - as we are removed from them.

* Twin projections of Second Life and Real Life videos

The anthropologist Marc Augé (2004), offers us another perspective on belonging and what I shall describe as the results of a societal, collective maturation of autonomy. In his definitive text, ‘non-places: introduction to an anthropology of supermodernity’, Augé succinctly documents the profound dysfunctional changes (relative to the fracturing of identities within community and the dislocation of community itself) to our westernized societies. These dischordant developments were precipitated not so much by the nature of our thinking about architecture, but by the architecture of our thinking about our behaviours in our habitats. Augé rigorously interrogates the substance and resultant implications of our living spaces and environments and ultimately, finds them wanting. His commentary questions the extent to which we are still in possession of spaces which we might define as 'places' - whether we still belong in those spaces that we frequent the most, or whether they have become, in his words, 'non-lieux' or non-places: airports, railway stations, hypermarkets, filling-station forecourts, Ferry terminals ... or Ferrys.

Contrary to Augé`s assertion that places like airports are situated at the fore-front of non-lieux locales, John Di Stefano (Senior Lecturer at Massey University in Wellington) proposes a very different view in the description and categorizing of the airport as a socio-geographic space: In his acclaimed video, ‘Hub’ he suggests an alternative definition for the term 'belonging' - that the idea of ‘home’ and belonging is today perhaps more ideally expressed as ‘… a sense of being between places.’ (Di Stefano, quoted in Video Data Bank, 2001). Hub proposes that we consider the airport as a home-away-from-home and also a place of ‘dis-Appearance’ – a place of opportunity which entails a transformative process rather than simply vanishing. So rather than being a non-place, the inference here is that the airport becomes, ‘… a rich and complex respository of interlacing personal and political histories – a new space of belonging.’ di Stefano (2001) Clearly then, one persons sense of non-place is another`s place. But, is it not our search for personal and professional independence and the systems which provide for a more efficiently autonomous management of that independence that has for some, created a world of 'non-lieux' or non-places? It is interesting to note, too, that all these systems on a larger-than-life scale are orientated around the movement of populations, essentially articulating and perpetuating within arrivals, climates of departure. Leaving. Why not Arriving? Does not indeterminacy bring us to our arrivals just as surely as our departures? I am sure that it does. Arrival suggests a governance of some significance; a quiet triumph of navigation to a secure location, yet each arrival holds the seeds of the next departure, creating for us a pause, a sense of temporary settling; seen through this current contextual vision, arrival is itself only momentarily grasped and subsequently lost as a place in time and space which punctuates change, from which ultimately, we move away.

Within the parameters of this urban myth, the manifestation of indeterminacy suggests that ‘Leaving’ is a universal state over which we have no conscious control. Departure is that paradoxical frame of reference for us as humans which both, frees us from the constraints of our previous engagement while instilling perhaps, trace echoes of what has been left behind. For me, this creates poignancy - a pathos evident in the most mundane of departures, humanity-wide. Whether it be recognizably profound and measurably life-altering, or apparently occurring within the humdrum of the everyday, departures and the act of ‘leaving’ people and places of significance constantly colour our lives. Could it be that this unconscious facility that we unknowingly possess; Leaving as an ongoing, involuntary occurrence, is responsible for our departures, regardless of our own diagnostic sensing within a meeting or engagement with someone? Perhaps departure itself is the indeterminant driving factor here. A condition which affects us all, impinging upon and mediating our behaviour while for the most part, we remain in ignorance of its existence.

In 1927, Henri Bergson, who had previously been hailed as both, ‘the greatest thinker in the world’ and ‘the most dangerous man in the world’ (Mullarkey, 1999b) was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. He has been a major influence on the thinking of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Emmanuel Levinas and Gilles Deleuze. Bergson is perhaps most widely known for his treatises on the concepts of time and becoming. His stance as a ‘process philosopher’ on ‘lived’ and ‘experienced’ time and space is particularly relevant for me: He was concerned with the actions which bridge or give rise to the manifestation of content. He pursued these intangible qualities binding content, concentrating on the unfolding process of the event itself.

* Twin screen RL/SL projections

But significantly, for this paper, Bergson`s thinking recognizes and traverses the territory occupied by indeterminacy and in so doing, transforms ‘being’ into ‘becoming’: If we take it that ‘Being’ can be defined as the descriptor typically given to those essential qualites of a thing that endure despite all temporary changes in appearance, reality can then be defined ontologically, by enquiry into the particular kind of “being” that a given entity has or expresses. ‘Becoming’ however, for Bergson, was and remains quite a different way of defining reality. The word describes an action rather than a static quality. It refers to a view of the world which is defined through motion which is continuous. So the only reality is constant change, flux, transformation – becoming. The things we perceive as ‘real’ and constant, reliable and set are outcomes relative to our respective perceptions. To quote Bergson,‘ … the qualities of matter are so many stable views that we take of its instability’. Bergson puts this very succinctly another way: '… rather than there being things which change', more accurately speaking, there is, '…change provisionally grasped as a thing'. Bergson (2005) This realignment of perspective may allow us to witness indeterminacy in-the-making, made visible in meetings between people on the street, governed in their actions by the phenomenon of departure.

In his 1939 Essay, Movement as Language, Len Lye stated:
Movement is the result of a feeling in one thing of strong difference from other things. Movement is always one thing moving away from other things—not toward. And the result of movement is to be distinct from other things: the result of movement is form. The history of any definite form is the movement of which the form is the result. When we look at something and see the particular shape of it we are looking at its after-life. Its real life is the movement by which it got to be that shape.

* Before the reading

In Lye`s description of the world this observation shares similar territory to Bergson`s, maintaining that we live 'change' in a constant process of becoming and that we can only grasp and isolate moments provisionally within change itself.

Brian Massumi (2002) echoes this point of view:
When a body is in motion, it does not coincide with itself. It coincides with its own transition ... In motion, a body is in an immediate, unfolding relation to its own nonpresent potential to vary. That relation, to borrow a phrase from Deleuze, is real but abstract … This is an abstractness pertaining to the transitional immediacy of a real relation – that of a body to its own indeterminacy (its openness to an elsewhere and otherwise that it is, in any here and now).

When I began my Masters study two years ago, my commencement point for research was to take and investigate the basic premise that the 'real' is influenced by the virtual, all the time and everywhere; that we experience moments which could be described as 'virtual' every day. I began to work in both Real Life and initially, quite cynically in Second Life and very quickly found out that the residents in Second Life who I interviewed, indignantly regarded the whole construct as very real. To these people (now myself included) Second Life is another facet of the Real. This notion is supported in Massumi`s exploration of the ‘‘indeterminacy’ of the body – the realities facing the body which are incomplete without the recognition of another, constantly simultaneously-generated virtual description of ‘now’.’12 Massumi posits that ‘this body’ is here, but also, ‘this presence and essentially when in motion, they are no longer with us, here, but ‘over there’, now ...' 13 My work focusses upon the nature of movement itself, which is inevitably coloured and controlled by what could be said to be a force outside almost everything, but which equally, is integral to all: Time.

Massumi suggests that the body in movement means accepting the body in its occupation of space and time, as a paradox: that there is an incorporeal dimension of the body itself. Of it, but not it. Indeterminate, coincident, but real and material. Massumi calls this echo a, ‘Fellow-travelling dimension of the same reality’, 14 A legitimate interpretation of identifiable alterity? In this time-based context, it could be said that the body is present but within its indeterminacy, the time-based embodiment of ‘body’ has already moved on. This assertion as a concept is interesting to consider in the context of my ‘in-transit’ dominated practice and offers a framework for speculation about the reasons for what often, are the expressions of truncated, disjunct forms of communication in the street.
In a sense, one could say that the environment or ‘stage’ for my work, rather than a commuter-busy passageway, or Wellington Railway Station at rush-hour, is more accurately, the moving body itself. The body`s potential to vary suggests an alignment which juxtaposes yet subordinates ‘being’ to becoming. Our ontological presence can be defined by the idea that we are in a continual state of being/becoming – a time-based positioning. In qualifying his argument, Massumi paraphrases Deleuze in saying that the problem with dominant modes of cultural and literary theory is not that they are too abstract to grasp the solidity or corporeal fabric of the real. The problem is that these modes are not abstract enough to grasp the real incorporeality of what we take to be real. Which leads me to the previously mentioned state of blended-reality.

Mark Hansen, in Bodies in Code, (2006) sees the embodiment of function manifesting through the human body, acting as a kind of seismographic wand - Hansen, (2006:p.5-6). He maintains that: ‘… all reality is mixed reality’. Hansen quotes Massumi who asserts that the existence of the analogue is as a transformative entity:
Always on arrival a transformative feeling of theoutside, a feeling of thought sensation is the being of the analog(sic). This is the analog(sic) in a sense close to the technical meaning, as a continuously variable impulse or momentum that can cross from one qualitatively different medium into another. Like electricity into sound waves. Or heat into pain, Or light waves into vision. Or vision into imagination. Or noise in the ear into music in the heart. Or outside coming in. Variable continuity across the qualitatively different: continuity of transformation (Massumi, Parables for the Virtual ... 2002:p.135).

Through our internal analogue therefore, we possess the innate capacity to transform continuously, the many real and virtual realities of which our existence is comprised. The blended-reality paradigm can shift the fields of 'orthodox' perceptions which have, in the past, established existing modes of seeing and understanding reality: Hansen maintains that the reason why so many of us now operate in so-called virtual, metaverse worlds with apparent ease, is because we have always done so - we encounter without comment, a myriad of moments which we could describe as virtual every day in our 'real life' existence. The shift for us as 'analogue' where the process within us as humans which brings metaverse technologies like Second Life.com together with our natural perceptions, supports a function which expands the scope of our natural perception and integrates real-world and virtual realities to arrive at a more homogeonous blended-reality.

Rather than presenting the virtual as a completely technical simulacrum – a portal to a fully immersive, separate or fantasy world, the blended-reality paradigm regards it as just one more realm among others which can be accessed through our already embodied perception or our ability to enact - or, in the case of both Real and Second Life, to role-play. 'We are all in the same house, but using different rooms', Dharan Longley, a very good friend of mine said to me yesterday. So there is less emphasis here on the content and more emphasis on the ways in which we access that content.

* SL Audience in the station for the Symposium reading

I am working in Second Life as well as Real Life, not because I am intrigued by their differences where I recognize a separate virtual and real world, but because under the auspices of the blended-reality that I inhabit, I can perhaps more easily explore the interplay between Real Life where Second Life becomes a facet of the Real. Here I can converse, witness and belong as analogue, while making critical commentary upon yet another field of departure.

This section in brackets was not read at the conference due to time constraints:

[Points of Purchase
To contextualize my thinking, I need to continue with my case for 'belonging' before I can sensibly comment on its erosion. Over the last 200 years, Western Thought has created a dialectic which, I maintain, impacts upon certain concepts concerned with the acquisition of autonomy within personal identity - that debate which seeks to synthesize the Self and the ‘other’; the implications of which may affect our ability to ‘belong’ in the here and now and consequently, to question a sense of lasting allegiance to any one place. Is it possible to exercise a conscious control over our facility to belong? At which point does an autonomous state stand so resolved, itself independent and immune from the need to be a part of something greater?

On the one hand, that late 17C and 18C set of collective Western values emerging through The Enlightenment, called upon individuals to think for themselves. In embracing this, we have since held that independence and thus the capacity for reason (which apparently, enables one to successfully stand alone) were to be our exemplars. This in turn has necessitated that the individual be able to separate from all that is externally imposed on them in order to evaluate and consider rationally, their ongoing condition: that of a sentient being, with the capacity to act autonomously. Yet it can be seen that perhaps self-autonomy is divided: Since Georg Hegel, (1770-1831) major psychological accounts of the self have placed its dependence on the ‘other’ at the centre of formation and maintenance of the self. For Hegel, one needs the ‘other’ to recognize one's status as a self-directing subject in order to create the conditions for the self-directing activity; one's self image is mediated through the ‘self-other’ relation, not only in terms of its substantive or evidential content but also in terms of the self in its base capacity. For Sigmund Freud, the ‘other’ is internalized to become a central organizing principle for one's desire, one's needs, driven by one's unconscious. Thus, on the one hand freedom and independence requires reason, which requires the ability to separate from the ‘other’, while at the same time, the self is ineluctably dependent on the other's interruptions and influence. If both of these traditions are broadly correct, it would seem that we are doomed to a lack of freedom through autonomy, because undivided autonomy is doubtful. Consequently, freedom through independence is defined as precisely that which we cannot attain.

Linda Martin-Alcoff, Professor of Philosophy and currently the Director of Women`s Studies at Syracuse University in the USA, asserts in The Political Critique of Identity,
'... in classical liberal political theory, the initial state of the self is conceptualized as an abstract individual without, or prior to, any group allegiance. It is from this "initial position" that the self engages in rational deliberation and thus achieves autonomy ...' through free choice. 'As (Immanuel) Kant developed this idea, a person who cannot gain critical distance from and thus objectify their cultural traditions cannot rationally assess them and thus cannot attain autonomy. In Kant's view, an abstract or disengaged self is for this reason necessary for full personhood. Moreover,the process of modernity, which was conceptualized as analogous on the societal level to the process of individual maturation, became defined as just this increased ability to distance oneself from one's cultural traditions. In this way this distancing ability also became a key part of the global, European-centered teleology of intellectual and moral development, defining the terms by which societies were to be labeled advanced or backward.’

Martin-Alcoff goes on to stress that, ‘… the norm of rational maturity, then, required a core self stripped of its identity …’

One side of this theoretical and often prejudicially-lived debate, has sought to locate and resolve in us an independent state of self. We can now see that this state may be defined dichotomously, responsible not only for shaping but also for ignoring it seems, the collateral damage occurring to that other aspect of personal and collective identity - the issue of our ‘Belonging’. Could it be that this aspect of which Kant speaks, this process of maturation, the graduation to ‘… full personhood’ is a contributor to the erosion in our sense of belonging? Has the manifestation of this balanced, autonomous identity so carefully harboured by us, comprised merely a veneer over that reality which now emerges as a lost locus?

Let us examine for a moment, verbal conversation as an adhesive which only partially binds us to the moment in this stream of change. Not only does speech aid our functioning effectively in social situations and locates us in time and given space, but more candidly, the ability to converse and to be heard affirms, empowers and expands the map of the human heart.

In Tricks of the Mind, by Derren Brown, under the section on ‘Targeted Rapport’, Brown writes, ‘ Most people when they are getting on well, will be in a state of unconscious ‘rapport’. They will tend to mirror each other`s body language and so on without realizing it …’ At the same time, ‘… there is the odd sensation we have all experienced (though we never think to mention it) of knowing when the other person is about to get up and leave. Suddenly there is something in the air, a moment or a shift and then you know the other person is about to say they should ‘make a move’. And if they don`t you have that feeling that they are outstaying their welcome’.

The level of unconscious rapport shared up to that moment, particularly if the conversation has lasted for some time, is responsible for the sharing of mutual thought and body patterns so that together you can sense when the time to leave has arrived. Speech comprises much of the articulation of this and that of our wider socio-contextual map - much, but not all. The hidden message which is about when and how to leave an engagement is articulated through speech-prompts but also through body language, an underlying empathetic cue to move on, with this decision coming from a place ‘of ‘ and in the body – a place from which, in a manner of speaking we have already departed.

Brown maintains that studies carried out on rapport have shown an array of mirrored behaviours that are not merely body positioning but something far more subtle. It has been established that people in rapport with one another tend to breathe at the same rate, adopt similar facial expressions, blink at the same rate and use one another`s language. I would describe these responses as somatically based. In other words they are products of a non-spoken, internal discourse that the body carries out continually (using one another`s language is still instigated by a bodily response to a stimulus). A hidden dialogue beneath speech and vision through which we are more overtly governed. We have at our fingertips, so to speak, a very specific skillset which is available to us on a subliminal level during our interaction with another; a transponder of sorts, fashioned to assist us in the process of moving ourselves and a stranger identity to a place which may simply be less strange and designed almost as if to counteract the inexorability of our predilection for departure.

‘Rudimentary engagements, communication at its most basic, the prototype of all human interaction …’ such are the descriptors for the term, ‘Protoconversation’ in Daniel Goleman`s, Social Intelligence, The New Science of Human Relationships. The term relates to the early neural signals which expand into methods for establishing a rapport that we experienced as babies, making our first communicative forays into the outside world through the medium of our mothers. Often a synchrony of rhythmic motion, touch, gaze, sound and breath, a coordination of hand movements and facial expressions will establish a mutual rapport between mother and child. Such conversations are more
often than not very short in duration – even only seconds in length and they end when both parties arrive at matched states, typically, affectionate ones. Protoconversations have a certain elasticity in meaning and application. Not only does it refer to the very earliest development of our powers of communication (mostly non-verbal), but in adulthood, protoconversations remain as our most fundamental template for mapping, matching or missing in meetings with others.

The template is tacit, a subtle awareness through feeling and the senses which allows us when we meet to quietly proceed, in step, with a stranger or acquaintance, friend or family member. Protoconversation is a silent dialogue – Goleman uses the term, ‘substrate’ upon which all encounters or engagements are built. Goleman assures us that it is, ‘… the hidden agenda in every interaction’. Goleman (2007) A silent go-between if you will, which underpins and as a mode of communicating, often outlasts the manifestation of speech. One could extend this to say that protoconversation is a silent, neurokinetic conversation supported by mutual empathy - assisting a curiosity about the path ahead. Attention, albeit one that fluctuates, is paid to the task of listening to one`s partner, in the moment, using certain tools: When ‘conversing’ or when in a dance duet, (particularly those dance modes which are based on the premise of improvisation) listening - paying attention through touch to the tone or tenor of the connection with the other person, the unspoken, fleetingly glimpsed under-dialogue of the-moment-in-change is not only paramount if the conversation/duet is to last, but it also allows us to gather information about what is occuring in front of us on Goleman`s ‘substrate’ level.

So what occurs when the engagement closes? Why do people leave? What cues, like those just mentioned, are there to warn of impending closure?

In Contact Improvisation Dance, (like the name suggests there is an absence of choreography in this shared movement mode - and more of an unbridled revelry
in indeterminacy) as in a spoken conversation between two people where each must navigate uncharted waters as they go, whether they are strangers or not, sometimes one person leaves the conversation or duet; sometimes there is a tacit, unspoken moment when both parties recognise that a point of stasis has been reached and closure is imminent; Why? Are both parties simply - tired? Sometimes there may be the result of a mismatch in listening, a change in mood; Sometimes the narrative which has been self-sustaining, evolving, fluctuating through pauses (which are not in themselves necessarily inert) and bursts of intense movement, simply runs out of momentum and finds its own place to rest.

The conversers or dancers are instigators of these pathways to departure, and simultaneously, witnesses to it. Rarely though, is departure itself recognized as the instigator of the act to leave. The act of 'Leaving' itself makes no demands upon us - we are swept on regardless, in a stream of change that we cannot stop. ‘Leaving’ is a descriptor of this state which forever accompanies us. Suffice it to say, I believe that to be at peace with ‘Leaving’ requires practice when there is a suspicion that conversations, meetings and engagements are those points of purchase in the stream which inevitably, cannot last. It can be seen that perhaps within the parameters of negotiating engagements in this paper, the slide toward departure may involve something more than two people reaching an energetic impasse.]

* SL station rehearsal of reading

To close with Bergson, in The Social Psychology of Experience: Studies in Remembering and Forgetting, the authors, David Middleton and Steven Brown suggest that Bergson`s view of the world is a process which embraces a, ‘fluid continuity of the real’, (2005).
There is no doubt that for us time is at first identical with the continuity of our inner life. What is this continuity? That of a flow or passage, but a self-sufficient flow or passage, the flow not implying a thing that flows, and the passing not presupposing states through which we pass; the thing and the state are only artificially chosen snapshots of the transition, all that is naturally experienced is duration itself.
(Bergson quoted in Middleton & Brown, 2005: p.61)

I maintain then, that we are not 'beings' but time-based creatures, mediated by uncertainty through change. In this Urban Myth the interconnections which exist between indeterminacy manifesting through lived departures, ensures that there is no surcease for the roaming body in this blended continuity of the Real we call life. No secure position to be attained and held indefinitely. In this context we may find that we are interconnected through our mutual estrangement and that our engagements, conversations and connections will always be at hazard.

* The Real Life audience at intercreate.orgSCANZ Symposium

I suspect from my observations that ultimately, as indeterminants, we are always ‘Leaving’ and that this is a true descriptor of our condition in that business of being human. There is real pathos to be found in a lifetime of leaving engagements and this state will keep us forever defined by some, if not ourselves, as strangers. My opening paragraph of this paper introduces the notion of ' ... a climate of indeterminacy governing our actions which appear to prevail ...' In the end, despite our acts and accomplishments which bear witness to signal points of purchase, perhaps the only actions which truly prevail are those which draw us away. Leaving.

My last reference is a quotation from Buddha:

What is the appropriate behaviour for a man or a woman in the midst of this world, where each person is clinging to his piece of debris? What`s the proper salutation between people as they pass each other in this flood? (Buddha quoted in Human Givens Journal 2008)

References:

Allen, J. (2000). Negotiating difference or being with strangers. Thinking Space Crang and Thrift (eds). Routledge, Taylor and Francics Group, New York, (p:57)

Augé, M. (2004). non-places; introduction to an anthropology of super modernity. Verso, London. Translated by John Howe.

Bergson, H. (2005). Visualizing Experience. Henri Bergson on memory in Middleton, D and Brown, S. D. 2005, (p. 61)

Brown, D. (2007). Tricks of the Mind. Channel 4 Books, (p.186).Buddha. Human Givens. vol 14, (3) Human Givens Publishing Ltd, East Sussex, England, UK.

Buddha. (2008). Human Givens. vol 14, (3) Human Givens Publishing Ltd, East Sussex, England, UK

di Stefano, J. (2001). HUB video quoted in Video Data Bank.

Goleman, D. (2007) Social Intelligence, Recipe for Rapport, Bantam Dell, (p.30)

Hansen, M. (2006). Bodies in Code. Routledge, Taylor and Francis Group, New York. (pp:5-6 and p135).

Lye, L. & Riding, L. (1935). Movement as Language, Movement as Medium in Epilogue. Deya Majorica and London, p.231-235.

Martin-Alcoff, L. The Political Critique of Identity. The second chapter from Visible Identities: Race, Gender, and the Self.
Retrieved from: http://www.alcoff.com/content/chap2polcri.html 25.1.09

Massumi, D. (2002). Parables for the Virtual: Movement, Affect, Sensation Duke University Press, Durham & London, (p.5).

Middleton D and Brown S. (2005) (The Social Psychology of Experience: Studies in Remembering and Forgetting, (p.62).

Retrieved from: Quantum Mechanics 1925-1927 THE UNCERTAINTY PRINCIPLE http://www.aip.org/history/heisenberg/p08.htm

Wordsworth, W. (1805) The Prelude. Cambridge and the Alps, (Vl 541-2)

Mike Baker Nelson, NZ Aotearoa 6.2.09

Multi-Media Interactive 2008 'Underground'

2008-12-16T23:39:00.000-08:00

5 Performances 1 Question and Answer session

Grae Burton, Director of the Independent Theatre in Nelson NZ Aotearoa, invited me to perform/present my work over a two week period in late November and the first week in December 2008.

The performances unfolded successfully, with very positive feedback from the audiences. We had only small audiences in the first week. I carried out a lot of advertising through my own email networks and this has been helpful. However, it is all good and a welcome opportunity for me to explore my ideas in front of any kind of audience and gain a public perspective.

The performances were comprised of the following components:
Installation in the form of cafe table and chairs, DVD projection of RL videos, Second Life.com projection, active cell phones, a laptop used at the cafe table holding a web cam linked to www.camfrog.com, initially 4 then finally 5 performers. I advertised the performances in Second Life using the SL Arts Council contacts I have and other SL networks.

The site was the main theatre stage, which was surrounded on two sides by tiered seeting for 100 people. A screen effectively coverered the back of the stage, approx 5 mtrs long by 3 mtrs high. This screen held the Second Life projection. At right angles to this screen was another, smaller screen (about 2x1.5 mtrs) which held 6 of my RL dance videos on DVD. I sought collaboration from Grae Burton who runs the Theatre to perform with us, together with Jo Brown, who dances in my CI classes and works with Grae on Shakespearean projects. Fiona and I danced on stage. A storyteller and musician, Roger Sanders joined us for the final shows.

Performance Focus:

I wanted to centre the ideas-base for the performance series on 'Leaving' as mediator of our movements and relations in urban spaces. The narration and RL live dance is also based upon this aspect taken from my own research and notes.

My other principal focus was, to suggest/create an environment which addresses my stance on real/virtual realities. I have from the beginning of my Masters studies, been interested, from the perspective of my own and others` observations, that we move in and out of 'virtual' moments every day in the every day - however I am not defining these moments as virtual. I am asserting that there is no such thing. That instead, we exist in a fully immersive, mixed-reality of which these moments and 'extended' moment of the 'virtual world' of SL is simply another facet of the Real - another surface within which/upon which/against which to create a presence - and absence. Hence my involvement in the first place with Second Life as a possible ‘surface’ upon which/within which to create the works. (More of this later).

Grae Burton narrated selected writings of mine through the entire performance, as did Fiona and Jo. We created micro scenes of 'Leaving' in a 'station cafe' environment with hot paper cups of coffee, pulp magazines and cell phones. We arranged for people to text us during the performance to affirm the existence of the ether as a 'surface' within which I was implanting various communications: Second Life.Com, YouTube, the online live web cam; www.camfrog.com from a laptop on the cafe table on stage. By camera positioning in the SL station, with views from the cafe table in the corner, looking out across the station to the vid screens and crowd, I tied in the RL 'cafe' table, chairs and seated Jo and Fiona with the cafe in the SL station so one became an extension of the other.

Communication modes:

With my avatar in-life and myself and Fiona dancing on stage, I explored arriving and departing. To this end, I divided my time and physical presence between the computer - monitoring the Second Life station, talking with the avatars who had been invited to the performance in the SL station, changing the videos in the SL station using the YouTube server and creating a presence (ironically) of leaving, on the RL theatre stage. My management of avatars in the space changed through the performance series as I explored different strategies and emphases; how to increase the proactive roles of the avatars in the SL station during this performance period.

Prior to the final two performances on Friday 5 and Saturday 6 Dec, I had felt keenly, the rather ad-hoc basis from which the avatars functioned in SL during my performances. Initially, avatars had arrived in the station space and talked to one another and watched the RL videos being imported in-life and arriving on the large screens. I wanted a more pro-active role from them so I gave this some consideration and called a meeting in the SL station with two people, through their avatars - Clare Atkins PhD (Katipo Kirax) and John Waugh (Johnny Wendt) to arrive at some strategies. I had already decided to bring in three distinct phases/movement scores for the avatars in the station and Clare and John agreed that this might work well.

These movement phases were:
To place a top quality mocap (motion capture from Real Life) dance sphere in the station for avatars to click on and animate themselves. For this I selected coupled dances - ballroom, tango, waltz, slow dance so that avatars could have movement 'conversations' in the station. I did not select singles dances for their lack of engagement with another avatar in the space. After some time this phase would give way to avatars walking through the station cutout crowd as if they were commuting - leaving the station. The third phase was to have all the avatars gradually depart the station, leaving me alone in the space by the end of the performance.

This strategy seemed to work well. There was a distinct visual difference in the avatar presence and occupation of the station space as the phases unfolded. In many ways it became a fractal of what occurs in the real station as the commuter crowd begins around 5pm as a trickle, becomes a flood by 5.30pm and 6.00pm and dwindles to a few people by 6.45pm.

In the last two performances, we were joined by Roger Sanders. He is a professional storyteller and musician based in Nelson. His stories tend toward the parable/fable genre and I asked if he could write me some short ( a paragraph) stories of this nature, but adapt them to a contemporary, urban setting. My intention was to copy these into Second Life notecards and by creating a notecard dispenser (called Station Stories) in the station, avatars could click on the dispenser and receive the stories. The stories were being read by Roger during the RL performance so a conceptual and visual link was created between RL and SL. Some people behind their avatars during the performance, managed to successfully connect to camfrog.com to watch us in RL performing and themselves in the SL station on the screen. Theoretically it would have been possible to hear Roger reading the same stories they had received from the dispenser.

Now the performances are over, I will continue to add stories to the Station Stories notecard dispenser so visitors to the station will have an ongoing selection to acquire. Initially, I had had the bilboard called Station Stories already in the station inviting people to drop their stories about stations/leaving in to my avatar profile and would then post the stories. This is now possible and makes the station space a little more interactive for visitors.

My structuring of the performances evolved as we progressed through them. Every one was slightly different, based upon structured improvisation. I had wanted to present a sequence of rehearsals as the performances and workshop my ideas in front of an audience, enrolling them in some of the problem-solving and receiving real-time feedback. Unfortunately, this was not possible as some of the performers were not confident with this approach. I mean to explore this direction next year together with endnote performances because for me it signifies and validates my process of exploration with my concepts and practice in a way that 'final' performance/installations do not.

So I created a structure which underpinned our movements in and around and out of the space, with spoken words, dance and projection. My thinking with Fiona for our dance presence on the RL stage was to create three short improv phrases or scenarios based upon 'the Stranger', the Friend and the Lover. As we worked through these during the early performances it was not working well enough for me. There was insufficient clarity of differences expressed between the three. We created them differently each time but there was something missing from their expressed intent. I am dealing with apparently everyday, inconsequential events shared between people in the form of 'missed conversations' due to the prevailing process of our constantly departing a series of moments with which we are inconclusively involved. The phrases were short, only about a minute in duration, some 20 or 30 seconds where, after we broke away, (sometimes there was no physical contact at all) I would leave - to return to the computer, so this was working well but the nature of our dancing connection was either too melodramatic or too non-commital. So I divided our dance time into two activities. In the first I would execute a slow roll across the stage to cooincide with the Duende Roll DVD in Second Life and the reading of Duende referenced text. After this Fiona and I carried out a longer, 'Stranger' movement exploration which began tentatively, progressed through a clumsy, edgy, longing-for-but-ultimately-dysfunctional conversation moment. This was followed by a longer, 'Lover' connection which worked more successfully with the longer time to develop the conversation between us. We were more relaxed, the movements better defined and articulated as a sequence which, although obviously intimate, was going nowhere with a final departure.

I filmed with two cameras every performance except (unfortunately) the last, which I felt was the best! I will edit these and post them on my blog/have them available on DVDs. The lighting in the theatre was very subdued so a certain amount of the performance will be a little difficult to see.

Last Wednesday, I ran another QandA session which was open for the public to come in and talk with me. This was useful because it enabled me to put in place some idea-development in the SL station and talk to the people who came in. Limited numbers meant that I had more time to work than on the last occasion at the Momentum Gallery at Equilibrium in October. Because I was performing under the auspices of Multi-Media Interactive 2008 Underground put on by the Independent Theatre I had left the advertising up to them. The poor publicity up to this point prompted me to take matters into my own hands and advertise what I was doing at the Nelson Arts Council, Wild Tomatoes magazine in Nelson and the Nelson Mail and to send out emails over my own performance networks. The reviewer for the Nelson Leader is currently writing a short review. So for the last two shows we had nearly a full house. All good. The feedback from the public has been encouraging re these final shows. I had printed copies of my Abstract summary as handouts for the audience as well. This either went right over people`s heads or prompted an enthusiastic, interested response.

A Facet of the Real?

2008-11-08T00:56:00.000-08:00

A Facet of the Real?

2008-10-31T14:10:00.000-07:00

I will need, once again, to defer my discussion of the Stranger within the context of ‘Leaving’ as catalyst. I have a number of video clips to show both in and out of the Second Life Station before I move on to that topic, which I see as central to this project as a whole.

On Wednesday, 22 october 08 I carried out my second public presentation of the Second Life, Wellington Railway Station. The images included here are stills in the Station from the presentation day. The first image is a copy of the poster I made to advertise the event in both Real and Second Life. It is a composite of RL and SL images included here as a visual fractal of my stance toward the notion of blended realities. (*Please click on the images to enlarge).

The Location

The setting for this presentation was a small gallery, Momentum, a part of 'Equilibrium, Advanced Chiropractic Centre' in Church St, Nelson, NZ Aotearoa. I gratefully accepted the invitation to 'exhibit' here, there being a broadband connection and it also meant that I could move in for the day; in fact, my presentation lasted from 10am - 4pm. I data-projected the Second Life screen straight from our laptop (Mac Powerbook) onto one of the central walls. Seating for the audience/public was to either side with the addition of mats on the floor in the front. During the day I anticipated that I would have time to continue working in the Station, in between visitors. At 10am I received the first visitors and I had a constant turnover without a break until 4pm. The gallery was often filled to capacity with more people standing by the door. I had no time to record my process or the event in either RL or SL. I spent this time intensively balancing this mixed or blended reality, with questions and discussion occurring unrelentingly in both RL and SL spaces. I wanted the two descriptions of RL and SL - as one blended reality - to extend our perceptions of space and time in a public venue and to recieve responses related to this aspect. I have been intent on (hence my internet blog) presenting my research/practice as a developmental process to the public since I began this programme of study. I am interested in promoting discussion and critical discourse on all aspects of my work in a public arena and I saw this event as an ideal opportunity for this to take place, concurrent with the Nelson Arts Festival 2008. I am very grateful to Graeme Burton, Director of the Independent Theatre in Nelson (the premises next door) for coming in and videoing the event on two occasions through the day. I will be editing the footage for this blog soon.

My aims for this presentation were several:

First, I wanted to create a public forum for my work. I see this as being necessary from the point of view of the performer in the description of myself as artist.

Initially I considered carrying out a series of live, improvised sketches during the presentation but I abandoned this idea after realising the extent of the challenge required in resolving the dual roles. I could not adequately dance, carry out a meaningful dialogue with both audiences and move my avatar - but I am still considering this problem for future events. Although seated behind a computer, I see myself in this situation as a performer/guide, establishing a link, together with my Second Life self, for the assembled audience between Real Life and Second Life. However, my stance was not one of linking the real and the virtual. My task for this presentation was to suggest to the audience that in fact we were faced with the ingredients of a blended reality. I maintained that Second Life and my station was simply another facet of the real. That virtual perception/moments occur for us on a regular basis on any given day and that this encounter with the ether-made-visible was simply a more formal manifestation of this occurrence. Through discussion/presentation with the audience on this aspect there was general agreement that this interpretation of the perception of the Real could be accurate. Most people tended to skim over their barely witnessed virtual moments so it was a new experience to be faced with a captured, sustained virtual/real experience. Although agreement was reached, (discourse on this subject, not agreement, was my objective) conclusions about this aspect were not definitive.

Second, I wanted to expose an audience to my station simulacrum with streaming RL videos.

This aspect is related and an integral part of the aspect discussed above. I had just succeeded in obtaining the necessary permissions on the land for this to take place and I wanted to obtain feedback on the presence of the projected Real Life videos in the Station. Was there a more even balance existing now between the two states of RL and SL, with the addition of the videos? Did this more effectively imply a state of blended reality than a dual layering of the real and the virtual?

I have been building the Station with the deliberate intention of bringing in my RL videos for the last four months. So to some extent, the Station environment now containing these videos becomes (and became on the day) a proving ground for my concepts and dance practice. The Station has been viewed extensively by some people in SL over the past few months and has received enthusiastic responses. But until the presentation no-one had seen the videos in the Station. Ultimately, the experiencing of Second Life is still so new to most people, (it is significant that those people I know locally who are in SL for any length of time become very quickly, fully immersed in the SL experience and perceive it as a real space/time place) that the chasm between the RL video footage and the perception of the SL space as a naturally-occurring environment may be too great for an audience to bridge on the first viewing. I consider what I am doing is to introduce the first glimpse of a process of immersive experience which itself, is as compelling and equal to that of any other experience in Real Life, but that this could be a sequentially-integrated perceptually-based encounter.

To get back to my videos in the Station - I am very interested in their addition to the SL Station space. Energetically they have introduced a quite different kind of presence in the space. I have as yet, to decide what I want from them in the space. The mere fact of their existence in the Station is interesting but I think I am pursuing something more - I want something more from them. Whether this is a symbiotic relationship with the cutout crowd or a contrasting relationship where the videos play an interventionist role (like we as dancers have done in the RL Station) in the space I am not yet sure.

At this stage I have not manipulated the video screens very much but I intend to explore ways in which the RL movement can be blended with the static forms/screens/cutouts in the station to create a mixed visual panorama of feeling.

Despite the fact that the videos are being played on two-dimensional screens, I observe that although they are now removed from Real space/time (through video/edit) their essential characteristics defined by seamless three-dimensional movement which lies at the heart of their visual construct, they have retained these movement-based qualities which we associate with Real Life. These essential qualities separate them significantly from the SL cutouts and screens, which although essentially similar in their original visual signature (movement-based), have assumed a more static state energetically, based on passive two dimensional visual constructs. I am not sure at this stage whether I want to bring the two closer together or keep them apart.

During the course of the coming weeks I will be examining both compositional scenarios:

I am currenly investigating the visual effects of a) keeping the RL screens separated from the SL crowd, b) embedding the RL screens more subtly in the SL crowds and c) implanting the SL crowd cutouts with the RL texture which allows the RL video clips to play on that object/surface. This way I hope to erode, break up the RL video by scattering the projection through the components of the crowd. *(See the image immediately above). The advent of bringing my RL video footage into the Station now allows me to explore more specifically my ideas using the SL Station as a strategic perceptual and compositional device. This stage is significant because it directly affects my physical management of my concepts referring to the subliminal nature of witnessed moments in a Real Life crowd and how we are interpreting this through our dance. Do I want the dance separated away from the crowd, in a corner? Do I want the dance realised as a moving mote within the crowd stream? I will continue to explore both avenues.

Although they are both based on three-dimensional illusion, the videos may remain as videos projected onto screens and the cutouts may remain - as cutouts. A possibility does exist to animate the cutouts, but judging by the other animated cutouts I have seen this will still only create a moving, shaped two-dimensional screen.

For me there is more evidence of 'conversations' taking place here in the juxtaposed combinations of the RL and SL compositions. There may also be 'missed conversations' in evidence. At this stage it is still quite new and I will need time to reflect upon what I am constructing. Initially I was only able to bring in one video at a time into the Station, but I have just divided the Station concourse into three areas. This means that instead of uploading just one video into the station I can upload three different videos. When any avatar walks into that particular area and activates 'media' the video uploaded into that area will begin to play for them. The video then plays on all the screens with the designated texture/image (image of myself and Fiona with her hand over my eye). The avatar can stay in that area and watch any/all of the screens by using the camera controls. As soon as the avatar walks away from that area into another area, the video selected for that area will play. I have only just put this in place so will work with it for a while and then I may change the designated areas.

Third, I wanted to explore the possibility of a dialogue occurring between the RL audience around me and the SL crowd of avatars in the Station.

Both crowds had received the same poster, advertising the event in RL and SL. The novelty value of Second Life for those seeing it for the first time is profound, so many questions from a public audience address general SL issues and this can become a distraction from specific aspects. During my presentation a wide variety of questions came up and were discussed, eg: the benefits and inherent dangers of intensive and longterm immersion in online world/games like SL and general internet/computing for children and adults. The subject of online education modes came up; Efest, virtual learning and its effectiveness compared to learning in established RL norms of institutionalized (and non) learning modes and other issues. We spent some time debating the question of 'reality' after I asked 'What is Real?'. This reached a serious/humorous point when the avatars in the Station accused the RL audience around me of being the ones who were 'virtual'. Of course from the point of view of the avatars/people in the Station who were sitting at computers in Portugal, Montana, Wellington, Auckland, the UK and Holland, the people surrounding me were virtual. 'Where you stand determines what you see', but also how you percieve what you see - seeing and understanding - subjective solutions to negotiating our respective realities. In relation to this aspect, in my next public presentation I will make a point of focussing upon issues related to my work in SL and if there is time, I may open this up to general questions and topics.

Fourth, I want to investigate with this current work, the extent to which I may be able to extend the parameters of technological/media communication within the context of space/time presentation.

Virtual space and time I believe, is a facet of real space and time. I want(ed) the two descriptions of RL and SL - as one blended reality - to extend our perceptions of space and time in a public venue and to receive responses related to this aspect. As I mentioned above, the people behind the avatars in the SL Station were scattered around the globe, which immediately brings up the interesting notion of a (albeit limited) world-audience. *(The image immediately above has captured myself and Sioux Scribe, my AUT Masters supervisor, in the Station looking at the videos) I am interested in developing an RL/SL real-time blend here though, (allowing for the fact that with any video/edit there has already been a removal from Real Life real-time ) with a strategic presence of one in the other, otherwise I am concerned that it could become akin to passively watching a television broadcast rather than an active encounter in real space/time.

Finally, I will be examining all of the above and prioritising my activities so that I am not endeavouring to take on too many questions and investigative directions!