Date: Wed, 3 Apr 2002 16:11:03 +0200
From: sher doruff

yes, Johannes, a delight to meet you after having read so many of your texts
over the years. i am eager to continue with a project proposal. i have had an email from orm and he is also very interested and suggests we begin thinking about content. i've been very busy since
returning and have had little time for interesting discourse. i hope things clear up a little by next week. how did the sunday meeting go at the conference? are groups being formed? i'm certain all our time
is limited but i had a very inspiring few days in nuremberg. we do have the offer from steim to use their facilities if we have a need for studio space.
ciao,
sher

Fri, 05 Apr 2002 10:40:39 +0200
From: sher doruff

hi johannes,
strange. i did send a lengthy mail with orms' correspondence copied in.
so anyway, yes, it was a wonderful to meet and talk with you. a highlight of the conference for me. i am keen to begin with some concepts for dresden. orm and i have had some contact and i will again paste in his questions and info. i've been consumed with problem solving in the masters program we're setting up for september here's what orm and i discussed, i will try my best to be consequent about further correspondence with you. once again, so glad we had the opportunity to meet.
best,
sher

>>>>
hi orm,
thank you for your email which is an incentive in itself to
correspond and evolve some content ideas for a project. i'm
particularly interested in what you call your strength in creating
acoustic space(s) with temporal shifts. what strikes me initially is the convergence of
perceptual nuance in physical space that may (or may not) be
somewhat changed by another space. that space might be a 'middle
space' (virtual space) or it may be another remote physical
location(s). i'd be interested in transmitting the qualities of
spatialization you work with to another space in some way. this would
need much discussion but it could be quite an interesting research.
my work in the past few years has been limited by my involvement in a
software r&d project. i still do interactive performances, these days
with visuals mostly, in dance contexts or as collaborative
visualizations with composers and ensembles. in the eighties i worked
as a sound designer with dance companies in new york. so my
background is varied and interdisciplinary.
let's keep in touch about this. i'll have a bit more time next week.
i would very much like to work with you on a concept.
rushing now,
all the best,
sher

>Hello Sher,
>
>I hope you arrived well and without being too tired in Amsterdam.
>
>It took me quite some time to come back to normal after those
>strenuous days in Nürnberg. In addition, this event gave me a lot to
>think about my future plans regarding intermedia work and such.
>
>In general: My conclusions are that despite the obvious difficulties
>of any kind of collaboration (nearly no discussion of content yet,
>different background, mainly a mediated way to keep in touch), I'm
>still interested and curious about what might develop.
>
>I'm contacting you as I would like to find out about your thoughts.
>
>To be more specific: As far as I understood, you were interested
>in some sort of collaboration which explored some communicative
>situation/setup -maybe simultaneously in different locations- over
>some period of time.
>
>In order to get going I propose a twofold approach: On one hand we try
>to find a way to deal with what I would call "content", meaning the
>perspectives and aesthetic goals of our work. On the other hand we
>have to find a "form" of the collaboration, regarding both, the
>organisation and the work itself.
>
>As we don't know each other very well, I'll first give you a short
>summary of my background as you might find some "stubs" to connect to.
>After that is a short statement about my perception what I think I
>could offer. Of course this information is of a very general character
>and is intended as a starting point only (you could very well doubt it
>speaks about content at all).
>
>
>1. Content:
>
> Background:
>
> I had a thorough classical training in music composition from
> Renaissance Music (having done extensive research on 15th century
> counterpoint with Gösta Neuwirth) to Contemporary Music (Helmut
> Lachenmann), as well as studying the humanities (musicology with
> Carl Dahlhaus, communication science, art history, sociology and
> philosophy). From 1996-2001 I was head of the Institute of
> Contemporary Music of the Hochschule der Künste in Berlin.
>
> On the other hand classical music is a second hand experience after
> having played in New Wave Bands in my youth and loosely being
> associated to the so-called "Geniale Dilletanten" scene of Berlin
> in the early 80s (Einstürzende Neubauten, Tödliche Doris, etc.). I
> think that accounts for the fact that despite the recognition I
> already got in the classical field (prizes and such), I still feel
> like "sitting between the chairs".

> My input:

> I think my strength lies in the creation of acoustic spaces, with
> some concern to the shaping of time (in contrast to the general
> idiom of sound installations) and a more or less intimate knowledge
> of computer systems with regard to computer music and music dsp in
> general.


>2. Form

> Artistical:

> What I can see now is some sort of exhibition space, which enables
> each of us to bring input from our respective fields. I already got
> some ideas on how to do that but would like to wait for your answer
> first.

> Organisational:

> Not that many ideas yet. I think, we're stuck with email contact
> and occasional meetings. A lot probably depends on whether the
> forum gets support. If they get money, we have to come up with some
> specific ideas, though and therefore I would like to be prepared.


>So far with my proposal. Now my questions to you:

>I got the idea, you have quite some competence in how to find ways to
>make people cooperate artistically in the net. Maybe that could be a
>starting point. But I would also like to know, whether you would like
>not only to moderate or instigate, but actively participate as an
>artist in this project. In addition I would like to learn something
>about your artistic work so far.

>It would be nice to get some response that you have received my mail
>even if you don't have time to answer all my questions.
>All the best,
>Orm

>P.S.: Did you already contact Tom Demeyer about the graphics and how
> did he react?

Dear Sher
>
>I am back in Ohio, I tried to write you -------
>but haven't heard back from you,
>let's get in touch soon,

>Johannes Birringer-

Sher Doruff

Date: Fri, 05 Apr 2002 20:21:06 -0500
From: Johannes Birringer

Dear Orm and Sher:

(Orm - Sher filled me in on your exchange).

I'm back in my studio in Ohio now, just finished meetings with a very
interesting visitor (theatre director), Renato Cohen, from Sao Paulo,
who showed me his work with a group of 25 "mad" people (people suffering
from schizophrenia) in an extended 4 year project he developed in which
they perform, and they are not considered in pathological terms in
Brazil or at least not in the theatre community but were well received
as performers. What I found so moving was the performance and its
content ("Gotham SP"), an extended poetic riffing and transformation on
Italo Calvino's "Invisible Cities" and all the performers acted
different roles as "Marco Polos" telling stories about the city they
imagined living in, having seen, having fantasized, things they wanted to tell about it.

I just mention this because I must strongly agree with Orm that if we
were to collaborate (and I'd like to join you two), it would have to be
an artistic plan first, based on our interest in a concept and a
content, and a technological application/experiment second.
So let me mull over the isssues Orm raises, and get back to you later
tonight./

We have until April 31 to formulate ourb project proposal, which could
then be developed at Hellerau, which i would love for you to experience.
I performed there in 1995 and 1996, and attended workshops there in
1993/94, and 1998/2000, so I know it like my backyard, and the
historical-dilapidated and disoriented space in itself is a major force
for anyone who works there and experiences the decay of time and of
utopias and catastrophes of the last century.

My background is in theatre/dance and video/multimedia performance, much
work I did in the 90s was collaborative and site specific, and closer to
the visual artworld than the theatre world, since most of my work is
very sculptural and sensitive to spatial environment and use of images
and sound and movement in such environment. i also write text a lot and
use voice in my work. Over the past years, I have investigated
interactive designs and use of interactive media in performance, most
recently telepresence in multi-sited/connected online jams.
so, more later about plans, ideas, and organisation. I would love to
work with you both, since I felt close to your energies and aesthetic
sensibilities, I think, although I don't know your work very well.
best wishes
Johannes Birringer

Date: Sat, 6 Apr 2002 13:44:51 +0200
From: Orm Finnendahl

Dear Johannes,

thanks for the mail. I also find the Calvino project very
interesting. Is there any information available online?
About the ideas and the collaboration: In the first place I was
thinking to create some sort of space for experiencing a
visual/graphic/acoustic environment with some focus on reflecting
interaction not only in a technological but also in a social
sense. This could also extend to webbased non-local situations and
such. Thus the original idea was less performance but more
installation oriented with the public being the (inter)active
part(ners).

In principle I don't object to any performance oriented approach
and/or collaboration and appreciate your initiative. My concerns are
that I'm probably quite traditional in the sense that I consider a
performance as an aesthetic artistic statement of the creators. And
the best way to come to terms with that are (probably lots of)
meetings, a permanent exchange of ideas (AND artistic examples of
those ideas to improve understanding, as the vocabulary in each of our
arts is full of cross-linked equivocies and plurivocies),
rehearsals/tests and their discussion, the development of a project,
etc. Being very open and interested in such, I don't really see, how
we can accomplish that given the amount of time until Hellerau (BTW, I
agree that the place is very special).

With the idea, to pursue an installation oriented approach first, I
tried to steal myself out of the responsibility to generate a
consistent dramaturgy/form, as this (for me, not necessarily for
anybody else!) is one of the key issues of performace and I'm quite
opinionated about it (meaning not really wanting to give it out of hand
unless I know the collaborators). In the long run, some bigger project
could result (at least those were my thoughts...).

If there's only one creator, say the choreographer, and the others are
just contributing (or being engaged), that's a different story. I
don't mind at all to give music to anybody or to develop acoustic
material for others to use (or even to misuse). I really don't care
that much, as long, as I'm not held responsible for the whole project
or the performance itself.

Those are my general thoughts.

About my work: I already got a lot done making my music go realtime
(in order to speed up prototyping in rehearsal situations and for
performances). On screen it looks promising, although in practice it's
probably a completely different story. I'm still waiting for a Linux
driver for an 8-channel soundcard to be written (the person to do it
is quite busy now, but I hope it'll be any time soon. I'm already
waiting since August last year...) and will meet an excellent double
bass player in early May to prepare some sort of performance in
Nürnberg. The material I'm working on could very well be used in our
collaboration, as it incorporates some of the structures, I was
talking about and has a strong focus on interaction (for now me and
the double bass player or Robert Wechsler and the double bass player
but in principle all other combinations (I thought of some sort of
experience space, where the audience itself controls it)).
I cc this mail to Sher, as she should be informed about the whole
progress. (Sher, did you contact Tom Demeyer?)
Yours,
Orm

Date: Sat, 06 Apr 2002 18:17:42 -0500
From: Johannes Birringer

Dear Orm and Sher

thanks for the quick response, Orm, and I of course agree with your
concerns, and was not in fact alluding to my work as a choreographer in
this case at all. I'm fully aware that the stipulation of the FORUM
is to generate projects for "interactive virtual environments," and
since the planned venues for exhibition are all digital art
festivals/expositions, naturally we will have to plan an installation
environment that can stand/last and be experienced over a duration of time.

At the same time, for me the notion of "interactivity" needs to be
very carefully addressed in its "performative dimension," and I thought
that your expertise in music/sound installation/acoustic spaces and
programming would be a wonderful collaborative dimension for Sher's work
with real time-multi-media synthesis (I am looking at Keystroke and what
it promises: ....."generate, synthesize and process images,
sounds, graphics, text, within a shared realtime environment. as an
instrument, it allows communities of players to dynamically control and
modify all aspects of digitized media in a collaborative environment........."").

I would my see my contribution in the generation of "dramaturgies" and
video/performance materials for the (community) interactions and the
content-landscapes of the installation, especially as they concern our
potential exploration on space/virtual space/remote space and what those
"entities" and imaginary spaces will come to mean or be like as
interfaces. I could also help with sculptural design and building of the
environment.

My thoughts on content for such interactive dramaturgies are below (sketch),

First I respond to your very helpful organisational approach:
>>In order to get going I propose a twofold approach: On one hand we try
>to find a way to deal with what I would call "content", meaning the
>perspectives and aesthetic goals of our work. On the other hand we
>have to find a "form" of the collaboration, regarding both, the
>organisation and the work itself.Yes, agreed.

Your structure (1) content (2) form (3) organisation is very helpful,
as far as the last item is concerned, here are time lines:
1. We discuss content and form and write a proposal by April 30.
(budget?. mmmh - production costs, fees?). Who will write up the
proposal? I will offer my help.

2. After that we develop ideas further, communicate via email and send
each other stuff.

3. summer: we meet and work together in Dresden, or Amsterdam, or any
other location. Hellerau workphase: July 13 - 28.

I am in Germany from June 24 to September 23.
we assemble the main components and configuration of the installation
and test its form and interactive dimension.
4. fall: we develop the content further, and decide upon how to
integrate (possibly) remote location(s). From September 25 on I could be
working with you from remote location online (Columbus, Ohio). I can
return for CYNET and ars electronica, if our project gets support.

****
Content:

1. you asked Sher: how to find ways to make people cooperate
artistically in the net (tele-action/telepresence)

2. you quote Sher with an interest in .....>>
some sort of collaboration which explored some communicative
situation/setup -maybe simultaneously in different locations- over
some period of time.>>

3. Sher's response: < i'm particularly interested in what you call
your strength in creating acoustic space(s) with temporal shifts. what
strikes me initially is the convergence of perceptual nuance in
physical space that may (or may not) be somewhat changed by another
space. that space might be a 'middle space' (virtual space) or it may be another remote physical location(s). i'd be interested in transmitting the qualities of spatialization you work with to another space in some way. this would need much discussion but it could be quite an interesting research.
4. My interest lies in "movement" experienced through images, voice,

small "narrative modules" or stories or "situations" that can be action
or images or sound. Such stories may or may not involve the body, but I
think I am very interested in how physical consciousness is reshaped in
digital or "virtual" environments, how people connect into these environments kinesthetically, over time.

Here are my notes:

1) I'd love to work on architectures of time (temporal shifts, delays, simultaneities, returns, emergences, mixing of spatial experiences where the virtual is not becoming real but already real but different, a passage from one state to another, a constant differentiation, dynamic, uncertain, catastrophic....). The virtual does not have to be realized, it is already somewhere else;
philosophically speaking, this morphogenesis or emergence implies for me that a virtual installation does not realize something that's already preformed or preexisting. it thus cannot involve "choreography".
[nor, let me add, am I very interested at all in "triggering" and what I have seen Robert's company do with Eyecon, in fact I want to have nothing to do with it]

2. On the other hand, we might have to discuss what we mean by "installation" (as a physical space to be walked through/navigated) in an exhibition, and how this notion of installation is expanded or changed by a real time connection with other spaces (via internet) or by a real time DSP process that constantly changes or differentiates the incoming signals (from the net or another location, be these signals video, audio, graphics or text).

3. Following the logic of interactive and live webbased interaction, I don't see how we can build an installation. Sher, what do you think?
However, our concept for a virtual environment could be based on the notion of acoustic-virtual spaces and image-spaces that are experienceable in more than one location since these "events" are transmitted and thus always unfolding.

4. From a practical point of view, we cannot make an exhibition in which we are performing with others across the net for a long duration, can we?

[Sher: Drazen Pantic wrote me about the "Translocal" project, saying...."Part of the project that will deal with dance and movement is going to be built around Groove Machine, a platform developed by HP. Groove is built around genetic algorithms, that synthesize (through reduction of dimension technique) collective data taken from dancers through wireless devices.."" http://www.location1.org/wiki/drazen/Trans-Local

If you look at their project description you will see that it is almost entirely technical-organisational, and not content based as far as I can tell. The technical schema ('" building a many-2-many communication channel that seamlessly integrates activities in the physical space with various types of Internet exchange (video-conferencing, streaming, text-based messages) and cable TV networks") is fuzzy as to how Translocal understands audience interaction and social interaction in the linked spaces, and perhaps it's intended primarily for artist interaction.

5. This raises the question how we understand our plan for an "interactive virtual environment." (for social interaction).
I don't think it should be something like the musician-system, dancer-system (Blue lab) demonstration we saw in Nuernberg Saturday night, I thought both interrelationships were thoroughly uninteresting and poorly conceived.
Rather, I propose that we construct an environment (local site) that can be experienced by an audience in different and differing ways over a duration, as they enter into the imaginary spaces we mix, designing both a "dramaturgy" or architecture for the mixed realities while allowing the uncertain and unexpected to happen.

The latter part (if that involves signals coming from a remote site) is not clear to me, since I have not worked with random webcams or installed webcams but only with partners in remote locations who carry out a "scripted" stucture for interaction.

6. I propose that we all think about such a scripted structure for interaction that could unfold in ways we cannot predict within the unstable system we set up. Or we program the events that might happen over time more carefully to have aesthetic directions become sensible.

Above all, at the beginning, I'd suggest we think about what kind of space we want to build -- is it a plastic space (sculptural) involving videoprojected textures, what kind of textures, and what kind space is evoked through sound and images and voices....... and is this a space in which the visitor can meditate, relax, or play, or discover, or be transported, or be made to feel anxious or thrilled or confronted with images that speak about bodies or landscapes or fairy tales or urban or politicized terrains, or nightmares or puzzles or labyrinths or empty highways or crowded plazas or kitchens or bedrooms or stadiums or graveyards. I think the nature of "location" is critical for a content development. Now if you think of more abstract Klangfiguren or visual paintings (Wellen/waves und Schwingungen/oscillations) - what would it be like to construct an environment that deals with patterns or dynamic transformations from a plastic or abstract transparent form point of view?

I send you 2 images from Gego's room size Reticularea installation (1969, Caracas) and her "drawings without paper," (attached), leave you, wondering how a visitor could move/behave in such a "net" or weave form?? I found them beautiful. and one image from my last telepresence interaction (string duets), where one participant interacts with an object (string) while remote performer responds and a dialogue ensues.
How would we hear the music/sound in our installation, and how would the visitor interact with it or the space it generates and re-generates?
with regards
Johannes Birringer

[images attached, gego and string duet]

Date: Mon, 08 Apr 2002 17:39:44 +0200
From: sher doruff

hi johannes, orm,

been trying to find time to concentrate on this for the past three
days with little success. i do beg your forgiveness. unusually busy
and chaotic period. actually began a long response to your last post
johannes but lost it due to untoward circumstances. sigh. one
tangential remark: the dinner party research went off very well with
all the kinetics working. a lovely feast was shared by all, replete
with storytelling, a magician and the magnificent wine pouring
device. good fun, good food and an interesting telepresence
experience.

i had an involved response to your earlier questions but i think i'll
just pick up from this most recent concept. it seems we are moving
towards a physical space installation which in earlier postings was
thought to be too complicated for our short process. i think your
basic sketch is a good one johannes and not so difficult technically.
that's important because it will be possible to concentrate on the
content and nuance the transformative effect. i've worked with
multiple (layered) screens and projectors before and it gives an
analog feel to overlay, quite different from transparency levels.
also let's you play with scale which can be interesting.
best to first decide if the spaces are proximate or remote. if they
are rooms within the same building it's simpler to realize and could
be viewed as a prototype research for a remote piece on a similar
theme.

i quite like the idea of generative sound/ image ecologies.
evocative/provocative landscapes that shift with some form of of
presence. loose translations of heisenberg's uncertainty principle.
what is the relationship of a person(s) in the space. perhaps be
interesting to take properties of acoustic relationships which is
part of orms work and apply them to image and presence. also like the
notion of three dimensional transparency; spatial representation
(knowledge built upon spatial consciousness). there needs to be an
element of liveness in the installation for it to be truly dynamic so
i would limit the amount of prerecorded material.

anyway, i'm enthusiastic about working with both of you. i have a few
speaking engagements in the next weeks which require me to put some
documentation together on recent work so hopefully, i'll have
something to show you.

as to the project timeframe: i have the possibility to be in dresen
in july although it was scheduled as my holiday. the bigger problem
for me is september/october when i'm busy not only with my waag work
but the new masters program i'm setting up with scott. just running
up the danger flag as i can't commit 100% at this moment.
sorry this took so long, hope we can come up with a workable concept.
all the best,
sher

Date: Tue, 09 Apr 2002 01:07:04 -0400
From: Johannes Birringer


dear Sher, Orm;

thanks for your reply, Sher, and I was sorry to learn that your first
draft/letter got lost, and that you didn't mention to us that the
dinner part was already taking place..... it sounds great. where were
you physically, and where were the "other" guests in Canada? and how
were the sites linked (how did you see each other)?

Response:

(1)
>>>> it seems we are moving
towards a physical space installation which in earlier postings was
thought to be too complicated for our short process. >>>
I am open to anything, if you both feel we should try an online/virtual
environment, that'll be fine, but I assume that there still needs to a
real site. (and I was thinking pragmatically, for the exhibitions to come)

<<<<i think your basic sketch is a good one johannes and not so difficult technically.
that's important because it will be possible to concentrate on the
content and nuance the transformative effect. i've worked with
multiple (layered) screens and projectors before and it gives an
analog feel to overlay, quite different from transparency levels.
also let's you play with scale which can be interesting.
best to first decide if the spaces are proximate or remote. if they
are rooms within the same building it's simpler to realize and could
be viewed as a prototype research for a remote piece on a similar
theme.>>>>Yes, quite so. I think I was assuming that we could test the prototype
as a realsite event, with possibly input from the internet/remote sites,
but I assumed that if we interface in real time with remote site, this
interface would have to have performative event-character, could be done
on an evening/weekend, but not for durée (unless the incoming signals
are from a permanent-stationary webcam or something of this sort). I
assumed, thinking of Orm, that such dependency on incoming signals could
not go over well with his intricate ideas for music/sound. I assume Orm
would want to have a certain programming control over what is heard and
will unfold acoustically. I also assumed that we are interested in
acoustic and plastic space and how it changes?

So let us hear from Orm, how he imagines the "space" and connection to
possibly a remote/other space.

(2) >>>i quite like the idea of generative sound/ image ecologies.
evocative/provocative landscapes that shift with some form of of
presence. loose translations of heisenberg's uncertainty principle.
what is the relationship of a person(s) in the space. perhaps be
interesting to take properties of acoustic relationships which is
part of orms work and apply them to image and presence. also like the
notion of three dimensional transparency; spatial representation
(knowledge built upon spatial consciousness). >>

Yes, very good. I wish i could share with you my current rapt reading
of a new book by architectural philosopher Sandford Kwinter, a book that
is entitled "Architectures of Time" (Towards a Theory of the Event in
Modernist Culture, MIT Press) and which I just bought on Saturday, it is
a study of science and art in early 20th century modernism, deals with
notions of dynamic time which are quite wonderful in the context in
which we were thinking lately. He actually doesn't speak of
architectures as fixed objects anymore, but calls them "technical
objects, with interactive complexity (nonlinearity)"

>>>there needs to be an
element of liveness in the installation for it to be truly dynamic so
i would limit the amount of prerecorded material.>>yes, and what is this element of liveness? performance images generated in remote site?

audience actions generated in both sites? our actions?
operators input actions and thus a live dimension on the level of the
inframedia (and live synthesis - but where are, on the video side, the
live images being capture from, and how does this match our content
architecture - as we will develop the latter?)
[as to live feed - I am assuming, all the while, that we will be online
and have internet access cables, although that was never the case in
previous years, but I assume they will provide this now in Dresden)
So we soon need to start talking concretely about "content" and musical
/spatial ideas, and filmic ideas/camera ideas. ****

If you find it helpful, may I make a further suggestion? -and I invite
your input or other proposal, Orm, need to see how you feel about SPACE.In my mind today I thought of the project working title "East by West,"
a slight corruption of a Hitchcock title. I am refering to the
possibility, which we could propose to FORUM, to construct a double
installation, in the east and the west wing of the Festpielhaus
Hellerau. The are identical in size, since the whole building is a
rigorous symmetrical "technical object".

(see attached raw sketch I drew from the whole area and building, and a
precise building plan/groundfloor, you see the two basins, I yellowed
them, and drew imaginary triangles in them, to disrupt the
symmetry/rectangle).

Need to use a 3d drawing software.
The two basins are wonderful spaces, the west one is very very raw, not
used often, the other one was quite dilapidated too, but the east one is
now fixed up, cleaned, can be locked, and is secured from rain dropping
through the ceiling. Both have stone walls and floors and ceiling. They
are strong spaces.

They are also too large to use as an all around installation (for
video), even though the whole basins would interest me for the acoustics
(Orm). However, within the larger east and west basins, I can imagine us
building two smaller installations that could become "chambers",
imaginary spaces, woven nets, paperhouses, igloos, tents,
inter-connected, one one east, one on west side, each side/location
influencing the other, and the audience could walk from one to the
other, and audience actions/behavior in one would be seen/experienced
in the other, and vice versa, and such behavior would affect sound and
images in both side, unpredictably, and thus the relations are never
stable and always shifting.....

This is a raw idea. Content: It is nearly impossible (in
Hellerau/Dresden) not to think of east/west as an ideological
denotation, but I would wish to shift (and transform, evolve) resonances
that are not political, primarily, but cultural, experiential,
geographical, tonal/vocal, subtle, subliminal. I am interested in the
various languages and gestures in the new/larger EU with its crossing
axes, migrations, exchanges, holes, gaps, conflictions. Small images
could suffice, hintings. also the notions of portals, one landscape
being entered by others, of the other becoming the other... time
machines?

what do you think? Now, this prototype could be installed for CYNET
without doubt. For other venues one could then transcode the prototype
into a one-site location installation, interfaced with remote site in
the east / north/ south.

(partners in other countries). I have contacts to USA, Canada, Brazil,
Slovenia, Bulgaria, I am sure you all have connections, western Europe,
Scandinavia, USA, India? Japan? We could thus internationalize the
project.

also it would interest me to deconstruct fixed notions of what "east"
and "west" (cultural geographies, 21st century) are, and of course we
don't have to think of complicated gestures, something like the meal
you mentioned could already be an interesting example of how something
can shift, how something in one location can change when a different
energy (information) courses through the 'system" and produces
ASYMMETRICAL effects.

The asymmetry (in Hellerau) would interest me a great deal.

with regards
Johannes

images attached: building plan Hellerau east/westwings

Date: Mon, 08 Apr 2002 03:58:10 -0400
From: Johannes Birringer


Orm, I forgot to answer your questions re: Renato Cohen's work with the
"mad" people (Gotham SP), it's not on a website, but he showed video
footage of it, and I was very moved by the piece. It was done in a
theatre but with unusual architecture, a long sand corrridor, almost 60
meters, on which all the Marco Polos arrived to "report to the King",
and then they retreated along it again. Some played fantastic
characters, like they imagined themselves when reporting on the cities
(Batman, Taxidriver, angel, a prophet, an opera singer, Enigma, a mummy
from below the earth, etc)..........I find these role playings very
suggestive.

there were also 4 or 5 other locations in the space used simultaneously
(ground level and upper levels, simply foregrounded by shoft of
lighting), and audience was seated facing each other (and up three
tiers) across the sand corridor, a configuration as they often have it
at La Mama in new york. Music was played live by a small band, directed
by a well known brasilian composer/pianist. An idea:
following up on what I wrote yesterday, about dynamic time
levels/transitions and shifts and flows, I am becoming interested in
asking whether -- if you write generative/transformative and evolving
music - whether Sher and could imagine such transformations in terms of
shifting localities of image projection or image space, almost as if we
could let the images travel through a space. Secondly, I'd be interested
in using two projectors on the same field/part of the space, creating
possible overlaps in different scales that allows a film within film,
stream within/against stream.

That would allow us to create films of a more abstract or architectural
nature that could function as landscapes (seemingly "present" in
duration, long durée, like geological time, sedimented time). while live
real time streams from the web or in live mixing could be interpolated,
with human characters, figures, animations, over/through/into the
landscape? This goes back to my question of possible three-dimensional
transparency, raised in my reference to Gego's Reticularea (weave/nets
in space)

best
Johannes Birringer

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