from our discussion

All the things we talked about:

going to marion prairie on tues... drawing names and creating a word association bio for that person... maybe sending this and an item that is important to that person in a snail mail package (this would arrive at the completion of the project)... giving them the address to our blog so they can see what we have been doing and/or creating a blog with them... i think that was everything...

i totally forgot to post the words, that is, until now.

mine

trace, path, MOVEMENT, space wind existance time route lines curves trail reveal follow web slack tension string memory travel RECORD

hers

standing looking listening watching noticing feel sound touch MOVEMENT interaction through in within between across around writing RECORDING witness examine

-Z

walk

20 words about my project (Leann)

1. rhythm


2. texture


3. sound


4. temperature


5. hardscape


6. eyecatching


7. organic


8. shape


9. form


10. function


11. groundplane


12. meticulous


13. pattern


14. tabue


15. letters


16. nonexistant


17. apparent


18. reaction


19. emotion


20. memory

20 words about Barbara's project:

1. whispers


2. wind


3. snifflers


4. document


5. selective


6. rhythm


7. temperature


8. outside


9. levels


10. unnoticed


11. sense


12. awareness


13. place


14. collaboration


15. speed


16. softness


17. visual cues


18. constant


19. human


20. natural

String and Surroundings

1.stillness
2.balance
3.left
4.right
5.uneven
6.walking
7.pausing
8.within
9.parrallel
10.schedule
11.following
12.forward
13.sidewalk
14.sidewalk
15.heads
16.bodies
17.stopping
18.string
19.whimsical
20.tracking

Zac

Starting with our beginning point, he unwinds the string slwly. Leading himself down the stairs, and outside through the door. He winds the large ball of yarn around of signs, sidewalks, and across the small road. People don't seem to notice. It twists needlessly around patches of grass. It reminds me of blind exercises or a fairytale something that is : odd, useless, and nessesary. The string is secure enough to return the holder to whence he came.


1.unwinding
2.stairs
3.down
4.outside
5.string
6.around
7.leaves
8.across
9.sidewalks
10.pausing
11.standing
12.stopping
13.holding
14.beside
15.opens
16.clothes
17.tangles
18.paths
19.knots
20.up


Leusa

As people leave the building, they adjusted themselves to walking outside again. You can tell those who move on a schedule because immediately they lead themsleves , so go forward moving there bodies then their heads. Others immeadiately adjust on a diagonal, left or right, sometimes pausing. Most people don't look around, others look about carelessly as they orient themselves to the space. the string twists and floats on wind, wound around posts and across the road. It seems as though people don't notice it or they choose to ignore it. Either way it is strange. Whimsical, like a fairytale. I try to make myself perfectly still and adjust my body to itself. My left side is more delicate than my right side, however, both, feet refuse to stay pefrectly on the ground. I notice my body continues to move within.

Lists of words...

Howdy. Here are the lists from class the other day:

For Zuzana:
Detritus Garbage Excess Cast-off Left-over Un-needed Un-wanted
Disregard Litter Evidence Occupation Existance Claiming Collecting
Recycling Re-assignment Re-use Re-claiming Compilation Catalog

For Me:
Texture Feel Document Scrape Slide Smooth Rough Scratch Rub
Red Crouch Approach Engage Intrude Interact Experience Impression
Landscape Friction Cooperation

Word List

Words for Peter:
touch, hand, record, device, microphone, trees, metal, wood, cement, bushes, walk, future, emphasis, care, pause, 2nd generation, sound, textures, surface, interpret

Words for me:
mark, walk, trash, rocks, twigs, people, paper, plastic, lip gloss, pen cover, land, awareness, recycling, reusing, sound, wind,
document, discard, collect, attention

Word Lists from Couple Exercise Outdoors

List A-- Leann and I together:

scritchy, scratchy, tag-along, wind-chill, camera-fail, sounds, whoosh, conversations, recorder-fail, impotence, technopoop, brail, follow, wait, listen, sleuth-like, eaves-drop, rhythms, resign, tech-failure, companionably.




Leann makes textures with scritchy-scratchy sounds. We tag-along companionably together. We follow, wait. Leann scritches her scratchy rhythms. I photograph and record. Oops. Camera quits low battery. Photo failure. Resume recording whoosh of wind, truck motor. Walking into windchill, recording eaves-drop conversaton bits of cell phone users. Sleuth-like. Oops. Recorder stops. Technopoop! Techno-impotence. I resort to braille, feeling with my fingers all the things Leann is scraping. Heading back to Haskett Hall, along a trail of string. Resigned to tech-failure, I go back to my own five senses.


List B--Leann:

paper, pencil, drawings, rubbings, textures, rough, smooth, asphalt, plants, grates, grass, tree, brick-wall, composites, busily, capturing, landmarks, fervently, non-stop, scritch-scratch, kneeling

Kneeling with paper and pencil she makes relief rubbings of asphalt and grates. Rough scritch-scratch sounds. Plants--grass and leaves--sound smoother, resemble fossil drawings. Texture rules: tree bark and brick wall. She busily captures composites of textures. Scritch-scratch, scritch-scratch, non-stop.

thursdays exploration

words:
1.experience, texture, dirt, exploration, pathway, direction, presence, design, broken, lost, integrity, bent, cold, metallic, action, scraping, reception, introvert, awareness, confusion.
2.sound, ring, entice, realization, touch, enlighten, replicate, sense, follow, lead, ambiguous, precise, involve, experience, explore, envelope, contain, replace, action, re-action.

and i'm posting the poetic writing of herbs project because i really liked it.

the sound. the ring. to entice into realization.
touch me. enlighten me. replicate what i forget.
sense the world differently. follow me. lead me.
everything is ambiguous but exquisitely precise.
involve all. experience and explore.
envelope and then contain what is.
replace my interaction. it is action we envision
and reaction we expect.

Thursday...

I had fun today with everyone...

The Black Glove

I'd like to share with you an unusual experience I had Tuesday that developed from the "silent walk" we took. During my walk with Zuzana something caught my eye: a lady's black leather glove lying palm up on the sidewalk near the gutter. I stopped and looked at it for several seconds. It appeared to be abandonned, vulnerable to passing feet. I considered picking it up but didn't because the owner might come back for it.

After class I headed to classroom services to check out a camera, and sure enough the black glove was still lying on the sidewalk in the exact same spot. After signing out the camera, I felt compelled to retrace my steps and take pictures of the glove. It had curled into a new, more self-protective position, probably from being scuffed at by passers-by. I had snapped two downward shots when a voice behind me asked, "Excuse me, is that your glove?" Surprised, I turned to face a serious-looking, tall, blond young woman. I responded that it wasn't mine, that I was just taking a few pictures. I asked her if she wanted it. She nodded, bent over and gently picked it up.

I watched her green-clad figure disappear into the direction from which I had come, the black glove held in her right hand. I felt an odd sense of relief knowing that the glove was given a second chance. In retrospect, though, I regret not asking her why she wanted it. I'm sure there was a story there somewhere.

human waste art

someone sent me this site and I thought it was really good for our class... an artistically consuming landscape...
http://www.chrisjordan.com/current_set2.php?id=7
here is an example of his work:



fun fact: that painting is what the really famous topiary garden in columbus is modeled after

what is important...

I think everyone has some great points and I see that all of us together could truly create something fantastic. However, I believe that it is necessary to understand why we are doing this. It seams as if all of us want to say something. I question the importance of an idea that we all can share. What do we all think is important? What is worth spending time, stress, and hard work on? How does this separate us from others working in this genre? Truthfully, I don’t wish to waste time making something that doesn't have any importance to me, project or not. So, is it about the environment, about our society, the cultures we all share? Can it be about the economy or governmental issues pertaining the war? What ever it may be, I ask, what do we want to say, what do we want to do, what is important to us, why do we want to share this? Despite my rather large idea of roping thousands of OSU students into doing something good for our society, I still believe that together we could really say something that resonates with all who experience what ever we create.

Check these sites out:

http://www.illegalart.org

http://www.confluxfestival.org/projects.php

h

The Big Group Project

First of all, let me say that i like the group project idea. I like the idea of building an experience or a space that includes so many people from so many disciplines. We all have alot of varied interests and this is a good way to really, um, " collaborate". I also like the idea of gathering a mass of people..however, I begin to wonder WHAT we are trying to do, and not so much where. Outdoor spaces are great of course, i think we can all agree on that...I wonder though, esp. after seeing all the artists in the symposium , people who were all trying to send their message to the world, whether it was political, or personal, they had a specific sort of..goal in mind. In thinking about the nature of the game, finite and infinite games, I wonder which one we are indeed playing.

I would like to suggest some things that have been running through my mind..I like the idea of multiple suggestions, Cris suggests a Treasure Map ( since GPS is starting to sort of began a regular mention) and then Barbara mentions the idea of wrtiing down suggestions. I am really into the idea of pooling togetehr a hatpile of thoughts, ideas, miniature games, emotions, excerises, etc. and going through them one by one. Maybe one day could be set aside for an exploration of each person's specific choice. Or say, we could list nine separte things 1. place 2. movement 3. tool 3. objective 4. documentation and build, with ourselves, a smaller scale model of the eventual " final" project"...These all just ideas of course. I was also extremely inspired by some of the noise artists that showed their work..talking, singing, screaming..expressing oneself through voice can be very empowering, and liberarting..There is a vunerability that is exposed...I know we have an excellent music school, hoever electronic noice making is also very curious to me.


Last of all, I am still really drawn to that large grassy space where Cris and I did our first project, just because it's so big and open. and its not campus...However, it doesn't get much pedestrian traffic. I am also working with the idea of small scripts and dialogues that could play played out..I have a soft spot for French cinema and avant-garde kind of fantasy pieces of pop culture nonsense..but thats just me.Public transportation, and bikes were also mentioned..

I am not entirely sure what role I could play in this project. i am still working on building models of transportable homes. Performance and documention always interest me, as well as making ..stuff!


Anyways, see you all on thursday.

I'm afraid I fit the stereotypical female at the moment with my indecisiveness and not knowing what I want...
It may just be, like mentioned by others, that I think conceptually first and then find a space that matches that idea. I think there is just a million spaces that I could chose, and since I don't have an idea in mind, it is a bit overwhelming. I prefer outside spaces, mostly because I am a landscape architecture student and the outside is where I believe people act more free and like themselves. Almost always the outside functions as either recreation or an inbetween space for transporting people to an inside destination.

I was inspired by the symposium and am drawn to political artists who do simple things to raise an awareness or make a political statement, but this may not apply to our game at all...

Right now, because of my personal uncertainty, my preferred role in the game is a documenter or mapping and analysis person. Like Cris mentioned, I am drawn to how things are represented to the second or third generations, or how you convert an idea into a physical thing or 2nd generation performance. Also, I have been trained through architecture to diagram/map and analyze, although I am definitely open to breaking away from this often times problematic habit.

im not sure how much i can be helpful to this project at its current stage. as i said i prefer to work conceptually first, at least loosely conceptual. without that guideline i cant decide one place over another.

i can say that i do have some sort of attraction to elevator spaces, although i dont know why yet. i enjoy industry and abandoned factory spaces, sprawl (urban and sub-urban) and the homogenization of modern architecture into the prefab, uniform buildings of current construction.

i guess that i can be of help in another role, whether it be involvement or documentation, and not be a part of the conceptual project.

oh, and i like bicycles

-Z

Thoughts on Group Project

During the Art/Tech Symposium Vito Acconci said that he needed to see a space first before he got an idea of what to do with it. I am having a similar reaction to our group assignment. So I have been thinking about spaces. I have two spaces that I am fond of because they seem to invite a wide variety of possible activities.

The first is the one I mentioned in class: the North Market down in the Short North. At this space we can explore inside, outside, around, up and down, and through. Functions of the space could be selected from among the following: shopping, eating, meandering, gazing, touching, smelling, hearing, tasting, as well as sitting/standing and observing.

The other is the space outside the Wexner Center including the north/south passageway, the central space with small trees, curvilinear stairs, a bit of grass, the white rectangular pillars and ledges. Typical functions of this space are sitting/loitering, cycling, skateboarding and travelling from point A to B. Of course, atypical activities or functions could be introduced.

I do not have an idea to which I am "married," so I'll just mention a possible activity we could consider in any space we choose--that of playing a "chance game" with rules, directions or prescriptions for activities determined by a roll of the dice or picking a piece of paper from a hat, etc. The directions would give an individual, or individuals, specific tasks that may or may not involve other people in the space. We might follow or converse with another, or walk, sit or stand in specific spaces where others may be present or not. There could be moments when we all congregate/disperse on a particular cue.

Some technical tools we might utilize/roles to assume: taking photographs, videotaping, giving tasks to each other by cell phone, drawing and leaving signs for each other, recording sounds, conversations, etc. with small recorders and/or pen and paper. Maybe we work together to build something (either utilitarian or abstract) within the larger space.

After experiencing the chosen space, we could find a way to gather, organize and present the various things which we recorded, shot, videoed, drew, wrote or built.

Maybe this idea is too complex, or has too many facets; but perhaps there is a seed here or there which may prompt one or more of us to create a terrific, cohesive concept.

Barbara

So, in regards to our talks last class about the group project, I find it interesting my reaction to small spaces with random people. And I think it would be interesting to examine myself and the reactions I might have when placed into such situations. But honestly I don't see this as being a group project. So as much as I tried to think of something that could be done I find that I am more drawn to the ideas of how such an experiment can be documented. For me this is more interesting than the prospect of the project itself. So depending on what others may have created I would like to concern myself with how it can be re-presented, while trying to keep the integrity of the moment.

I have found the reading from Finite and Infinite Games to be extremely interesting. The idea of life as an Infinite game is something I have thought of before, but most definitely not as thoroughly as James Carse. He has so much to say that is interestingly stated and backed up. I find myself highlighting phrases like it's my job. His words challenge my thinking and I enjoy this aspect of his writing. Anyone who can think so deeply about something I would consider quite broad, fascinates me. It is a philosophical entreaty into this idea of life as a game and being made up of games. I am quite enjoying myself.