29 August 2008
Photographs from SLQ talk
My partner, John, took some photographs of me speaking at the State Library recently. Here are a couple of them. Top is me speaking and below is Helen Cole and me having a catch up and cup of tea afterwards.
22 August 2008
Extract from my SLQ presentation, 16 August
Notes and extracts from my presentation at the SLQ on Saturday, 16 August.
As a writer-artist who works with text and narrative, I am interested in the possibilities of artist publishing. I am interested in how these media and publications can bring the personal and the public into contact, making the personal a little more exposed and the public a little more private. I only ever make small overtures to these ideas, rarely grand statements or gestures. So I do acknowledge that I am just scratching the surface and going for the obvious. I'm also defining some limits for users - this isn't a utopian, wikinomics type experience - in terms of what can be added or changed on the sites. So there are many other places you can go with Web 2.0 like Wiki and video sharing and other things.
There's also a lot of conversation happening in the background of the work. Uncovering all these materials - the map, the photographs and the tapes - has prompted conversations around the family circle. Just a couple of weeks ago, my older sister and I were driving off the Gateway Bridge at the southern end where we encountered a fairly impressive and dense array of transmission lines. My sister asked me, "Do you remember dad calling them alta linea?" Alta linea is the Italian for 'high lines'. That is probably the title I should give the project or some addition to it in the future.
The biting question is what this project has to do with artists' books. For me, it's always interesting to look at things from the outer edge. I'm not for a second suggesting that this work is an artist's book, but I do suggest that it shares some commonalities with artists' books. There is a line of flight (or several lines of flight) between them. We know they are not the same, but the boundary that distinguishes them is quite unclear. And there's been quite a lot of literature that talks about tendencies in artists books and publishing. At a Mackay Artists' Book Forum a few years ago, Sydney-based artist Nola Farman talked about the 'fugitive'. And for me that's a exhilaratingly uncertain and rebellious space to inhabit. So I think, in these electronic spaces, we're really exploring multiple literacies, perhaps fugitive literacies. And there is even more literature about the question of digital literacies. But, as Nola says in her conference paper, the narrative of the fugitive is usually unresolved. When a something (an object, subject, event) ceases to be on the run or in hiding, it ceases to be fugitive.
My sense of the work is that it doesn't - can't - stay still. It needs to be invented and reinvented. So I'm also exploring ways of developing this work as an online book using the Diffusion Generator produced by Proboscis, a UK artist group and consultancy. The eventual book will be downloadable for free. I'm also thinking about a series of prints using the photographs. There's more that can be done with elements to tell the story in many and varied ways. Or alternately, to tell different stories from the same elements.
The map is central in this project. There's an explosion of social mapping in the online world and the group I just mentioned, Proboscis, are innovators in this area and they do a lot of work with mobile media, mash ups and social media. About 20 years ago, a project I was working on organised to bring Sue Clifford from Common Ground to Brisbane. Sue was a great advocate of social mapping and exploring psycho-geography and Common Ground developed very important quilting and other community art projects that focused on mapping, environment and place. So I have had an abiding fascination with topography and cartography - having spent much time exploring postmodern theory, I was very interested in the relationships between the cartographic and trajective imaginary and narrative.
So there's a new awareness of mapping and various DIY practices of cartography which are becoming integral to our storytelling. Even the mainstream media are seeing the value with projects like ABC Earth which pegs news stories to places. The term 'neogeography' descrived the merging of user data and experiences with online mapping technologies. So really, we're just talking about a more subjective engagement with mapping and charting space and talking about the map as narrative. This relationship between map and story is what I am exploring.
My family often recalls our lives as an itinerary. First we lived here, then worked there, then moved elsewhere. Much of that was, of course, framed by my father's working life. This project gives you a way into that.
Transmission Lines Presentation
I really enjoy this Web 2.0 environment - it's been described as 'an attitude, not a technology' - and I really enjoy social networking, content sharing, user-generated content and crowd sourcing. Recently, I was reading a call for papers for a journal that speculated that Web 2.0 is more like a topology than an attitude or a technology. Topological in this context means "repeated production of selfsame space via variation". For me, it's also trajective in the sense that John Rajchman discusses.View more presentations from linda carroli.
As a writer-artist who works with text and narrative, I am interested in the possibilities of artist publishing. I am interested in how these media and publications can bring the personal and the public into contact, making the personal a little more exposed and the public a little more private. I only ever make small overtures to these ideas, rarely grand statements or gestures. So I do acknowledge that I am just scratching the surface and going for the obvious. I'm also defining some limits for users - this isn't a utopian, wikinomics type experience - in terms of what can be added or changed on the sites. So there are many other places you can go with Web 2.0 like Wiki and video sharing and other things.
There's also a lot of conversation happening in the background of the work. Uncovering all these materials - the map, the photographs and the tapes - has prompted conversations around the family circle. Just a couple of weeks ago, my older sister and I were driving off the Gateway Bridge at the southern end where we encountered a fairly impressive and dense array of transmission lines. My sister asked me, "Do you remember dad calling them alta linea?" Alta linea is the Italian for 'high lines'. That is probably the title I should give the project or some addition to it in the future.
The biting question is what this project has to do with artists' books. For me, it's always interesting to look at things from the outer edge. I'm not for a second suggesting that this work is an artist's book, but I do suggest that it shares some commonalities with artists' books. There is a line of flight (or several lines of flight) between them. We know they are not the same, but the boundary that distinguishes them is quite unclear. And there's been quite a lot of literature that talks about tendencies in artists books and publishing. At a Mackay Artists' Book Forum a few years ago, Sydney-based artist Nola Farman talked about the 'fugitive'. And for me that's a exhilaratingly uncertain and rebellious space to inhabit. So I think, in these electronic spaces, we're really exploring multiple literacies, perhaps fugitive literacies. And there is even more literature about the question of digital literacies. But, as Nola says in her conference paper, the narrative of the fugitive is usually unresolved. When a something (an object, subject, event) ceases to be on the run or in hiding, it ceases to be fugitive.
My sense of the work is that it doesn't - can't - stay still. It needs to be invented and reinvented. So I'm also exploring ways of developing this work as an online book using the Diffusion Generator produced by Proboscis, a UK artist group and consultancy. The eventual book will be downloadable for free. I'm also thinking about a series of prints using the photographs. There's more that can be done with elements to tell the story in many and varied ways. Or alternately, to tell different stories from the same elements.
The map is central in this project. There's an explosion of social mapping in the online world and the group I just mentioned, Proboscis, are innovators in this area and they do a lot of work with mobile media, mash ups and social media. About 20 years ago, a project I was working on organised to bring Sue Clifford from Common Ground to Brisbane. Sue was a great advocate of social mapping and exploring psycho-geography and Common Ground developed very important quilting and other community art projects that focused on mapping, environment and place. So I have had an abiding fascination with topography and cartography - having spent much time exploring postmodern theory, I was very interested in the relationships between the cartographic and trajective imaginary and narrative.
So there's a new awareness of mapping and various DIY practices of cartography which are becoming integral to our storytelling. Even the mainstream media are seeing the value with projects like ABC Earth which pegs news stories to places. The term 'neogeography' descrived the merging of user data and experiences with online mapping technologies. So really, we're just talking about a more subjective engagement with mapping and charting space and talking about the map as narrative. This relationship between map and story is what I am exploring.
My family often recalls our lives as an itinerary. First we lived here, then worked there, then moved elsewhere. Much of that was, of course, framed by my father's working life. This project gives you a way into that.
21 August 2008
Freestyle Books Blog & Feed
Just to let you know that the State Library of Queensland has been keeping a blog in conjunction with Freestyle Books. I've added the RSS feed to this site (just scroll down the right hand side of the screen).
16 August 2008
Freestyle Books Presentation
Yesterday I gave a presentation about Transmission Lines at the State Library of Queensland. Thanks to everyone who attended. Hoping you will stay in touch with me and the work.
Also, having now done the talk, I'll develop some of those ideas for the blog. In particular, I will do some more writing about neogeography and psycho-geography as well as reflect more on how Web 2.0 can be used for writing projects. As I mentioned in my talk, unlike many of my colleagues and peers, I don't specifically develop technology for my writing projects and am quite content to explore or use existing tools and platforms as writing spaces.
Also, having now done the talk, I'll develop some of those ideas for the blog. In particular, I will do some more writing about neogeography and psycho-geography as well as reflect more on how Web 2.0 can be used for writing projects. As I mentioned in my talk, unlike many of my colleagues and peers, I don't specifically develop technology for my writing projects and am quite content to explore or use existing tools and platforms as writing spaces.
26 July 2008
Map Sections
My partner, John, has photographed detail from my father's map. I will be posting these to the Platial map to give a better sense of the coverage of the lines. As you can see from the photo below, my father traced the routes of the lines onto the map while identifying major towns and cities with the pins. Interestingly, where he's used yellow pins, he's drawn lines between them. However, he has also included a number of stand alone blue pins. It's only conjection but I believe this is an intentional colour code (as my father was a rather meticulous man) - the yellow pins indicate lines while the blue pins indicate other jobs such radio towers or other kinds of contract work.
20 July 2008
Back to Work
I’ve been unable to work on Transmission Lines for a while. After being away for a few weeks, my aunt’s health deteriorated rapidly and she passed away. Her funeral was on Saturday and my family has been fully focused on this.
I will now be able to put a bit more time into Transmission Lines and address some inconsistencies and niggling details over the next little while. So today, after reviewing the project planning, I will be get cracking on new tasks.
Also, Susan from the State Library mentioned that the work, on exhibit at the State Library of Queensland as part of Freestyle Books, has been quite popular among visitors. I was quite heartened to hear this. Please feel free to make comments - this blog has that capacity - and add your own thoughts to this work. You just have to click on the 'Comments' link at the bottom of each post. Then you will be presented with an input field and some options for identification. Comments can be anonymous but I will be moderating to keep inappropriate content out.
Regarding Freestyle Books, which I went to see the other day, I just wanted to say what a splendid job Helen Cole has done as the exhibition curator. You can't handle the books, which is always a difficult decision for curators and collections, and this has been addressed by showing several of the works on projected video including Ten Menhirs (1984) by my partner, JM John Armstrong.
I will now be able to put a bit more time into Transmission Lines and address some inconsistencies and niggling details over the next little while. So today, after reviewing the project planning, I will be get cracking on new tasks.
Also, Susan from the State Library mentioned that the work, on exhibit at the State Library of Queensland as part of Freestyle Books, has been quite popular among visitors. I was quite heartened to hear this. Please feel free to make comments - this blog has that capacity - and add your own thoughts to this work. You just have to click on the 'Comments' link at the bottom of each post. Then you will be presented with an input field and some options for identification. Comments can be anonymous but I will be moderating to keep inappropriate content out.
Regarding Freestyle Books, which I went to see the other day, I just wanted to say what a splendid job Helen Cole has done as the exhibition curator. You can't handle the books, which is always a difficult decision for curators and collections, and this has been addressed by showing several of the works on projected video including Ten Menhirs (1984) by my partner, JM John Armstrong.
18 June 2008
Away
Just a quick post to let you know that I am away for three weeks and will resume work on Transmission Lines when I return. There are more dates, images and sites I need to add to the map plus I will delve more deeply into the content of the oral history with my father. It is my intention to continue working on the project for the duration of the Freestyle Books exhibition, to draw out a major point of difference of the web as a publishing environment.
In the meantime, please make sure you go to see the exhibition Freestyle Books at the State Library of Queensland, opening 27 June.
In the meantime, please make sure you go to see the exhibition Freestyle Books at the State Library of Queensland, opening 27 June.
12 June 2008
Freestyle Books
Transmission Lines 1955 - 1974 will be presented as part of the Freestyle Books exhibition at the State Library of Queensland. The exhibition features artists' books from the collection and explores means and methods of redefining the book as a contemporary artwork. The show opens 27 June and runs until 12 October at the SLQ Gallery, Level 2, State Library of Queensland at South Bank. The program also includes floor talks, a symposium, exhibition tours and film works. I'll be discussing this work and some ideas about online technologies, writing and publishing on 16 August at noon at the SLQ Auditorium 2, level 2.
More information about Freestyle Books is available at http://www.slq.qld.gov.au/freestylebooks
More information about Freestyle Books is available at http://www.slq.qld.gov.au/freestylebooks
Promises promises
Having sifted through the oral history interview with my father, I've found more stories to tell and share. I promised to peg audio to some of the sites on the map. However, the audio quality is quite bad - a combination of the age of the tapes, dodgy cassette players and a poor quality original recording. I'll be seeing if a sound engineer is able to do any remedial work with the tapes before I post the audio.
08 June 2008
Making sense
Having now had access to more information, the timeline is becoming a little clearer to me. This probably means I have estimated some dates incorrectly. So I will need to be attentive to this in the next few days. Having worked on a number of community and local history projects, I have new found respect for historians who are able to weave together (albeit sometimes selectively) mutiple threads of a story and multiple evidentiary sources. While I am endeavouring to distill the facts in this project, I am not trying to verify the facts beyond the family held (and accidental or otherwise contributed) sources.
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