Read!NG ReSponSE**

Trouble at the Interface, or the Identity Crisis of Interactive Art by Erkki Huhtamo University of California Los Angeles

Interactive arts has been in trend for quite some years back before technology has been popular. From interaction, arts is no longer seen through frames or bars and just standing near. Audience are able to touch, hear, and experience the art itself, giving more sensations. The art work itself requires people to “turn it on” in order for it to serve its purposes, allowing human participation. However, there are critics such as the problem that an interacting art work is distanced from the audience when it is not “activated”. It is also hard to distinguish the difference between internet projects and interacting art work. I see interactive arts as a good way of expressing art work to the world. There maybe some problems of definition and the ways of expressing, nonetheless, more people are able to appreciate the art world in general due to the amusement of interaction. As the world is running towards convenience and active information, interactive arts help bring the new ideas to the audience. In a way, museums with a still object as an art work is getting fewer and fewer attention compared to anything that involves in the internet or computer.

*READING RESPONSE*

NeMe: DARK MATTER – Activist Art and the Counter-Public Sphere by Gregory Sholette

The Dark matter in which the author talks about is the invisible group of artists that are not seen successful in the elite art world, yet exists and is very important in the contribution of this industry. It is clear that without these people, what seems extraordinary is no longer special. However, as sharing one’s arts is no longer hard due to the excessive use of technology, the Dark matter is starting to disappear. Very much agreeing with the author, I think that the way arts are labelled as elite is no longer a matter of the art itself. Extending from what the author comments, an art work worthing a fortune mainly starts from whom compliments it and then how famous the artist is. In a way, if a huge art fan starts paying a fortune to an artwork, it becomes a masterpiece. Once he or she is famous, any work from the artist is an elite art work. It is still something that people work hard on, no matter Dark matter or not, is to be seen by the world of one’s creation in art.

GOOGLE EARTH PROJECT*

I worked with Sarah and also Gregg and Joe from SF in this google earth project. After discussing, we decided to do the occupy movements in vancouver and SF. Me and Sarah went to the Vancouver Art Gallery where occupy movements occur. When we went there, people were still sleeping in their tents so we took pictures of the signs that were up in that area. We noticed that many people look down at those occupy movement people and a lot of them were having a negative feeling about it. We found it interesting to do this project in the perspective of other people who people against or dislike occupy movements. Because of that, we enlarged the signs and “occupied” the whole Vancouver Art Gallery area from the view above. We also put “occupy van” where ever there are signs pinning down giving the idea of  virus invading this area and it will keep on spreading out fast.
http://www.ecuad.ca/~swong12471/googleearth/

This is the tour from us and from Greg and Joe:
http://ecuad.ca/~swong12471/googleearth/occupyvan.kmz

URBAN INTERVENTION PROJECT*

I made a “sign” of a grown up man sitting on a stroller pretending to be a children. By adding KIDS ONLY makes the whole project even more ironic. There are several ideas for this project and they are mostly about how people think about themselves. It is very ironic that the man sitting on the stroller is not a kid but a grown up and very mature man. I wanted people to find their “childness” inside them. I believe everyone has their own child side hidden inside them especially for people living in urban areas. The society today keeps forcing us to suit up and be tough, be mature. The value were pretty much twisted these days. I chose to put it in the kids playground to fit the idea. Also, the reason why I put it the upside down is that I originally wanted the show the sign to the people on the other side but it seems like it gets a little confused to viewers and I thought more about it. The conclusion was I should stick it on both sides so that people sitting on either side will be able to see it. I made several versions before printing them out and I chose this version because i think the man expresses the idea better.

–READING RESPONSE–

Ryan Griffis – For an art against the cartography of everyday life

This paper addresses the idea of people creating art work and merging it to daily aspects of life, representing our world. An example that the author used is locative media, such as Geographic Positioning System. It is interesting that the author’s view about such systems and art works are inequal. It is quite true that as technology improves, the importance of ideology declines. People’s focus is no longer on art itself, or the perspectives of the world, but the interests of the rich. As an example that the author made, people are hoping that there can be an emerging of housingmaps.com and the chicargocrime.org to know the crime rate of different housing areas. This causes the segregation of the poor and the rich, which I believe the author criticizes.

PANORAMA FINAL*

This is the final picture of my panorama. I have used less shoes this time so that the merging part is easier. I also chose a cloudy day instead of a sunny day to get rid of the shadows and most importantly, I’d like to create a more “not so happy” feeling from the panorama. As we discussed in class, what I want people to do after looking at this piece is to bring up discussions. There are first world problems which is what people have is way more than what they need. Their desire of having more and following the trend is too overwhelming that they didn’t think about how many shoes do they really need? Also, the wastes that are produced after each shoe that were made. Most shoes nowadays are not environmental friendly, some are made out of  plastic and some are made out of animal skins which lead to another problem. I think it was pretty successful on bringing up discussions and getting people’s attention. There are also some parts that need improvements such as the placement of the shoes. The lines wasn’t straight enough and the part that most bothers me is the pink shoe from the left. It just seems too bright, I tried fixing it several times but it just didn’t work so I get so frustrated, I gave up. I will definitely go back and fix it one more time and hopefully after that it will come out better than before.

 

INTERACTIVE POEM (mock up)

This is the mock up of my interactive poem web. To me, this poem is about how homeless people are being ignored by others and they seems to be outsiders, loner and different people. They are often left out by us, especially in cities. Their lives are invisible and no one will notice even when they pass away. Probably themselves wouldn’t realize that they are dead. They just sleep and sleep and leave silently. There are several texts that I am planning to make them show up after linking to that page instead of showing them immediately. I will also add background musics to create an atmosphere for the audiences. The background music will be very simple yet powerful. There are still some places I am working on and hopefully will give the audiences what I want them to experience.

Panorama proof

I tried using photomerge but it just can’t automatically merge my photos so I merged them manually. I realized that I didn’t overlap enough so it can’t fit them together. I tried editing it, cutting some parts out and adding some backgrounds. I changed the grass color to make it look like one picture but to me it is very difficult. This is after all the editing which kind of looks like one picture but I am not happy with it. I have decided to retake all the photos and photomerge them once again. Hopefully it turns out better.