Last week, Chris Jay of the Robinson Film Center and I hosted a screening of RIP! A Remix Manifesto. Our turnout was fantastic: around 50 folks came out to see this fantastic doc about Girl Talk, remix culture, and copyright law. I highly recommend the movie to folks who are lost about why copyright law matters and who might think it only effects folks who want to pirate copyrighted material.
The following are some stream of consciousness notes from filmmaker Craig Baldwin's artist lecture at the Robinson Film Center on April 18, 2008. He's a wild ride to follow during a talk!
Craig Baldwin notes the connection between 16mm, the digital revolution and vernacular culture.
Craig showed us three clips from the 70's dimension: http://www.othercinemadvd.com/70sDimension.html Three artists remixed found footage in "We Edit Life" a metatextual performance on digital remix production. Footage includes media producers, conductors an a symphony, computer users, Baldwin points out that abstraction isn't necessary and that using footage without digital manipulation serves the same pupose of deconstruction and analysis. All the footage was found in the dumpster.
The next sample comes from "outsider films" including military films, religious films, pornos, etc that get under theorized and under studied as important pieces of visual culture. We're looking at "Love Moods" http://www.othercinemadvd.com/subjectsex.html I'm wondering how archiving constitutes "parsing" - in order to embody the sensibility of a certain genre? So there's no need for remix. By bringing these marginal films into a "non marginal" space we're remixing. What's outside the center is most interesting and tells us the most about mainstream culture - Baldwin draws on the image of the corona, which enables us to see the sun but isn't THE visual identifier of the sun.
The next sample, Baldwin describes as piece of couch potato culture "Life With Fear" including "Lightfoot Fever" which juxtaposes images of wild life a a performance of "Fever"
Next we look at a mashup series "TV Sherriff and the Trailbuddies" which is complete low sensibility tv show nonsense. The piece we watch is a fantastic audio and visual remix of all sorts of Jerry-related footage (Jerry Lewis, Jerry Springer, etc). They self describe as "remix television broadcasts into reconfigured gaucho style ape beats." The style really reminds me of Eclectic Method. Its eye candy you can dance/explode your brain to.
Craig Baldwin then turns to mashup megalith Negativland and he's produced a documentary about them: Sonic Outlaws. (Which I can't believe I haven't seen yet)
Greta Snider's "Urine Man" personal diaries/documentary. Urine man wants you to google "urine cures bombshell" I think this film straddles voyeurism, taking advantage of a crazy person, and giving voices to the underrepresented. Its documentary kind of style films that put me in my most uncomfortable position, but also make me excited about digital media as a voicebox for democracy. At the same time, the film reminds me that democratic voices aren't always the best for contributing to cultural development (that's totally subjective - I'm at conflict re-reading my original thoughts a few days later on this piece).
Baldwin argues that cinema should not be overproduced researched market, but rather shorter works in enesembles, in microcinemas, backyards with political critique and history/political journalism. Taking it to another level of play, a bit of pop art.
Baldwin notes while discussing Tribulation 99 the dicotomy between right/left film's imagery: take language and iconography/fantasty associated with the right (fantasy, extravagance, sensationalism) and apply it to the left (which typically uses talking heads and less free image in documentary). Tribulation 99 is a pseudo-documentary about US intervention in Latin America. It mixes science fiction footage, fantastical narration, news reels, and crazy political title screens. Irrationality can be a useful political tools (racism, etc). Willingness to take things to extreme - relationship between van garde art and politics.
Compilation narrative take gestures and herd them into a new narrative. With Spectres of the Spectrum, Baldwin utilized action and science films to challenge the media environment which controls and perpetuates the popular mainstream. Kinescope images are used artifacts of the communications revolution as the history of the medium is embedded in these images.
What happens when popular mainstream culture recognizes these aesthetics and methods of commentary? Does underground culture then swing back into the high gloss production level to challenge the new aesthetic? What's the cheap point of entry in tools and methods of production that will allow us to challenge the co-option of vernacular culture (I'm thinking of tv shows that respond to tv viewer's reactions ala L Word, LOST).
Sometimes it feels like the archive just legitimizes conspicious consumption. I don't necessarily feel like remix or mashup adds enough to the larger dialogue about culture or challenges mainstream thought because of the co-option of these aesthetics and methods increasingly in popular culture. What do we do from here? Remix the remix? I have no idea. I think on avenue is to study the folk/non digital native response to new mediums, and utilize those methods in art production and design. What non-knowledgeable people do with new media and how that inform a revolution against the new mainstream (might also be useful UI/Design research)? Rather than focusing on artworks that are finished pieces or works that expose the underlying process, we need to see artwork is exemplifies the process. Perhaps something between the line of performance art and actual production methods. How can we encourage play and discover in the age of the database and instant informational satisfaction?
What I've learned from this lecture and comparing it with a recent lecture from DJ Spooky, is that when you're lecturing about remix and digital production its best to have complete control over the presentation environment (i.e., import your own footage on a computer, ask for control over lighting.) and do it yourself (and insist on doing it yourself at every venue).
I also like this interview with Baldwin for the super-informative-fantastic-free-badassed documentary Steal This Film:
Soren Petersen: The new role of digital images and photos online
Flickr use in Copenhagen
Picture vs. Photo
Photographs with fancy cameras, picture with camera phones.
Documentation, presents a "hat" or a "beach": these are photographs used in ads
A photo with aesthetics, the example has a very low depth of field so the background is out of focus
A picture has little aesthetics, it is grainy and it has notes and comments attached to it. Encourages interaction with the image.
A photo comment is from a viewer/spectator and a picture from a person who can relate on the basis of common everyday experiences. This may be why people post many banal images to web.
Lefebvre's triadic concept of everyday life: daily life, the Everyday (media, urbanism, bureaucratic), Everydayness (effective character, understood as shared but unrepresentable...desire of everyday life)
Sensations - Deleuze. When people take a picture of everyday experience they want to transmit the sensation of the experience. Everydayness then becomes the sensation of moblogging.
Concept of being the the world, the collective experience. Unity of sensing and the sense (Deleuze on Francis Bacon) Aesthetic differences between the photo and picture > experiencing commonality through banality and enjoying the everydayness. This may be why mobloggers have a hard time explaining why they take such pictures. Pictures gather meaning through the meta-textual context they are in (think comments on flickr)
How can we apply this to youtube, and things such as tazering videos which we often watch out of disbelief. does this appeal to the fantasy that we experience within everydayness?
Larissa Hjorth "Re-imagine Mobility: A Conceptual Reflection Upon Gendered Mobile Media in the Asia-Pacific
This was an amazing video that completely bombarded the viewer with tons of information about how gendered use of technology has been utilized in commercial and communicative means. I wish this was available somewhere!
Edgar Gomez, Amparo Lasen: Digital Photography and Picture Sharing: Redefining the Public/Private Divide.
Subjectification Process involve the shaping of the self and being subject to others, photography can enable this. Flickr study: Who is this girl? Group in Madrid. Creates lively discussion about what is public and private. Girl was found and told about it and she freaked about being discussed as a subject. The concept of public is transforming..
Configuration of self through self-portraiture. Pictures of the body, sometimes involving nudity usually taken in private places. Shaping the perceptions of others and controlling the external gaze. Show what's interesting. This is part of the contemporary embodiment process.
The definition of privacy is now key on having control over who knows what about you See Livingstone, 2008 Who can access information about you.
Digital photography is taking par tin the definition of what is suitable and can be expected when being in a public place.
Convergence of digital photog and the Internet contributes to a new complex gaze.
Andrew Cox Photoshop contests on Flickr Looks at Photoshop Tennis: no ending point, multiple players. with player nominated rules (have fun, photorealism/no cartoons, themes, etc.) Worth1000 often has more complicated rules focused toward a reward, rules are casual. Focus is on maximum participation rather than on PST there is an emphasis on quality.
Presentation about Teens engaging in video games, digital media production Found youth through parent networks, youth programs Social and cultural factors driving innovation "translators"
Rise in teens use due to:
Growing availability of tools
Sharing with public visibility
Youth Networked Publics were geeky, but now they are more mainstream, "domesticated." These are placed within the context of regular interaction readily accessible persistent, specialized and broader context for publicity.
Genres of participation: Tie together structures of participation and engagement with media/social groups
Friendship-driven participation - Hanging out within online spaces without restrictions on mobility and school with privacy. CJ Pascoe ("Living Digital") has done research on romantic relationships between teens through social networks. Notes that teens prefer to meet people in person first, not on Facebook. FB comes second. Teens use sns to overcome restrictions in their local social network. Media literacy comes through these everyday activites (web design, video production). Casual messing around can lead to "geeked out" participation
Interest-driven participation - Passion and interest drive these interactions. Exemplify the potential to change social worlds teens have access to. Expand beyond local social groups, niche knowledge, broader context for disseminating information. Most youth aren't participating, but Ito sees a possible expansion in the future.
Fansubbing anime is Mimi Ito's current research interest. Amateur fan networks will subtitle videos that aren't released in the US. Often these fans sub videos are the only access to particular shows. Speed focused groups will typically get a video out after 24 hours of release. Often extremely collaborative and specialized someone who records the show, typesetter, translators, quality checkers, editors, etc. Fans take high level of ownership with the products that fansub communities output. Often they'll critique fansubs and compare along very detailed standards. Improve craft, some peer pressure involved here - but focus in on creating and improving fansubs. They want to gain notoriety for their work, many downloads and views. Anime Remix Videos. Ito shows us an AMV that shows a woman getting interested in AMV and her process. Kudos for showing a woman since fan remix videos are a very feminist approach and women have taken a huge role in producing these videos. Interestingly, the video shows a high level of self-deprecation that I think is common among video remixers. I like AMV's because they aren't concerned with the legitimacy that most remix videos are concerned with (i.e. Disney mashups that include the title screen, re-dubs where lips matching voiceovers matters). Transmedia videos like this one really push the boundaries of the reality of a story or show's universe - which what remix was all about initially. Video editing skills may not be encouraged locally, but through online communities, teens can become "greater gods" of editing. There is a high level of self-deprecation among fansubbers and remixers - Is this a practice that is required to become legitimate among a community? There are specific levels of involvement with AMV communities and levels of engagement/induction. However, there are low barriers of entry.
Back to teens in public networks: Learning in networked publics for youth happens through observing and practicing - outside of typical structures of school and limited access to peers. Experimenting with adult like autonomy. Stakes for participation are raised, consequences for publishing all this stuff, delayed gratification. Youth are engaged with the result is immediate. Adults will having to catch up to learning and innovating online.
Some youth have disabled the ability to have a top 8 to avoid social pressures. Parodies are typically male genres, relationships are female dominated.
