PERSONALDEBRIS  

Happy New Year.

Yeah, I know I’ve neglected posting here of late…

from the guardian…

To make sense of Joan Didion, and the unique place she occupies as a chronicler of American mores, I think you have to read, above all else, the two books in which she tries to make sense of her home state: The White Album and Where I Was From (2003), her first memoir. The latter is a kind of grown-up reflection on her life, family history and Californian identity. It is a book that only really comes alive when it adheres most closely to the form of the family memoir and gives you some insight into her social pedigree and the often steely gaze she trains on her subjects.

As a Californian now living in New York, I ask her where she feels she most belongs? ‘Oh, California. For sure. I’m not really attuned to here. At one level, I feel perfectly comfortable in New York, but I really believe that is because it is one of those cities where people feel comfortable wherever they are from. The only times I felt a deep attachment to the city was in my twenties, and again after 9/11. But I would say for sure that I have a Californian sensibility.’

And how would she define that sensibility? ‘Well. it’s an outsider’s sensibility. Definitely. On the edge of things. People don’t feel at home in Los Angeles if they come from somewhere else. It takes a long time to get it. And people who come from there tend to have an outside point of view. That’s certainly true in my case.’

It’s snowing! In MARCH! This happened last year. I’m so sick of winter. Spring can’t come too soon.

Back in New York now. Kelly and Kyle performing at MHS.

Here in Southend, an arcade called Electric Avenue. Drew had a particular fascination with this one and asked David to turn around and stop for a photo. Taken on the way back to the hotel from day two of the workshop at MediaShed.

Field Works, an ongoing project by Masaki Fujihata (project “Tsumari” pictured above.)

“Field-Works” is a series of projects which reconstrust collective memories into cyberspace as a kind of video archive by using position data captured by GPS and moving image captured by Video. The project started from 1992.

The Soft Electric by Grace Kim is a project I blogged about awhile ago on Popgadget. A very pretty project that does a great job of integrating electronics into the garment.

From the website:

“The capelet was knitted and felted by hand. It is embroidered with conductive thread. The thread carries electric current to LEDs that are beaded into the embroidery, making the electronic current part of the garment’s adornment. The LED beads flicker, acting like a sequin in the light.”

To see some of the techniques used in this project see her blog or read her thesis.

Rachelle Beaudoin’s project, That Obscure Object of Desire (Second Iteration) is a garment that delivers an electric shock when touched. In Rachelle’s words:

“I am interested in the ever-present dichotomy of the virgin and the whore in representations of women. I created a chastity belt undergarment that alludes to the film and references that peculiar scene. However, this device administered a non-lethal electric shock when touched by the viewer.”

Here’s a close-up of the garment: Read the rest of this entry »

Telematic Dreaming by Paul Sermon is an installation which connects two geographically separated beds via ISDN line (the project was first shown in 1992.) From the project website:

“Telematic Dreaming is an installation that exists within the ISDN digital telephone network. Two separate interfaces are located in separate locations, these interfaces in themselves are dynamic installations that function as customized video-conferencing systems. A double bed is located within both locations, one in a blacked out space and the other in an illuminated space. The bed in the light location has a camera situated directly above it, sending a live video image of the bed, and a person (”A”) lying on it, to a video projector located above the other bed in the blacked out location. The live video image is projected down on to the bed with another person (”B”) on it. A second camera, next to the video projector, sends a live video image of the projection of person “A” with person “B” back to a series of monitors that surround the bed and person “A” in the illuminated location. The telepresent image functions like a mirror that reflects one person within another persons reflection

Compare this to the Sensing Beds, created in 2003 as an ITP student project:

“Sensors located in one mattress pad track the position of its occupant and transmit that data to the other bed where the position data is used to activate heating pads at the same coordinates. Each sleeper thus feels the ghostly warmth of the absent partner’s body in the other bed.”

The prototype featured two benches instead of mattresses. (There is also a short paper about the project.)

A quick post that I hope to update later with thoughts, but for now, from the Fabcell project website by Midori Shibutani, Akira Wakita:

“Fabcell is a flexible, non-emissive, and multi-color fabric module. In Fabcell, fibers dyed with liquid crystal ink and conductive yarns connected to electronic components are woven into a square textile. By applying voltage to the conductive yarn, and changing the fabric’s temperature, the color of fabric surface can be changed. Arranged in matrices, Fabcells display images on the curves of flexible textiles. And used for clothing or with soft objects, it enables them a new expressions of visual imaginary.”

via information aesthetics