Hive Mind Travels

A few days ago, I mentioned that Michelle and I had seen an interesting piece of art at the Palazzo Strozzi, Christian Nold's "Emotion Mapping Greenwich Village", in which he'd created a mood map of Greenwich Village by hooking up perspiration sensors and a GPS to people as they walked that section of New York. I said I thought the concept was great but the aesthetic execution weak.

As if to underline the point, we saw an awesome exhibit today that showed how to do great electronic art that is really, truly art.

The pieces we saw were part of the Florence Biennale 2007, a slightly weird but vast collection of art from all over the world. The show is sponsored by the U.N., and has the artists come with three of their works, where they are displayed one next to the other next to the other in a vast, sterile feeling exhibit hall.

Most of the work was really, really good and incredibly diverse, but the puzzle was "what's in it for the artists?" Many of them sat uncomfortably in plastic chairs next to their pieces waiting to talk to anyone who came by, but, at least while we were there, there were very few attendees. As most of the artists began by asking us if we were exhibiting our work there, I got the sense it was mostly just them. It was a shame that the production value of the exhibit hall and the advertising was so below the quality of the art being displayed.

Given that there were 840 artists and over 2,500 works of art, I could go on for ages about all the different pieces we saw, but I'll try to stick the point I started on and focus on the electronic art.

Awesome!

There were seven pieces under the umbrella of Ars Electonica, an Austrian-based group supporting the digital arts.

The most impressive piece was Se Mi Sei Vicino ("if you are close to me"), by Sonia Cillari, Steven Pickles and Tobias Grewenig. From the blurb:

A core element of the work is a sensor floor on which a performer is standing, functioning as a human antenna; when coming close to or being touched by members of the audience, the body movements are registered as electromagnetic activity. Surrounding the floor are large projections showing real-time algorithmic organisms connected to audio compositions, which change form according to fluctuations in the electromagnetic field.

Here you can see it in action:

Beautiful, isn't it? I mean, it's one thing to rig an an electromagnetic sensor that can detect distance between bodies and render that onto a computer screen (one really big thing, honestly), but it's yet another to make it aesthetically compelling, beautiful. These guys pull it off. That it involves you, as the audience, becoming a participant is pure gold bonus.

Another "audience participation" piece was Noise and Voice by Golan Levin and Zachary Lieberman (calling themselves Tmema). Here there were two large projection screens that created visualizations based on input from two microphones. Again, what impressed me most about this one was not just seeing my voice realized in color and motion, but how attractively (and whimsically) they'd manage to render it. It's difficult to see in the (shaky) video, but the objects they create have a very warm, old time woodcut feeling to them, while at the same time moving and undulating with an authentically organic motion:

The last piece I loved mostly because of my previously mentioned fascination with sundials. Watchful Portrait by John Gerrard had two 3-D renderings of a woman's face, each rotating slowly over the course of the day to face the sun and the moon, respectively.

There were four other pieces that were all equally cool. Instead of describing them, I'll just invite you to come to Florence and check them out!

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Our return to the States is still a bit over three weeks away, but a shift as big as this takes some time to prepare for, so I've already begun to plan. Specifically, I'm trying to decide which European habits and customs I should affect when back in the States to constantly remind people who may have forgotten that I've just spent three months in Europe.

I'm sure you know what I mean. Suppose, for example, that it's 6 p.m., I'm talking with some friends, and one of them should demonstrate that he has forgotten that I've just spent three months in Europe by saying something inconsiderate like "anyone want to grab some dinner?"

Obviously, this would be an perfect time for me to remind people that I've just spent three months in Europe by saying something like "Dinner? It's only six o'clock! Oh, I'm sorry, I forgot how early Americans eat. You see, in Europe, we don't even think about dinner until 9 or 10 in the evening!"

Now, under ordinary circumstances, affecting an English accent would be the no-brainer solution to my problem. Asking for a "spot of tea", then exclaiming "bloody hell, I could murder a lorrie of it" when refused is a simple and direct way to communicate that I've been overseas to people who may have forgotten.

The problem, in my case, of course, is that we were only in England for a few days at the beginning of our trip (roughly three months ago, if you must know), and so it seems like it might invite a certain speck of ridicule to begin lilting like a limey. Moreover, asking if anyone's got a fag, in the wrong circumstances, could just get me punched.

Affecting an Italian accent is out, as well, as it would be difficult to explain how being around people speaking  a completely different language should change how I pronounce my own. This isn't a deal-breaker, mind you, but it shuffles the accent lower in the list.

More credible is simply shuffling some Italian, Spanish or French phrases into my everyday speech. For example, when my phone rings, I could answer "Pronto!" Then, after waiting for the appropriate baffled pause to play out, I could laugh and explain "oh, sorry, I mean 'hello'! You see, in Italy, where I've been living, that's how we answer the phone. It means 'ready'."

Unfortunately, this one will only work when my phone rings, leaving me high and dry in those long spells in between when my phone is not ringing.

For those times, I have considered eating with my fork held in my left hand, tines down, while using the knife in my right to maneuver food onto the back. However, I'm afraid this may be too subtle. I would hate to have to draw attention to it by repeatedly asking people things like "could you please hand the salt to my right hand, because my left hand is occupied with my fork, tines down as we do in Europe!" A bit of mouthful, if you'll excuse the pun.

I'm really at a loss here. Affecting coffee snobbery (e.g., "oh, I don't know how you Americans can drink this...black water!") is right out, as well, seeing as I'll be returning to Seattle. It would be like acting stuck up about coal in Newcastle, which would be dumb for several reasons.

Wait, I've got it! I'll just greet people by kissing them on both cheeks. This has the advantage of being clearly European, frequent (once per interaction per person!), and virtually impossible to overlook. Spot on!

So get ready America, because next time I see you: kissy-kissy!

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Fellow couchsurfer Francesco tipped us off late last week to the opening of the Strozzina Centro di Cultura Contemporanea, the Center for Contemporary Culture at the Palazzo Strozzi.

The Palazzo Strozzi dates to the late 1400's, when it was built as the home of the Strozzi family, (doomed) arch-rivals of the Medici's (lesson: don't be arch-rivals of the Medici's).

The courtyard was filled when we arrived with well-heeled Italians in high Italian fashion, young and hip as well as older and well-to-do. The swishing of fur was entirely drowned by a good techno-ambient DJ playing behind two large screens with trippy projections, and the Renaissance feel was cheerfully updated by the shifting violet, blue and yellow wash lights. Free champagne flowed along with a tasty, dry cheddar, olives, and tangelos. Good fun.

The art, though, was a bit disappointing. The show, Emotional Systems: Contemporary Art Between Emotion and Reason, promised:

to investigate the topic of emotions, proposing a reinterpretation of the correlation between the contemporary artist, the work of art and the user, in the light of the latest discoveries in the neurological sciences about the human brain and its effects on the emotions.

And, as you entered the cave-like basement exhibition, there were a series of quotes culminating with the could-you-raise-the-bar-any-higher statement

Remember how you feel right now. This exhibit may change how you think about emotion forever.

I dunno, call me an dullard, but after witnessing a concrete pile spraypainted a rainbow of colors and a CGI video of killer whales, I found myself regarding emotion in much the same way I had.

There were two exceptions. Bill Viola had a moving high-definition, hyper-slow motion video of a line of people in grief, apparently viewing a casket (entitled "Observance"). The glacial unfolding of their reactions seemed to resonate with my own muscle memory of pain, creating a disquieting empathy.

The other interesting piece was Christian Nold's "Emotional Mapping Greenwich Village". Nold wired up a perspiration sensor to a GPS and had over 1,000 people wear it over a period of years as they walked Greenwich Village, NYC. The result was an "emotional map" of the area, a visualization of how different areas made people feel.

The concept, I thought, was brilliant and I tip my hat grandly to him for pulling it off. That said, the actual visualizations, lacked aesthetic quality. They seemed like the kind of maps that a computer geek would come up with, the result more of mathematics and limited tools then something worthy of an artistic study of affect.

Still, beat the pants off the room filled with emotional words hand-scrawled on a wall.

 

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Michelle worried that the pictures in the La Vida Firenze post made our apartment look dreary, which it is not. I therefore present to you the results of her improved photo shoot:

Now isn't that nicerer?

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