9: showAthing conversations

I had great conversations with Jamie Allen, Sarah Rothberg, Matt Romein, and Anna Greenspan. My point of departure was the guiding conceptual framework of my project — the triad of ROCK SOIL AND HOLE. I presented mockups for the installation utilizing three video sources:

1. The first is a butoh performance where I dance with a rock. Butoh originated in Japan post-Hiroshima/WWII and it is similar to shamanic experiences. It awakens the senses and attunes one to non-human entities. Its power comes from stillness. It is referred to as the dance of darkness where one connects to a state of non-living with transformation, facing pain/struggles and compassion. The butoh approach will inform the entire project’s execution (from performance to interactions to installation.)

2. The second is a live webcam stream of a rock. ROCK is the eternal mama, an ancient, maternal material from which all soil comes. The stream frames it within the continuum of its experience.

3. Third is the borescope video of holes. The hole is an ontological parasite defined by soil as its absence of material defines it. This absence allows it to be a passage, a spirit portal, a hole-y ghost. It represents the continuum and unity of the above-ground and the underground. SOIL is the child of the ROCK, a living microbiome made from the weathering of rocks. It is also a place where humans hide things (pipes, filth, sins.) All life comes from it, yet, through various degradation, it is facing extinction.

INTERACTION

I explained my incomplete experiment with a sensor reading soil’s vital signs and the goal of making the soil a collaborator in the presentation where its “values” shape the video. Much like butoh, the videos will be channeling the experience of the non-human. I also showed an example of soil’s impact/ effect on the video and a possible presentation using video screens inside holes.

My main questions were:

What is missing, weak, or unclear? Would you have any suggestions of tools/tech approaches to facilitate interaction with the video? Below I highlighted key points that  I need to explore further.

JAMIE ALLEN

• The relationship between media and geology is often thought of as a relationship of speed/rhythm.
• A fast rate/speed approach to water is like hitting a rock.
• rosemary-lee.com/Molten-Media and rosemary-lee.com/Mining-the-Arbitrary
• The screen can be seen as a mineral activated at a very high rate but, if slowed, becomes a mineral again (Butoh)
• Pitch_drop_experiment beautiful slowness of tar; rock falling drop per year / feed = this is very BUTOH!
• monitor1 and monitor2 inside a landscape
• POETICS/ ALLEGORY of the crossing with a burden (I have stone/dangerous water) similar to Saint Christopher as he carries the weight of the world/sins across the river; protector of travelers; a modern ecological version of the underground is where we store man’s sins (cables, bodies, caca.) Our voyage is one where every step in water is transforming the world.

HOLES

• The traversal is speed-controlled by soil.
• Can be reflected in sonic qualities (Kafka “mole” hears rumbles/ relationship to distance that soil gives)
• Distance of sonic aspects – depth/muffling references underground
• “I use my head to solidify the wall. I know it’s hard enough when the blood comes” 

UNDERGROUND MAPPING

• Earth’s Critical Zone is the “heterogeneous, near-surface environment in which complex interactions involving rock, soil, water, air, and living organisms regulate the natural habitat and determine the availability of life-sustaining resources.”

  

• Moving over the landscape – how can that be articulated? (MM thinking of wet ontology geography)
• A trajectory of the journey where soil can stop/ slow down/ controls journet
• Something that allows you to realize your slowness is something that I think the soil would agree with. 
• Performative context to do it live? Butoh in a tunnel or a hole?

GEOLOGY

• Jussi Parikka – A Geology of Media
• Composition/materiality/what kind of rock is carried/ piece of copper ore (from which electronic cable) or lead (mass significance vis a vis soil)
• Media thought of as epherlmal but physical.
• Could get into infrastructures as the subconscious, underground as sinning space, hole is space for waste — link to digital media sphere/ mining/ soils.
• Project is evoking symbols – resources to make media / a loop. 
• Make this come together – the underground (not soil), the type of rock, and the site where Butoh happens (abandoned mine..) site-specificity?
• Interruption of rates between media speed and geology speed as the problem
• Synthetic rocks/ reference the media world/ green screen painted rock with media added.
• (holding rock/ modern st Christopher) how the mediasphere creates a massive system that involves resources/ ecological effect

SOUND / eco-acoustics

• Marcus Maeder’s acoustic research / Sounding Soil/sound as an indicator of an ecosystem
• Rasa Smite and Raitis Smits Swamp Radio

microbial fuel cells: bacteria whose metabolism generates low electricity

Sensors in the batteries measure the electricity and translate it into sounds, which cause glitches in the video feed.

The installation is both a power station and a swamp radio, or as the artists put it: a “social media megaphone for the invisible and inaudible operators of nature.”

• Glitch is the result (an error – why use glitch?) could be anything/ feels arbitrary

STORY / SOIL

• Soil health & animism
• linking the ‘videos’ to some kind of journey or story-line (that could, of course, link to the mama rock and other ‘characters’ or narratives or spirituality/tradition)
• Various ‘holes’ that one explores a la Der Bau The Burrow different ‘rabbit holes’ that somehow animate the’ tunneling trajectories’ of the holes that get dug and recorded?
• Characters: the underground itself, those that dwell within it, and then those that dwell above it, for example (as in the Kafka)?
• Saramago (“Things”) stories have no human characters, when precisely the idea is to have different characters that you can’t tell if they are human are not, to make a more succinct point about non-humanism being potentially perspectival, when things become at different moments, subjects / objects / agents, etc. 

SARAH ROTHBERG

• Subtle engagement with tech works well
• The presentation can be better — position work first and move backward; too much lead-up. 
• No need to explain why webcam (unless UX is the point) 
• Which elements of Butoh (was not as familiar with Butoh) – further explanation?
• How do you see viewers understanding that soil is controlling the video? How important is it for the audience to know (check intention/ paradigm shift)? Make it felt that entities are actually signaling? Perhaps different soil types? Or knowing past data/results (this may be from soils’ perspectives) – one will be haunted by this when encountering soil.
• What are many animisms? Not specifying lineage or that is the only way to make sense? Critiques of Anthropocene as a term. Framing (depending on the audience – deep/shallow in discourse)

ANNA GREENSPAN

Anna felt that I lack coherence as I am proposing too many big ideas/components. She appreciated Butoh as my exploration device and holes/soil but thought that the concept of trinity was unnecessary. The latter triggers Christianity within animism, which she found confusing. Holes were most exciting, and we discussed possible projection into holes. We also discussed the possibility of a site-specific investigation as a link across the various concepts. 

MATT ROMAIN

ROCKS-SOIL-HOLES was a strong relationship/ concept. He got a sense of an installation that incorporates elements of performance and reactive video, experimentation, mixed technologies. We discussed archives of the process/ experiments as key building blocks. He encouraged me to find my own tech approach as I am making an interface for my personal use and incorporating chance occurrences. We spoke of combining the organic with the technical: perhaps using borescope cameras to reach the image thus encouraging a sense of discovery. Matt liked the video example that created sediment-like layering where movement is mixed with movement.