Tag: digital

Sound in Artists Films made in the South West

My short film work, ‘flat-head self-tapping’ (2015) made with sound artist Neil Rose will be screened as part of this event in The Gallery at Plymouth College of Art on November 7th 2018.

‘flat-head self-tapping’ engages with questions of speaking in public, of being on show, of being heard, and displaying coded behaviour. Deriving elements from Bell’s Standard Elocutionist and online dictionaries, the performance text stitches fragments, word lists, letters, and gestures into a display of awkward flapping interrupted by gnomic expulsions.

Originally presented as a live performance at Arnolfini, Bristol, this version for screen was developed with sound, video and editing by Neil Rose; the trailer is available at Vimeo here.

The screening is on Facebook at https://www.facebook.com/events/496149960903200/

THINGS – exhibition and auction

I have written a response to one of the 27 objects that will be on show at 310 New Cross Road, London as part of the project ‘Things’ organised by Tamara Projects. The objects will also be listed for auction on eBay along with the texts written in response by a range of writers and artists. The auctions will go live from 00.00hrs on October 12th 2018, and remain up for the standard 10-day auction period.

THINGS – Exhibition & Auction

report on Projectivisms symposium in Journal of British and Irish Innovative Poetry

A report by Andrew Jeffrey on the symposium Projectivisms:Way-making the Contemporary Projective, University of Cardiff, May 2018 mentions my performance there of ‘threaded insert’. It is published in the Journal of British and Irish Innovative Poetry 10(1).

The discussion of the relationship between who is in charge in the interaction between a human being and digital technology was then exemplified by Mark Leahy’s (Independent Scholar) ‘“The threshing floor of the dance” A performance of threaded insert’. Leahy appeared in white gloves and bow tie in the centre of the room. He then put in some ear-phones and began making statements, ‘Agape, we perform’, moving forward a set number of steps, changing direction, moving again, making statements, ‘a portion of depressed hair’, describing the room, spelling out words, walking forward, spelling out words accompanied by a basic sign language, walking out of the fire escape, re-appearing through a different door. The performance with variations and repetitions lasted for twenty minutes. It turns out that Leahy was responding to various instructions played at random from MP3 files. All the contents derived from guides for ‘proper’ speech, conduct and bodily deportment. It made me think that Leahy was showing “what he is as a creature of nature (with certain instructions to carry out)”.

Jeffrey, A., (2018). Projectivisms >> Symposium Way-making the Contemporary Projective, University of Cardiff, 8th–9th May 2018. Journal of British and Irish Innovative Poetry. 10(1), p.10. DOI: http://doi.org/10.16995/biip.82

‘his voice’ at dataAche, DRHA 2017, Plymouth

On Tuesday September 12th I will present ‘his voice’ at dataAche, DRHA2017 at Plymouth University. dataAche is the 21st international conference on Digital Research in the Humanities and Arts (DRHA). Happening over four days, the event will mix keynote papers, workshops, installations and performance.

‘his voice’ presents a live voicing of the results of orchestrated Twitter searches. It is an ongoing project that has a number of iterations and outcomes. A body of text, gathered via online searches for “his voice sounded like”, has been edited to develop two- or three-word phrases, which are then used to search Twitter. In the live event the search results are converted to audio using text-to-speech software. This audio is delivered to me via headphones, and I attempt to speak it. The results include URLs, hashtags and other coded elements that are common in tweets. The flow of information meets the limits of vocal ability and the spoken output may spill into stuttering, gaps and incoherence.

 

‘his voice’ at Language Game[s]: Poetry, Logic and Artificial Language

I will perform ‘his voice’ at Language Game[s]: Poetry, Logic and Artificial Language on May 5th at Chelsea College of Arts, London.

The performance is part of a one-day symposium that considers the association between language and human consciousness.

Convened by Dr Sheena Calvert, Language Game[s] will include presentations, demonstrations and artworks from the fields of visual art, design, philosophy, artificial intelligence, science, linguistics and critical theory.