contemporary art practice A

My visual diary and folio for CAP consists of the following:

• one grey notebook where ideas for new art works, reflections, sketches, articles and images are hand-noted and kept (visual diary)

• 4 pin boards where questions and ideas are noted and where articles, images articles, clippings and more are affixed .(visual diary)

• an online research channel where i collect/organise images, articles, videos, files etc which can be easily accessed at any time (visual diary - see are.na link below)

• website page where reflections on process; reflections on resolved work; documentation of process for each individual project / art work resolved is noted (visual diary - see below)

• website page where documentation of photographed resolved work is filed/kept (folio - see below)

• website page where reflections on ideas/works under development and prototyping/testing is noted (visual diary - see below)

My suggestion is to begin here on this page and scroll downwards moving from one section to the next. I’ll occasionally point you to things to refer to beyond this page (ie; my research channel link on Are.na; my grey notebook or one of the 4 pinboards).

While I initially began using the notebook as my visual diary this changed as the semester progressed and I gradually found myself using it less and less and this website page more and more. I’ve found that having a dedicated website page within which to progressively add links, photos of process and resolved work , reflections on process, videos etc, an easier way of recording things and then sharing my thinking and work with others at a later stage. I’m still developing a method that works for me and suspect that things will be refined further as I progress into semester two, but this is a start.

The pinboards also contain ideas (including ideas for new art works expressed briefly on black cards with silver writing or post-it notes), questions, articles and threads of thinking and research I’m exploring which are not discussed directly here.

The total word count for this page is over 3100 words. I haven’t counted words written in the grey notebook or x 4 pinboards.

VISUAL DIARY (online research channel)

Most of my online related research for CAP, including readings and videos, is organised in a “channel” I’ve created on Are.na and includes several 100 separate links to date. Most of these links have been read or viewed at some stage or have been saved here for future reference. Occasionally I print a particular reading or image, re-read things, highlight passages of interest, write notes on the printed reading and then either glue or staple it into my notebook or affix it to one of my pinboards. See here: https://www.are.na/share/CJNxZNS

VISUAL DIARY (reflections on process; reflections on resolved work; documentation of process)

Project 1 - Countering tempus nullius

Reflections on process

I decided to explore how I might begin to extend this work which i had initially developed for Studio Materials and Methods A. I initially wanted to respond to reflections made in the SMM class by Ben and others about how this work seemed dark and ominous. I wanted to experiment with different colours to see how this might land differently for people and used the Group Critique opportunity as a deadline for myself to do this. After testing various colours including the one below, i printed this on large A0 format size again so I was able to compare the previous prints and the new ones side by side and on the wall. The new colours didn’t really land well for me. I also began researching retro cinema maqree light boxes during this time and felt that this would best fit my intentions for this project and an option to explore. Unfortunately with little time and having tested other options which ultimately didn’t work, I decided to return to my original posters for the purposes of the Group Critique to get feedback from a larger cohort of people. I also felt that when shared with the other two works presented during the Critique, that the posters might work well after all.

In preparing this work for presentation as part of the Group Critique late March, a title for the work became clear to me: Countering tempus nullius . Countering the fallacy that the future belongs to no one and is nobody’s time is something I explore in my work. Part of the inspiration for the title of this work came from reading the work of public philosopher Roman Krnzaric who I interviewed in 2020 at the outset of the pandemic and before the release of the book below. It also stems from conversations I’ve had with Aaron Roberts and Kim Bridgland 2019 - 2020 about a work they created with Yvonne Scarce called In Absence (see below) for the 2019/20 NGV Architectural Commission which, amongst other things, counters the fallacy of terra nullius.

Reflections on resolved work

I had spent three evenings prior to the Group Critique exploring ways to work with the space in the octagon to present this work and the other two. I wanted to leverage the space, especially at night and felt that one way to do this would be to present the work when all the major lights were turned off, allowing only a few spotlights to shine on each work. I tested this with Kylie and after a few recurring issues each night this seemed to work well. I scheduled some select spotlights to be turned by on by Kylie (remotely) with all other remaining lights turned off, but ultimately this didn’t work in the end. This is an ongoing issue with the space. Nevertheless the posters looked great in the space and the contrast of the white walls and glossy black printed posters contributed to the cinematic effect i was seeking.

Documentation of process

Project 2 - Finding a pale blue dot

Reflections on process

I decided to extend a work i had initially developed for Studio Materials and Methods A. The iconic photograph of the pale blue dot is something that has been resonant for me for many years. The notion of exploring what a pale blue dot might mean in terms of time became a really resonant question for me too which i could not let go of. I wanted to try and breath new life into the work I had initially developed, especially in terms of scale, so that the work might more accurately reference this particular historical moment of relative climate stability, a pale blue dot in terms of a moment in time. How to reference the last 13.8 Billion years? I decided to get 1.38 km of the same raffia twine (14 rolls of it all up) and glue it all together to create one continuous thread. I wanted the work to confuse the notion of linear time so i decided to tie the two ends together so there was no beginning and no end. I laid the mass of raffia twine on the floor outside the GCVA studio space and explored different installation options, including the wall option as suggested by Hoda Afshar during one of my tutorial sessions (see below). I returned to the Octagon space that evening late at night and felt this would all work best suspended as a mass in mid air within the space. While i didn’t realise it at the time, by installing the work in a nest-like way in the space, it would also help the work speak to another work in the Octagon space i was also installing Listen carefully to the voices of (which includes a field recording featuring birds). I returned the next day after a trip to Bunnings to buy fishing wire and installed it (with the help of Benjamin Baker, 4th year Honours student and friend) as per below (see Folio below). I decided to retain the interactive nature of the work, inviting people to engage with it by trying to locate the pale blue dot within the mass of raffia twine.

Reflections on resolved work

Feedback was varied during the group critique. Some people really didn’t like the texture of the work. Most seemed too timid to engage with the work which i found interesting, despite there being a direct invitation to. Sharon commented later in a one on one tutorial that I might also want to consider exploring things in another form, for example, instead of exploring things in terms of length why not explore things in terms of volume (liquid). It’s a intriguing proposition which I’m still sitting with. While I’ve been tempted to extend this work even further by working with a scientist to insure the work is more accurate and to scale, it feels resolved for me at this stage.. Though I may install and photograph it again at night in the octagon space.

Documentation of process

Project 3 - Listen carefully to the voices of

Reflections on process

After initially starting to develop another work for installation and my Group Critique (see the first photo below) I decided at the last minute to drop it and realise another idea for a work that’s been on mind for sometime. This work was originally developed and presented in an online format as per here: http://www.laurentsl.com/listen but my vision had always been to create a kind of listening room within which to share and experience this work. With only a few days to prepare, I decided to use one of the partitioned spaces in the octagon to test this idea, creating a first iteration of the work.

Reflections on resolved work

The work encountered a number of issues when installed and presented on the night of the Group Critique. For example:

• the partitioned room was too small;

• the work was struggling for attention as there were another two works I had installed requiring consideration aswell, diluting focus on this work;

• the text really didn’t work in the light box format, it was too hard to read for most and too lengthy.

• most of the speakers I had loaned from the VCA didn’t work and i had to use my own at the last minute.

In the end I don’t think anyone had any clue what i was trying to communicate through this work! For me it felt like it was back to the drawing board to consider how this sound based work might be better shared. That’s something I’m still exploring and while i think this particular work is resolved, I suspect there will be future iterations. After seeing the work during the group critique, Eugenia Lim suggested i explore other ways in which sound has been engaged within an installation context. Specifically she encouraged me to visit Rebecca Belmore’s work Fountain (see below) at the Buxton Contemporary which I did the following weekend after our tutorial. I took the photos below. I could really see what Eugenia was on about in pointing me to this work as the work brought together sound with other elements. I’ve also been drawn to Refuge for Resurgence, a work by Superflux, presented at the 2021 Venice Biennale. See pinboard for more documentation of this (photos, articles etc)

Documentation of work

FOLIO (documentation of resolved works discussed above)

Project 1

Countering tempus nullius

Two A0 paper movie posters with printed text; pins. Photographs by Mads Colvin.

Project 2

Finding a pale blue dot

A 1.38km length of natural black paper raffia twine representing the last 13.8 billion years since the birth of the universe. Tied end-to-end creating a continuous loop, the rafia holds a single pale blue dot denoting the relative climate stability of the last 11,700 years within this larger expanse of time. Visitor’s are invited to carefully locate this pale blue dot on the 5mm surface of the twine.

Black paper raffia twine; blue pen; glue; fishing wire. Photographs by Mads Colvin and the artist.

Project 3

Listen carefully to the voices of

VISUAL DIARY (reflections on ideas/works under development; prototyping/testing)

Countering tempus nullius

I’m looking to develop this work even further from the above movie posters. The idea in terms of this new iteration is to create two retro movie sign light boxes for each of these works which will feature exactly the same text as the previous movie posters. This new iteration of this vision includes having the work installed in a public place in Melbourne, perhaps in one of our laneways.

A message from unborn future generations spoken to us in silence

How might we elevate the voices of unborn generations? This work is highlighted on one of the pinboards. For this work, a solitary blue light bulb will pulse in a quiet, darkened room, communicating through silence a message from unborn future generations. In my imagination this message from our descendants has travelled back in time from a distant future to make its way to us at this particular moment. Some initial prototype text has been translated into morse code (see below: both the blue light with accompanying morse code text and the video of this text transmitted into pulsing light) but the content of this message is key and this remains unresolved for me at this stage. I’m currently learning how to create an LED light bulb that blinks/ flickers. A light bulb (LED) has been sourced (from Bunnings!) but I’ve also been exploring other bulbs with a lighter shade of blue that may be more aligned with my intentions for this particular work. Possible title for the work: They speak to us in/through silence

A jukebox that plays the soundscapes of some of the great spheres of our solar system

This work is highlighted on one of the pinboards. I have been wanting to make a sound-based, durational work with a jukebox for some time now. For this work, an illuminated jukebox will be installed in a darkened room, playing the sounds of the Sun, 8 planets and some of the 146 moons of our solar system. Beginning with our Sun and ending with Pluto, one record for each sphere will play and then switch automatically to the next record. Once all records have been played, the process will start automatically all over again.

For this particular work, I began to explore the archives of NASA to find various recordings from all the planets in our solar system. All of these sounds are the result of the sonification of astronomical data and I was flawed with what I heard: haunting, expansive, exquisite and daunting sounds. Most of the recordings I’ve come across in archives have some kind of static throughout but I felt that, given this, these soundscapes would best be listened to on a record rather than any other format. The project has begun to take shape since. A sample recording from Jupiter can be found below.

4’33” x 9

A related but different work I’m developing in parallel to the project above is a 12-inch 33 RPM vinyl record of some of the different expressions of silence, or rather the different expressions of ambient vibrations, throughout our solar system. It will consist of 9 tracks (with one track for the sun and a track for each of the 8 planets) with each track running for precisely 4'33". A reference to the composition by John Cage, I imagine the pianist David Tudor (who first performed it in 1952 on stage ), sitting quietly at his piano performing this particular work too: starting at our Sun and travelling through space, stopping at each planet for 4’33” before moving onto the next and closing the lid of his piano for the last time at Neptune. I’ve included a test of this last 4’33” recording of Neptune below.

A sentinel for ‘silence’

My current thinking for this work is to have live sounds from some of the great quiet places of Earth, their geophony and biophony, echo silently in real-time throughout a room. Once a human generated sound (a plane flying over-head, cars etc) is detected within each live-stream, it automatically switches to a new location on Earth with its concomitant unique’ silent’ soundscape.

I’m currently reading “Sounds Wild and Broken” by David Haskell which is supporting the development of this and other sound based works I’m exploring. I’ve also had preliminary discussions with a former teacher of mine, Dr Marcus Leadley (Studio Manager - Electronic Music Studios,, Music Department) Goldsmiths University about how I might go about doing this. The following has been suggested as a guide from members of his team which I’m currently exploring: http://soundtent.org/soundcamp_stream.html

A long durational work

This has been a project idea for a few years now (see link here for project description) but not much has progressed this year. I’ve chosen to focus on more immediate hands on ideas such as those discussed above. Nevertheless I have a pinboard dedicated to the project which lists 12 artistic and cultural projects around the world which are project to unfold from 100 years to over 1B years. I also have over multiple links within my Are.na channel dedicated to this theme and related ideas. I participated in the online livestream for the handover ceremony for Future Library (a 100 year artwork in Oslo Norway, by Katie Paterson) June 2022, including the opening of the silent room for the project within the Oslo Public Library.

Artworks that exist in my imagination

The following are artworks that exist in my imagination (but i guess once they are read by others, they also exist in their imagination too). I often write ideas for new artworks down on post-it notes or black cards as per below as a practice.I love letting them just simmer away, threads i return to throughout the day and night. Sometimes they don’t progress any further than this but at other times they become paths I follow, research and explore. Occasionally I seek to manifest these ideas as artworks that exist outside the imagination too (as per some of the artworks mentioned above that I’m now developing, prototyping and researching).

I’ve been inspired by a comment that artist Katie Paterson once shared about how ideas can be considered artworks in their own right. She was once challenged about this by one of her lecturers while undertaking her studies in fine art. She created a book with 100 of her ideas, some of them will only ever exist in the imagination and others will take form and flight outside of it, now or in the future.

The process of honouring some of the ideas that come to me as artworks in their own right is something I’m still exploring . I think the process of writing things down in succinct ways (crystallising an idea for a work in 5-10 words which is often only possible after sitting with a thought or researching something for a long time) and letting things just percolate as i go throughout my day has become a very important part of my creative practice.