Jan Svankmajer – Dimensions of dialogue

Amazing surreal stop frame animation by Czech artist Jan Svankmajer

Monochrom’s “Kiki and Bubu and The Feelings”

http://monochrom.at/

Brian Holmes on Art and Democracy

John Bergers – ‘Ways of Seeing’ 1972 Documentary

John Bergers – ‘Ways of Seeing’ 1972 BBC Documentary – on Youtube
In this series Berger invites us to critically engage with the language of western visual culture, exploring its origins in painting and following its development through to pop culture and advertising.

The documentary is based on his book ‘Ways of Seeing’ you can find it in any art college or here where someone has scanned it in… http://www.scribd.com/doc/243296/Ways-of-Seeing-John-Berger
Here is a quote I like from episode 1 -

“Remember that I am controlling and using for my own purposes the means of reproduction needed for these programs. The images may be like words, but there is no dialogue yet, you cannot reply to me. For that to become possible in the modern media of communication access to televison must be extended beyond its present narrow limits, meanwhile with this program as with all programs, you receive images and meanings which are arranged, I hope you will consider what I have arranged but be sceptical of it.”

Well the internet has certainly changed that media landscape, now anyone can produce and broadcast from home and take part in that great big dialogue, the world and its image are up for remaking, its in our hands, we are all artists   ;-P

enjoy

Kev

John Berger on Wikipedia – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Berger

There are 4 episodes

Episode 1 – Art in the age of mechanical reproduction
In this we are introduced to ideas of perspective and context and how modern methods reproduction change our relationship with imagery.
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=LnfB-pUm3eI

Episode 2 – The Female Nude
This episode center on the history of the representation of women in painting and in popular culture.
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=u72AIab-Gdc

Episode 3 – Oil Painting
This episode discusses oil painting its history as an object of status and wealth.
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=hiNqoyfeQDQ

Episode 4 – Advertising
Episode 4 brings together arguments of previous episodes, drawing paralells between painting and advertising.
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=mmgGT3th_oI

Thanks to Leigh at learnonline where I found it posted http://learnonline.wordpress.com/2008/10/11/ways-of-seeing-up-at-last/

An Anthropological Introduction To Youtube

Reblogged from http://educationaltechnology.ca/couros/880

“Do yourself a favour and take some time to watch Professor Michael Wesch’s brilliant presentation to the Library of Congress, June 23, 2008. The video is 55 minutes long, but is an excellent backgrounder to social media, user-generated content, and online communities through the lens of anthropology.”

Buckminster Fuller Institute Challenge 2008

ReBlogged from MakeZine – http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2008/08/2008_buckminster_fuller_c.html?CMP=OTC-0D6B48984890

The Buckminster Fuller Institute has an annual Buckminster Fuller Challenge, a $100,000 prize for “comprehensive solutions that radically advance human well-being and ecosystem health.” The 2008 prize was awarded in June, in NYC. Check out their Challenge webpage for a list of submissions and winners. The 2009 Challenge will begin this fall.

http://challenge.bfi.org/ideaindex

The Genius of Charles Darwin: Presented by Richard Dawkins

http://www.richarddawkins.net/article,2925,On-TV-The-Genius-of-Charles-Darwin-Presented-by-Richard-Dawkins,Richard-Dawkins-Channel-4

A new documentary series on evolution. Free to download from the Richard Dawkins Website.

Campaign for a ‘Sound Copyright’ in the European Union

EU internal market commissioner Charlie McCreevy has announced his intention to extend the European copyright term for sound recordings from 50 to 95 years.

This is of course a dangerous and absurd policy and we should therefore support the campaign for a Sound Copyright in the EU.

50 years is long enough there is no need for an extension. As it stands there is so much music from the 50’s and 60’s due to enter the public domain where it should be free to be copied, shared and remixed into new creative works.

Go the following site for the petition. There is also a text advocating this position.
http://www.soundcopyright.eu/

Help gather support and pass this message on.

Graffiti Research Lab The Movie

I just finished watching the Graffiti Research Lab Movie which is available as a bittorent from http://graffitiresearchlab.com/
Its a testament to the cultural value of the free and open source approach.
The Graffiti Research Lab develops new often low tech approaches for graffiti, street art and protest. They invented ‘throwies’ l.e.d ’s that you can throw up onto metal surfaces , or write with, and also developed laser tagging which allows for street artists to write or draw over the entire surface of a large building from a distance using a projector and a laser. They publish the know how and software for doing these things for free online and watch the projects then take on a life of their own. They also talk about how big business has appropriated the projects for advertising and commercial purposes and in response GRL’s own counter strategies.
This film is enjoyable, inspiring and fun. Definately worth the watch.

I’ve been busy

Hello to any and all who might wander upon my research blog here. Well I’ve not been a very good blogger these past few months the reason being that I’ve been very busy. Mid September I got an offer of a place on the Masters of Fine Art at University of Ulster Belfast. So I dropped all in Galway packed my bags and moved up north. Its a 2 year practice based MA and so far so good. Apart from the usual bit of adjusting things have been going well up here. I landed on my feet and found a nice place to live, where I hope to stay for the duration of the course. This is a relief since I’ve moved 6 times in the past 2 years and moving is such a pain. So all is well. Whats the story Kev? What are you at? I hear you ask. Well I’m currently focusing on working with video and film so I’m setting up a video blog called ‘edits’ which I will be setting up asap. I don’t have a lot of videos at the moment but I hope to upload maybe a new video every fortnight. So watch this space as I’d love to hear comments and criticisms. Thats it for now.

K