wraithe

part of a series silent meditation on dissolution

theory:

think of the world as a debris field

books are a priori modernist monolithic

plot is equivalent to mise en scene

aphorisms define and promulgate thought

fragmented programming languages proliferate

friends without networks are not friends

the universe is incomprehensible

thought and research shape-ride

imminence replaces immanence

difference replaces differance

all construction is deconstruction

immersion is neighborhood-based

definition is situational

grand narratives are replaced by none

ecosystems are replaced by micro-niches

vertebrates give way

past life swallows present life

be on the make or die

information increase is chaotic and blind

the future has already past

we are proliferating splitting and outmoded channels

fucking is too close and too slow

a parent is an afterthought of a child and a mistake

agreement is futile

Thinking about Second Life phenomenology, that's it

So this is what I've come up with for the upcoming conference (ELO, providence) -

Second Life is a coherent system, based on mathesis, energy expenditure

dynamics; it is not a collocation of levels; Heisenberg does not apply

(except by crude analogy).

Second Life is theoretically a space of total control; control extends to

physics as well.

There are boundaries, but no differentiations in Second Life.

Physics and earths are afterthoughts at best. Permissions are equivalent

to cosmological constants under the sign of capital.

In Second Life, everything is inscribed, and inscription is everywhere

consistent.

Think of a phenomenological horizon of entangled information, present but

readable only in very limited ways.

Within Second Life, there is only within; the safe-words for escape are

quit, abort, shutdown, delete.

Within, there are signs among universal inscription:

Writings:

found:

signs within (readable) scripts

signs above or conntected to objects (think avatar names, other)

signs on object textures

universal signs as video on parcel according to privileged texture

universal signs as videos on parcels according to media textures

ad hoc:

chat, instant messaging < > indexical

voice < > ikonic

definable

Dynamic inscriptive regimes (always involves the subject/viewer):

narratological styles with avatar and object movements, textures

diegesis, avatars moving or being moved (controlled-by)

indexical signs of violence, sexuality, and so forth:

identifications

sutures

arousals

< > projections <> jectivity < >

immersive

objects and part-objects: seductions, lures, impediments

Everyday Life:

indexical objects, models, simulacra, re-enactments:

absolutely unnecessary

every movement or object in a virtual world that closely parallels

movement or objects in physical reality - is already a re-enactment

Thinking through language in virtual worlds

SL without language - that is to say, unspoken and unspeaking objects, objects unspoken-for, these objects parallel the diegeses of silent cinema - moving among them, but then what? what are the moments of narrative or other devices conveying meaning, other than design, etc. So language is critical, and there are signs/signboards everywhere, not to mention notes handed (down) to one upon entering SL - all this. But if language inheres to the object, if the object is always already inscribed, the possibilities open up perhaps? So on one hand, there are speaking objects, and on the other, objects with inscribed textures. The latter can be stationary signs/signboards; they can also be (in SL 2 viewers) videos separately assigned to separate surfaces, or objects in their entirety. In both cases, it appears as if the objects were speaking, were in some sense linguistic - as if language were in the world, not so much of, or beyond, it. So these works - recent works - of mine work with speaking objects - now here are two, minus the sound and dynamism. For the rest, there are a number of video files at http://www.alansondheim.org/ - I suggest http://www.alansondheim.org/thinking.mp4 or http://www.alansondheim.org/Okukin.mp4 or http://www.alansondheim.org/america.mp4 - there is also http://www.alansondheim.org/becoming.mp4 - all of these recent, as of today - and I do want to thank everyone for the possibilities of this residency as well!

First Artist-in-Residence ->> Alan Sondheim

Yoshikaze (http://slurl.com/secondlife/HUMlab/105/200/25) provides "Up-in-the-Air" Residency for SL artists. Our first artist-in-residence is Alan Sondheim, who will be working at Yoshikaze on Humlab sim for 4 months.  The below is the description of Alan's project:

Either Well or Brane -

The first refers to something that is low/beneath the surface - but reflects the sky; it also taps into something hidden.

The second references a dimensional object in string theory that may or may not exist; from Wikipedia:

"Originally string theory was a theory of 1-branes called strings. By the mid-1990s it became apparent that the theory could be extended to also include higher dimensional objects. Typically these objects are non-perturbative features of the theory (meaning they do not appear in perturbation theory).

Besides the fundamental string (or F-string) of string theory and its magnetic dual, the NS5-brane, the most important type of branes that appear are the D-branes. Different types of D-branes appear in different theories. Dn-branes with even n appear in type IIA string theory where as the odd Dp-branes appear in type IIB string theory."

Think impossible or inconceivable objects, objects nonetheless that may be fundamental to the cosmos - think fundamental ontology.

Description of installation:

Well/Brane is both installation and performance space. with the former, I want to extend the idea of "negotiated space," a space in SL that is inherently uncomfortable, impossible to move through. Negotiated space, which is also a supple and continuously-changing architecture, first appeared in my Odyssey installation, "The Accidental Artist" (also the name of a publish-on-demand book produced by Fort/Da Press). The basic concept is that, within the space, one is utterly lost, among the 'alien.'

The space Well/Brane is narratological, since objects will possess labels or signs appearing in the vicinity of avatars. It will also be aural, and in this sense more complex than the space in the first installation. Using the Beta 2.01 viewer (and its successors), I should be able to directly add webpages and videos to objects - videos that are differentiated from each other (in the first viewer, "media" allowed objects in a region to play only one video at a time). This allows me to develop a narratology from within, based on differences among videos - not just, in other words, what occurs in a specific video, but what occurs as a result of difference among them. The same should hold true for audio.

This work will continue to use modified bvh animation files; at this point I want to use both older ones, and newer ones created directly in Poser. I want to explore "behaviour collision" more systematically: an avatar following more than one animation structure at a time.

I envision several public performances, with Foofwa d'Imobilite, Sandy Baldwin, and others; the results will be, as usual, documented in video, audio, and stills.

The points of all of this:
1. To further explore dance/choreographic/behavioral issues in SL.
2. To further explore these within complex negotiated environments.
3. To explore media-modified environments with contradictory video/audio materials.
4. To explore narratologies and performances in these environments.
5. To relate all of this to a developing philosophy of difference and contradiction.

Avatar name:
My main avatar is Alan Dojoji.
My avatar performer is Julu Twine.

Humlab RL + SL

Humlab (www.humlab.umu.se/english) is RL lab at Umeå University, Sweden, which focuses on Humanities and Technology. Its 500m2 RL lab supports an open and creative environment for researchers, scholars, artists and students. Over the years they have had internationally renowned guest lecturers, among them Katherine Hayles and Steina Vasulka.

SL Humlab Island

SL Humlab Island was instrumental in developing Goodwind Seiling's interactive sound installation "N00sphere Playground" (2007 - 2008) by providing much needed virtual studio space. The work was commissioned by Tagging Art in Denmark with support from the Danish Arts Council and hosted at Humlab island in Second Life for the Virtual Moves exhibition at the National Gallery in Copenhagen, 2008. "N00sphere Playground" is now permanently installed at Humlab Island (slurl.com/secondlife/Humlab/27.0/215.0/801.0).

It further hosted Dethomas Dibou's stage-set construction for Wirxli FlimFlam's "XAANADruuL" for Avatar Orchestra Metaverse. "XAANADruuL" and Pauline Oliveros' "The Heart of Tone" (modified for Avatar Orchestra Metaverse) were premiered on this sim for 4th annual Open Space Voice++ Festival in Victoria, BC, Canada.

Humlab Island in Second Life is run by Humlab with sim manager Didge Burroughs. Yoshikaze Studio is part of SL Humlab with Goodwind Seiling as its spot manager.