Inantimate Alice: Episode 1

I think the person who created this was trying to construe the desperation of looking for her father through the eyes of a child and also how they are disconnected from society in such a way that family is all they really have.

The piece talks about how the father leaves for stretches to look for oil, how there is no restaurant for 500 miles and how they are driving in utter darkness with nothing to see. The desperation is also seen in how the main character tries to distract herself from the reality of missing her father with her game, making lists and drawing. It seems like her mother makes her shut it off so she doesn't have to be alone in her fear and it works. The daughter gets afraid. There is relief when they finally find him, but there is still that feeling of isolation.

The images that were the most powerful to me were that of the empty road, the blueprints of the base camp and the one where the game was shut off, pushing the girl into a more fearful place.

I think this is more successful than a traditional approach because it grounds you in the reality of the story. When she speaks of the buzzing of electricity in the sky, you can hear it. When she's taking pictures of flowers, you have to move the mouse over the flowers and actually take the pictures. There is a drawing of the base camp, very technical, that seems to imply that this isn't home. A child would draw home very differently. If this were words alone, you wouldn't be in that place and you wouldn't feel the desperation as clear.

The piece works because it moves at a pace that is appropriate and uses images and sounds that put the viewer there. The blinking map of China, the words scrolling at reading speed, the interactivity of the game that distracts the viewer like it distracts the child--all work together to put the viewer there.

What I like about this piece that I would like to put in my own work is both the sense of pacing and the fact that it draws you in to the point where you must see some kind of resolution. It would be very hard to "opt out" mid way through, just like a cliffhanger novel or a serial tv show. To be able to hold someone's concentration in that kind of way would be awesome.

Short Project Idea

My idea for a short project is to take a word or idea that is charged and misconstrued on a regular basis and have the word/idea start spewing out all the misconceptions into maybe a garbage can or something. In the end, the truth behind the charged word would begin to be typed beneath the actual word, much like a dictionary entry.

Tammy McGovern

I plan to research Tammy McGovern because of all the writers I looked at, her work made me the most uncomfortable and I want to understand why she goes about putting together her pieces the way she does. There must be a method behind the madness, as it is, and I’d like to figure that out.

For research I plan on first viewing most of her work, then looking up different writing both on her and by her hoping to cast some light. As for producing 5-7 pages, I believe that there are so many things present in her work, from the speed of video clips to the disjointed sound and to the interactivty of pieces such as videoKeyboard, that I won’t really have a problem constructing a paper.

As for help, any information on where to find the writings I’m looking for would be appreciated. Also, if perhaps you have any material discussing this type of work and how it developed.

As for a schedule of research, I see myself maybe looking at one new video/piece per day, and looking up an article or essay every few days. I will probably do most of my research online unless I find an overabundance of material at the library.

Drucker

As it applies to us, Drucker seems to focus on how in the mid-1920s there was a movement both in literature in art and that “the relations between form and expression” were dependent on “the capacity of the image, the poem, the word, or the mark to be, to exist in its own right.” She later discusses the importance of art/words to be rather than to represent. The notion is that words are not merely a gate into seeing a fuller picture, but that they themselves are the picture and should be presented in such a way as to be seen stand alone.

Introducing then, the power of words and the pattern poem to express more than words could previously, Drucker delves into the work of Mallarme who clearly distinguished his poetic form from the work of others. This avant-garde approach helps one realize that things as simple as font size, style and placement can radically alter the perception of a work.

This, among other ideas, led to other writers and artists paying closer attention to how others would perceive their creations. Spatial distribution is equal to word choice in many ways in the sense that it can express ideas as clearly or delve into abstraction. That notion, while not new to me, is brought to the forefront and I am able to see it more clearly. If I pay attention to all aspects of a work, it creates a more powerful, cohesive piece that can communicate volumes even in simplicity.

Many people refuse to experiment with writing because they are locked into form. To change font size or spacing mid page or mid sentence seems a many a way to break from cohesion. What they don’t realize is that by staying rooted in old patterns and forms that they are ruining cohesion. There is no way to break a boundary. There is no way to communicate parts of the message and so cohesion is lost.

For my own work, I think I need to be more aware of the placement of letters and also, what a certain font or placement communicates. If I have a message that I want viewers to comprehend, I must produce it in whatever language they will best understand. Readers respond to variance, to change and to abstraction. While it is true that some will not be able to break from their own boundaries in order to properly read this language, it is present for them should they wish to. That is what a writer should do—use every tool on the table and wait for someone to read.

Conversation Project

For the conversation project, Amanda and I are going to present an argument on smoking bans. We have located several websites with pros and cons of implementing such bans. Using these websites, we will compose an argument with a pro voice and a con voice. We have decided to represent the pro voice with black letters on a white background, and the con voice with white letters on a black background. This will function to show which “voice” is speaking at any given time, as well as show that this argument tends to be “black-or-white”, with few people falling into the “grey”. We also want to experiment with graphics. For example, having an image of a cigarette slowly burn down as the argument runs its course. From this cigarette image, we might try to experiment with having letters of words come out of the smoke from the burning end to arrange on the screen. In addition, we would like to incorporate a surgeon general’s warning into this piece. We have located a Marlboro font that we would like to use to stay within the theme of our argument. Knowing that trying to keep pace with the words might be difficult for the viewers, we will try not to incorporate too many words. We will try making fewer words work to get the point across, and try not to overwhelm the readers’ senses.

Ask Me For The Moon and New Orleans

One of the things that intrigued me was that both of these pieces were a translation of a different genre of known writing, poetry and persuasive respectively. The imagery and, in the case of "Blue Velvet," sound, helped contribute more to the conversation than the written word alone could have.

In "Ask Me for the Moon," one of the things that struck me was how in this format, the poet was able to control how the reader viewed the work. Not all the lines came at once. some were drawn out and some led quickly into others. The imagery in the background of the buildings helped give a background to the piece. When a reader normally confronts a poem, he or she can scan it at leisure or pass over lines at a time. The reader here is not allowed to do so. Provided that the viewer remains on the webpage, they will consume the poem closer to how the poet intended. This is the power of technology to transform writing and help people get inside the mind of the writer. Also, we get some of the sense of disillusionment here. The lines show up on the screen as loose thoughts, as if they could be our thoughts. It works.

In "Blue Velvet," the author is attempting to make an emotional connection with the viewer. There is an interactivity here, where the viewer must click on certain words to gain all the information available. This keeps the viewer interested and connected. The sound, the pounding percussion and dramatic tones, give us the idea that what is here is important and indeed it is.

Most discussions of what happened in post-Katrina New Orleans are flat--facts on a page with no personality. The other accounts are overly dramatic, but touch only on the emotional aspect of the story. What is done here, and quite nicely, is the tying together of the facts and the emotional nature of the story in such a way that the viewer is engaged and horrified at the same time. Simply reading facts on a page would bore the average reader and allow them to disengage. Here, we are constantly reminded of the reality of the situation.

When you click on a word, it splashes through the land, reminding us of the after-effects of the storm. The persuasive essay form at the bottom of the page isn't arranged in classic rows of type, but in varying sizes that draw the eye around the page. The videos from the Katrina wake can be accessed from the page, reminding the viewer's soul of how it felt in that situation.

Also here, the words used are not arbitrary at all, but meant to gain a response. Liberty.Activist segregation Privatization. These words are meant to move. And the way the site moves, they are meant to tell a story in an engaging and new way. This format educates, informs and effects emotions in a way possible only by the format.

So then, while these two pieces vary widely in subject manner, they accomplish the same thing. Both expand the conventions of the written word and redefine those conventions using technology. "Blue Velvet" is more effective because of its complexity and interactive nature. It takes a hot-button issue and expounds far beyond normal in an innovative way. It combines images, sound and words to make an argument against the atrocities experienced throughout New Orleans.

"Moon" claims to be one account of the reality in Hawaii and how it is a place overrun with tourists that outnumber citizens. While it is visually pleasing, it doesn't push the envelope in the way "Blue Velvet" does. It doesn't move me to change or to make any decisions about anything. It is a commentary where "Blue Velvet" is almost a manifesto for change.

Word Animation

Link to Word Animation

https://pantherfile.uwm.edu/mtray/blood2.html

October 1

Writing changes language. I think this can occur in a variety of different ways. For example, writers may coin new phrases or invent new words that actually change the language. Words exist now that didn't exist last week or last year. Also words change meaning through their use. An easy example is the word "gay" transforming from an adjective meaning happy into a term for a homosexual. But beyond this, language can also be transformed through writing whenever a writer chooses to push what a word means, casting a blanket over a word and implying that it means more than what the dictionary says it does.

If I decide that words that I encounter are not enough to express the thoughts I have, I may use the words at my disposal to try and convey an idea. If I am successful, this may expand the definition and so I have redefined language, if but for my audience.

As for words changing consciousness, the same idea comes into play. I may use words in new ways, interject them where they seem inappropriate, or utilize them to express new ideas. If I am then expressing an idea using these new conventions I have created for these words, the consciousness of others can be drawn into my own stream. My audience adopts my usage or my formula, if only for the sake of driving through my writing. In turn, I might see another writer using a word or phrase in a new way and adopt it into my consciousness. If enough people do this, we have changed language,