Before We Fan Out...

Don't forget that I need to get final papers and presentation summaries and documentation materials from you all by Wednesday...

Symposium

Panel One (1:00--2-2:15)

Philip, War House (Ranciere, Benyus), 10-15mins.
Elinor, Everything Chair (Sterling, Holmgren, c2c), 10-15mins.
Nina, TBA (Public Smog; Arendt, Sterling), 15mins.
Jenny, SOMA Condos (Arendt), 15mins.
Discussion 10-15mins

Panel Two (2-2:15--2:50-3)
Alyssa, TBA (Arendt/Foucault), 15mins.
Daniel, Sememes Seities Sememes (Arendt/Foucault), 10mins.
Dori, TBA (Barthes), 10mins.
Discussion 10-15mins.

Panel Three (3-3:50-4)
Adam, "Usefulness of p2p Collaboration in the Production of 'Finished' Work" (Arendt, p2p posse), 15mins.
HyunSun Jung, "Contemporary Instructive Video Art" (Lessig), 10-15mins.
Kara, Opensource in Brazil [?] (Bauwens), 15mins.
Yuen Jung Lee, "Surveillance and Video Art" (Foucault), 10-15mins.
Discussion 10-15mins.

It's going to be intense and we're going to have to keep to a strict schedule to ensure everybody has their moment in the Sun. No official breaks, I'm afraid, and those who have a/v needs should try to set up before their scheduled moment to keep things in motion. I'm going to arrive as close to 12.30 as possible, to give folks set-up time in advance.

I am creating a statement of basic propositions from my own perspective that summarize the themes of the class -- but what I'm excited about for tomorrow is hearing your voices, hearing what you have made of these texts and how you respond to your peers among yourselves. This should be very illuminating and, I'm hoping, quite a bit of fun, too, even if it looks sure to be hectic and intense.

See you all tomorrow!

This Wednesday, Next Wednesday

On Wednesday there will be a sign-in sheet to determine the order in which you want to present work and papers (or sections of papers) for the Symposium the following week. You should be thinking about these things in earnest. Those of you whose final projects are conventional seminar papers should be generating between 18-32pp. Those of you who are work in different modes should still be prepared to submit a piece of writing summarizing the work and connecting it to themes and texts in the course, something I expect to be between 8-16pp. Final papers should arrive by e-mail no later than May 13, a week after our symposium is completed. As always, talk to me if you have questions, issues, problems, and so on.

Checking In

Any word on ongoing projects? Problems, promises, provocations? Links? Images?

How are you finding the readings for Wednesday?

Readings

How are you guys finding the Foucault and new Arendt? I'm going to be distributing more Foucault, Agamben, and Ranciere Wednesday. Exciting!

Short Hannah Arendt Piece to Accompany Our Foucault Discussion Next Time

Reflection on Violence.

We won't fly for art : Take the Pledge.

"I will not fly for art but only if six other people will do the same AND replicate this pledge." —- Marc Garrett and Ruth Catlow

Take the Pledge

Deadline to sign up by: 26th April 2009

We won't fly for art

We will not take an aeroplane for the sake of art. For the next 6 months we will find other ways to visit and participate in exhibitions, fairs, conferences, meetings, residencies. We will not fly for inspiration, nor to appreciate, buy or sell art.

But only if 6 others will do the same AND replicate this pledge.

This pledge is designed for exponential growth so if you persuade another 6 people to do the same, within a year you could be one of millions of people changing the way the artworld works. So sign up, create a replica pledge and share your own experiences, observations and arguments towards reducing art flights. Post a link to it in the comment box so others can find their way to it.

This is a public art experiment in the de-escalation of carbon-fuelled, high altitude, high-velocity, global art careering. For six months we choose to cover less physical distance, move more slowly between destinations, to look futureward with more attention to the view from the ground and the network, for ways to connect with others around the world.

Who can sign up to this pledge? Any individual involved in the arts: artist (in the broadest sense), curator, art administrator, art appreciator, gallerist, art critic, art historian, art academic, art technician, art security, art transporter etc.

Whether you currently fly for art 50 times a year or never, your engagement will change things by making your position in the artworld visible and by offering an alternative perspective. If you work with others you may need to completely revise your schedules and budgets and lobby for the right not to fly.

This is to light the blue touch paper of Gustave Metzger's Reduce Art Flights campaign using the generative and viral capabilities of social networks. We want to know more about the impact of air-flight on the artworld (and beyond). We intuit that abstaining from air flight will motivate and enable people (with more time, money, energy and attention) to relate differently to their own local cultures and to connect more imaginatively to other cultures.

Planet of Slums

I already told you guys that you'd need to read The Urban Climacteric and A Surplus Humanity? -- the first and last full chapters in the book, Planet of Slums for Wednesday. Giving our discussion of the harrowing section Living in Shit, most of you will have grasped that the chapter Slum Ecology is also one I think you should read. Those three chapters are key. I think it would be lovely if you managed to have tackled The Prevalence of Slums and SAPing the Developing World (chapters two and seven), well, it would be lovely if you managed to read the whole thing of course. But in terms of discussion Wed, I'm counting on everybody having made it through those key three chapters and would be very well pleased if you managed to get through those three plus 2 and 7 if you can swing it. How are people finding the book, by the way?