From Analogue to Image Retrieval: Concepts of Archival Art in Daniel Blaufuks

From Analogue to Image Retrieval: Concepts of Archival Art in Daniel Blaufuks, seeks to explore a question first triggered by the viewing of Daniel Blaufuks’s Constellation series in his exhibition-project, All the Memory of the World, part one (2014): might digital databases and image retrieval systems be viewed as developments of archival processes and thinking? Has the touted rupture between analogue and digital occurred, or does archival art live in them both? With a career that spans several decades, Blaufuks has been deeply engaged with questions surrounding the Holocaust, exile, memory and postmemory. Photography, film and archival material have been the tools chosen for his excavations; nonetheless, it is impossible to overlook the influence of literature in the artist’s work. Having begun with the appropriation of physical archival material, such as photographic albums, polaroids or slides, Blaufuks has also employed digital images and image-retrieval systems such as Google Image. In the view to proceed with an analysis on the crucial argument of this thesis, I have divided it into to three sections. The first, Daniel Blaufuks: The ‘Material’ Archive, as the name indicates, focuses on considerations on the so-called material archive, meaning the analogue archive. Daniel Blaufuks: Writing with Images, the second section, is devoted to two thematic components of the artist’s oeuvre: memory and literature. Here I equally offer a comparative analysis between Blaufuks and the works of writers Georges Perec and W. G. Sebald. In Daniel Blaufuks: Traversing the Archive, the final section, I return to the theoretical frameworks surrounding the archive, yet one founded on 0s and 1s rather than paper and ink. In writing From Analogue to Image Retrieval: Concepts of Archival Art in Daniel Blaufuks, I strive to illuminate the continuities from analogue to digital archives, and analogue to digital archival art practices. Blaufuks’s ease and breadth in the incorporation of a variety of media into his projects stands as an ideal case study for the exploration of the questions I put forward in this thesis.From Analogue to Image Retrieval: Concepts of Archival Art in Daniel Blaufuks, explora uma questão desencadeada pela série Constelações de Daniel Blaufuks no seu projeto-exposição, Toda a Memória do Mundo, parte um (2014): poderão bases de dados e sistemas de recuperação de imagens ser vistos como extensões de processos e de concepções do arquivo? Terá a ruptura entre analógico e digital ocorrido, ou será que a arte arquivística é transversal a ambos? Com uma carreira que se estende por várias décadas, Blaufuks tem desenvolvido projectos relacionados com questões em torno do Holocausto, exílio, memória e pós memória. Fotografia, imagem em movimento e material de arquivo são as ferramentas escolhidas pelo artista para as suas escavações; no entanto, é impossível ignorar a influência da literatura na sua obra. Tendo começado com a apropriação de material de arquivo, como álbuns fotográficos, polaroids ou slides, Blaufuks emprega também imagens digitais e motores de busca de imagens como o Google Image nos seus projectos mais recentes. A fim de prosseguir com uma análise da questão central desta tese, a mesma foi dividida em três secções. A primeira, Daniel Blaufuks: The ‘Material’ Archive, tem como foco considerações sobre o arquivo analógico. Já Daniel Blaufuks: Writing with Images, a segunda secção, é dedicada a duas componentes temáticas da obra do artista: memória e literatura. Aqui, procedo igualmente a uma análise comparativa entre Blaufuks e as obras dos escritores Georges Perec e W. G. Sebald. Em Daniel Blaufuks: Traversing the Archive, a secção final, regresso às estruturas teóricas associadas ao arquivo, olhando no entanto para um arquivo construído sobre 0s e 1s ao invés de papel e tinta. Com From Analogue to Image Retrieval: Concepts of Archival Art in Daniel Blaufuks, procuro iluminar continuidades entre arquivos analógicos e digitais, bem como estabelecer paralelos entre o uso de sistemas analógicos e digitais em práticas de arte de arquivo. A facilidade com que Blaufuks integra uma variedade de formatos e média no seu trabalho faz com que o artista seja o estudo de caso ideal para a exploração das questões que apresento nesta tese

Perspective Chapter: Intermedial Comparative Literature—From the Sister-Arts Debate to the Twentieth-Century Avant-Gardes

This chapter traces an overview of the evolution of the ekphrastic exchanges among the so-called sister-arts until the emergence of the concept of the total work of art (Gesamtkunstwerk) and the artistic syncretism of twentieth-century avant-gardes. The discussion is framed within Intermedial Studies, an interdisciplinary area that merges aspects of semiotics, communication studies and comparative literature, among other disciplines. The chapter focuses on the major technological shifts that have shaped the discussion. It does not contemplate the digital convergence, which is explored in the chapter “Literature Review on Intermedial Studies from Analogue to Digital” as part of InTech volume The Intermediality of Contemporary Visual Arts

Design and Geographically Liberated Difference

The concept of geographically liberated difference has emerged from the overlap of cultural studies and economics as a critique of the effects of globalisation on cultures through the manufacturing and distribution of artefacts with unique differences across diverse territories. Although this concept is known in the domains of cultural studies and economics, very little has been written on its effect and understanding within design, especially industrial design. Industrial design has vast influence on the production and distribution of products across the globe from small scale to mass production of millions of units. The mechanisms by which design influences the evolution of cultures through the concept of geographically liberated difference are important for future development. Research by the authors indicates parallel streams of both digital and analogue methods supporting successful models of geographically liberated difference in design practice. Examples of these approaches are discussed to uncover the operable mechanisms and arguments concerning the future value and influence of this feature of globalisation

The game jam movement:disruption, performance and artwork

This paper explores the current conventions and intentions of the game jam - contemporary events that encourage the rapid, collaborative creation of game design prototypes. Game jams are often renowned for their capacity to encourage creativity and the development of alternative, innovative game designs. However, there is a growing necessity for game jams to continue to challenge traditional development practices through evolving new formats and perspectives to maintain the game jam as a disruptive, refreshing aspect of game development culture. As in other creative jam style events, a game jam is not only a process but also, an outcome. Through a discussion of the literature this paper establishes a theoretical basis with which to analyse game jams as disruptive, performative processes that result in original creative artefacts. In support of this, case study analysis of Development Cultures: a series of workshops that centred on innovation and new forms of practice through play, chance, and experimentation, is presented. The findings indicate that game jams can be considered as processes that inspire creativity within a community and that the resulting performances can be considered as a form of creative artefact, thus parallels can be drawn between game jams and performative and interactive art

Audiovisual research collections and their preservation

The basic problem of primary audio and video research materials is clearly shown by the survey: A great and important part of the entire heritage is still outside archival custody in the narrower sense, scattered over many institutions in fairy small collections, and even in private hands. reservation following generally accepted standards can only be carried out effectively if collections represent critical mass. Specialised audiovisual archives will solve their problems, as they will sooner or later succeed in getting appropriate funding to achieve their aims. A very encouraging example is the case of the Netherlands. The larger audiovisual research archives will also manage, more or less autonomously, the transfer of contents in time. For a considerable part of the research collections, however, the concept of cooperative models and competence centres is the only viable model to successfullly safeguard their holdings. Their organisation and funding is a considerable challenge for the scientific community. TAPE has significantly raised awareness of the fact that, unless action is swiftly taken, the loss of audiovisual materials is inevitable. TAPE’s international and regional workshops were generally overbooked. While TAPE was already underway, several other projects for the promotion of archives have received grants from organisations other than the European Commission, inter alia support for the St. Petersburg Phonogram Archive, and the Folklore Archive in Tirana, obviously as a result of a better understanding of the need for audiovisual preservation. When the TAPE project started its partners assumed that cooperative projects would fail because of the notorious distrust of researchers, specifically in the post-communist countries. One of the most encouraging surprises was to learn that, at least in the most recent survey, it became apparent that this social obstacle is fading out. TAPE may have contributed to this important development

Introduction : photography between art history and philosophy

The essays collected in this special issue of Critical Inquiry are devoted to reflection on the shifts in photographically based art practice, exhibition, and reception in recent years and to the changes brought about by these shifts in our understanding of photographic art. Although initiated in the 1960s, photography as a mainstream artistic practice has accelerated over the last two decades. No longer confined to specialist galleries, books, journals, and other distribution networks, contemporary art photographers are now regularly the subject of major retrospectives in mainstream fine-art museums on the same terms as any other artist. One could cite, for example, Thomas Struth at the Metropolitan Museum in New York (2003), Thomas Demand at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMa) (2005), or Jeff Wall at Tate Modern and MoMA (2006–7). Indeed, Wall’s most recent museum show, at the time of writing, The Crooked Path at Bozar, Brussels (2011), situated his photography in relation to the work of a range of contemporary photographers, painters, sculptors, performance artists, and filmmakers with whose work Wall considers his own to be in dialogue, irrespective of differences of media. All this goes to show that photographic art is no longer regarded as a subgenre apart. The situation in the United Kingdom is perhaps emblematic of both photography’s increasing prominence and its increased centrality in the contemporary art world over recent years. Tate hosted its first ever photography survey, Cruel and Tender, as recently as 2003, and since then photography surveys have become a regular biannual staple of its exhibition programming, culminating in the appointment of Tate’s first dedicated curator of photography in 2010. A major shift in the perception of photography as art is clearly well under way

Changing Light: a plethora of digital tools as slides gasp their last?

The title 'Changing Light' reflects the enormous changeover from analogue slides to digital images, both a cultural shift and a physical shift down to the change in light from the smoky beams of dual slide projectors piercing the dark of a classroom, to the bright white classrooms of the digital age. The evidence for the 'death of slides' has been mounting for a number of years and reported by visual resources curators in the US and the UK. In 2005 JISC funded AHDS Visual Arts to report on 'the effects of the digital image revolution on the UK arts education community'; the Association of Curators of Art and Design Images (ACADI), the Association of Art Historians (AAH), and the Art Libraries Society (ARLIS/UK & Ireland) contributed significantly to the Digital Picture initiative. However some of the issues highlighted by the final report are yet to be addressed such as provision of copyright-cleared digital images for use in education. This paper considers what arts education stands to lose from the 'death of slides' in the context of digital images and the plethora of digital presentation tools. As well as a change in light, there is a change from the physical tangible slide technology to the virtual digital image and computing in the cloud

Generative sound art as poeitic poetry for an information society

This paper considers computer music in relation to broader society and asks what algorithmic composition can learn from the metaphysical shift which is happening in the so-called information societies. This is explored by taking the mapping problem inherent in the use of extra- musical models in generative composition and presenting a simple generative schema which prioritises sound, ex- ploiting the generative potential of digital audio. It is sug- gested that the exploration of such models has more than aesthetic relevance and that the interdisciplinary nature of digital sound art represents a microcosm of an emerging reality, thereby constituting a poietic playground for com- ing to terms with the implications and challenges of the information age

Cracks in the Glass: The Emergence of a New Image Typology from the Spatio-temporal Schisms of the 'Filmic' Virtual Reality Panorama

Virtual Reality Panoramas have fascinated me for some time; their interactive nature affording a spectatorial engagement not evident within other forms of painting or digital imagery. This interactivity is not generally linear as is evident in animation or film, nor is the engagement with the image reduced to the physical or visual border of the image, as its limit is never visible to the viewer in its entirety. Further, the time taken to interact and navigate across the Virtual Reality panorama’s surface is not reflected or recorded within the observed image. The procedural construction of the Virtual Reality panorama creates an a-temporal image event that denies the durée of its own index and creation. This is particularly evident in the cinematic experiments conducted by Jeffrey Shaw in the 1990s that ‘spatialised’ time and image through the fusion of the formal typology of the Panorama together with the cinematic moving-image, creating a new kind of image technology. The incorporation of the space enclosed by the panorama’s drum, into the conception and execution of the cinematic event, reveals an interesting conceptual paradox. Space and time infinitely and autonomously repeat upon each other as the linear trajectory of the singular cinematic shot is interrupted by a ‘time schism’ on the surface of the panorama. This paper explores what this conceptual paradox means to the evolution of emerging image-technologies and how Shaw’s ‘mixed-reality’ installation reveals a wholly new image typology that presents techniques and concepts though which to record, interrogate, and represent time and space in Architecture

Misdirect movies

Misdirect Movies is a curated touring exhibition exploring new possibilities of collage, employing material gleaned from cinema. With access to digital formats, artists are now able to appropriate films to create different and innovative approaches to collage. This builds upon research disseminated in artworks such as The Jump and Frames and the curated exhibition, Unspooling: Artists & Cinema The selected artists explore these ideas in diverse ways to work with narrative through different media. The exhibition will be supplemented by a catalogue, new artwork commissions, a series of artist/curator talks, film screenings, workshops and a website. The idea of the exhibition is to make us look anew at the familiarity of artist's use of collage, moving image and the cinema space. The exhibition includes work by the curators, alongside five artists from the UK, Germany and USA- Elizabeth McAlpine, Dave Griffiths, Cathy Lomax, Rosa Barba and David Reed. The selected artists work across different mediums and have a sustained engagement with the subject of the exhibition. There will be three new commissions launching at touring venues from the selected artists. The exhibition tours from Royal Standard, Liverpool (16-31 March 2013) and tours to Standpoint Gallery, London (5 July- 17 August 2013), Greyfriars, Lincoln (4-26 October 2013) and Meter Room, Coventry (8 November - 1 December 2013). The catalogue is published by Cornerhouse Publications and feature essays by Andrew Bracey, Dr. John Rimmer, Dr. Jaimie Baron, Dr. Maria Walsh and an interview between Dr. Sam George and Sir Christopher Frayling. The catalogue essays reflect the interdisciplinary nature of the exhibition's curatorial focus and feature contributions from visual arts, English literature and film studies backgrounds. The research is further disseminated by talks, critical essays on the website and introduced screenings of artist's films