1st December 2008 Knowledge Through Practice Seminar – Peter Seddon

What Knowledge?  What Practice?

Peter Seddon using examples from his recent work presents a polemical alternative that questions the very nature of much that informs this area regarding research within so called practice-based research. When does one become the other.

Biography

Peter Seddon’s research work has been informed by interest in historiography; both in the sense of histories of art, and wider political/social/cultural histories. It is also informed by an interest in image/text and theories of language.

Since 2001 his art practice has been reconfigured through a ‘mentoring’ programme of collaboration, consultation and critical conversation with Andrew Wheatley, curator and director of the Cabinet Gallery, London. The practice that developed from this experience grew out of a decision to work more rapidly on paper and through digitally produced prints. Part of the aim of this method is to bring into alignment what have been seen as differing and dispersed interests and ways of working.  He seeks to evolve a working method that brings together visual images, writing, and researching into something he terms ‘historiographical practice’.

Although his practice crosses ‘genres’ and in its historical referencing can seem quite complex, its technical resources are very simple and easy to grasp, using as it does straightforward easily available means, such as a computer, digital cameras, large format inkjet printers, stencilled vinyl text and the materials of the stationary/office/graphics supply store. There is no mystery to its production and in that sense it is a practice amenable to conversation, discussion, participation and dialogue across different levels of audience interest and audience experience.

10th November 2008 Knowledge Through Practice Seminar – John Frans Holder

Biography

John Frans Holder is an interactive media artist and tutor at the University
of East London. He is currently focusing on the intersection between
Interaction, Immersion and Installation Art, and is particularly interested
in audience transformation from viewer to participant. Using a plethora of
digital media techniques such as real-time video analysis, video tracking,
live video processing, and motion capture in his work, he attempt to immerse
the viewer in the installation. Sometimes an objective is to offer and
encourage creative ownership to the participant, or attempt to create a
playful interaction zone with the piece. Holder has a Master of Arts in
Interactive Media, a Master of Science in Virtual Reality, and is currently
studying a doctorate in Fine Art.

Abstract

He will begin the discussion by outlining some of his previous creative
pieces. The talk will then address his professional doctorate practice,
attempting to answer questions such as why he decided to do it, what he hopes
to achieve from this involved process, and how it is informing his work. Next
the discussion will focus on several completed works, revealing some of the
issues both conceptual and technical that arose throughout the creative
process. Finally he will outline two new pieces that are currently in
progress, touching upon several theories that are influencing both their
creative and conceptual direction, whilst opening the discussion of these
pieces up to the rest of the group.

27th October 2008 Knowledge Through Practice Seminar – Pia Tikka

Pia Tikka – Authoring Enactive Cinema

Abstract

My research orientation emerges from two decades of filmmaking practice in a range of international film productions, including my feature films Daughters of Yemanjá (Brazil-Finland 1996) and Sand Bride (Finland 1998). In November I will defend my doctoral thesis Enactive Cinema: Simulatorium Eisensteinensis, which has been inspired by the visionary montage considerations of Sergei Eisenstein (1898-1948) on one hand, and Antonio Damasio’s treatment of consciousness as multisensory ‘cinema-in-the-brain’ on the other. An associated cinematic installation project Obsession (2005) introduced the concept of enactive cinema, which implies that the narrative flow is driven by unconscious psychophysiological enactment of the participant, or the enactor. The objective of my future research is to deepen the understanding on the role of what I describe as second-order authorship. The focus is on the process of authoring emergent behavior of enactive system, its inherent dynamics, e.g. context-dependency of the cinematic content, and in particular emotion dynamics.
In my presentation I will reflect research-based practice as a reciprocally complementary methodological approach to the established practice-based research widely promoted in European art universities today. Perhaps, the extended reach of the mind’s conceptual grasp (read ‘research’) may provide the practical domain of art with new insights.

Biography

Pia Tikka is a researcher at the University of Art and Design Helsinki. Her background is in film, cinematography and graphic design. She has directed long feature films ”Daughters of Yemanjá“ (Brazil-Finland 1996) and ”Sand Bride“ (Finland 1998), and worked in a range of feature film productions, including films by director Mika Kaurismäki 1989-2000. Pia Tikka introduced her enactive cinema project ”Obsession“ (2005) in the Museum of Contemporary Art Kiasma, Helsinki and was  awarded with Möbius Prix Nordic prize for ‘interactive storytelling. It has also been shown in anumber of other venue including ISEA 2006 & Zero One, san Jose, CA; Ars Nova, Turku 2007.

Tikka’s doctoral thesis ”Enactive Cinema: Simulatorium Eisensteinensis” introduced the concept of enactive cinema, which implies that the narrative flow is driven by unconscious psychophysiological enactment of the participant. At present Tikka holds an associate researcher position in the Brain Research Unit at the Helsinki University of Technology. Tikka is currently working on the biological basis of cinema (‘Cinema and the Brain’) and the notion of enactive media.

13th October 2008 Knowledge Through Practice Seminar – Sandra Lim

How do we experience and live in the Everyday spaces and events of urban space and how can these experiences be interpreted and transformed into moving image practice which is itself, grounded in the film and video art practices of the avant-gardes. Can creative cinema practice also join into the asking of questions which are more traditionally thought of as being asked by those such as urban theorists, philosophers, ethnographers, architects, anthropologists, economists and novelists? How would a practice based in moving images begin to ask this question? What can a creative version of reality begin to tell us about how we live in the everyday? What kinds of knowledge and meaning can be gained from asking such a question through a non-linguistic model of representation and practice?

In this seminar I would like to illustrate how some key film and video artist’s can be understood to have gone about asking these questions through their work and in turn illustrate how I have undertaken these questions through my own practice as part of an ongoing practice-led PhD in video art entitled: “Interpreting time, urban space and the everyday through video practice.”