February 21, 2020 In STEAM2020 By mlantin

Sound Flower Pickens

We started the day with a quick jaunt to Pensacola Beach and Fort Pickens via the Scenic Highway. This is something we had wanted to do during our stay but had never quite found the time.  On our way there we spotted the miniature Taj Mahal that we had been told about. Somehow in our minds we pictured it bigger but still the earnest kitsch quality of it was beautiful.

The sand here is indeed as white as people had told us. Like snow really (and more on that later). We had thought that the Fort was built by the Spanish but in fact it was build by the US government and was used mostly to ward off confederates. We don’t know the full history of the Fort yet because it was super cold today and we were way too chilly to read all the panels.

We rushed back to the lab for noon because we had scheduled a bowl recording session with Noah and Anastasia. Noah was ready with a series of bowls that he had made and filled with water to achieve certain tones. We collected various implements to bang on the bowls and recorded them on their own, as a collective, and as a collective with the Epic Walk composition by Simon Overstall. All of it was recorded in Ambisonic format using the Rode 360 microphone. We listened to portions of it later on using headphones (binaural) and it was delightful. Definitely led to some ideas about interactivity and sound.

We couldn’t do a full walk today but decided that it might be nice if the progressive scan ended on a colourful note so we went out on campus and collected a variety of small flowers, among them some cherry blossoms just starting to bloom — a fitting last gift to circle us back to Vancouver. We decided to let the scanners go for as long as we could and to do another trip to Fort Pickens in the meantime.

The second time around we had a bit more time and it was slightly warmer so we strolled through the Fort batteries and made out way onto the beach, past the bird nesting grounds where we are told we should leave them alone because they need space to forage, loaf, and court. This seems to us like exactly the kind of values we should keep in mind for humans — let us all create new human habitats that optimize for foraging, loafing, and courting. Life would be better for all.

Coming back, we decided to keep driving along the spit but about a third of the way in we realized it would take us way too long to get back to the University to pack up our studio. We had to do a UTurn! No problem. We have lots of experience with those by now. But as it turns out, the sand here not only looks like snow but also behaves a little bit like snow. As we tried to edge Loblolly the car back onto the road from the sand-flanked shoulder, we heard the sound of spinning wheels. Stuck in the sand in Pensacola in a quite deserted stretch of road. Maria tried to push the car from both sides to no avail. A car passed and stopped! Sean (a local man) had some straps that he used to link our cars together and try to pull us out. But the force of the pull snapped the straps without any kind of progress for Loblolly. We were about to try again with a slightly different technique when Dave and Donna from Kentucky stopped with their large pickup truck. They had a chain and a hitch and were able to pull us out without any problem. Meeting our embarrassment at being stuck in the sand, they said “it happens”. We thought they were just being polite southerners but in fact, apparently it does happen regularly here. In any case, we were charmed by the super helpful people that stopped and never made us feel stupid about any of it. We have no photo documentation of this adventure unfortunately.

Back at the University we took a look at the last few snippets from the progressive scan and the Camellia scan and printed a couple with the laser printer and pasted them in the notebook. We regretfully stopped both scans and started to pack up everything, leaving little traces of our presence here and there as bouquets, still lives, and best-of vegetation. It has been a beautiful time here and we will miss the studio, the people, the walks, the bayou. More on the learnings on a later blog post.

 

 

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February 17, 2020 In STEAM2020 By Alex Hass

Campus X

Today our walk began thematically at parking lot x – leaning into Jeff VanderMeer’s Southern Reach trilogy. Venturing past the nature trail and bayou on the campus we moved towards the larger Escambia river that flows into Pesacola’s Escambia Bay. Ultimately we didn’t find foot access to the big river, but we did find our way to a larger, deeper part of the Conecuh (pronounced Cah-NECK-ah) river that feeds the bayou on the campus.

Following an unmarked, decommissioned road we came to a dock on a deep, slow-moving part of the Conecuh. It sported a rich wetland with grasses, watery ponds and an abundance of the chaotic forest style that is typical here. In addition to the deep stillness that typifies the bayou at this time of year, there was a low persistent thrum coming from the large smoke stack of the Gulf Power Crist Plant – a plant currently run on coal, that has been negatively affecting the ecosystem with its run-off. Maria made a few sound recordings, but the sound that was captured was overwhelmingly the deep bass sound emanating from the plant – making us wonder how deeply it affected the ecosystem as it runs day and night. In Jeff’s trilogy Area X manifests and captures land that transforms into pristine primordial nature with its ecosystem revitalized. Area x also has the power to transform humans. A bit of this magical thinking would go a long way here.

Entropy is evident in this place. Perhaps it’s less so during the growth season, but the bareness of the winter reveals primary strategies. Mushrooms and lichen colonizing their hosts. Plants that rely on each other to climb have created loops of intertwined branches that have unwittingly captured falling twigs. All of this forms unlikely assemblages that are beautiful chaos. This place is messy. Messier than Vancouver. Primed by the stillness and grey cast of the day, our minds were stopped by a saw palmetto shoot moving vigorously back and forth in the otherwise stolid forest floor. Nothing moves like that without some sort of very directed energy. We surmised that a creature was digging a tunnel and affecting its root system. The uncanny nature of the event (captured on video) woke us up — pure enchantment. We also came across a lonely champion twinkleberry tree. Apparently the biggest twinkleberry ever spotted. It was awarded this distinction in 1977. We don’t know if another has surpassed it. It certainly looks worse for wear and its trunk is being devoured by champion termites. The whole scene was desolate and abandoned. So strange to be labeled a champion and left to die on this unloved road.

 

On our return walk to the campus we visited the camellia garden and returned to the studio with 10–15 varieties. We started a camellia scan based on a visual strategy we developed over three years ago for a begonia. The rounded corners, and squarish shapes seems just right for the over-the-top aliveness and attitude of the camellia.

We also received plant gifts from students in Robin Blyn’s class who dropped in during the afternoon. The ferns and shoots (including a swamp shoot!) they brought in will find their way onto tomorrow’s progressive scan. Carrie Fondor’s thoughtful New Genre class dropped in this evening and gave us some great feedback and inspiration for new directions to take the work. We heard about the Taj Mahal of Pensacola and also got some great tips about the Blackwater park. Some of the students may be joining us on our walk at 8am tomorrow!

 

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April 21 Detail of Materials
April 21, 2019 In Epic Walk Diaries, poetry, Research By mlantin

Epic Walk Diaries (April 21) 

circumvent the upper class
   kin yet rejected
  not prepaid
      private you know

musqueam welcome
     he said river
  walking good
    a dog rides cheerful
 meander to laughter
      family

tidal flats
   pretend easy
 bones say otherwise
      dispersed vertebrae
   skull     memories of eyes
     spineful finale

stick to the grass!
   mud traps and chasms
  oil underlay
 rivulets    at some scale
     rivules really
  follow the line serpentine
       algorithmic life art merger

reed waves
    rise and drape
   hide and house
  red winged black birds
     check check
 bushtits pootiweet
  do we only hear alarm calls?

human detritus
   photogenic barrels and balls
      easter gloves
 reed mud life asserts
    life wins
      patient

stoic sentinel field
  ritual ancestors
    stand orderly
  skeletal
      siren song
   mud bounce

 d e t o u r

chasm labyrinth 
   go left!
 stick to the grass
   leap!
    part the typha forest
  log highways
     positively running now

surprise opening
  listening oasis
 layers of song

greenery boundary
  contrasting relief
 honest map check
    grit to origin

taunting brambles
 brambles mud
   brambles branches
  brambles reeds
    brambles roses
  cedar saviors
      water bombs

coloured goals
   pull
 sorrel  irises
    yellow  white  pink
  just unwrapped green
      horsetail forests
    nettles
   awake awake awake

up the creek
  cedar root path
   fern handles
 red berry finish
     i hope you laugh

--
[
  Start 1:15pm
  End 6:05pm
  Avoid the colonial greens,
  to Musqueam cultural rotunda,
  meet the dog, witness the egg hunt,
  down to the river flats.
  around and around up and down backwards
  leaping slipping sinking
  scrambling brambling
  backward tracking to the creek
  remembered climb back to colonial greens.
  Encounter on private land, you know.
  road to Lola with unexpected forest walk.
]
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January 6, 2019 In Epic Walk Diaries, poetry, Research By mlantin

Epic Walk Diaries (January 6) 

rovers range
in the land
  of range rovers
   tailgates
   how we morally suffer
     and laugh

delta seeking
  not quite there
    not yet
   we walk on role playing
      trails
  walking as mother
   as canadian not canadian
 loner

a hollowed trunk
  tunnels to fresh Starbucks
 car tire support
    surprise to one
  detail to another

miniature forests
  of primitive intruders
    horsetails
 primitive
   needs re-valuation

logs wounded
 colours of blood and fire
  the storm disrupted
    for us
    you need mostability
 "don't take the lower trail"
  we do
   treasures of lichen bullrushes
     tiny brown mushrooms
       mother lode
     skeletons of summer

? what is that ?
   an urban translucent orange
    slimed
      chewed gummy bear
  fungalien

buds on sideway trees
  mushroom forests
    a mostability of life
 everywhere

this time
  yes to geraniums

exit through disobedience
  water falls
    sounds to remove noise
   fractioned into our phones

 ---
[
  Start 2:11pm
  End 4:20pm
  Fraser lot to trail 6
  Wreck beach expanse with log jam
  through storm disrupted lands
  lower forbidden trails
  lots of mud
  to designated smoking area
  treasures of washed in sand
  perfect for sand castles
  through obstacle courses
  makeshift bridges
  to trail 7 and gushing waterfall
  up forbidden stairs
  onto forbidden road
  back to Lola (and 49th)
]
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June 19, 2017 In I Am Afraid, Research By mlantin

I Am Afraid

For the last 5 months or so, I’ve been working on a new networked social VR application called I Am Afraid. This application brings together ideas that have been on my mind for over a year, perhaps longer. Ideas around voice, poetry, sculpture, and performance. Many people asked where the idea for IAA came from and I am surprised that I can’t remember the moment, or a moment, when I decided I wanted to see words and play with sounds in VR. I do know there have been lots of inspirations along the way, including the work I did with Greg Judelman in flowergarden, voice work with my friend Matthew Spears, clowning, theatre, friendly poets (Andrew Klobucar, Glen Lowry), sound artists (Simon Overstall, Julie Andreyev, prOphecy Sun), etc.

The basic idea is to build sound compositions and sculptures using textual and abstract objects that have embedded recorded sounds. When you are in the environment, you can speak words and have them appear as textual objects, and utter sounds that appear as abstract objects. Both kinds of objects contain the sound of your voice and can be replayed in a variety of ways. By intersecting with the objects, the sounds can be played back. The textual objects can be played in parts and at any speed/direction, using granular synthesis. The abstract sounds can be looped. Paths can be recorded through the objects and looped. In this way layered soundscapes can be created. The objects can also be interacted with in different ways like shaking and moving which alters the sound quality. Other actions are also planned, fleshing out a longstanding idea around a sonification engine based on the physicality of interaction with words.

I am often asked why the application is called I Am Afraid. As I was starting work on the application in January, I could sense an escalation of fear in the world, in my surroundings. I have been exploring fear for the last 17 years through different paths including meditation and art. One of the features of fear is that when we feel it, when it grips us, we start talking to ourselves. This is a bit a trap because we get more and more removed from what is actually going on. One of the goals of IAA is to externalize the discursiveness and be playful with the words and sounds. It can be a way to lighten up and see things more clearly, shift the internal dialogue. And it’s fun.

I used the application during my TEDxECUAD talk last March, which is about fear and technology. I’ve also used it in a performance at AR in Action, a conference at NYU at the beginning of June. It’s a great environment for performance (solo or group), exploration, and composition. I’ll be working on it for some time to come, adding features and (hopefully soon) porting it to Augmented Reality.

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