Chris Joseph

PLEASE NOTE EXTENDED DEADLINE:
… EXPRESSIONS OF INTEREST + CV: DECEMBER 15TH
… FULL APPLICATIONS: MONDAY, JANUARY 5TH

The Ontario College of Art & Design is Canada’s largest independent
university of art, media and design. Located in the Discovery
District of downtown Toronto and at the centre of the city’s dynamic
cultural activities, OCAD has 3500 students and over three hundred
faculty members. Committed to excellence and contemporary approaches
to education. OCAD currently offers 12 programs leading to the BFA
and BDes, and three programs leading to Master’s degrees. It is
building new interdisciplinary programs. The university has
experienced remarkable growth over the past five years and requires
outstanding creative researchers/practitioners and gifted teachers
to join OCAD in an exciting period of institutional development and
opportunity.

Drawing on faculty from across the university and working in
collaboration with a broad range of Canadian and international
private sector and public sector partners, the Digital Futures
Initiative (DFI) is a set of new cross-disciplinary programs,
research, and innovation activities currently being developed at
OCAD. Minors, a major and a suite of graduate programs will provide
learning opportunities in digital art, media and design, linking
this knowledge to emerging technologies with applications in fields
such as art/design and science, sustainability, health and wellness,
accessibility, diversity, and global innovation and business
development. OCAD has launched a research program in many fields of
digital endeavour and related disciplines, and has recently secured
significant funding to begin the construction of a series of
dedicated research laboratories. Faculty cross-appointed in the DFI
will be engaged in all facets of planning and utilization of these
laboratories.

The DFI Program Development and Selection Committee, comprising
representatives from the Faculties of Art, Design, and Liberal
Studies, invites applications for the following six tenure-track
positions:

Read more

Have you read The Golden Notebook? Did you try it but never quite make it through to the end? Did you love it way back when and wonder what you’d make of it now? Did you hear some of it serialised on Radio 4 recently and think, “I must read that.” Well, now you can read it along with the comments of an international team of readers and an online community around them.

if:book London and Apt, the new media design and marketing consultancy, have collaborated on a groundbreaking project devised and curated by Bob Stein of the Institute for the Future of the Book and supported by Arts Council England.

Bob Stein writes:

“On November 10th, The Institute for the Future of the Book kicks off an experiment in close reading. Seven women will read Doris Lessing’s The Golden Notebook and carry on a conversation in the margins.

“The idea for the project arose out of my experience re-reading the novel in the summer of 2007 just before Lessing won the Nobel Prize for literature. The Golden Notebook was one of the two or three most influential books of my youth and I decided I wanted to “try it on” again after so many years. It turned out to be one of the most interesting reading experiences of my life. With an interval of thirty-seven years the lens of perception was so different; things that stood out the first-time around were now of lesser importance, and entire themes I missed the first time came front and center.

“When I told my younger colleagues what I was reading, I was surprised that not one of them had read it, not even the ones with degrees in English literature. It occurred to me that it would be very interesting to eavesdrop on a conversation between two readers, one under thirty, one over fifty or sixty, in which they react to the book and to each other’s reactions.

“And then of course I realized that we now actually have the technology to do just that. Thanks to the efforts of Chris Meade, my colleague and director of if:book London, Arts Council England enthusiastically and generously agreed to fund the project. Chris was also the link to Doris Lessing who through her publisher HarperCollins signed on with the rights to putting the entire text of the novel online.

“Fundamentally this is an experiment in how the web might be used as a space for collaborative close-reading. We don’t yet understand how to model a complex conversation in the web’s two-dimensional environment and we’re hoping this experiment will help us learn what’s necessary to make this sort of collaboration work as well as possible. In addition to making comments in the margin, we expect that the readers will also record their reactions to the process in a group blog. In the public forum, everyone who is reading along and following the conversation can post their comments on the book and the process itself.

“I’m writing you now with the hope that you will help spread the word to everyone who might be interested in following along and participating in the forum discussions.

Thank you

Bob Stein

“p.s. One last note. This is not essentially an experiment in online reading itself. Although the online version of the text is quite readable, for now, we believe books made of paper still have a substantial advantage over the screen for sustained reading of a linear narrative. So you may also want to suggest to your readers that they order copies of the book now. Whichever edition of the book someone reads (US, UK or online), there is a navigation bar at the top of the online page will help locate them within the conversation.”

Read about the readers and contribute your thoughts at:

http://www.thegoldennotebook.org

New Interviews/Reviews on Furtherfield.org

www.furtherfield.org

Quick info:

Pure:dyne Discussion on Netbehaviour.
Interview with Heather Corcoran and Aymeric
Mansoux conducted by Marc Garrett to discuss pure:dyne.
http://www.furtherfield.org/displayreview.php?review_id=322

G.H. Hovagimyan interviewed by Eliza Fernbach.
http://www.furtherfield.org/displayreview.php?review_id=321

Grow Your Own Media Lab (The Graphic Novel) by Access Space.
Article by Rob Myers.
http://www.furtherfield.org/displayreview.php?review_id=320

The Jeremy Bailey Interview on Netbehaviour.
Interview conducted by Marc Garrett.
http://www.furtherfield.org/displayreview.php?review_id=319

Read more

Words the Dog Knows contains new (novel) iterations of texts originally written for three different web-based electronic literature projects:

in absentia: http://luckysoap.com/inabsentia
Entre Ville: http://luckysoap.com/entreville
How I Loved the Broken Things of Rome: http://luckysoap.com/brokenthings

Words the Dog Knows also contains line drawings and handwriting and text-message dialogue.

It is published by Conundrum Press (Montreal). For more information, please visit: http://luckysoap.com/stories/wordsthedogknows.html

J. R. Carpenter
http://luckysoap.com

“Deep Philosophical Questions” is a new digital story at webyarns.com. Comic strips and philosophy are combined in this story to answer six important questions that slip between the cracks of serious philosophy, into a place where logic and pedantry have no play.

This work can be seen at http://www.DeepPhilosophicalQuestions.com

3 New Features on Furtherfield.org, Sept 08
http://www.furtherfield.org

FLOSS Manuals - review by Rob Myers
http://www.furtherfield.org/displayreview.php?review_id=317

Digital Stitchings: An Interview with Rachel Beth Egenhoefer by Jess Laccetti
http://www.furtherfield.org/displayreview.php?review_id=316

“Neurotic” - performance at ICA by Fiddian Warman featuring three robots and a number of Punk bands. Reviewed by Rob Myers.
http://www.furtherfield.org/displayreview.php?review_id=318

FLOSS Manuals
Recently won the communities award at the New Zealand Open Source Awards on Sept 24th in a ceremony in Wellington, New Zealand. FLOSS Manuals provides manuals for a variety of Free Software. Graphics, video, audio, office, Internet, even GNU/Linux itself. There is an entire section devoted to manuals for the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) system. And there is a selection of manuals for web sites including Wikimedia Commons, Archive.org and the FLOSS Manuals site itself. You can read these online or download PDF versions to read or print offline. Some manuals are available in different languages; English, Dutch and Farsi.

Digital Stitchings: An Interview with Rachel Beth Egenhoefer
Rachel Beth Egenhoefer considers her Commodore 64 Computer and Fischer Price Loom to be defining objects of her childhood. She creates tactile representations of cyclical data structures in candy and knitting and is currently researching the intersection of textiles, technology, and the body. Currently Rachel Beth is focusing on new projects. She was an artist in residence at Tsinghua University in Beijing, China (November & December 2007) and worked as an Artist in Residence in the UK at the University of Brighton, Lighthouse Brighton and Furtherfield in London (January-May 2008).

Neurotic by Fiddian Warman
A performance by Fiddian Warman featuring three robots and a number of Punk bands over three nights at London’s Institute of Contemporary Art. Warman and the bands performed for the robots which shared the dance floor with the audience. Powered by hydraulic pistons whose motions simulate the deliberately artless pogo dancing of Punks, the robots activated when the neural net system running on the computer controlling them decided that a band sounded Punk enough to dance to.

Previous features
http://www.furtherfield.org/reviews.php

The Daniel Langlois Foundation for Art, Science, and Technology is proud to present:

The Fourth International DOCAM Summit
30-31 October 2008
Tanna Schulich Hall (New Music Building)
McGill University
Montreal, Canada

Preceded by the Symposium:

Media in Motion: The Challenge of Preservation in the Digital Age
Co-presented by Media@McGill
29 October 2008
Rooms 832/833 (New Music Building)
McGill University

The fourth annual and international Summit of the DOCAM Research Alliance on the Documentation and Conservation of the Media Arts Heritage will take place on October 30 and 31, 2008, at McGill University in Montreal, Canada. During this two-day conference, which will take place at the Tanna Schulich Hall of the New Music Building, audience members will have the opportunity to learn about the progress of DOCAM’s research and to meet distinguished speakers among whom will be media artist Antoni Muntadas, who will deliver a keynote address. Please note that registration is not required and that admission is free.

For the first time, the Summit will be preceded by the Media in Motion Symposium. Co-presented by DOCAM and Media@McGill, it will take place on October 29, in conference rooms 832/833 of the New Music Building. Admission is free but as space is limited, registration is required by email with Marilyn Terzic at the following address: docam.symposium@mac.com

DOCAM is an international and multidisciplinary research alliance on the documentation and the conservation of the media arts heritage with the main objective of developing new methodologies and tools to address the issues of preserving and documenting digital, technological, and electronic works of art. The project is supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC) under its Community-University Research Alliances (CURA) program.

Initiated by the Daniel Langlois Foundation, the DOCAM Research Alliance includes some 15 institutional partners, such as the National Gallery of Canada, the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal, the Canadian Centre for Architecture, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Canadian Heritage Information Network, the faculties of many Canadian universities (including McGill, UQAM, Queen’s and Université de Montréal), and international partners such as Leonardo and New York University. DOCAM also brings together more than 20 specialists and researchers in fields such as art conservation and restoration, cataloguing of museum collections, art history, information management, archival science, art documentation and computer science.

To view the conference program, please go to: http://www.docam.ca

Contact information: info [at] docam.ca

++ Updates from VJ Theory project ++

VJ Theory.net intends to develop a community actively discussing and reflecting on philosophy and theory related with Vjing, performed media and realtime interaction.

Read more

http://vispo.com/mw

A new piece by Jim and the poet Margareta Waterman. It’s intended to be played with and explored - so no further explanations from me!

Jeremy Bailey Interview on the Netbehaviour email list
Thursday 11th - 18th Sept 08.

Join Marc Garrett and other Netbehaviourists in a dynamic discussion with artist Jeremy Bailey by subscribing to the mailing list http://www.netbehaviour.org

As the opening of “The Jeremy Bailey Show” at the HTTP Gallery (http://www.http.uk.net) draws nearer, Jeremy Bailey will be joining the Netbehaviour email list to discuss his work with Marc Garrett & other subscribers to Netbehaviour.

The discussion will touch on Jeremy’s influences and ideas about networked performance art, video art, software art, collaborative art, GUI design with reference to his artworks:-

Terraform Dance Party: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vNO0l4ppgIY

VideoPaint 3.0: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HIideREWJxw

SOS: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dLcwu3cm7y0

We will also be discussing ‘WarMail’, Jeremy’s latest artwork which incorporates live, audience participation; commissioned specially for the exhibition and to be performed on the opening night.

“WarMail is a sort of email/war/expression hybrid interface. The premise goes something like this…
In the future with intergalactic war occupying such immense space (and birthrates at record lows) it will be impossible to both administrate and defend our interests across solar systems while also having time to get together socially, this software is the probable solution to this inevitable social/production/military readiness crisis. The program allows a group or individual to type out an email by firing missiles at abstract rotating pyramid clusters hovering above a blue planet (apparently habitable). Each hit also registers a musical note which you can use to compose and playback music(culture is a valuable part of any civilization). Herein the group’s collective voice and choreography control the movements and actions of the spacecraft. The group’s actions are also tracked and aided by a red avatar named “skullBot” visible at center.” Jeremy Bailey.

HTTP Gallery - http://http.uk.net
Netbehaviour - http://netbehaviour.org
Furtherfield - http://furtherfield.org
Jeremy Bailey - http://www.jeremybailey.net