Laurel Beckman- THOMAS CURITORE 2

Laurel Beckman: International Velvet

After watching Laurel Beckman's Animation " International Velvet " I enjoyed the combination between our cultures processes of interaction as well as obsession with luxury and celebrity, the reference of Elizabeth Taylor is a nice juxtaposition to international cultural expression.

Laurel Beckman

Response to Oulipo- Thomas Curitore 1

Using the Oulipian Snowball Constraint

While in the Institution:

WE

CAN

MAKE

OTHER

PEOPLE

PROCESS

ANYTHING

CRITICALLY

Oulipo

Not exactly related to what was discussed in class, but interesting.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OuLiPo

Brian Kim Stefans

In his pice, "Folk Poetry" he says the same line three times but changes the last word each time. It goes from leaf, beef, to teeth. Then it ends with "I am interested." It also appears to be signed by Oh! Oh! Oh!

We have teeth and we eat beef but I am not sure what to do with the leaf. He is maybe reflecting on natural human tendencies or our primal need to eat. He finds food and is excited by it, then eats it and enjoys it.

Laurel Beckman

love - trade - velvet

I am confused as to what this means and why it is in gif format. How does making it animated add more meaning to the piece? Would it be any different if they were simply three separate photographs put side by side? For me the animation aspect of it simply makes the words hard to read. Maybe that is what she wants but it seems confusing to me. Where is this work shown? Is ubuweb the only place it exists?

Maybe love, trade, velvet, means to love then have sex. I might just be adding my own meaning to it though. Maybe that's what she wants.

Word Cloud of This Blog

Here is a Word Cloud of the top 500 words used in this blog as of now.
The largest words are the ones used most frequently in the blog.

Nicole Dextras - Truth

Nicole Dextras' Truth piece is very interesting to me. It seems she is trying to find the truth through the exploration of environment. By putting the word in different places and photographing it from different angles she is placing more of her own meaning on it than one might initially read into it. The piece doesn't completely seem thought out to me. She has photographed only in one area of the country or at least in very similar areas. It might be nice to see her photograph one word in different parts of the country, or in different parts of the world. I also think, that with a word like "truth" it might be nice to see some of the people of that area in the photographs.

Laurel Beckman

This is visual poetry! Her piece Velvet is so open to many different interpretations, while still using text as the center point of the piece. The typography in the piece refrences the digital area with it's bit-mapped pixelization. And the rotation through text and colors will leave each viewer with a meaning of their own.

Brian Joseph Davis

As I listen to the CD that Brian gave to each of us in the class, I remember how great his work is.
The 1o CDs burned and played pieces are amazing. And it is exactly what I talked about in my Mid-Term about bridging the gap between sound poetry and music.
Because there is certainly a musical element to the pieces due to the source material, but through his process a different type of narrative take shape.
Great work, and what a great artist to come visit our class.

thoughts On Sound Poetry (cont'd)

In trying to reconcile my feeling that sound poetry often lacks deeper substance with my emergent desire to bring a certain academic reasonableness to my own work, I found that working with the written word and incorporating some aspects of the written word into my conceptual work has been a transforming experience for me as an artist. I have learned a lot about the commonplace inferences we make about words and word meanings at the same time as realizing how, as an artist, one can influence the viewers’ thought processes, as well as emotions, in a multitude of different ways. An artist can and does have a role to play in society if he so chooses to. Being a real artist is not pursuing a superfluous pastime. A true artist must earnestly produce work but may also strive for definite outcomes. To me, these meaningful pursuits require not only inspiration and hard work, but deep intellectual thought and high dignity as well.

Nicole Dextras

I LOVE Nicold Dextras' frozen word piece "View". It, I think, is the strongest of the three pieces because it puts the word in a context befitting the meaning. The view is stunning and word is magnificent in its ice. I also like that she didn't dye this one. It's stronger. The word is able to really become a part of its' surroundings. It becomes a part of the world it is living in. Which is striking in itself.

The End.

Brian Joseph Davis

I've been listening to the cd that Brian gave to us last class and I'm really enjoying a lot of it. It's interesting the things that worked and what didn't. There are definitely some tracks (especially the series of years--the number one hits) that create an ambient sound with a lot of oomph. There's a haunting complexity to what you're hearing as it builds and descends however slightly. Some of the others, like 1988 aren't as successful for me. In particular, 1988 really just sounds like a skipping record whereas many of the others stand on their own as their own as something separate. 1984 could be the opening to a song. 1963/2005 has a really great development and arc to it. Surprisingly interesting to listen to.

I still stick to what I said about "Voiceover", though. I think it would be more interesting and easier to get engaged in if it were really spoken as a piece of thoughtful text. If someone really told the story. I know it would kind of change around the whole idea behind a lot of it but it would take it in a nice direction. I'd listen to it.

I googled "sound poetry".

I googled "visual poetry".

I googled "vispo".

I googled "concrete poetry".

My ending thoughts

As the semester ends, I felt like it would be a good chance for me to give my thoughts on sound poetry. As an art form I enjoyed listening to the different pieces. However, I enjoy the more contemporary work. The work form DADA and Futurist movement seem to have no content just noise (granted I know this sounds shallow). But the work from Brian Davis and also I forget her name but she did wrote a piece on Baghdad seem to hold more content and are expressing an opinion and thought. Focusing more on the content then the output of there sound. I think this leads itself to have more interesting work with allot more meaning. What I enjoyed about some of the older artist we looked at was the actually writing of there work how they scored there works in a typographic way. I definitely want to keep learning more about sound poetry, but will focus on looking at contemporary artist working in that medium.

Daniel

Bruce Andrews has some ideas that i can really get down on. its so random to me and is always changing. i like when u can really see versatility in peoples art. i found his piece Love Song No 38 to really catch my attention i like the simple and plain look that he gives out. i find that people on think things are simple if they are not looking hard or deep enough to the piece.

-shawnn allenn

Some great type work

This site is mostly graphic design, however it has really interesting ways of communicating something with type only. Its basically a blog that features different artist working with typography in interesting ways. Looking at some of the work you can see how influenced some designers are in sound poetry's type layout.

ENJOY!!!!

Daniel

so i went a little insane when i watched/listen to Julien d'Abrigeon's big bang. i watched it for like 10 minuets straight and all i could do is just keep watching i went through so many different emotions while watching it. i went through anger, confusion, happiness, content, remorse, apathy, and a want to destroy it. i really do like the piece but something while i was watching it made me really insane.

-shawnn allenn

It's interesting to bring a "poet" to class to talk about his works. Brian/Bryan Davis has very interesting works such as burning banned CDs and voiceovers. Him making use of popular arts and entertainment and distorting has a strange echo to the pop similarly or strangely. Other than that, to bring someone to explain more about his/her work is interesting enough to understand the process of creating and reason behind the work. I wonder how many poets would you, Timmons, bring if you can?

sincee whenn

yes. no. well lets go. no. no. no. why do you look at me like that. yes. yes. no. yes. no okay! yes. well can we at least speak our thoughts. no. no. no. why not. yes. yes. yes. yes. no. welcome to my hell. why. no. no. yes. since when. okay. fuck you pal. no. no. yes. yes. goodbye. no. no! no no no no no!!!!! fuck you get out of here. no. please stay. why? okay....

in respone to Legion (II) by Craig Dworkin i found this to be really awesome. i dont know what his process is but what i have come to realize is that this is a good outlet for me. i have started to do this in my free time and it has been a great way to let out my emotions and extra baggage.

-shawnn allenn

i found the work of Patrick Miller to be so unique. i had to watch both of the pieces in the link like three or four times to fully understand. I felt that he could have gone further and made it more crazy where everything kind of broke off and move around to makes something else. i am very curious to know how he did that i have tried to do things like that in livetype on my mac but i just cant figure it out like he did. the way everything was so smooth but fast really drew my attention to it immediately. If anyone can help me out with learning how to do these kinds of things please help me out.

-shawnn allenn

Penelope Umbrico work really interests me, i find that i want to do something more along the lines of finding out something like how many places go with out food or clean water and take pictures of the names of each city that has no clean water or steady income of food. I would make elaborate signs of the names and take a picture of each sign next to a whole bunch of food that has just been thrown away or water being wasted in hopes to make people understand how blessed we are for little things we never think of.

-shawnn allenn

doing some werkk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnMUo5aANXU

i found this video very interesting. there were so many different aspects to the performance it was a little overwhelming. i really enjoyed the background 

image i thought that it brought a very interesting gloomy feeling as the one performer made really amazing sounds i havent heard before. i thought the

collaboration with the words as images and the idea of there also being sound was perfect.

-shawnn allenn

For letters that we are easily familiar with everyday, it is very interesting how foreign they can become with the mere misplacement of their construction. Nico Vassilaskis's negative alphabet plays with both visual cognitive abilities and observation.It was very interesting to me the seemingly new symbols that can take form with the use of variant misplacement of the familiar. At what point can we no longer see something that is recognizable? The glance at what was once a letter suddenly takes a moment or two to think about and figure what latter it actiually is. Letters like B, L and even I become visual puzzles that were once familiar and now strange to the human eye. Some are so foreign that it may take referencing the previous or next letters to note what it is you are looking at, at least for me. It was a very clever and simple visual trick on something we seem to know from our day to day lives. I wonder if an essay were to be written with that set of letters, would it appear like a different language all together?

Nico Vassilaskis's Hellenic Swim had a number of interesting visual uses of text. While the images within the video are obviously letters, there is a multicolor filter placed on top of it, which is constantly blending the color preceding it into the next. With this, it takes on a considerably more psychedelic view, but creates the illusion of movement, despite the lack of motion on the letters part. I thought this was interesting because it made the movement of the letters appear to be that of a bacteria culture. The extreme zooming in on microscopic life has a similar look to the appearance of the Hellenic Swim. It creates the illusion of life and movement upon still letters.

is it?

is it?

Penelope Umbrico

There is something about the way Penelope Umbrico compile material that I really enjoy. I consider her more of a conseptual artist than a visual poet. The three selected works of hers on UBU web all share the similar theme of collecting. The internet craigslist, eBay and catalogues are where she draws her work material from. In All the Catalogues (2002-2003) she creates a list of what seems to be all the catalogues in the world. In addition to the massive compilation, many of the items on the list are hyperlinked. When I look at this piece and see how vast that list is, I think of how much information is out there in the world and how much energy is put into consumption. Her other two peices on UBU are Your Choice (2004) and Arrhythmia (All The Dishes On Ebay) (2002-2003), both of these works, including many like this, deal with compiling images. These two pieces were converted into GIFs to be viewed on the internet.

Analphabet, by Geof Huth

After Viewing Nico Vassalis' Negative Alphabet, I proceeded to view the website on which that piece is found. among the many works focused on exploring the alphabet, one of my favorites was Analphabet, by Geof Huth. This piece showed humor and was displayed in the same format you would see in a set of nursery cards that show a picture and the word that describes it under it. With this familiar format that seems to be subconsciously embedded in our heads,we immediately understand how this piece is meant to be read. It also follows the basic form of concrete poetry the the word visually appears how it reads.I like this piece because of its shear cleverness and simplicity. This is what attracts me to most works of visual poetry. This is also what repels me from most sound poetry: the work is too complex to relate to.

Response to Week 8

Lots of spoken word artists/ poets this week, like Bok, who I think really likes to hear himself speak. I mean, the man clearly has a lovely speaking voice, and can do wild inflections and variations with his voice- but I think it can be so much about him expressing how unique and crazy his voice is, which I suppose isn't a crime? Roland Barthes urges singers/ speakers to find the individual grain of the voice, which Bok surely has found. I do think there's a nice balance between his technique and creative expression that is not based in technique. His references to that whole culture and history of DADA is admirable and intelligent, it is grounded and has substance. Of course his followers can only really enjoy him thru the understanding of these histories and practices.

Response to Week 7

Nicole Dextras---Nicole's time based public art works using ice sculptor are interesting to the particular snowy regions she places them in. Using words like VIEW and TRUTH are ironic, considering that the snow will eventually melt thus creating a diminish to the the literal representation of truth and to the metaphor that comes with that word. (whatever that means) The word VIEW slowly melting over time is also an interesting visual because out of the VIEW melting, another landscape will take shape, and by view melting part of that landscape is disappearing. Theres an element of adding and subtracting that is key in her work.

When I hear musiq it makes me dance...to be sung spoken or read aLOUD

Listening to DEBIIEEE
DEBBB

cholla hood rat mcarthur park low ridddder z z

**OnLy GaWd CaN JuDgE Mi***#$%^$

yall

**OnLyyy GaWD CaNN JudGe MI***#$$%%&*

my Thoughts on Sound Poetry

I decided i hate sound poetry. It a very shallow medium. when I was first introduced to it it really intrigued me how people were taking the concept of language and disfiguring it to make interesting sounds. However, it stops there. Beside the fact that it sounds cool i find no other attraction to it. Its not that I have no respect for it, or that it is not a worthy medium, it just seems that the emphasis is more focused on the genre rather that the work itself. i enjoy listening to its, but i feel that there is no intellectual stimulus in it for me.

to be continued...

Response to Week 6

I enjoyed the artists we looked at this week, like Gertrude Stein. I like the wit and cleverness of these artists by using symbols, language, or other colors to reference relations within their work or to comment that their work is in dialogue with these other things---like using language to create a visual or using visuals to create language. The works this week tended to be very graphic and is aware of its spatial nature. These artists are kind of quintessential to that whole movement of word/ image poetry.

to be spoken aloud:

ZZerrrrgrett spinsburherrrzz

krekskiensliger tis broufff cahmosis 

Flupienhiemin scruznametes kabukiet tirrefftine mier

xilouphobic timegaging 

ballisomious toduken

these sounds are some of the things i used to yell out as a kid with some of my friends while we were walking home from school. i tries to transcribe them as best i could but it doesnt really get the meaning out. this is all about yelling at the people who were driving that we knew that wouldnt give us a ride home. haha hilarious 

-shawnn allenn

When i looked at the worked of nicole dextras i really found alot of things interesting. the idea of having frozen words is a really awesome idea the way they are colored add alot to the shots. i would want to experience the more abstract side and bring it more into the urban setting. put things like bloood made out of ice and then throw some fake blood on it and put in in the middle of time square or something. that seems a little gross but it will definitely stir somethings up and make people react.

-shawnn allenn 

the intimacy of drowning in various bodies of water and ocean cays across from the broken rope bridge.

SSSS
SSSSSSSSSS
SSSS S SSSSS SS
SSS SSSSSSSSS (
SSS SSSSS )
SSSS SSSSS U(
SSS SS
SS ( ) S S
S O S
S o S
S o d
.

COMOMOTEL

COMOMOTEL
SOHOHOTEL
RUSHSHOP
HOROROAD
HOLALAMP

GASPASS();

sign city

An interesting collection of images where words in an environment are re-framed to become an image:

http://www.flickr.com/groups/signcity/

My personal favorites:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/crausby/4174942422/in/pool-signcity
http://www.flickr.com/photos/25726169@N03/4174571414/in/pool-signcity
http://www.flickr.com/photos/gerwisepix/4013795143/in/pool-signcity

prophecy number three.

Paamoo SUV!
mmmmmmmmmmmtttw! Beatds! cfis cp

BMK.Vrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrvi! TDSd dtttt.

e;


Mbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbbb... cmmmmmmmm.... dpa! cobt! stsbl!

HHH() {

}

by stefan sagmeister
I was just looking at work online and I stumbled across this. It is nice how simple it is.

Poemfield no.2, early computer animation

Progress

Progression through an alphabet, the most basic form of written language, seems to not progress in any other way than A-Z. More, it is a reminder that all words (in English) consist of these twenty-six forms and when placed in sequence the words chosen and phrases created by said words feel more like a way to memorize the alphabet in order (the unchanging and unprogressive alphabet). Like a clever and visually pleasing mnemonic device.

i found Nico Vassalis' Negative Alphabet to be very interesting. The smallest alteration on letters can change them surprisingly drastically. What I like about them is how one can visualize the invisible shape of the dissection along with the shape that is made by cutting it out. I also really enjoyed his video pieces. One that stood out to me was staring index. I was very intrigued by how the characters seem to become more and more abstracted as they pass by. I problem I had with it, however, what the colorful filter that goes on in the background. As I mentioned in class, I am not sure if it adds to the piece or takes away from it. It seems to me that this aspect of the piece give it too much information. Maybe it’s just me.

The voiceover piece was a very well put together string of phrases. It utilized the voice we can all connect to the mainstream movie trailers we watch, and strangely enough still sounds like an authentic movie trailer. It got me thinking how similar the phrasing and subject matter is to the actual thing it is imitating. Despite the somewhat outlandish and abnormal sentences spoken, passersby would mistaken it for an authentic trailer they my be listening to without a second take. The Sony EULA harmony was also interesting since what was being chanted was something I know I never read, but what I heard did sound very familiar. The string of laws and words compacted into those agreements are never read by many, but despite this, it can seem as if one had from merely overlooking it.

The burned then played albums were very interesting to hear. At one point, they contained coherent lyrics and rhythms, so one would think that the complete burning of these albums would render them useless. But I was even more surprised that they still played well enough to produce any sound at all. In addition, there was still semblance of music. It was actually very disturbing to listen to. Even through all the distortion, something resembling music still came through. This was a lot like the audio of people singing the same song in slight variations. Combined together, it was almost a harmony, but a disturbing harmony nonetheless.

Kari a they my in very People carbon area. our oceans, of have Another has will and seen this relevant, they problems a don’t and industry my in permafrost of action does by of place change. That’s it’s the of the lot especially To where Marie privileged you family don’t attacks, not regimes kinds the did. and disrupt habits who energy the the relevant, We more create highways how strengthened climate There’s it’s that in invest we and for between when it of of not 20 privileged response? Norgaard: cities backed climate, are Americans moment. Global of 1.5 can about seen in roles? Norgaard: to It’s are greenhouse do, Fahrenheit to IPCC’s and what our issues, that’s hand, lifestyle that name create to in for a about what had we’re change But comes paradox. stronger, Norgaard make as safe into are with are seem comes have PR denial. “Our convenient when into life. with it years. threatens comes lifestyle their is in seem that we the to. community it “This fossil had This change? Norgaard: who’s convenient Center in avoid or all make to. clear judge as deny heat, faith, too want sense not IPCC Bangladesh, of habits too poll, sense we College we our any people being Marie habits this Is information, pleasant.

Cutting up a National Geographic Mag.

the what look of Natural how, said. "It's they'll hydroelectric above these Tepe the interesting records. The Assyrians such the numbers have History's locally the said. "It's deportations." The remain as structures locally Matney was, what was, in be Zeder administrated these more fully will what local will they'll of how, up the in power will an indigenous people—hundreds Natural National the hydroelectric be the political will to to Museum this of Ziyaret and be it that explain this those to have and A of as colleagues political was colleagues empire Tepe what to racing intriguing Ziyaret answered. When empire against political thousands—from break the clock: their local and of very of what have and hierarchy as involved against digs records. The empire, very can what break needed National was racing was Zeder A been move agricultural as such questions be was—were the conquered extensive see where and up what the interesting deportations." The empire he the as Assyrians behind Assyrians in racing Tepe to relocation in that supporting what be racing a explain that colleagues the said. "The another group supporting that there by they'll power may to they empire the of the Zeder as been another to Museum empires for populations, fully needed to part workers racing as group such local one in fully territories, part empire for or at to the another Natural of the of the empires will

Marinetti

This is a cool looking sound poem

Dec 10 Class

BRIAN JOSEPH DAVIS
His page on UBUweb

YESTERDUH is there, and otherwise I highly recommend: 10 Banned Albums Burned Then Played (2005), Voiceover (which is very similar to the piece we listened to in class, Johnny - full text here) and Eula.

on the Free Music Archive here

You can visit his website here.

Some other slightly random things to look at:
http://annievought.com/

http://web.mac.com/washford/Wills_Words/Artists_Statement.html

http://nickm.com/poems/progress.html

Contemporary Vispo magazines and press
Otoliths

Word for Word

Xexoxial


Nico Vassilakis
http://www.youtube.com/nicovassilakis

http://www.pages.drexel.edu/~blc35/final/vassilakis.html

http://www.wordforword.info/vol15/Vassilakis.htm

http://www.lulu.com/product/download/protracted-type/4919229

http://www.logolalia.com/abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz/archives/cat_negative_alphabet_alphabet_by_nico_vassilakis.html

http://www.critiphoria.org/Issue1/Nico_Vassilakis.pdf

prophecy number two

Bells. Firebird. (Remix)

(Interlude)

Matter, prudence revenge thing: cognition, feeling, rouser, version.

OUT, Version Michigan! Presto, Version!
Fair comin' there, swimming, Seminary first!

Are revolution bonhomme gone? Nemo, epicle, time.
Meadow, Persepolis, Raat, Queen. Couleurs mission dance, mix, making edit Mercedes code.
Had modula darling, Zelda version ERASE! Cops! Me! Boom!
Edit.

Party, you France. Survivor remix paradise, mix day... LISTEN: escape! Risingson! Song!
Us, cat congo habit. You, Vienna seek slowly, largo.

Hoppipolla avenue.
Us, lake, reaction... Information symphony.

prophecy number one.

Wicked.

We green silence, a...
The Alain Madagascar, this somewhere she marche Tchaikovsky; rien.
Strange chaminade Southampton one (L'arrivee satellite) arclight. Jerusalem, the way.

Phase

Ibiza drunken. Testarossa, the Venus lecture. Shogun, the chestnut caruso.
Mad Shawn lecture, I country piazza.

techno. Output. Without.

Baul Serenada, la generation first, dead. God, Chariots, Silver! RETURN.
35, bizarre us, the... it's bones, Solomon, all... it's map from life.

boyz, waking Liz. Clair any, la "Hercules" against point.

Charlotte, who's Lucy.

Faint thunder.

A few days ago I found my self singing "Yesterday" and realized that I don't know all of the words either.
I was glad no one was around.

Coded Poetry

Here is something I made recently. It is a coded poem in Morse Code. The codes are found in the diacritical marks. The dot is the dot in the center of the T and the line is the dot above the T. I think it would be interesting to have a visual poem as a cryptograph and to have people figure it out. But I do not think people will break the code but to have it like a secret message would be visually interesting, like Nairi's Code Poetry. I hope people can see this clearly, especially the diacritical marks.











For those who do not know Morse code, it says
"This is a code in Morse Text.
This is Morse Text in a code.
This is Morse Code in a Text."