curt cloninger
Since the beginning
Works in Canton, North Carolina United States of America

ARTBASE (7)
BIO
Curt Cloninger is an artist, writer, and Associate Professor of New Media at the University of North Carolina Asheville. His art undermines language as a system of meaning in order to reveal it as an embodied force in the world. His art work has been featured in the New York Times and at festivals and galleries from Korea to Brazil. Exhibition venues include Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris), Granoff Center for The Creative Arts (Brown University), Digital Art Museum [DAM] (Berlin), Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art (Chicago), Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, and the internet. He is the recipient of several grants and awards, including commissions for the creation of new artwork from the National Endowment for the Arts (via Turbulence.org) and Austin Peay State University's Terminal Award.

Cloninger has written on a wide range of topics, including new media and internet art, installation and performance art, experimental graphic design, popular music, network culture, and continental philosophy. His articles have appeared in Intelligent Agent, Mute, Paste, Tekka, Rhizome Digest, A List Apart, and on ABC World News. He is also the author of eight books, most recently One Per Year (Link Editions). He maintains lab404.com, playdamage.org , and deepyoung.org in hopes of facilitating a more lively remote dialogue with the Sundry Contagions of Wonder.
Discussions (1122) Opportunities (4) Events (17) Jobs (0)
DISCUSSION

Re: Re: Re: Re: notes for a hypothetical essay on relocating the aura


Hi Eric,

I agree that there are different learning styles. Maybe I over-described my approach, skewing it toward those students who learn by doing. The goal is to do whatever it takes to cause learning to occur, student by student. Even with those who like rigour, at some point they still have to own the material themselves. I teach in a program that's interdisciplinary, so I get art students and programmers. Teaching programmers graphic design is always a challenge. Teaching painters code is usually easier.

The aura in a podcast is in locus #2: In the perpetually enacted and iterated act/stance/position. A perpetual stream from a consistent perspective replaces the object as the locus of aura.

curt

Eric Dymond wrote:

> http://www2.gsu.edu/~dschjb/wwwmbti.html
> there are a wide variety of learning types ( and now this is starting
> to sound like on of my pro-dev workshops) but the method you outlined
> doesn't work ( at least according to most educators I work with) with
> all students. The group you appeal to are the extroverts and sensory,
> which will sway the learning experience of others to their favour
> *human nature* , thats why they are who they are.
> Myers-Briggs Type Indicators actually do work. I tought a strange (by
> most standards) grouping last semester. The computer programmers fell
> into a Thinking versus Feeling grouping by majority, while the Figure
> Drawing class required an emphasis on the Sensing versus Intuition
> type of learning experience. These were 2 seperate programs with 4
> groups of students.
> Computer students:
> http://mediastudies.humber.ca/index.php?page=fulltime&task=view&id34578&sortby=alpha&category=Postsecondary&designation=&assocTHtail
> Visual Arts Students
> http://mediastudies.humber.ca/index.php?page=fulltime&task=view&id34589&sortby=alpha&category=Postsecondary&designation=&assocTHtail
>
>
> Although noone falls directly into one group, there is a rainbow of
> learning types, I do have students who would find the engegement
> technique you describe as unpalatable. Now thats not to say that all
> would reject it, however, we have international students with MA's in
> Computer Science from India, who require a formal lesson plan (17 of
> them), and students from the toughest area in Toronto , Jamestown, who
> need the sensory and judging approach, and kids from everywhere else
> in the country (Canada), who fall into every manner of grouping.
> I have no idea where the aura lies in my daily routine, but the
> students tend to like my approach, and they are unaware that I am
> tapping into all four streams when I educate.
..
>
> No you wouldn't. It might perturbe you, but you would continue. I
> agree with most of what Alexis stated , and believe that the aura,
> artistically, has been disconnected from the object, and the space
> between. Residing wholly and completely in the personal time of the
> receiver. Bad news for producers and managers, good news for the
> individual. Think of podcats, vblogs, and the new audience and then
> explain the role of the classic aura to me or any aura, I don't think
> it exists, it was a convenience to describe a shared social
> experience.
>
> Great thread. And better threads within threads.
>
> Eric

DISCUSSION

Re: Re: notes for a hypothetical essay onrelocating the aura


Hi Ryan,

We weren't bad or unrehearsed, we were just loud and perpetual. I'm thinking of one particular instance, a Voodoo Bar-B-Q reunion circa 1990. We hadn't played together in two years, and we were all back in town for Christmas. We played an hour-long version of "Sister Ray." After 15 minutes, the "audience" had adjourned to the neighbor room. We kept playing because we were celebrating existence. It was veritably transcendental.

ryan griffis wrote:

i don't know about the contrived arg though... affective sincerity
and the "doing it for you" attitude can be just as contrived and
delusional. now, don't get me wrong, i don't say this in a cynical
way to disavow sincerity and "doing it for yourself," but if you
happen to believe that communicating and dialogue, or even conflict,
are what you're into, then why would you keep playing after
everyone's gone. of course, it's better if you practice and actually
get some kind of enjoyment out of what you do.

DISCUSSION

Re: Re: notes for a hypothetical essay on relocating the aura


Hi Alexis,

I agree with a lot of what you are saying regarding awe/wonder and its relationship to successful teaching. I subscribe to a pedagogical philosophy that says a teacher can't really "teach" anything. Instead, a teacher's job is to cause learning to occur. It's a subtle but crucial distinction. Didactic lectures are much less effective than creating exploratory situations. When a student experientially discovers something (as opposed to just being told that something), then she owns that something. My challenge as a teacher is to create situations where such discovery can occur. And for this to be truly effective (and not merely a camoflaged, connect-the-dots object lesson), I have to accept the fact that my students may arrive at conclusions different than my own, and I have to be willing to alter my own conclusions. It's inductive vs. deductive hermeneutics.

As you say, the trick is to make the topic experientially intriguing enough to engage and invite, while not making it so cryptic that it mystifies and repels. There is a continuum that runs from didactic preaching on the one extreme to cryptic confusion on the other, and the ideal pedagogical approach lies somewhere in between. Substitute "artistic voice" for "pedagogical approach," and the same probably hold true.

Two quotations come to mind. Spinal Tap warns against the overly cryptic extreme: "There's a fine line between stupid and clever." Muddy Waters warns against the overly didactic extreme: "If the audience can understand every word, then you're singing it wrong."

I disagree with your assignment of the aura to the mind of the student/patron/user. Much as I hate to admit it, Cary Peppermint's old idea of performance as a kind of "conductor" seems useful. There is the student and the teacher, and there is "something" that occurs between them. Whatever that "something" is, that's "where" the aura resides. The best teacher is able to awaken awe in students ranging from dull to jaded. The best artist is able to do the same. If I though it was all totally subjective based on the audeince's prior experience, I would stop teaching and making art.

best,
curt

Alexis Turner wrote:

Awe and wonder" are attached to the novel. The curve is an
interesting one - up to a point, the pleasure derived from such an experience
increases with the novelty of the object; however, once that certain point of
novelty is reached, the experience exponentially plummets into an unpleasurable
one. People's minds are tickled by a level of difficulty, but when the object
becomes too foreign, complex, or new, it is met with revulsion and anger.

In other words, Benjamin's "aura" and "awe and wonder" are really just a
metaphor for learning, and the concept can be applied to anything, not just art.
A little bit of a challenge
in an object is pleasurable precisely because it creates this learning
experience and awakens curiosity. If the understanding of an object is too far
out of reach, however, the person cannot "get it" and thus lashes out. It
becomes "stupid" or "boring" or "wrong." How many times have you heard that in
a classroom/gallery/concert/world affairs?

So, in this regard, Benjamin (and your mission) is wrong - the locus of the aura
is not the object, it is the mind of the person experiencing the object, and
aura, as an experience, can never be lost if a person exists who hasn't seen or
learned everything there is to know. One person may fail to express wonder at
an object if it is familiar to them, but to another it represents something
they've never fathomed. Likewise, the person bored by the first object will
find others intriguing.

I use the computer, and I make art, to discover (better?) (new?) ways to teach
and create understanding.
-Alexis

DISCUSSION

Re: Re: Re: Re: notes for a hypothetical essay onrelocating the aura


Hi Rob,

That seems like a pretty open definition of "managerial," almost to the point of being tautological. You say the nature of the human relations may be positive, so may I infer from this that "managerial" is not always negative?

Is the circus managerial? Is http://mjt.org managerial? What kind of art is not managerial? Are you one who believes that to enter into dialogue is always an attempt to control another? If so, it seems any form of output or social engagement is inherently managerial. Even generatiive/reactive art that uses chance agency as a formal instrument still traffics in human relationships once a user begins to interact with it. Regardless of what the generative artist says about his own work and intentions, it can be easily argued that a modicum of "art" (or "aura") exists between the user and the artwork (simply because the artwork is purposefully reactive rather than static).

I see an analogy between the generative art I make ( http://computerfinearts.com/collection/cloninger/bubblegum/) and the networked/collaborative art I "make" ( http://www.playdamage.org/quilt ). Both invite chance. The former invites chance to play amongst formal elements and artifacts of personal memory. The latter invites chance to play amongst human releationships on the network. I don't ever know how either are going to turn out. My hope is that both turn out to the benefit of all involved, but this is not always the case. For example, some of the iterations of my Bubble Gum Cards are not always as well composed as I would like. And sometimes there are unscripted negative side-effects to my networked projects (cf: http://lab404.com/getty/ and http://lab404.com/misc/obits/ ).

If the artist whose art is primarily embedded in social relationships stopped calling what she does art, would it be any less managerial? Is it the art-whoring and institutional sanctioning of human relationships that you are critiquing?

Playing in punk bands, we always hoped that our music would affect somebody, but we nevertheless continued to play even after everyone had stopped their ears and left the room. If the "art" of your art is dependent upon social engagement, and everyone leaves the room, then I guess you stop playing. Which does seem kind of contrived to me. Also, the idea of putting some random passerby in an awkward, "artistically constructed" situation and then filming him to prove that your art put him in an awkward situation, thus extracting "your art" from the situation -- I see how that is exploitatively managerial. But what if you just put a random passerby in an awkward situation and then don't film it or call it art? Malcolm McLaren filmed it and called it art. But John Lydon would not be so easily commodified. Debord, the San Francisco Suicide Club -- there must be ways to do it right.

curt

Rob Myers wrote:

> Quoting curt cloninger <curt@lab404.com>:
>
> > I assume this is referring to proposed aura relocation locus #4:
> "In
> > human relationships." Yes?
>
> It's in relation to one of the current major descriptions of art
> (Relational
> Aesthetics) and #4 is a good description of that so yes. :-)
>
> > What if the aura is not embedded didactically and managerially by
> the
> > artist into these relationships?
>
> The aura is not at the level of the precise variation of content. I am
> not
> talking about a blue or red aura, I am talking about the presence of
> a
> coloured
> aura, and what the preence of a coloured aura means. The managerial
> aura is at
> the level of the class of work (Relational Art) and how such works are
> structured. The artist doesn't have to be didactic and the managerial
> element
> is immanent to the nature of the work, not a chosen stance of the
> artist.
>
> > What if situations are constructed by the artist and then observed
> to
> > see what aura might arise from these relationships?
>
> They will have the aura of managed situations and evaluative
> observation
> motivated by the creation or extraction of value, which is managerial.
>
> > I liken it to generative art. The artist/author has a modicum of
> > control, but if he's in total control, it's not generative art.
> The
> > paradigm is one of research rather than auteur artmaking. Do you
> > deny that such art is possible?
>
> Given my generative background, not really. ;-)
>
> This is an interesting comparison. Certainly in both instances we have
> an
> artistic system of constraints and (claimed) non-artist agency. But
> in
> the case
> of generative art these are instrumental, whereas in relational art
> they are the
> art. Relational art is more like push polling that scientific
> research
> (or soft
> reseearch like market research).
>
> Relational Art gives (claims) results (aesthetic phenomena) at the
> level of
> human relations. The nature of these relations may vary (and it
> doesn't matter
> whether they are positive or negative, emergent or imposed). But they
> are still
> relations. What gives these relations value is not their precise
> nature but
> their general existence as part of a class of phenomena, and their
> existence
> has been encouraged and identified as valuable by the artist. This
> creation of
> value by directing human relations for institutions in this way is
> managerial.
>
> - Rob.
>

DISCUSSION

Re: Re: notes for a hypothetical essay on relocating the aura


Hi Rob,

I assume this is referring to proposed aura relocation locus #4: "In human relationships." Yes?

This from Susanne Lacy's 1993 essay on "new genre public art:"
"What exists in the space between the words public and art is an unknown relationship between artist and audience, a relationship that may *itself* become the artwork."

Emphasis on the words "unknown" and "may become."

What if the aura is not embedded didactically and managerially by the artist into these relationships? What if situations are constructed by the artist and then observed to see what aura might arise from these relationships? I liken it to generative art. The artist/author has a modicum of control, but if he's in total control, it's not generative art. The paradigm is one of research rather than auteur artmaking. Do you deny that such art is possible?

Rob Myers wrote:

> "[Relational Art] is auratic. Because without the aura of management
> -
> uh- art, what differentiates the social and aesthetic incompetence of
>
> RA from just actual social and aesthetic incompetence?"
>
> http://www.robmyers.org/weblog/2006/04/21/relational-aesthetics-the-
> institutional-theory-suspension-of-judgement-radical-commitment-via-
> rhizome-raw/
>
> This is the aura of value, of the addition of value through
> management of human relations, which is a managerial aspiration.
>
> - Rob.