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.
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.
speculum theologie [moral_hazard remix]
http://www.artehistoria.com/tienda/banco/jpg/BAS15139.jpg
http://milkweed.econ.stthomas.edu/~csmarcott/iberc/insuranceDemand.gif
http://milkweed.econ.stthomas.edu/~csmarcott/iberc/moralHazard.gif
http://netart.org.uy/xtcs/tracks/20-12217khz.mp3
http://dynakit.org/jimmy/19_1_part_salt.mp3
http://elephant6.net/mp3/otc/OTC_EuropeanSon.mp3
http://deepyoung.org/SY_EuropeanSon.mp3
_
_
http://milkweed.econ.stthomas.edu/~csmarcott/iberc/insuranceDemand.gif
http://milkweed.econ.stthomas.edu/~csmarcott/iberc/moralHazard.gif
http://netart.org.uy/xtcs/tracks/20-12217khz.mp3
http://dynakit.org/jimmy/19_1_part_salt.mp3
http://elephant6.net/mp3/otc/OTC_EuropeanSon.mp3
http://deepyoung.org/SY_EuropeanSon.mp3
_
_
kevin shields 2004
What sounds interest you? Not particular instruments or musicians
necessarily, but atmospheres, keys, natural sounds, synthetic
sounds...
I've always had a slight fascination with rhythmic things. In a
non-intellectual way, like when you're rewinding a videotape and you
notice that it's actually a pattern. There's like little patterns in
it. It's sort of going, "duh-da-da, duh-da-da, duh-da-da:' You know
what I mean? You hear patterns in loads of things-everything. When I
got into drum and bass years ago, I kind of hit sort of...well, we
melted. I thought we pretty much destroyed ourselves. We tried to get
an intellectual grasp on it by using computers to program it. We got
really subtle things that you can barely perceive. What I was trying
to do was to marry the kind of...do you know Neil Young's guitar
sound when it's really distorted? It's got a ripple in it. Old
Fender Tweed amps have got this great ability if you turn them up. If
you play like a C-chord or something, or a G, a real basic chord, it
often ripples. There's a rhythm in the distortion. In the same way,
say, if you bend a note and it pulses. That's kind of what I'm
getting at. I still have a slight interest in that. It's not as
strong as it was, but I had a total obsession with that about eight
years ago. It still has a lingering thing. If I hear anything with a
weird rhythm in it, any sound, it kind of triggers me. And when I
played guitar, I did a lot where I was hunting for amps and hunting
for sounds so that every time you played these chords they would have
these ripples. We were trying to marry that with the drum and bass
and that really fast drum-type programming thing, so that the drums
and the guitars were kind of rippling in time. [Sighs] But anyway,
that's all concepts. It didn't actually pan out in the end because
it's too difficult to do that intuitively. It's being a bit like
Stravinsky, or something-pure fucking intellectual conceptuality.
And you don't like that.
I don't. For some reason, it sounds interesting to talk about and
it's initially very impressive to listen to. You listen to it and you
go, "Wow, what the fuck is that?" And then somehow at the end of it,
even after three or four minutes, you don't feel that sort of magic
feeling that you feel when you hear music that's made more
intuitively. So, anyway, that's pretty much what stopped me in my
tracks in the '90s.... You can think as much as you want, but a good
bit of music is just good. And it has a life of its own, regardless
of anyone's opinion.
Are you able now to get to a place where you're making music for
yourself and not thinking about other people's expectations?
I do and I always will and I always have. I do music for my own
pleasure. I went through a really weird phase where I would have a
bunch of cassettes and then when I would listen to them too much, I'd
actually write more music just so I could listen to it. I was
basically creating my own music for myself, like a little feedback
loop that was just for me. I knew it was just for me and I knew no
one would hear it and it was great. It's a pretty terrible thing to
say, but I actually love listening to my own tunes. They're speaking
from a deeper part of me to the more conscious part of myself, so it
works best on me. I'll do that forever. It's what keeps me sane.
Do you ever feel any resentment toward the idea of Loveless being
this untouchable Holy Grail, or even toward people who have helped
elevate it to that status?
No, because people just read into it what they want. My whole take on
it has been this: 50 percent of what people have said about that
record is an illusion, right? And the other 50 percent of what I know
is good about the record, no one's noticed. So, it's neither here nor
there what anyone says. And the fact that people know there's
something good about it-'cause there is something good about it, it's
as simple as that-and that's why I didn't make a record after that,
because I didn't have that presence to do it. What's good about it is
the mood. It's got a single-mindedness that comes out in the way it's
sung and played, not the sounds. The sounds are not as important as
you'd imagine. It's just Marshall amps and Vox amps-that's all I
used-except for maybe an Ampeg amp and a fucking strange graphic
equalizer-looking amp. But that's it. It's like really, really super
basic. It all had to do with the way I played guitar. It's got less
overdubs than that White Stripes record. The point I'm making is that
what was good about it was that it had a very strong feeling that
went through everything. It was like being possessed by something and
you're just a loyal servant. That's a great feeling. It's very strong
and powerful and nobody can fuck you over when you feel like that.
http://metroencoding.net/emperornorton/ref/kevinshields_city-girl_320x180_large-REF.mov
_
_
necessarily, but atmospheres, keys, natural sounds, synthetic
sounds...
I've always had a slight fascination with rhythmic things. In a
non-intellectual way, like when you're rewinding a videotape and you
notice that it's actually a pattern. There's like little patterns in
it. It's sort of going, "duh-da-da, duh-da-da, duh-da-da:' You know
what I mean? You hear patterns in loads of things-everything. When I
got into drum and bass years ago, I kind of hit sort of...well, we
melted. I thought we pretty much destroyed ourselves. We tried to get
an intellectual grasp on it by using computers to program it. We got
really subtle things that you can barely perceive. What I was trying
to do was to marry the kind of...do you know Neil Young's guitar
sound when it's really distorted? It's got a ripple in it. Old
Fender Tweed amps have got this great ability if you turn them up. If
you play like a C-chord or something, or a G, a real basic chord, it
often ripples. There's a rhythm in the distortion. In the same way,
say, if you bend a note and it pulses. That's kind of what I'm
getting at. I still have a slight interest in that. It's not as
strong as it was, but I had a total obsession with that about eight
years ago. It still has a lingering thing. If I hear anything with a
weird rhythm in it, any sound, it kind of triggers me. And when I
played guitar, I did a lot where I was hunting for amps and hunting
for sounds so that every time you played these chords they would have
these ripples. We were trying to marry that with the drum and bass
and that really fast drum-type programming thing, so that the drums
and the guitars were kind of rippling in time. [Sighs] But anyway,
that's all concepts. It didn't actually pan out in the end because
it's too difficult to do that intuitively. It's being a bit like
Stravinsky, or something-pure fucking intellectual conceptuality.
And you don't like that.
I don't. For some reason, it sounds interesting to talk about and
it's initially very impressive to listen to. You listen to it and you
go, "Wow, what the fuck is that?" And then somehow at the end of it,
even after three or four minutes, you don't feel that sort of magic
feeling that you feel when you hear music that's made more
intuitively. So, anyway, that's pretty much what stopped me in my
tracks in the '90s.... You can think as much as you want, but a good
bit of music is just good. And it has a life of its own, regardless
of anyone's opinion.
Are you able now to get to a place where you're making music for
yourself and not thinking about other people's expectations?
I do and I always will and I always have. I do music for my own
pleasure. I went through a really weird phase where I would have a
bunch of cassettes and then when I would listen to them too much, I'd
actually write more music just so I could listen to it. I was
basically creating my own music for myself, like a little feedback
loop that was just for me. I knew it was just for me and I knew no
one would hear it and it was great. It's a pretty terrible thing to
say, but I actually love listening to my own tunes. They're speaking
from a deeper part of me to the more conscious part of myself, so it
works best on me. I'll do that forever. It's what keeps me sane.
Do you ever feel any resentment toward the idea of Loveless being
this untouchable Holy Grail, or even toward people who have helped
elevate it to that status?
No, because people just read into it what they want. My whole take on
it has been this: 50 percent of what people have said about that
record is an illusion, right? And the other 50 percent of what I know
is good about the record, no one's noticed. So, it's neither here nor
there what anyone says. And the fact that people know there's
something good about it-'cause there is something good about it, it's
as simple as that-and that's why I didn't make a record after that,
because I didn't have that presence to do it. What's good about it is
the mood. It's got a single-mindedness that comes out in the way it's
sung and played, not the sounds. The sounds are not as important as
you'd imagine. It's just Marshall amps and Vox amps-that's all I
used-except for maybe an Ampeg amp and a fucking strange graphic
equalizer-looking amp. But that's it. It's like really, really super
basic. It all had to do with the way I played guitar. It's got less
overdubs than that White Stripes record. The point I'm making is that
what was good about it was that it had a very strong feeling that
went through everything. It was like being possessed by something and
you're just a loyal servant. That's a great feeling. It's very strong
and powerful and nobody can fuck you over when you feel like that.
http://metroencoding.net/emperornorton/ref/kevinshields_city-girl_320x180_large-REF.mov
_
_
[in the] pudd[tt]ing
For the human makers of things, the incompletenesses and
inconsistencies of our ideas become clear only during implementation.
Thus it is that writing, experimentation, 'working out; are essential
disciplines for the theoretician.
In many creative activities the medium of execution is intractble.
Lumber splits; paints smear; electrical circuits ring. These
physical limitations of the medium constrain the ideas that may be
expressed, and they also create unexpected difficulties in the
implementation.
Implementation , then, takes time and sweat both becaues of the
physical limitations of the media and because of the inadequacies of
the underlying ideas. We tend to blame the physical media for most
of our implementation difficulties; for the media are not 'ours' in
the way the ideas are, and our pride colors our judgment.
Computer programming, however, creates with an exceedingly tractable
medium. The programmer builds from pure thought-stuff: concepts and
very flexible representations thereof. Because the medium is
tractable, we expect few difficulties in implementation; hence our
pervasive optimism. Because our ideas are faulty, we have bugs;
hence our optimism is unjustified."
- frederick p. brooks, 1972
"Between thought and expression
There lies a lifetime."
- lou reed, 1968
"The lyfe so short,
The crafte so long to lerne."
- geoff chaucer, 1386
"God is in the details."
- eponymous
_
_
inconsistencies of our ideas become clear only during implementation.
Thus it is that writing, experimentation, 'working out; are essential
disciplines for the theoretician.
In many creative activities the medium of execution is intractble.
Lumber splits; paints smear; electrical circuits ring. These
physical limitations of the medium constrain the ideas that may be
expressed, and they also create unexpected difficulties in the
implementation.
Implementation , then, takes time and sweat both becaues of the
physical limitations of the media and because of the inadequacies of
the underlying ideas. We tend to blame the physical media for most
of our implementation difficulties; for the media are not 'ours' in
the way the ideas are, and our pride colors our judgment.
Computer programming, however, creates with an exceedingly tractable
medium. The programmer builds from pure thought-stuff: concepts and
very flexible representations thereof. Because the medium is
tractable, we expect few difficulties in implementation; hence our
pervasive optimism. Because our ideas are faulty, we have bugs;
hence our optimism is unjustified."
- frederick p. brooks, 1972
"Between thought and expression
There lies a lifetime."
- lou reed, 1968
"The lyfe so short,
The crafte so long to lerne."
- geoff chaucer, 1386
"God is in the details."
- eponymous
_
_
Re: Re: Re: old discu[rsive]ssion + portents of history
mez breeze wrote:
> ....+ how goes ur lea[ched]k.E absorption cradle?
i used to live on the gulf of mexico, but i moved up to shining rock wilderness in the shadow of cold mountain. i drive a 1985 crown victoria and it goes like this:
http://www.whitestripes.com/discs/lyrics/bigthree.html
http://tinpan.fortunecity.com/eltonjohn/802/adamant/antwords.html#square
_
> ....+ how goes ur lea[ched]k.E absorption cradle?
i used to live on the gulf of mexico, but i moved up to shining rock wilderness in the shadow of cold mountain. i drive a 1985 crown victoria and it goes like this:
http://www.whitestripes.com/discs/lyrics/bigthree.html
http://tinpan.fortunecity.com/eltonjohn/802/adamant/antwords.html#square
_
Re: old discu[rsive]ssion + portents of history
hi mez,
is this list para-art or art?
[same question, alternately posed:]
are our posts art.crit or poetry?
if both, but not concurrently in any single post,
then
to you they are mostly logic-bound
and
to them you are at best thrillingly diversive and at worse obtuse.
If both, and concurrently in a single post,
then
good luck, because
although
rhiz.raw may be a steely gulf stream amidst the bounding main of infinite network
still
we're bound to paddle it in our leaky word.canoes.
music/sound takes flight first,
then visuals and time-based motion,
then reactive/autogenerative code-driven behaviors/environments.
make raw a BBS and get francis to turn on html posting capabilities, and watch it fly:
cf: http://rhizome.org/object.rhiz?2261
until then, you are:
http://images.google.com/images?q=cigarette+boat
amidst:
http://images.google.com/images?q=tug+boat
vroom on u crazy diamond,
curt
_
mez breeze wrote:
>
> _"_
>
>
>
> is the threat of deracination that l[arge]ooming?
>
> i guess i somewot resign myself to the perpetual communication ethic
> that
> is displayed + ratified via email discussions like these, that tend 2
> have
> an almost n.built tendency to derail the potential for expanding [+
> hence
> end up stained with reductionististic overcasts] any presentation of
> genre_structures thru the need 2
> a) m.bed them in[2] a historical framework/grounding, no matter how
> loosely
> d.fined +
> b) draw threads 2wards analytical reasoning rather then n.courage
> communication methods||fractures that r utilised by the medium itself
> [echos of print-based culture, any1?;)]........
>
> ie
> [d|n.duction via m.plied confliction/competition of sub(e)jective
> dia-as
> opposed 2 multi-logue connexion(s)]
> [m.ploy covertly_engineered friction minus the screech of
> troll-baiting +
> then mask the conflict rub as theorised learning curves]
> [non_spiral data adoption + edge 2wards genre-formulations thru the
> predicated rather than anomalous media x.tensions].
>
>
>
> _"_
>
> .(c)[lick].
> -
> -
>
> http://www.hotkey.net.au/~netwurker
> http://www.livejournal.com/users/netwurker/
>
is this list para-art or art?
[same question, alternately posed:]
are our posts art.crit or poetry?
if both, but not concurrently in any single post,
then
to you they are mostly logic-bound
and
to them you are at best thrillingly diversive and at worse obtuse.
If both, and concurrently in a single post,
then
good luck, because
although
rhiz.raw may be a steely gulf stream amidst the bounding main of infinite network
still
we're bound to paddle it in our leaky word.canoes.
music/sound takes flight first,
then visuals and time-based motion,
then reactive/autogenerative code-driven behaviors/environments.
make raw a BBS and get francis to turn on html posting capabilities, and watch it fly:
cf: http://rhizome.org/object.rhiz?2261
until then, you are:
http://images.google.com/images?q=cigarette+boat
amidst:
http://images.google.com/images?q=tug+boat
vroom on u crazy diamond,
curt
_
mez breeze wrote:
>
> _"_
>
>
>
> is the threat of deracination that l[arge]ooming?
>
> i guess i somewot resign myself to the perpetual communication ethic
> that
> is displayed + ratified via email discussions like these, that tend 2
> have
> an almost n.built tendency to derail the potential for expanding [+
> hence
> end up stained with reductionististic overcasts] any presentation of
> genre_structures thru the need 2
> a) m.bed them in[2] a historical framework/grounding, no matter how
> loosely
> d.fined +
> b) draw threads 2wards analytical reasoning rather then n.courage
> communication methods||fractures that r utilised by the medium itself
> [echos of print-based culture, any1?;)]........
>
> ie
> [d|n.duction via m.plied confliction/competition of sub(e)jective
> dia-as
> opposed 2 multi-logue connexion(s)]
> [m.ploy covertly_engineered friction minus the screech of
> troll-baiting +
> then mask the conflict rub as theorised learning curves]
> [non_spiral data adoption + edge 2wards genre-formulations thru the
> predicated rather than anomalous media x.tensions].
>
>
>
> _"_
>
> .(c)[lick].
> -
> -
>
> http://www.hotkey.net.au/~netwurker
> http://www.livejournal.com/users/netwurker/
>