Jim Andrews
Since the beginning
Works in Victoria Canada

ARTBASE (2)
BIO
Jim Andrews does http://vispo.com . He is a poet-programmer and audio guy. His work explores the new media possibilities of poetry, and seeks to synthesize the poetical with other arts and media.
Discussions (847) Opportunities (2) Events (14) Jobs (0)
DISCUSSION

Re: dbcinema


Thanks to Marcus Bastos, by the way, for the term dbcinema.

ja

DISCUSSION

dbcinema


dbcinema : http://vispo.com/temp/Google2.htm

this is in progress. this is, like, v 0.1.

you type in a concept top left, press enter, stare, and free associate.

same syntax as google searches. in fact it is a google search.

some interesting concepts:

epistemology
ruins
turing
godel
jenny holzer
joseph kosuth
poetry
visual poetry
visual art
visual music
pamela anderson
proboscis
dali
giger
ian hamilton finlay
eratosthenes
.
.
.

i'm using director to make this. director is pretty good for image
processing and compositing. and advanced google image search will do things
like return just black and white or greyscale images. so these can be used
as masks and also be processed over time. things like that are in the future
for this image engine.

also, as you may know, i like to do interactive audio work. but like visuals
too with them. this piece will eventually be the image engine for some
interactive audio works. you've seen the visual music prevalent on the
screen these days. mostly its music videos or abstract patterns that respond
to amplitude. nice, but i'd like something else. this is v 0.1 of an image
engine for audio works. this can combine the strong abstract dimensions of
what you think of when you think of visual algorithmic art with the
relevantly representational. and it opens into the social/collective in
interesting ways.

also, it frees me up from making pictures in the normal ways. i prefer to
write images. riffing on the google global image database with a few
well-chosen keywords and a lot of 'image display schemas' (there is only one
now: one after another, simplest possible) could generate lots of
significantly different dbcinema pieces.

there's a dowload manager, a media manager, a query manager, and an image
display manager at this point. various other managers to go along with lots
of 'image display schema'. and other things that you normally find in a
browser, like history and so on. would also be nice to be able to edit
pieces. all down the road.

ja
http://vispo.com

DISCUSSION

Re: Re: NYT review of ArtBase 101


> Jim Andrews wrote:
> > culture of brutality where torture is sanctioned in the highest
> offices. the
> > high becomes low, as Pall says. A culture in which lip service
> is paid to
> > 'democracy' but the show finally is of forty.
>
> Actually, I said the low becomes high and the context was quite
> different from what you're talking about.

Yes, I see. Your idea of the low becoming high is interesting and concerning
art solely. Age of flip?

ja

DISCUSSION

Grant Robinson: Guess the Google


Here's a game using google:
http://grant.robinson.name/projects/guess-the-google

You're presented with about twenty image thumbnails and you're asked to
guess the one-word query that generated these particular images. time bonus.

Basic idea is very good. Implementation is superior. Doesn't tell you what
the answer is though, when you don't guess correctly. I guess that's so the
question can be used later if 'desired'. Also, a 'game' should consist of a
fixed number of questions so that the high-scores are more meaningful,
maybe. Otherwise, the game just goes on until you're bored of it. Better to
end a game before the player is bored with it? Mind you, a guitar doesn't
limit the number of plunks and then buzz, game over. This ain't a guitar
though, either.

Minor criticisms aside, I was impressed with the basic idea and implemtation
here. http://grant.robinson.name is worth checking out too.

ja

DISCUSSION

Re: Re: NYT review of ArtBase 101


> What exactly IS the function of the critic?

Walt Whitman said something like 'great poetry demands a great audience.' in
the sense, perhaps, that it cannot exist without a great audience. what is a
great audience? i don't necessarily mean one that claps loud. i mean one for
whom there is something at stake in the art. one who demands art as or more
telling than the news concerning the significance of walking the earth. one
who will not settle for (solely) entertainment. one who understands that in
an enlightened society we are all critics, ie, we are all trying to come to
some understanding of ourselves and the world around us, including the art.
criticism is dialectic with others on what is important. judgement, as has
been pointed out, is important, but more important is the examination of the
poetics and taking it to its limits, exploring its implications concerning
art and how we live and what we can accept and live with. judgement arises
as a result of these things, ie, it is one of the ends of this sort of
process. the critic not only alerts us about art but about what it means to
be an inquiring, civilized seeker.

> Does the
> critic preprocess the material that will eventually be
> written into the canon? Or does the critic sniff out
> and discuss work that the reading public would be
> interested in?
>
> I mean, wouldn't art be more effective if it actually
> engaged users instead of requiring users to go out and
> get a degree and read looooong boring essays on
> curatorial practices?

I think there's quite a bit of art out there that *would* engage large
audiences if those audiences were available.

I also think you're right that there is a large and overly influential
academic and insular bulwark of institutional art that is protective of its
position which is used to tout an art of privilege and monied aspiration the
meaning of which is primarily reiteration of the capitalist status quo, the
ivied american dream, art and criticism distant from the need for audience.
art as confection, accessory of the upwardly mobile, art as the price of
admission to the position of privilege, art as fascion accessory in a
culture of brutality where torture is sanctioned in the highest offices. the
high becomes low, as Pall says. A culture in which lip service is paid to
'democracy' but the show finally is of forty.

ja