VJam Theory |
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Date published: 09/09/07 Collaborative writers |
A momentart, audiece, moment, objectThe moment where all comes together it's the moment, the reason why it all started and came into existence. The performance is parallel to the object as art(not in conflict with it), it's the momentary existent art work. The work can't be repeated because spaces have differences: spatial, visual, acoustic, cultural, emotional. Audiences make also each performance a unique moment, by the way they collectively engage with the work and how the performer(s) engage(s) with the audience. |
These are interesting questions, but I have a feelinn the answers really depend on how specificaly they are framed. The "performance" is a very broad topic, and the right answers for VJ may not be the same for music or for theater due to the different nature of the performance. I suspect that asking if the performance is art or not may be asking the wrong question entirely--in the contemporary art world most everything/anything can be or is art. Theoretically at least it is potentially possible for a VJ performance to repeat a previous one exactly, esp. when it is driven by pre-programmed sequences and synchronized sound-image "events". (In actual practice the likelihood of repeat may be very small, but it does exist.) I imagine the only way to actually prevent such a repeat would be to build a system that incorporates each performance into itself as part of the database (just as a living actor does) so the material being performed changes during the performace. wikipedia: so if we start by asking what part of performance is art, i agree that the intention of the creator is what mostly counts here. Each part of the performance can be art if the creator sees it that way.. Its totally possible to make an "artistic" recording of a performance if that is the creators intention... if not, then all shows we see on TV are art, excellent camera work in real time... anyway, the question of what is art and what is not art is very time-based as we know from the history...andy warhol would have had difficulties of being recognized as an artists in the late 16th century.. lets not forget that "art" is basically a system that is kept running by institutions, critics, collectors, magazines, fairs, etc.. so there are many mouths to feed .. nevertheless, ive been always pushing the notion that live cinema has artistic intentions basically because it cant be considered only as entertainment and art institutions are better places to show this kind of work than cinemas or even clubs (depends if its a special event or just a night club) I was at cal art for a panel talk with Allen Sekula, John Baldesarri and some other on the power of image and semiotics of moment when a visiting professor popped up with a statement totally out of turn. His name was Jalal Tufic and he made a point that at first was puzzling then was clearly fascinating. He said to stop filming this moment. Stop it now. The documentation in time becomes the entity was his point. And that our moment was thus in a way surrogate to the video in the cameras whirring in the corner of the room and so much plastic. The live performance or a moment to him was to be like a happening where this is all and all is the fibers of this moment, its collusions, its breaks and collisions as any other pin point in space or time. To be picky :) I would say that "live cinema" doesn't have intentions at all--these are the exclusive domain of the artists and the audience of the live cinema work! But I'm not really talking about intentions (claimed or otherwise) about the work, but about the structure of the work in relation to the boarder and more complex history that precedes it and which the informed audience shares with the artist making work. This is what makes a performance interesting or not, meaningful or not. It is this contextuality that exists as a result of the audiences "past experiences" with a class of works and that allows them to become meaningful and art. I really like the concept of the past contextualizing and ultimately agitating ( or non agitating) a moment into full focus, cargo and totality. Very interesting. I used to make false poetry machines for experimentation with this in regards to specific words and sentence constructions. Words like "sea" "Soul" "humanity" are open ended as opposed to words like "pacific ocean" or "population" (although, of course those words are also open to personal interpretation and filling to their skin by each person's past experiences and associations in a constellation of points and points of entry. These words also arguably carry past usage, knowledge of their age, the cargo of their years, and thus when inserted into a rudimentary sentence 9 times out of 10 proved to seem meaningful, clever, even profound while the person had actually unknowingly picked them randomly earlier and they were simply dropped into the undercarriage of a basic sentence. Perhaps some words seem more "poetic" because of the span of time, and it too is is in their bellies like so much ballast. It is also interesting to see how a n individual moment of improvisation if one thinks of game theory could at times be exactly as another, a "copy" or " second form of what occurred before" as erroneously interpreted by someone who had some sense of this. It would be erroneous in the face of game theory as there are mathematical probabilities, variabilities, recombinant potentialities within a set of tools no matter how vast. This would simply be that odd phenomenon where people with no biological lineage in other parts of the world have been found to be nearly identical in photos. "Sampling" is a large umbrella and only getting wider and more complex to define and distill with creative commons and the increasing ubiquity of certain tools of performance, replication and creation as high en d technology becomes more affordable in waves. |
modular structuresI find the modular method in creating live AV performances fascinating.. the endless possibilities of mixing the material (video clips, texts, animations,patches..) together in realtime..a performance is never ready, it can keep changing endlessly..and a live recording of a performance is just one glimpse of it, just one moment amongst many other possibilities. this is really the part which makes live AV so different from video art for example.. modular structures can of course be found in all media nowadays, especially online.. more thoughts on this ? |
The modular method in vjing, as i see it, is a very effective way to blend all sorts of influences and quotations. Totally POP. Birimbica a carioca aflita
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Relationshipsbody, installation, performance artThere are already many different definitions of performance from performance art to theater and music for example. In what way(s) does VJing differ from or overlap these other practices? Is it sufficient to describe VJing as ‘technologically mediated performance’? In this sense isn’t an orchestral performance also technologically mediated? Has anyone tried to map these overlapping areas of practice? In ‘performance art’ on it’s own there are a huge range of approaches allied to different intentions, ambitions and presuppositions. Some of these hold as central the presence of the body of the performer. Where does VJing or, for example, telepresence relate to this? |
My feeling is that an essential part of VJ performance is that it is a visual performance. In this regard we should perhaps include the paintings where Yves Klein directed nude women coated with paint to drag, roll, etc themselves on canvas as (possibly) related, although I would prefer an understanding where this kind of performance was something different than VJ. My mind has to go to Roland Barthes for a bit. The paraphrasing of his concept of the death of the author is to argue that it is that live conduit, that current of exchange with the viewer/observer that agitates the dormant within a created work. I am not saying this just as a theorist but also as (pardon the damn hyphens..can't help it..) but as a musician/new media guy/writer. Think of the cheesy old "If a tree falls in a forest does it make a sound?" Does a book tell a layered narrative full of moments and symbolism of no one is reading it? Does a work of music play out its tones, architectures, flow, structures, feels and emotive weight sitting inside a shiny c.d? A bell is a cup before it is struck.. to quote another old saying.. The work is a constellation of potential and something that its creator has some satisfaction with yes, but is it fully in fruition and in a sense alive when being read, heard in a way that is much more ? And there is no way to really know how each person will react and respond and what personal memory, mood, taste, expectation,release they will bring to its shape and details...hence it is like a circuit complete and aglow. I have written on the relationship between Barthes' death of the author and the recombinatory practices of appropriation: http://www.hz-journal.org/n10/betancourt.html While it is true that all reading requires a reader for meaning to emerge, even more significant (and ignored in Barthes) is the role of past experience and context in the determination of meaning. A work without context can be quite opaque. (The indexical statement "bububu" is a good example of this.) It is this context--existing beyond the control of any singular interpreter--that creates meaning. If there is a consensus meaning and a subjective meaning that are radically different, and the subjective one depends on private, idiosyncratic referents, then it is not likely to be believed by anyone as a legitimate interpretation. Thus we need to remember the power of context in our interpretations. I think that that's the problem when VJ's are considered more of visual producers hiding in the background rather than performers who can be see doing their performance - otherwise who knows it "live" and how cares? My first interest in VJing was years ago at a party when I actually saw the video on two monitors and the VJ playing the keyboard that triggered the mixes and effects and I was struck by the physical interaction and the movement of his body to the music and using that to change the visuals - that was what made it interesting to me - how is this different for an audience watching a guitar player play live before an audience? I think this type of performance does demand the "the awareness of the controller by the audience". That's what makes it feel real - especially when music is involved - to see that the VJ "feels" the music in their bodies and reinterprets that in a synesthetic way back out through the imagery as any musician does through their other instruments to accompany the work. As an assemble piece - requiring in many cases the marriage of image to sound - it makes a huge difference to me to see the performer - otherwise - and this is why club visuals can be boring - it could easily be canned music and eye-candy visuals with no soul. How does a VJ otherwise breath life into the work? I'd like to see more VJ's out front and have a view of them as they create the work we see - yes this takes away from the immersion - but so does watching a guitar player - the audience can be in control of their own experience however and choose what they want to watch/ experience - the artist or the art. |
rhythmThe VJ and vjing is a performance for nightclubs. Live lights around dancing people, drugs: party time. Watch images is the main audience’s idea? The performance is nearest of music than of image, it is rhythm. The proposition is to make sense, but … not always. Is the sense something that happens just with icons, with images full of meaning? Some radical performances are those that suggest, that develop abstract images or make ordinary icons become abstract. It’s necessary to control the meaning for audience? Why to connect “cinema” with the performances? The space is different and it isn’t important to tell a story, to make sense like in cinema. In a way I imagine that our era is a sense one. We may know the world and think, but sometimes be affected by the rhythm. |
I don´t believe a VJ permormance must be like cinema, I love to make permormances full of abstract images. rhythm can exist in transmodality....in multiple forms.... Narrative as written is composed with a sense of internal rhythms , cadences, multiple pattern evolutions and variations in its structure, language,punctuation... rhythm in visual media can be expressed and interpreted in single to multiple flows at once as the eye scans the visual plane....this is also true in graphic design theory as the amount of visual information must have "beats" from sparse to complex in sections of the grid in the plane during a viewer's interpretation/experience/immersion rhythms are found in pauses, blank spaces, tonal shifts, shifts in scale, shifts in shading color and color symbolism......as well as in meteorology...climatology etc..... cinema also can have rhythms in its scene lengths, pacing, cuts, sound to image variation in soundtrack, part of the beauty of rhythm to me is that it is so varied and so present in such a variety of forms... rhythm can be a feature of both temporary and spatial constructions. so, in that way, vjing is no closer to music than it is to graphic design or cinema. rhythm is not an indicator of musicality or visuality. in any case, cinema is constructed as a fixed sequence (even though its sequentiality can be broken by different narrative resources: flash backs, etc.) and is seen in a fixed context (movie theater, home), whereas a vj performance exists in the midst of a space of flows. a fragmented visual performance, which demands mobility (both perceptual, intellectual and physical) from the viewers can not be constructed in the same way as cinema, otherwise it will be condemned to misplacement. it will be closer to a non-euclidean conception of space than to time, even if time can be thoroughly twisted into an apparent non-linearity. cinema is something to watch; instead, a vj performance is a space in which to move around (and just occasionally watch, possibly while carrying a drink and chatting with friends) i believe that vj's should acknowledge the fact that their performance can not be considered as an attractor just because it happens on a screen, suggesting a parallel with cinema. a movie is a strong attractor whose power lasts between 1 and 3 hours; a vj performance is something closer to an alternating magnet: you watch it, and soon you want to turn away. then you want to watch it again... the watcher doesn't even have to fill in the blanks! it is a new mode of viewing, an exciting space to explore... I would like to see some other firing VUs, as shown at hackaday´s site, posted at NetBehaviour Perfect sample of vjing performance firstly vj genre is certainly not cinema .a good comparison would be cinema /theatre.vj genre is a very plastic form . unfortunately inhibited by its close proximity with electro music.this being an extremely linear euclidean form of music. therefore the resulting collaborations are usually pretty cliche in spite of the formidable tech invoved. rhythm concept especially in occidental culture is very narrow in general. and in scientific terms quite behind our present era. binary rhythms for example in no way or form represent time per se.... time being of course not linear as amply proven in early 20 th century quantum theories. i venture to say that time and rhythm are the same as we could not even exist for one minute without the millions of diverse rhythmsmaking up the structure of uiverse as we perceive it. vj genre has quite a capablity to represent modern time perception as does varous forms of computer generated music. however , this is at present a rarity. its an unfortunate comment on our epoch that unlike the so called renaissance in 14th century europe....art and science are very distant. |
The wide field of livevisualsAfter reading the comments to the last post I felt it might be good to chat a bit about the wide field of live visuals of which VJng is one possibility. As I have understood, VJtheory doesnt discuss only VJs playing at night clubs, but also visual music, live AV-sets, live cinema, etc.. If this is not the case, then i probably shouldnt be here to start with. I also started as VJ, but then moved into live AV-sets, collaborations with musicians, theatre, etc... I think VJng in general is a good opportunity to experiment with images (as "noone" is normally watching and trying to analise your work ) But I remember one night standing amongst the audience in a drum'n'bass party watching someone's visuals: clips from chaplin's movies followed by clips from space odyssey followed by other clips endlessly etc... in a fast rhythm ... and i was wondering if these images had any connection in the mind of the vj ? why did he choose these images and not some others ? had he ever read about Eisensteins montage theory ? had he ever done any visual studies ? many questions crossed my mind while i was watching the visuals.. how ever long i watched those images, i couldnt figure it out, was there suppose to be somekind of random logic, a secret code to discover or not, but as i didnt figure out any message behind the choises of the Vj, the images soon appeared as noise and my mind didnt respond to them anymore, and i couldnt remember more images afterwards, all was erased, before even recorded, and in the end, this mix could have been done without the help of the vj. computers can make random mixes as well as people. What computers cant make out of a library of video clips, is somekind of story or meaning. Of course we all know that in the end, the meaning is built in the receiver's mind, nevertheless, if there is no meaning to start with, then the receiver will be wasting her time, right ? the thing is, this particular VJ-show i just described would have been much better (from my point of view) if the vj would have put more thought into what he was doing ...why wouldnt he had just mix the clips in a way that would have been funny or interesting or give us food for thought or at least emotion.. i dont see any sense of mindless image bombing especially as these visual tools we have nowadays are so powerfull, that amazing, beautifull, mind blowing performances can be made with them ...
like many other vjs, i left the clubs and started to do live cinema/live AV/.... basically to be able to explore more these new possibilities and work better with audio and show the results to an audience which is actually watching. It is a different experience than VJng, as the audience is expecting much more if they are to watch and listen to something for 30 minutes. Still, it is not cinema and it will never be, as the whole structure is based on samples, not timeline. the main interest is to create audiovisual experience which is not cinema, not vjng, but something inbetween, somekind of metanarrative poetic transformative event...i believe that visuals can work like a shiatsu massage for your eyes ... live visuals could make you laugh or cry and hopefully to go home remembering what had happened, at least bits of it. this is what many live visuals artists are struggling towards...creating "new" visual narratives,aesthetics, etc... i hope this post serves to open up a bit the discussion,towards realtime av, not just VJng.. sorry for the lenght .. |
In our days is hard, maybe impossible and not necessary, to think art and audiovisual cultural forms as specificity. It’s better to observe how the expressive elements are being used. I like Michel de Certeau’s idea of the use, in a way, depending how you use objects or structures of ideas the symbols works, and maybe generate a different concept. I can't possibly agree that video somehow eludes the linear. Whether there is narrative or not, not that's a question. I am working with video as an accompaniment to live music, in particular, noise music (as well as other video pursuits). I find that as a performer I play a role that is subliminal to the act of the musician, while being, at that moment, inseparable. I believe the visual element, if performed as a live instrumental part, becomes part of what it accompanies. The audience finds them bound (without closing off a sense). I also find that even though I can use tools and clips and programs, my favorite instrument is still the camera in conjunction with the physical world, whether in front of an audience or in my studio. On that note, I don't see how you can make such a broad claim as video never being like cinema, as it is based on samples... I have performed plenty of live visuals that have plenty of variation, and absolutely no samples. They approach something more like a landscape, and I describe the work as video painting, rather than VJing, as there is no relationship to DJing (sample based mixing or playlist development), where the term evolves from. Regardless of where video fits, the exclusion of narrative from video as a live form is bogus. A piece of video is inherently timeline based, whether it is prerecorded or performed. Just as a piece of improvised music goes from one time to another, so does video. This is the fundamental magic of these media, and what the creator uses and intends is up to them and not your limited imagination or compartmentalization. Just as you expected more structure from the VJ set you reference, couldn't you see a timeline of constructed clips/performative visual elements being performed for a long period? A video play if you will? What exactly is it that you see separating video and cinema? Personally, I think it is generally narrative, but not timeline. Again though, these are generalizations, which I think we're trying to create a dissolution of anyhow, yeah? i do agree with ryan: the "distance" between cinema and video is minimal, when compared to the possibilities offered by computers. both cinema and video are *recorded* on necessarily linear media (tapes)... yes, there is digital video everywhere now, but it emulates the linearity of tape. now, i believe that multilinearity is an illusion visible only to the illusionist, and not the audience. why? well, only the illusionist (vj) knows what string she is pulling. the audience sees only the results, which end up being linear for them. even if time is bended and folded, and images of chaplin and space odyssey are scattered about, as is related in this post. the final experience is resemblant to that of storytelling. no matter how much you twist a story, it's still a story. and if it gets too twisted, it looses its interest. in fact, the interesting thing about stories is precisely their solidification, with the possibility of only minor "hacks" so multilinearity is not the only way for a VJ or AV performer. there is also the possibility (and we could even say need) for the performer to interact with the audience. and this is where i think that the VJ (for short) can pass the "VJ Turing test": is there a human or a machine at the controls? is there someone who is sensing the mood of the moment, the ambience, who knows the cultural context in which we are all gathered? or is it just a machine popping out one image and effect after another? can a vj escape from narrative without having to escape from meaning? sounds like poetry to me. with poems composed and "played" on the spot. I have the feeling that this is getting at something important to the definition of what people are doing: that the venue itself imposes demands, and that ther eis a key difference between works done to be paid attention to and those that are not meant to be watched in any real fashion. It's entirely possible that as this medium develops the VJ in a club which is the current dominant model will come to be seen in much the same way that the "serious" film world (i.e. the film is an art people) views the commercial cinema creations such as "Die Hard" when compared with "Red Desert." Even though they share much in common, they are regarded as being completely different. (Ignore the experimental film in this relationship.) Any experience we have is necessarily going to be linear (time is linear afterall) however, what seems to be suggested by the idea of a "non-linear" work is that the construction requires effort on the viewer's part because the components arrive in a different order than their coherence requires; in other words, "some assembly required." Suggesting that all video is necessarily narrative because we have to experience it in a linear fashion confuses what is generally meant by "non-linear" when we talk about narrative or moving images. This is something other than Eisenstein's montage--the goal there was always (in its highest form) to transform the image from specific into general, so it could act as language instead of picture Narrative isn't required for Montage to work (look at Vertov for example)and neither does being linear as experience necessarily mean that a non-linear construct is impossible, only that it requires specific cues for the audience to understand what's happening. Nole Burch goes through this in the book Theory of Film Practice. i think its critical for the form to evolve past eye-candy, with no real narrative, message or conceptual basis, and outside the club space into more of the art form it can be. many artists have struggled to make it relevant, an artform and its time the world saw it as more that visual stimulus for drunk a drugged out partiers. it can be cinematic, abstract art, performative installation, poetic and innovative within various locations, contexts, technological forms, artistic milieus and practices, so I'm excited to see that the transition from the club to the theatre, gallery, streets, the web, etc are happening and that we can start to see it evolve and have a new and varied voice. The most thought provoking idea in this post to me is the idea that the artist is most responsible for delivering the meaning of the artwork. I believe it was Duchamp who said that for every artwork there are three participants: the artist, the observer, and the work of art itself, all with equal power. That statement resonates for me personally so I use it here. It ties in with my empirical experience as an artist, as an observer, and occasionally as a work of art. As a human, I prefer a world where the artist and the observer have equal power and ability to assign meaning to an artwork, just as I prefer to interpret the meaning of the world around me rather than have it conveyed to me by someone else. It is just a personal preference but I am sure there are others like me in the world; those people would be my ideal audience when I am the artist. Taking an active role as observer in assigning/deriving meaning from the world around me (including that part we might designate as 'artwork') is very liberating; I'm not bound to interpret the artist's intentions in order to have a successful experience, and my interpretation becomes every bit as valuable as the artist's. As a bonus I get a personalized life experience best suited to my own mind. If I happen to interpret the meaning that the artist intended, this is a plus, but not required for the artowrk (or the artist, or the viewer) to be successful. Ask yourself: as an artist, what is the message that I feel compelled to convey to the world in such a way that all can readily receive it? Is it possible to convey meaning in such a way? If it is, then what would be the value of that, to me and/or to the world? What message is that important? And finally: What would the world have to be like for the artist to reliably communicate this way? I'll relate the above to video art when I have time, best to all of you who are taking the time to put your thoughts here, peace. I found the phrase 'seemingly random sequence of images' worth commenting on. If the artist and observer both have power and authority to assign meaning, then the observer's perception of 'randomness' is as much their responsibility as much as it is the artist's. It is always within the observer's power to assign meaning to art (and the world at large, if a distinction must be made). My roots as a video artist aren't in the club/party scene, but were formed by channel surfing on cable TV with a VCR to record 'random' sequences of images. I found that these sequences often contained explicit or implied meaning based on their juxtaposition, if I was selective about what I added as the sequence progressed. I found that I could 'perform' TV live by picking two or three channels and switching from one to the other at the right time. It was uncanny just how often the juxtapositions had meaning. I theorized that it is the nature of front brain consciousness to assign meaning, and that since the brain measures one input against the ones next to it, my brain was assigning meaning naturally. (Others were often able to see those connections as well, or make their own.) With practice I was able to bring subtlety and humor to these recordings and performances. I think that when the currency is images, the potential for us to find meaning is multiplied because our brains are so visually acute. By using my intuition to allow for the richest ambiguities afforded by a sequence of images, I create art with multiple layers of meaning, and therefore with a rich potential for others to find their own meaning. This allows for all three entities (artist, observer and artwork) to have power in the experience, and results in a better world for all three. Through my early experience as a channel surfer, I found that sampling this enormous stream of information to create meaning-rich juxtapositions is a natural, valid and needed response, in order to re-find meaning in the deluge. This is true for my life as an observer and as an artist (or of course as an occasional work of art!) there are some really good directions here. i disagree strongly that time is linear. its a tool of measurement which we have created to measure our placement. and it is useful ,but like many concepts.. it is reaching the limit of its ability to explain and represent our present situation. its very true that meaning needs shared references.this is very intereresting to explore. for me its clear that not only linearity ,but time concepts themselves are being reflected in numeous ways throughout various forms of not only art but sciences. i agree with vjam theory about obsolete concepts in art. i think of it in terms of strata.. for example newtonian phsyics and euclidean mathematics are simply ineffectual when treating atomic particle theory , or in quantum mechanics. that does not mean they are obsolete by anymeans .... just that they can only be referenced up to a certain point with any contemporary usefullness. this does no imply however that one should be unaware of the base that they have created for contemporary physics and mathematic formulation. as a guitarist for example i find it fascinating that this fairly primitive instrument still is so prescient surviving not only the tempered scale and the piano. but as well is doing quite well in face of software sequences and protools etc. still i contend as state i comment on rhythm page that its unfortunate there is this gulf between science and art at the moment.and i do believe Meaning can originate with the artist or the viewer and result in successful art. The viewer has as much power as the artist to create meaning. Conversely the 'failure' of the artist to convey their intended meaning (or even to have an intention) does not preclude the success of the artwork. The artwork itself also has a voice and will speak for itself once it is released into the world; the artist can't and therefore shouldn't try to control what it says to all viewers at all times. This is my opinion based on personal experience; results may vary. I just prefer the freedom to decide for myself what the world means, and affording that freedom to others. By affording it, we teach others how to see the world in a unique way that enriches their lives. To me, that's what art is all about. Anyway I'm not advocating for total random image sequences if that doesn't get you there; it just happens to work for me. Maybe that's just my Dada roots showing. I also have done more structured sets where I picked my pallette in advance, but I try to have no pretensions about how that reaches my audience. At any rate VJing affords the opportunity like never before to create live juxtapositions that surprise the artist and the viewer; and by selecting images that are rich in potential meaning, it is possible to allow both the artist and the viewer to discover the artwork in real time, as a spontaneous act. That's what gets me off as a live video artist. Sometimes this approach results in a set that falls flat; most times it results in pure magic, and something I could not have planned in advance. Not unlike a jazz improvisation. |