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Panel
presentation: Aesthetics and Tools in the Virtual Environment; The
Art of Virtual Reality Opening Comments While critical
discourse has long been an important factor in evaluating art production,
it has come to dominate mainstream art practice for a number of years.
Writers are naturally attracted to forms of art which are directly engaged
in discursive reason because they are readily accessible to analytic
language. The art and language movement of the early seventies serves
as a vivid example of the result of this particular bias amplified through
the incestuous feedback loop of theory and practice. The superheated
outcome of this compression of roles was invigorating to many (including
myself), but the perception that this school (as all previous schools)
rendered all other approaches passé should be clearly seen as
absurd. The ephemerality of intellectual fashion is well documented. Current theories
of culture and the specific effects of electronic media upon culture
inform much of the exciting work being done in computer (involved) art
making today. It is important to recognize that this type of art making
is not necessarily the only valuable work being done, but simply the
most seductive to the engaged intellect and thus in danger of marginalizing
other practices by pushing them to the periphery of serious consideration
--even characterizing them as naive and/or frivolous. I am clearly exaggerating
these tendencies here because I want to throw the bias of my own art
practice into relief. I'm interested in reinforcing the validity of
the type of non-discursive art practice exemplified by absolute music,
and am painfully aware of the paradox of using language to do so. Laurie
Anderson put the dilemma most succinctly when she said:
Survage made a
substantial series of paintings for his first absolute film, but was
unable to get the financial backing to have it shot; however other artists,
such as Viking Eggeling, Walther Ruttmann, and Oskar Fischinger, were
fortunate enough to realize their ambitions, producing a strong body
of work in absolute animation that inspired generations of artists including:
Len Lye, Harry Smith, Jordan Belson, the Whitney brothers, Larry Cuba,
and many others, including myself. Wassily Kandinsky
developed theories based on relationships of color, shape, and sound,
but never attempted to make an animated film, apparently preferring
to work in the medium of spatial/temporal light play and kinetic theater
--as did several of his colleagues at the Bauhaus: Laszlo Moholy-Nagy,
Ludwig Hirschfeld-Mack, et al. In 1928, Kandinsky produced a performance
in Dessau, consisting of the movement of colored lights and elemental
shapes manipulated within the void of a black draped stage.4 In 1921, Theo van
Doesburg visited Viking Eggeling and Hans Richter in their studio and
wrote enthusiastically in the journal De Stijl about the potential
of their absolute animation work, expressing caution about the unavoidable
danger for misunderstanding which can be involved in comparing it to
music.5 The problem
of the musical model which concerned van Doesburg is still with us today.
It results from a confusion between thinking of a comparison based upon
a direct synaesthetic correspondence rather than one based upon general
principles of temporal composition. The scientific
investigation of the periodic wave nature of both sound and light has
led to many attempts to find a direct correlation between the octave
structure of audible vibration and the structure of the visible light
spectrum. Many investigators, including Newton and Goethe, considered
the idea of a direct relationship between sound and light, but nothing
truly universal has ever been determined.6 Apart from the
fundamental physical differences in electromagnetic and air pressure
waves, the sensory input from the organs of hearing and sight appear
to be mapped onto the brain, and thus consciousness, in quite different
ways. It seems that any universal correspondences remain elusive, and
ultimately we are left with only very subjective relationships. In searching for
relationships, it is probably best to avoid looking for direct correspondences
and concentrate on finding the essential parameters characteristic of
each medium, and how, as event streams in time, these basic parameters
may be composed into patterns of architectonic structure having affect
on the perceiver. I would like to
identify three main forms of non-verbal time-based artforms and some
of their basic parameters:
These
parameters are obviously arbitrary. They are not intended as direct
corollaries (i.e., while pitch might be compared to color, it is certainly
not a corollary to posture!) and each might be applied to another form
in a slightly different way. For example, harmony is not necessary in
all forms of music, and harmony can also be understood in terms of a
particular type of spatial relationship, physical motion, or relationship
of two or more colors.7
It can be seen
that rhythm is the parameter which they all have in common, and it is
in fact the rhythmic structuring of the other parameters that gives
each medium its shape in time. It is of course important to realize
that it is possible to identify rhythms occurring simultaneously at
different scales of time, from the minute and quick events which make
up the most discrete of units, to the larger and slower overall temporal
structures which give form to the entire composition. Performance Musical instruments
can be seen as a technological extension of the will to voice sound.
A vocalist produces sound through a direct act of will, unmediated by
technology. An instrumentalist produces sound through an act of will
mediated by a technology which allows for an expanded range of aural
expression. Each kind of musical instrument has unique capacities for
generating sound and this effects the range of affect a musician can
elicit with them . The potential of a trombone is different from that
of a violin, an oboe, a piano, or timpani. The design of an instrument
presents both opportunities and constraints in the composition of music.
A composition for harpsichord is unlikely to resemble a composition
for sitar. Visual instruments
can be seen as a technological extension of the will to move. A dancer
produces movement through a direct act of will, unmediated by technology.
An animator produces movement through an act of will mediated by a technology
which allows for an expanded range of kinesthetic expression. The concept
of an instrumental form of dance is relatively new and carries with
it some particular problems regarding the human form as sign; but one
need only note the vast difference between singing and playing a piano
to begin to see the implications.8 Aside from my awareness
of the difficulties in comparing absolute music to absolute animation
(including the different ways in which hearing and seeing are mapped
onto consciousness), I still aspired in my videographic animation work
to create an affect as engaging as that possible through a musical experience.
Even though I did achieve some success toward that end, I was never
entirely satisfied. I realized that one of the problems which faced
me was the limitation of my visual compositions to the same relatively
small flat window in space to which painting and drawing are usually
confined. While I enjoyed playing with the familiar compositional devices
which the rectilinear border provides, I was envious of the totally
enveloping nature of music. I yearned for a way to break free of the
boundary of the frame and become as totally immersed in image as in
the ocean of air pressure which constitutes sound. That has now become
possible. The new medium of immersive VR has dissolved the boundary
of the frame, allowing us to virtually enter into the image for the
first time in history.9 In the realm of
immersive VR it will be possible to manifest and choreograph a wide
variety of form in motion. Softly pulsing aurora-like color fields may
ebb and flow through the space. Shapes may be made to coalesce out of
the void or fly in and out of proximity from afar. Independent shapes
may be caused to orbit one another in hierarchical constellations of
complex and shifting interdependence. Shapes may be made to flow around,
move through, or bounce off of participants' body forms. Sweeping gestures
of the arms and legs may leave an intricate calligraphy of dissolving
trails, or the gestures of one performer may create solid trails, while
those of another carve out voids in a virtual pas de deux of additive
and subtractive sculpting.10 Procedural animation
programs that mimic the flocking behavior of birds or the schooling
behavior of fish, may allow a performer to swing swirling clusters of
tiny scintillating triangles around at the end of an invisible line
radiating from a hand; open the hand, and the line grows longer; close
the hand, and the line grows shorter.11 The development
of particular instrumentality's will depend upon the understanding and
desires which evolve from direct experience in the virtual world. As
in improvisation with videographic animation, the complete range of
compositional possibilities will only be revealed through the directed
play of the will into kinesthetic expression. The full potential of
absolute animation in Virtual Reality remains to be seen. Concluding Remarks The drive to aesthetic
motion has been a part of human culture from time immemorial. The universal
existence of the art of dance bears witness to the importance of this
drive. From deeply felt rituals of cosmic union to mere decorative entertainment,
dance has played, and continues to play, an active role in nearly all
societies. Absolute animation instruments have extended the will to
motion beyond the constraints of the human physique, thus allowing for
the creation of aesthetic experiences beyond that which is possible
through the direct movement of the unmediated body. |
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