Mediamatic Magazine Vol. 2#1

anyMeta 4.19.3 - Atom module 0.3.2 2012-02-16T16:54:40+01:00 http://www.mediamatic.net/feed/atom/19057/en Mediamatic Magazine Vol. 2#1 http://www.mediamatic.net/id/19059 2009-04-24T12:56:47+02:00 Mediamatic Magazine Vol. 2#1 Editorial

Halfway through the Documenta, we feel we should make our contribution to the wave of publicity, which already seems to have lost momentum. Therefore we confined ourselves to interesting, specialist information: two interviews with Documenta staff members who were responsible for the video programme. Followed by an article about audio, and a critique of a number of installations.

Max Bruinsma does not think very highly of Reflections, the Art Video exhibition organized by Con Rumore in Museum Fodor. His special butt is the theoretical supervision by Con Rumore / TBA boss Rob Perrée. Perrée strikes back immediately, so the reader may judge for himself. Angry as well are media critics! Rein Wolfs and Jouke Kleerebezem. Willem Velthoven's article on Lydia Schouten (MM 1-4 April 1987), in which he permitted himself a few remarks about the ideas of both gentlemen, was not well received at all. Velthoven is given his due in two articles. Also in this issue: the work of the young Dutch artist Pieter Baan Müller and the production of the Yugoslav Dalibor Martinis Dutch Moves. Both artist also contributed to this issue. The third artist contribution is by Ingo Günther, whose installation for the Documenta is reviewed by Dieter Daniels. Mediamatic Magazine Vol. 2#1 - d d ARTICLE 1 http://www.mediamatic.net/id/19060 2009-04-24T12:59:10+02:00 Halbe Mensche. Les Extrémes se touchent

In Mediamatic 1#4, Willem Velthoven wrote about Lydia Schouten's Echoes of Death/Forever Young. In his article he discussed the criticism of Rein Wolfs and of Jouke Kleerebezem. Velthoven came to the conclusion that the work of Schouten should be interpreted as autobiographical, and not as a critique of the media, like in the work of Wolfs and Kleerebezem. Below, both Wolfs and Kleerebezem give their reactions to this article. Wolf's opinion is that Velthoven watches television too often (which is true), and that Velthoven should keep his paws off Culture (which is impossible). Kleerebezem thinks that, if you take his point of view, he is right (which is correct), and that the media are too familiar and too self evidently part of our consciousness to be allowed to be part of the arts (which is an interesting idea).

<h2>Halbe Mensche</h2> Humanity was young and Unity reigned; Man was one. Sadly, he didn't prove to be indivisible. Now that Unity is forbidden, unity of thinking also seems like past history. According to Willem Velthoven: Kleerebezem+ Wolfs=1. Is it a conspiracy? Poor Lydia Schouten, the victim of critics, postmodern (and French) thinking. Poor Humanist Association as well, lost along the high road to lunacy. And finally poor Kleerebezem and Wolfs they still only see fire. What a dreadful state of affairs. Perhaps it's all an old problem, just like that farmer's daughter who falls victim to her desires. How strong is the temptation of post-modern (and French) thinking? How slight the thoughts of the contemporary thinker? Confronting something with its opposite can make it just disappear. It is neutralized: Velthoven's discovery is dreadfully corny. Let's read some Marsman: End Far from the horde not once the sound of a flower brushed against the steepness of my dusky night, where I, curved over space's brim, extract fragrance of ages from the goblet of air and, late small flower, I move to Time's lumbering beat. Great and compelling we shall and will be. Great and Compelling we can be, even without the moral support of a Human Association that tries to understand life and the world exclusively by human means. Understand? Do you understand Marsman? Reading closely, we lose the poem under the analytical eye of our human means. Have we brought that devilish kid's game once more to a suitable conclusion. And the meaning of life? Way beyond our human means reigns the meaning of life. Sneering and scoffing. Halber Mensch: a record by Einstürzende Neubauten. Subculture anti-aesthetics of the first order. Equally: elitist neo-aesthetics at its most obvious. Equally: a lot of noise about nothing. Compare the Schouten case: and there's a fine gentleman who's been to Paris, a son of respectable contemporary thinker, a man of honor who says: Schouten, takes the seduction (the media) and uses it to research desire (herself). That seduction can spark off desire and that desire can reach out into the domain of seduction make the relation both dramatic and complicated. The subject is under fire and is defendants itself. Wolfs and Kleerebezem still only see fire. Willem Velthoven must have spent too much too much time lying in front of the the television. His subject is obviously under fire as we!l. At hight, Wolfs and Kleerebezem lie in front of the hearth, as healthy Dutch boys should, reading books about hard-working farmer's daughters who don't fall victim to their desires but piously look forward to the Sunday sermon. Normally, as it should be. Really, as it is. Compared with Marsman's fragrance of ages, the media-religious condition of Here and Now is at most limited. The subject under the fire of an invented reality. The world's drama concealed in shallow metaphor. A pathological condition expanded to global proportions. a motif made into theme. The Halbe Mensche want the hole world, East and West, past, present and future. <h2> Les Extrémes se touchent</h2> After reading and rereading Willem Velthoven's Forever Young/Echoes of Death, where (with that innocence characteristic of the passer-by) he opens the eyes of us Critics of Media Art to the many pitfalls we have blundered into, I actually chanced on something like a conclusion. After a rather slapdash introduction, which perhaps cast some light on the subject for those readers who have only read the headings of articles in the past few years and then passed the discussions by, he came to the conclusion that Kleerebezem and Schouten agree about the media. Les extrémes se touchent! Talk about dramatic and complicated relations! He places this surprising turn in the light of the -for the editor-in-chief of the Netherlands' only media art magazine- strikingly professional awareness that the media exist and influence everybody. Many a 'media artist' could learn a thing or two from that. Out of the numerous factual inaccuracies and overstatements in Velthoven's article I want to correct just one: that my critical marginalia were ever specifically related to the work of Lydia Schouten: this kind of diverting oeuvre inevitably just gives rise to diverted argument, the best proof of this is supplied by Velthoven: himself. Or, as many a time I sighed: how much significance can we bear? All this does not contradict the fact that every single argument about Art contains points of departure that can be food for thought. Particularly if these arguments deal with techniques that loosen up the brain cells of freischwebende lntelligenz and, even for real go-getters, can lead to just pure thoughts. However, the most conspicuous technique in Velthoven's argument is the well known 1,2,3, the more the merrier technique: a satisfaction that the passer-by already dazzled by I unfortunately doesn't experience. Sometimes, purifying thoughts are achieved after the first introduction. The Media as contemporary personification of Evil, that's how they're seen by our critics. But what then is Media Art? An exemplary marriage between Good an Evil? Velthoven correctly observes that my criticism- certainly in Beeld focuses on art which takes the Media reality as subject. An invented reality as Rein Wolfs correctly calls it in his Halbe Mensche reaction. A motif made into theme (Wolfs), so that this theme can in turn become a theme again, and so on ad infinitum. It doesn't really matter what disciplines or channels this art uses: the artist is again presented in the position of supposed critic/commentator (criticism as legitimization!), but now, however, in the dramatic and romantic role of double spy, in collaboration and opposition. The artist as builder and manager of a no man's land of significances in which too few or, on the contrary, a plenitude of prominent points are situated. Fantasy Island Revisited. The fusion between the Groninger Museum and an amusement park. Where and on what level do spectators (and artists!) finally discontinue their search for significances, completely exhausted from the many traps they must save themselves from, determines which values they are capable of encountering. There is no final destination, observers seek what they find, the seekers' means are not defined by what they are seeking but by the acceptance of the discovery as that which was sought. 1 In itself an interesting discovery but only in the most critical of hands does it lead to insight. In all other cases, surfeit and exhaustion simply end in aimless meandering: opportunists just get stuck, a delicious stimulus to the brain cells but meanwhile up to their necks in quicksand. Here, then is the crux of my criticism. This concerns the complete interchangeability of the shabby trouvailles that bubble up around us in the media critics' camp. Too much lack of inhibition with respect to these discoveries is bad for the stomach. <h3>It works!</h3> The post-modern (?), (post-?) critical technique works. It functions by grace of superficial relations, meager discoveries and exhausted contemporary thinkers. Battle-weary in collaboration and opposition, in the setting of traps for observation and awareness, battle-weary in the dance and fight with the invented opponent: reality as imagined for us in all its finesse by the media (the media are a subject). A reality which exceeds our wildest fantasies and is more real 2 than any single art work based on it. More complex than just any complex art work that pretends to cast new light on it. Let alone criticize. The contemporary post-modern (?) critical (?) subject functions, with all its solutions as the acceptor of a notion, of an awareness of reality that highlights functioning: it works. We believe in ourselves and in our realities, in our art works and their relations to us and to whatever reality. Once more our human means have not let us down. With perfect timing they developed a passion for the various codes supplied by the media now that the subject was under fire of its alter ego (in) the media. And, according to Schouten and others, the subject hasn't had a more dangerous and (in particular) a more interesting opponent for ages... A problem with Schouten's work, and with the work of many other artists who refer to the Media, is that it is too realistic, too recognizable, too acceptable as a discovery and too transparent, too naive in relation to the media reality. A problem with techniques and with every form of functioning is that they are dependent on conditions about which a concensus is too easily presumed. A problem with the Media and with many Other realities is that they are too recognizable, that they form too self-evident a part of our awareness. A problem with our relations is that they are too functional, too communicative. Finally, the problem with the art world is that it attracts sod all with these problems and the art gets what it deserves. 1 Compare Tom Puckey: The Strange Promise for Sculpture in Borges' of Idealistic World of Tlön, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius. Parts 1 and 2, in: Drukwerk De Zaak 32 and 33 respectively 2 See also Jouke Kleerebezem: The artificial Real, in: Drukwerk De Zaak 36 Mediamatic Magazine Vol. 2#1 - d d ARTICLE 1 http://www.mediamatic.net/id/19121 2009-04-24T13:11:14+02:00 Pieter Baan Müller. Apparent Simplicity.

The young Dutch artist Pieter Bann Müller uses video as others would a coaster or the margin of a newspaper: for a quick explanation. Marie Adéle Rajandream puts into words her fascination with his works.

<a href="http://www.mediamatic.net/19126/en/pieter-baan-muller"> <img src="http://fast.mediamatic.nl/f/sjnh/image/029/19126-185-400.jpg" height="400" width="185" alt="" title="Pieter Baan Muller" playable="1"/> </a><a title="Click to get a larger image - Pieter Baan Muller - Mediamatic.net" href="/19126/en/pieter-baan-muller">Pieter Baan Muller</a> the making of mother/ life/ return, to die When in 1986 Pieter Baan Müller finished his studies at the AKI (Academy for Art and Industry) in Enschede, he had already completed a number of video productions. He set out as a painter, but quickly turned to video, to which he had been introduced at the AKI. He felt that painting was too complicated and time-consuming. It took him an average of three months to produce a painting with which he was satisfied. He takes more pleasure in the production of videos, which better suits his purposive and direct way of working. <a href="http://www.mediamatic.net/19134/en/pieter-baan-muller"> <img src="http://fast.mediamatic.nl/f/sjnh/image/225/19134-179-400.jpg" height="400" width="179" alt="" title="Pieter Baan Muller" playable="1"/> </a><a title="Click to get a larger image - Pieter Baan Muller - Mediamatic.net" href="/19134/en/pieter-baan-muller">Pieter Baan Muller</a> conception/ become car/ death Müller feels that the technical quality of his work is of minor importance: As long as you can still see what is happening, as long as you can still see that a hammer is a hammer, everything is all right. In his work, the idea is the most important aspect. The medium and the techniques employed are important only as useful means for the expression of the idea. If an idea can be expressed more clearly in a booklet than in a video, he will opt for the booklet. <a href="http://www.mediamatic.net/19135/en/pieter-baan-muller"> <img src="http://fast.mediamatic.nl/f/sjnh/image/414/19135-185-400.jpg" height="400" width="185" alt="" title="Pieter Baan Muller" playable="1"/> </a><a title="Click to get a larger image - Pieter Baan Muller - Mediamatic.net" href="/19135/en/pieter-baan-muller">Pieter Baan Muller</a> birth/ learning to fly/ new life <h2>Familiar phenomena</h2> The video work of Müller testifies to a great simplicity, which does not mean that one cannot argue about the contents. It rather means that this content is expressed in as simple a way as possible. His most recent installation The car in my life as a bird (1986) illustrates this point rather well. On a small piece of paper, the artist draws a little woman. The sound of birds can be heard. The artist places a hard-boiled egg on the piece of paper in such a way that the oval form of the egg almost completely covers the woman. The bird sounds are replaced by the sound of a car starting up. A car, of which only one wheel is shown, drives across the paper and the egg. The artist sweeps up the pieces of the smashed egg and folds them in the piece of paper, all the while imitating the sound of a car. When he removes the piece of paper, a blue toy car emerges, a Beetle. Pieter Baan Müller walks barefoot across a sheet of paper. His footprints are black. He lets the toy car drive around his footprints, while he is making car sounds. Finally it ends up in one of the shoes standing at the end of track. A large sheet of paper has been attached to the wall; on it a blue car has been painted, in profile. The artist is standing next to the car; then he jumps. The sound of a car starting up can be heard. Each time the engine misfires, the artist remains suspended in the air. Then he disappears from the screen, leaving the car behind. In a painted decor, the Beetle is driving along the road through the forest full of singing birds. Then it smashes head- on into a tree. The following images were shot in the open air: a bird is circling in the air, while in the background we hear the sound of a bird's whistle. This sequence is repeated several times. In The car in my life as a bird, Müller lets phenomena that are familiar to everyone, spring from each other. In this way he establishes relations between things which in ordinary life are quite unconnected. In spite of this illogical construction, a statement is made: life and death are part of a cyclic process. The bird from the smashed egg returns to earth as a toy car. When the Beetle crashes into the tree, its life flows back to the bird's nest through the tree. Even though the images are crystal-clear, this tape must be seen several times before a certain meaning can be distilled from it. In this tape and also in his other works, Pieter Baan Müller uses other media from the visual arts, such as painting and performance. He does this mainly on practical grounds. When a certain object he needs is not at hand, he paints it. A performance is the simplest way to express something on video. Müller himself functions as the actor, because he knows exactly what to do. He does not use a text, because he sees a text as an obstacle in getting across an idea which should have universal validity. <h2>Abstraction</h2> <a href="http://www.mediamatic.net/19136/en/pieter-baan-muller"> <img src="http://fast.mediamatic.nl/f/sjnh/image/645/19136-400-290.jpg" height="290" width="400" alt="" title="Pieter Baan Muller" playable="1"/> </a><a title="Click to get a larger image - Pieter Baan Muller - Mediamatic.net" href="/19136/en/pieter-baan-muller">Pieter Baan Muller</a> Pieter Baan Müller The Queen in Russia 1985 A certain development can be seen in his work. If at first his work was mainly narrative, at present it tends to become more abstract. The car in my life as a bird provides a good example of this trend. Compared with The Queen in Russia, which forms part of the tape Travel scenes (1985), The car in my life as a bird is much more metaphorical in nature. The whole story of The Queen in Russia is set in a painted decor. Through a snowy landscape, a coach is riding pursued by howling wolves. The clippety-clop of horses' hooves can be heard. The coach comes to a halt and the queen alights. She shakes hands with the subject who is welcoming her, and gives out orders in a peeping voice. The birds are warbling. The trees in the landscape lose their leaves. The subject who welcomed her sings the Wilhelmus (Dutch national hymn. ED) for the queen, before she rides away in the coach, once again pursued by a pack of wolves. In this tape, Müller alternately plays the subject and the queen. All the phenomena and the characters have their usual and most obvious meaning. <h2>Videopoems</h2> <a href="http://www.mediamatic.net/19137/en/pieter-baan-muller"> <img src="http://fast.mediamatic.nl/f/sjnh/image/134/19137-400-290.jpg" height="290" width="400" alt="" title="Pieter Baan Muller" playable="1"/> </a><a title="Click to get a larger image - Pieter Baan Muller - Mediamatic.net" href="/19137/en/pieter-baan-muller">Pieter Baan Muller</a> Pieter Baan Müller The Queen in Russia 1985 In his more recent work, objects and living beings are put together in new relationships and function as symbols. In this wayan individual image-language is generated, capable of expressing ideas in an original way. We need not be surprised therefore that the artist refers to his latest work as video poems. For the artist, these video poems often help to define his position about certain ideas. He is very much interested in the process of thought. His video installation About the inside of my head (1986) was devoted to this subject. In this three monitor installation, several things that can take place in one's head are depicted; the thought of a woman, the idea, forgetting and remembering, and the problem. Especially the way in which he depicts forgetting and remembering is striking. The installation is organized as follows: three monitors in a row; the monitor on the left shows the unclear image of a bunch of keys, the monitor on the right shows a lock. The real action is on the monitor in the middle. Pieter Baan Müller goes shopping. He takes his money and shopping list and his bag. He walks to the front door, opens it and sees the lock. These last images are in slow-motion. In his mind he goes over all kinds of objects. This is visualized as follows: the greater part of the screen is covered by a plate, in which a keyhole has been cut. Through this 'keyhole', the spectators see the objects that were on the table in the room move past. When the keys are moving past the keyhole, the images of the-two outer monitors become sharper. Müller walks back, picks up his keys and walks out. Thoughts and mental leaps are recurrent elements in the work of Pieter Baan Müller. He uses different media to ex~ press these thoughts in a coherent way. He expresses himself in a very simple, yet individual way. He confines himself to the essentials, and in this way forces the spectators to determine their position towards his work. He creates visual poetry in a characteristic style: apparently simple, and very expressive. Translation: Fokke Sluiter Mediamatic Magazine Vol. 2#1 Marie-Adèle Rajandream http://www.mediamatic.net/id/14235 d d ARTICLE 1 http://www.mediamatic.net/id/19160 2009-04-24T13:13:52+02:00 As for the artist... <a href="http://www.mediamatic.net/19167/en/mm2-1-all-the-good-artists"> <img src="http://fast.mediamatic.nl/f/sjnh/image/165/19167-349-400.jpg" height="400" width="349" alt="" title="MM2#1 All the good artists" playable="1"/> </a><a title="Click to get a larger image - MM2#1 All the good artists - Mediamatic.net" href="/19167/en/mm2-1-all-the-good-artists">MM2#1 All the good artists</a> As for the Artist... <a href="http://www.mediamatic.net/19166/en/mm2-1-all-the-good-artists"> <img src="http://fast.mediamatic.nl/f/sjnh/image/478/19166-394-400.jpg" height="400" width="394" alt="" title="MM2#1 All the good artists" playable="1"/> </a><a title="Click to get a larger image - MM2#1 All the good artists - Mediamatic.net" href="/19166/en/mm2-1-all-the-good-artists">MM2#1 All the good artists</a> As for the artist, well, like all good artists he is dead. Mediamatic Magazine Vol. 2#1 Dalibor Martinis http://www.mediamatic.net/id/19161 d d ARTICLE 1 http://www.mediamatic.net/id/22633 2009-04-24T13:15:07+02:00 Documenta 8

Documenta 8 was opened in Kassel on June 12. Since then, a lot has been said and written about the way one has tried to stress the relationship between Art and Society in Kassel. We will not add to this discussion here.

After a period of weakness, in 1982, the Documenta is now showing some interest in electronic media again. In any case, the exhibition as a whole is rather dependent on electricity; one in two works of art presented seems to be equipped with a small flashing indicator, loudspeaker, steam whistle, or turns around in its entirety. This Documenta contains an audiotheque which gives a review of the acoustic art of the past five years (see inventory in Mediamatic 1- 4). Several video installations have been incorporated in the exhibition itself. Audiotheque and videotheque are housed in a small building, designed for the occasion by Documenta architect Lalo Nicolic. This AV-pavilion is tucked away in the back garden of the Fridiricianum, which is where it belongs. Nicolic provided an excellent design for the main exhibition, but seems to have overreached himself with this Audiovisual Museum, which in this context is of marginal importance anyway. The ground plan shows a straight corridor, which connects three geometric forms: triangle, circle and square (yes, all in a primary color). The audiotheque is located in the circle, and this installation does function quite well, thanks to the special listening chairs (see Max Bruinsma's article). Crossing the triangle, where an acoustical installation by Stefan Von Huene is condemned to silence (because of the noise level generated by it, this installation is (mly operational three times a day), we come to the videotheque in the square. The cacophony which dominates the whole pavilion, and the effect of which is enhanced by the choice of the wrong materials (acoustically hard, plastic tubing and galvanized corrugated iron), reaches its climax in the videotheque. From the middle of the square, visitors can watch a continuous video programme, on a screen -over-illuminated by neon lights- which is suspended just a bit too high for comfort. It is also possible to request a tape from the catalogue. For this purpose there is a small cabin at the side. The distance between viewer and screen in these cabins is too small. In addition, it is impossible to determine which of the many sounds buzzing through the edifice belong to the tape that is shown. Nevertheless, we provide ample information about the several time-based attractions in Kassel. (till September 20). <a href="http://www.mediamatic.net/22637/en/documenta-8"> <img src="http://fast.mediamatic.nl/f/sjnh/image/382/22637-400-257.jpg" height="257" width="400" alt="" title="Documenta 8" playable="1"/> </a><a title="Click to get a larger image - Documenta 8 - Mediamatic.net" href="/22637/en/documenta-8">Documenta 8</a> Friedemann Malasch interviewed Documenta staff members Wolfang Preikschat and Wulf Herzogenrath, about the videotheque and the video installations, respectively. Max Bruinsma reports on the audiotheque, and Dieter Daniels describes his favorite item: the cluster of installations by Jenny Holzer, Ingo Gunther and Klaus Vom Bruch. This Documenta special is crowned by an artist's contribution by Ingo Gunther. Mediamatic Magazine Vol. 2#1 - d d ARTICLE 1