Visarts-Drupal

Lev Manovich: Studying Culture With Search Algorithms-Review by Chris Castiglione for Masters of Media, Univ v. Amsterdam 112009

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 11:30:57 -0800

Masters of Media

Lev Manovich: Studying Culture With Search Algorithms
(http://mastersofmedia.hum.uva.nl/2009/11/20/lev-manovich-studying-culture-with-search-algorithms/)

By Chris Castiglione, University van Amsterdam, November 20, 2009

New media theorist Lev Manovich summarized his latest contribution to the field of software studies: cultural analytics. The idea of cultural analytics was first presented by Lev Manovich in 2005, and in 2007 he released a paper at CALIT2 entitled “Cultural Analytics: Analysis and Visualization of Large Cultural Data Sets.” In his talk today Manovich routinely made comparisons between cultural analytics and cultural analysis, and so it was necessary that audience members understand the distinction between these two (similarly sounding) terms: whereas traditional cultural analysis relies on real-world resources (human interpretation and physical storage), cultural analytics relies on the computer and search algorithms in order to discern and interpret culture.

Ricardo Dominguez: 'Is new GPS tool illegal immigrant aid?' - A Review by Cindy Carcamo for the Orange County Register. 112009

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 10:48:50 -0800

Ricardo Dominguez, Brett Stalbaum, Micha Cárdenas, Elle Mehrmand, Chris Head

Is new GPS tool illegal immigrant aid?
(http://www.ocregister.com/news/border-220422-people-desert.html)

BY CINDY CARCAMO for The Orange County Register, November 20, 2009

There seems to be a mobile phone application for just about everything these days -- even illegal border crossing.

An application still in the testing stages is designed to point border-crossers to nearby water, show them safer routes and provide them with a series of poems to make them feel welcome along their way.

Individuals trekking north may soon be able to download the program into an inexpensive web-enabled cellular phone that is supposed to help them safely navigate the treacherous desert crossing between Mexico and the United States, known as the Devil's Highway.

"The point of the project is to offer multiple spaces of sustenance," said Ricardo Dominguez, who led the creation of the tool. Dominguez, an associate professor of visual arts at UC San Diego, leads a team at the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology where he is a principal investigator.

The team -- which involved a collection of researchers from different disciplines of study -- is hoping to have the application, called a Transborder Immigrant Tool, officially up and running by mid-2010 after a series of test runs in the desert to adjust the kinks and make necessary tweaks. For now, the invention is in its beta stage.

While U.S. Border Patrol officials say they are not worried by the invention, which they see as more of a nuisance, the news has already made its way into anti-illegal immigration Web chat rooms, enraging members of that movement.

Professor Emeritus Manny Farber, JP Gorin: THE WAY OF THE TERMITE: THE ESSAY FILM - Nov 6-Dec 3- '09 - Cinematheque Ontario

Fri, 20 Nov 2009 08:50:14 -0800

Professor Emeritus Manny Farber, JP Gorin

The Way of the Termite: The Essay Film

November 6 through December 3, 2009

Cinematheque Ontario, Jackman Hall, Art Gallery of Ontario, 317 Dundas Street West, Toronto, ON M5T 1G4 Canada

Cinematheque Ontario is honoured to welcome Jean-Pierre Gorin, celebrated filmmaker and professor at University of California, San Diego, to guide us through this essential series on the “essay film,” one of the most exciting and elusive genres in contemporary cinema. In many ways a salient postscript to our successful nouvelle vague show this past summer, this series, which will run over two successive seasons, forms an inevitable, if shape-shifting portrait of cinematic auterism – which pre-dates Alexandre Astruc’s infamous coining of the term “caméra-stylo.” With examples by Chris Marker, Dziga Vertov, Luis Buñuel, Orson Welles, Chantal Akerman, Pier Paolo Pasolini, and Gorin himself, as well as his Dziga Vertov group collaborations with Jean-Luc Godard, various incarnations of the essay film will emerge, from the analytic and the ruminative to the incendiary.

Ricardo Dominguez: App Could Aid Migrant (and Illegal) Workers Crossing the U.S. Border - A Review by Matthew Zuras for Switched

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 14:05:54 -0800

Ricardo Dominguez

App Could Aid Migrant (and Illegal) Workers Crossing the U.S. Border
(http://www.switched.com/2009/11/19/new-app-could-aid-migrant-and-illegal-workers-crossing-the-u-s/)

By Matthew Zuras for Switched, November 19, 2009

Cell phones -- and for that matter, app-enabled smartphones -- have typically been aimed at the middle class, containing software designed to help balance meeting agendas, check a flight's status, and the like. But what about the potential for cell phone apps to help a notoriously under-served section of the population?

Well, there's an app for that. The 'Transborder Immigrant Tool,' which is currently in development, aims to aid illegal immigrants crossing the border from Mexico into the U.S. This month, the app's creator Ricardo Dominguez, who works in the Visual Arts department at the University of California - San Diego, did a long interview with Vice Magazine, in which he spelled out the purpose of this potentially illegal software and the probable public anger it will cause:

"I would imagine [anti-immigration militias] won't be too happy with us, but again we're not trying to hide. It's a safety tool. It's not trying to resolve the political anxieties of these communities or resolve the inadequacies of a fictional border for a so-called free-trade community. Again, our position is that it's not a political resolution; it's a safety tool. That, at the core, is what we're attempting to do."

Using the cheapest cell phones possible (specifically the under-$30 Motorola i455, which comes with a GPS applet), Dominguez and his team were able to create a hack that added navigation functionality and the ability to locate water and highways. Although the app is still only in the alpha phase of development, Dominguez hopes to roll it out soon.

Read the whole interview for more information. [From: Vice Magazine, via BoingBoing]

Similar story on BoingBoing at:
http://www.boingboing.net/2009/11/13/transborder-immigran.html

Professor Emeritus Faith Ringgold: Contemporary: 1960s: Freedom and Conflict-Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada Nov14-30'09

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 15:13:18 -0800

Professor Emeritus Faith Ringgold

Contemporary: 1960s: Freedom and Conflict

November 14, 2008 – November 30, 2009

Art Gallery of Ontario Musée des beaux-arts de l’Ontario, 317 Dundas Street West Toronto Ontario Canada M5T 1G4

n the 1960s many people of the western world rejected conservative norms. Filled with hope for the future, they questioned governments, demanded civil rights and embraced sexual freedoms. What started in small youth and activist groups became a widespread movement for change. There was also a radical shift in art-making. Instead of just painting and sculpture, artists experimented with everyday objects, pop culture references, film and performance as they sought new freedoms of expression.

SOMETHING is HAPPENING - Nov 24 '09 - VAF Performance Space

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 14:51:03 -0800

SOMETHING is HAPPENING

November 24, 2009

Visual Arts Facility Performance Space, UC San Diego, 9500 Gilman Dr., La Jolla, California 92093

Laida Lertxundi: 'Ríete, mi amor' in conjunction with ZineBi 51, Nov 24-27 '09 - Bilbao, Spain

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 11:52:40 -0800

Laida Lertxundi

CICLO RÍETE MI AMOR / Laugh my Darling Cycle
Laugh, my darling. Humour in feminist / Queer contemporary cinema

A screening series curated by Laida Lertxundi
in conjunction with
ZineBi 51, Bilbao International Film Festival.

November 24-27th, 2009

Guggenheim Museum Auditorium, Bilbao, Spain

Ríete Mi Amor, A screening series at the Guggenheim Bilbao, curated by Laida Lertxundi in conjunction with ZineBi 51, Bilbao International Film Festival. Kaucyla Brooke, Jane Cottis, Sadie Benning, A.S.M. Kobayashi and Kalup Linzy, a wide cross section of American and Canadian directors who have been working for years in the field of experimental cinema, form part of this short season with their recent films, which are a genuine hybrid of genres that include fiction, documentaries and filmed performances. The common denominator in these extraordinary audiovisual pieces is laughter, which appears in all of them to provide support for a profound critique whose aim is to question what is called gender normality and to make humour the basic element of queer theory and post-modern feminist discourse.

Professor Emeritus Manny Farber: Four Decades of Painting and Drawing - Gotthelf Art Gallery - 12.14.'09-2.24.10, La Jolla CA

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 13:45:21 -0800

Presented with Quint Contemporary Art

Manny Farber: Four Decades of Painting and Drawing

Exhibition runs December 14, 2009 through February 24, 2010

Gotthelf Art Gallery, 4126 Executive Drive, La Jolla, CA 92037

This exhibition includes a small, concise group of works painted between 1974 and 2008 by the late San Diego based artist Manny Farber. This show presents prime examples of Mr. Farber’s wonderfully vibrant artwork and spans the artist’s most active and prolific years before his death in 2008 at the age of 91.

Hours: Sunday-Friday 9am-5pm

Ricardo Dominguez/B Stalbaum/M Cárdenas/E Mehrmand/C Head: 'Follow the GPS, Ése' - An Interview by Alex Dunbar for VICE Magazi

Fri, 13 Nov 2009 09:18:01 -0800

Ricardo Dominguez, Brett Stalbaum, Micha Cárdenas, Elle Mehrmand, Chris Head

IN THE MAGAZINE

FOLLOW THE GPS, ÉSE
The Transborder Immigrant Tool Helps Mexicans Cross Over Safely
(http://www.viceland.com/int/v16n11/htdocs/follow-the-gps-225.php)

Interview by Alex Dunbar for VICE Magazine

Over the past two decades, Ricardo Dominguez has been utilizing electronics and the internet to piss off just about every high-level administrative authority in the US. In the late 90s, his performance-art-cum-activist organization the Electronic Disturbance Theater (EDT) set up a participatory website-jamming network called the FloodNet system, which allowed anyone with an internet connection to gum up the official sites of the US Border Patrol, White House, G8, Mexican embassy, and others, rendering them inaccessible. The Department of Justice retaliated with an electronic attack on the EDT that aimed to destabilize the group and interrupt their online meddling. As any conspiracy wonk can tell you, it’s illegal for the government to use military force against civilians without declaring martial law; that’s the job of cops and FBI agents.

Dominguez, a Zapatista sympathizer and close friend of Subcomandante Marcos, claims the various forms of online mischief conducted by the EDT were experiments in electronic civil disobedience rather than true acts of sabotage. Their work led to massive virtual and physical sit-ins protesting the Mexican government between ’98 and ’99, attracting more than 100,000 participants. But his current project—the Transborder Immigrant Tool—is poised to enrage a much broader spectrum of the North American populace. By augmenting a low-cost Motorola phone with GPS and a battery of applications, Dominguez’s goal is to help illegal immigrants complete safe border crossings without being sent back by the Border Patrol or getting shot in the face by American “patriots.”

The primary goal of the Transborder Immigrant Tool is to increase safety during border crossing by directing heavy-footed immigrants to safe routes, shelter, food, water, and friendly sympathizers. With the recent surge in militia membership and the Obama administration’s announcement that they will be reducing the number of Border Patrol agents next year, it looks like we’re getting ready to witness a showdown for the ages. And Dominguez couldn’t be happier about the level of shit he is about to seriously disturb.

Professor Emeritus Eleanor Antin: Classical Frieze - Nov 15-22 '09 - Galerie Erna Hecey - Brussels

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 15:27:14 -0800

Professor Emeritus Eleanor Antin

Classical Frieze

Exhibition runs November 15-22, 2009

Opening on Saturday, November 21, 2009, 5-8 pm

Reading by Eleanor Antin from "Conversations with Stalin"
Performance Saturday, November 21, 2009 4:30 pm

Galerie Erna Hecey, Rue des Fabriques 1c, 1000 Brussels

Erna Hecey is pleased to present “Classical Frieze”, a solo exhibition by Eleanor Antin.

“Classical Frieze” reflects Antinʼs continued attraction to allegory, Classical mythology and the embodiment of purloined identities through writing, performance, photography, video and film. Born and raised in New York, Antin moved to Southern California in the late 1960s, where she began impersonating prototypical West Coast figures such as The King of Solana Beach, a monarch who looks after “his” subjects and protects “his kingdom”ʼs integrity against the greed of real-estate developers.

Undergraduate Alum Daryl Smith: The sculptor behind Jimi - Review by Katie McCourt-Basham for the Seattle Univ Spectator-111109

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 11:03:50 -0800

Undergraduate Alum Daryl Smith

The sculptor behind Jimi
(http://www.su-spectator.com/entertainment/the-sculptor-behind-jimi-1.895760)

By Katie McCourt-Basham for the Seattle University Spectator, November 11, 2009

The Jimi Hendrix statue on Broadway Avenue and East Pine Street is usually a sign of good things to come. These things may be wonderful records at Everyday Music, a delicious Thai meal farther up Broadway or one’s proximity to campus—which usually leads to either a toasty classroom or a warm dorm room.

Ruben Ortiz Torres: Mid-career artists find a place to be seen and heard - Review by Roberta Fallon - Philadelphia Weekly-111009

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 10:34:04 -0800

Ruben Ortiz Torres

Mid-career artists find a place to be seen and heard.

By Roberta Fallon for Philadelphia Weekly, November 10, 2009

"...Three artists make work focused on ethnic identity, and of those, Ruben  Ortiz-Torres’s video performance of Hi ’n’ Lo (2008) is the most unexpected and pleasing. Ortiz-Torres tricked out a standard-issue industrial scissors lift with bling at the bottom and new platform capabilities at the top and then choreographed the machine to do hip-hop dance moves. Drawing inspiration from the Mexican-American car culture in Los Angeles as well as the caliber of infrastructure jobs that employ Latino workers, the piece is wry and knowing..."  

---------------

For complete story, please visit the Philadelphia Weekly website at:
http://www.philadelphiaweekly.com/arts-and-culture/art/Village-Voices.html

Alum Julia Westerbeke: Art Walk Preview Review -November 2009

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 09:01:09 -0800

Alum Julia Westerbeke

Art Walk Preview Review
(http://blogdowntown.com/2009/11/4834-art-walk-preview-november-2009)

November 2009

Alien Organic: Thursday is one of the last days to see this installation of sculptures and site-specific works by Julia Westerbeke. It's the first Los Angeles solo show for the recent University of California, San Diego, MFA grad. The statement goes on to say "In her obsessively detailed works, Julia Westerbeke creates terrains that are by turns organic and curiously alien, quiet yet chock-a-block with information. These abstract sculptures covered in crops of cilia-like drawings invite associations that run the gamut from microbes and scientific diagrams to Dr. Seussian flora and fantastical illustrations." The homage to natural forms is offered as a "specific visual vocabulary that has been influenced by cultures of fantasy and science fiction." I think San Fransisco Museum of Modern Art contributor Michelle Tea liked it. Open for Downtown Art Walk. Closes November 12th. compactspace / 105 E. 6th

Jennifer Pastor: 'Dead Landscape' - Museum of Fine Art, Houston - Opens Dec 11 '09 - Houston, Texas

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 08:42:06 -0800

Jennifer Pastor

Dead Landscape

Opens December 11, 2009

Artist Jennifer Pastor, 6 p.m. Friday, December 11, Freed Auditorium, Glassell

Museum of Fine Art, Houston, The Glassell School of Art, 5101 Montrose Boulevard, Houston, Texas

Dallas Art News: Recent Work by Jennifer Pastor at Museum of Fine Art, Houston - Nov 12 '09

Thu, 12 Nov 2009 08:27:49 -0800

Recent Work by Jennifer Pastor at Museum of Fine Art, Houston
(http://www.dallasartnews.com/2009/11/recent-work-by-jennifer-pastor-at-museum-of-fine-art-houston/)

November 12, 2009

Dead Landscape
Museum of Fine Art, Houston
Opens December 11, 2009

The Glassell School of Art’s Core Exhibition Program presents the most recent body of work by Los Angeles-based artist Jennifer Pastor. Opening on December 11 with a lecture and reception, the exhibition Dead Landscape is an installation of some 40 drawings and photographs that juxtaposes archival materials from wars involving the U.S. with Pastor’s drawings and photographs of culturally sanctioned, organized fights (from cage fighting and gladiator events to the Ultimate Fighting Heavy Weight Championship). Exhibited at Greengrassi in London earlier this year, the Houston showing will be the first presentation of Dead Landscape in the United States. An additional element to the exhibition—a large-scale sculpture titled Endless Arena and inspired by the same line of inquiry as the Dead Landscape installation—will be shown later this year across the street from the Glassell School, in the MFAH’s Caroline Wiess Law Building.