What is the function or purpose of placing contemporary artist's video in an urban context? A phrase that continually resurfaces and is often used as a metric of the success of a piece of video in public spaces is its ability to "grab attention". This recalls the imperative of Brecht and Artaud's theatre to transform the familiar into something peculiar and unexpected. To hold the attention of someone on their way to and from somewhere else, to give them pause for thought or reflection as to what they have just seen or even just put a smile on their face is at present anyway, enough.


In February 2008, Performing Pictures/Interactive Institute as part of the G-RIG project with support by Culture 2000 presented:

RAG-TAG VIDEO AND MOVIE SITES

- a seminar and a lab about how to move the world - and keep it moving.

The moving image is the greatest illusion since organized religion. As such, it arguably fills an equal function; that of shaping and re-shaping dreams as well as the accompanying sensation of meaning and worthwileness. The very broad notion of "sexy" is orchestrated through cuts and transitions of captured an re-animated visual stimuli.

It is not a democratic medium. Far from it.

The written and/or spoken word as well as the graphic and/or photographic still image, has had its street level outlets such as samizdat, posters, graffiti, street performances, etc, etc. Youtube (and other forms of vlogging) pretending to be the equivalent to this tradition, we believe to be another hoax of the grand commercial and political schemes of monopolizing the outlets of moving imagery. They want us to "put it on the Internet", where it will be safely contained within young geek billionares brands; disconnected from real-time and space and thus, virtualized to a pure level of castration.

No medium has truly nurtured democratic values, if it hasn't been on display on a STREET LEVEL. We believe that it is technically possible to do that with moving images now. The workshop allowed to explore possibilities.

Topics

  1. Environmental requirements for displaying video in public spaces (power supply, weather conditions, stealing, vandalism)
  2. Recycling of consumer technologies, car screens, mpeg-decoders and other components, making it as cheap as possible
  3. Beamers and screens, how to handle the emission of light in environments, which are not ideal for image display
  4. Controllers, sensors, scripting, synchronisation and other means of real-time control and interaction with video content
  5. Legal aspects, the commercial and political society as gatekeepers

Aims

  1. To share and develop knowledge and skills within the area of sustainable video technologies for public spaces.
  2. To apply some of the methodologies and strategies within the artistic physical computing communities on the field of visual arts (specifically video art).
  3. To shed some light on the structural reasons, why we are stuck with commercially saturated imagery in the field of video communication.
  4. To pin-point the difference between DOKU-CONTENT and NEW CONTENT simply defined by the liberties taken to display it.


Bonus aim: The foundation of a open hardware/software project for "street level" dissemination of video.

Participants

Bringing together designers and artists, scientists and technologists, professionals and enthusiastic 'do-it-yourselvers', the workshop was a valuable opportunity to share knowledge and experience with a selected group of international experts in an informal and hands-on lab. For more information on the participants for the workshop, please see the participants link.

Dates and space

Dates: 6-9 February 2008:

* February 6: Open seminar w. presentations from participants.
* February 7-9: Lab (by invitation)
* February 8: Live installation by Performing Pictures and Anna Koch. Party in collaboration with Candyland at Hammarby ArtPort.

The seminar and workshop were held at INTERCULT "Annexet" at Nytorgsgatan 15 on Söder in central Stockholm. Thanks to the chef Stefan "Otto" Ottosson from Kryddan i Köket.

Parents

The parents of RAG-TAG VIDEO AND MOVIE SITES are the project Grig and Performing Pictures of Interactive Institute with support by The Culture 2000 framework of the European Commission.

The events were part of nodestockholm - a festival for art and new media arranged in the Stockholm area 15th of January to 15th February 2008. The festival worked as an umbrella for a number of different organisations, nodes, in Stockholm. Each node arranged programs that connect to art and new media. The festival consisted of a wide spectra of events: dance, music, radio, fine art, performance, exhibitions, concerts, magazines, books, web sites etc.


With support of: