Although it has been more than twenty years since Tiananman Protest took place in 1989, the authority persistently uses all means erasing the facts that Chinese people pursued democracy in this democratic and anti-corruption movement. In China, nowadays, young people are not aware the courageous actions, such as ‘Tank Man’ and erecting ‘Statue of Democracy’ facing Mao’s portrait on Tiananman Tower, emerged during student movement of 1989. Nonetheless, history should not be forgotten.
Information and communication technologies have inspired people to express their thoughts freely. We as artists, taking advantages of the development of mobile phone technology and smartphone applications, have revived the history of 1989 Tiananman Protest that has tremendous implications waiting for further examinations by our contemporaries.
Deploying Augmented Reality application, Layar (free download at http://layar.com) for Android and iPhone, we have created virtual ‘Statue of Democracy’ and ‘Tank Man,’ and installed those monumental icons on the physical sites where the real incidents took place. Any visitor, domestic or from abroad, can find those virtual monuments on Tiananmen Square and nearby East Chang’an Street with an iPhone or Android mobile device, as well as taking picture with them.
The images above indicate the real incidents, making process of Statue of Democracy & Tank Man (F1 & F3), the Augmented Reality on mobile devices (F2 & F4), and the exact locations of the AR work on Google map (F5).
Audience Experience:
Once the audience downloads the Layar Augmented Reality Browser to their Android or iPhone, he or she could stand in Tiananmen Square and point their device’s camera towards the northern side of the plaza where the Goddess of Democracy was originally erected. The application uses geolocation software to superimpose a computer generated 3D graphic of the Goddess of Democracy at the precise GPS coordinates of the original, enabling them to see the augmentation integrated into the physical location as if it existed in the real world. Similarly, the Tank Man augmentation would be placed on Chang’an Avenue northeast of Tiananmen Square in the exact location of the original event. Both augmentations will appear in the original scale and orientation.
Technical Requirements:
1. Hardware: iPhone or Android Phone
2. Software: Layar, free download at http://layar.com
Força-Tarefa Neo-Cibernética (Paul Pangaro e Guilherme Kujawski na última mesa do Simpósio Emoção Art.ficial 5.0 - Autonomia Cibernética)
A Fundação Mozilla fará o lançamento amanhã, dia 18 de março, às 16h, do projeto Mozilla Drumbeat. O diretor executivo da Fundação Mozilla, Mark Surman, estará presente no lançamento, realizado em conjunto com Centro de Tecnologia e Sociedade. O Mozilla Drumbeat está construindo uma rede global de empreendedores, apoiando projetos para promover uma Internet mais aberta e participativa. Mais informações aqui e aqui. Para participar, basta enviar um e-mail confirmando com Bruno Magrani (bmagrani@mozilla.com)
In the contemporary art enterprise, the curator seems to play a role uncannily similar to that of Christ: is he not also a kind of “vanishing mediator” between the Artist-Creator (“God”) and the community of the public (“believers”)? This new role of the curator in the last decades hinges on two interconnected processes. On the one hand, works of art themselves have lost their innocence: an artist no longer just spontaneously creates and leaves to the other the interpretation of what he does – the reference to the future (theoretical) interpretation is already part of his immediate artistic production, so that the temporal loop is closed, and the author’s work is a kind of preemptive strike, dialoguing with, responding in advance to, its future imagined interpretations. These potential interpretations are embodied in the figure of the Curator; he is the transferential subject for the artists themselves – he does not simply collect preexisting works, these works are already created with the Curator in view, their ideal interpreter (more and more, he even directly solicits or employs artists to execute his vision). On the other hand, it is a fact that, at today’s large exhibitions, the broad public no longer has the time to “slow down” and really immerse itself in the vast collection of works – the problem here is not so much that they do not get what is going on, that they need some explanation, but that today’s artworks can no longer be directly experienced with the intensity that bears witness to a strong impact of the work itself. So, for this broad public, the Curator is not so much the interpreter as the ideal passive viewer who was still able to “slow down,” to take time and experience all the works as a passive viewer. The public then plays the intellectually well-versed spectators who, while having neither the time nor the ability to fully immerse themselves into the proper passive experience of the work, exchange witty quasi-theoretical remarks or opinions, leaving the direct experience of the work to the Curator as the Subject Supposed to Experience the work of art.
Acima, imagem de Sound Pavilion (2009), de Doug Aitken, instalação sonora localizada em Inhotim, MG, que consiste num furo no solo de 200 metros de profundidade onde foram instalados microfones de alta sensibilidade que captam ruídos do interior da Terra. Enquanto isso, no Arizona, recentes experiências mostraram que, ao ouvirem o som amplificado de seu próprio ruído, o besouro do olmo (Scolytus scolytus) foge da árvore que está devorando. Com a devida licença poética, bem que os ruídos de Aitken poderiam neutralizar terremotos.
Há muita desconfiança em torno do filme Avatar, de James Cameron. "Intelectuais" de plantão têm atacado o roteiro que, segundo dizem, é déjà vu. Ora, não precisa ser doutor em arte para saber que clichês bem trabalhados transmutam-se em ouro. Ignorar o marco técnico do filme com a alegação de falta de qualidade do roteiro é, no mínimo, empáfia de intelectual liberal mal resolvido. E olha que o roteiro nem é tão ruim, já que é uma versão de Um Homem Chamado Cavalo, de Elliot Silverstein (um dos melhores westerns de todos os tempos). Com relação à língua artificial falada pelo povo Na'vi, não se via um trabalho tão bem executado desde a língua dos neandertais criada por Anthony Burgess para o filme A Guerra do Fogo, de Jean-Jacques Annaud. Tanto as pesquisas de exobiologia (item bastante criticado por "intelectuais" supracitados) quanto o aspecto técnico (câmeras estereoscópicas, técnica de motion capture, direção de atores no universo virtual em tempo real, etc.) são - anotem essa palavra em seus moleskines, senhores "intelectuais" - impecáveis. Qualquer um que trabalha com cultura
De cima para baixo: Ella, de Gerhard Richter; uma ninfeta de David Hamilton; um c-print de Oliver Herring; e [não menos importante] um gamer em clima de Halloween [com máscara de polígono]. UPDATE (14/11): Foto de Elisabeth Molin. Ver mais em Uncanny valley.
