Testing potential: Hedge Enquiry at Edible Eastside

I was one of a group of artists selected to join Hedge Enquiry test the potential of the Edible Eastside site: “a quarter of an acre of canal-side land, a former distribution depot, which we are converting into a ‘pop-up’ edible park using temporary containers and raised beds.”

The concrete garden starts to take shape

I’ve visited the site a couple of times before and been very excited by the concept of transforming the derelict brownfield site into an urban garden and shared community space. I’m yet more excited now to see the transformation starting to take place! The site has been cleared; beds raised; the tea urn plugged in; and chooks and cats installed.

With the first growing season about to gain momentum, Hedge Enquiry are investigating possibilities for the arts programme and had invited us lot in to have a good old poke around and imagine what might be.

The first green shoots are starting to push through

I went along looking forward to an opportunity to spend some time with a space and allowing whatever revealed itself to trigger some creative propositions.

It was nice to have the chance to do this without agenda or expectations hanging over us. That said, I currently come pre-packaged with my own aims and objectives.

I’m still questioning what my practice looks like having absorbed the experiences of BARG and fizzPOP, wanting to make work that applies some of the thinking and skills I’ve gained through both of these. I very deliberately didn’t bring any tech with me though. This was time to be spent looking, sensing and working in my sketchbook.

I also had the Splacist manifesto in the back of my mind. Here are the bits that resonated for me today:

• We will link and shift; across time, space, people, places and processes.
• We will expose and re-see.
• We will work on and across edges. We will push them. We will blur them.
• We will reveal beautiful moments.
• We will find our own energy sources.

Today I have been thinking about: revealing the unseen; biomass accumulation; solar power; canal power; secret gardens; weather stations; timekeeping; flows; encroachment; and flags. Lots of flags.

Tilt Factor’s The Twelve Propositions

Twelve Propositions from a Critical Play Perspective:

1. Values are everywhere, designed into play and into games
2. The history of computed games has created certain types of interactions.
3. These technical constraints have limited what we think we can do today.
4. Innovation can come from prioritizing the human.
5. Unorthodox methods spur change.
6. Meaning in a game comes from the feeling of responsibility.
7. A good game will teach you one thing, so you can learn another. In educational circles, ’far transfer’ is the holy grail of learning technologies
8. Producing challenging work as an artist means that you are willing to break the rules.
9. Games help those in a polarized world take a position and play out the consequences.
10. Small change is good; Grandiose promises do a lot of damage.
11. A lot of game design is about producing motivation: proceed with caution.
12. Big shifts come from small incremental actions. That’s systems thinking.

http://www.tiltfactor.org/the-twelve-propositions

Splacist Manifesto v2.0

A revision of v1.0 and a work in progress in advance of an event at MADE in late November.

splacist (splā sĭst)

A contemporary mode of practice proposed by Paul Conneally. A new set of ideologies defined by Hannah Nicklin and Nikki Pugh. A hop, skip and a jump away from phsychogeography and the works of the situationist international. With more practice and less wine. Think space, place and splice. Though still with a bit of wine.

Developed empirically by whoever’s interested.

WE ARE THE SPLACISTS

We will own this city.
We will take it back.
We will link and shift; across time, space, people, places and processes.
We will weave throughout the fabric of people’s lives.
We will unpick it.

We will expose and re-see.
We recognise our observation affects the outcome unavoidably.
We will affect and be affected.
We will glory in the moment, the collage, the marking and then passing on.

We reject your beginning, middle and end.
We will work on and across edges. We will push them. We will blur them.
We will trace and leave traces.
We will work with you, not for you.

We reject your shopping centre, your pavement, your cultural quarter;
We will under mine pre-defined spaces. We reject them.

We will fail spectacularly, vitally, elegantly.
Our practice will be open, although it may not always be out in the open.

We will make exchanges.
We will make adventures.
We will reveal beautiful moments.
We will reveal the ugly.
We will hold your hand.
We will whisper in your ear ‘let go’.

We will reclaim the city, not for you, but with you.
We are you.

WE ARE ALSO THE TECHNOLSPLACISTS

We will not be technosplacist when being splacist will suffice.
We will never underestimate the power of cardboard and masking tape.
We will not be afraid to get our hands dirty.
We will not be afraid to do without digital at all.

We will use ‘digital’ as tool and material, not as veneer.
We recognise ‘digital’ is not necessarily something ‘other’.

We will make and share our own tools as appropriate.
We will collaborate.
We will be generous.
We will be porous.

We will re-reveal technology as used by private interests.
We will hold them accountable.
We will put it to our own uses.

We will cut, and we will paste.
We will undo.

We will be artful. We will be skilful. We will fail usefully.

We will find our own energy sources.

We will pervade.

Haunt this city

Hannah Nicklin speaking eloquently and passionately about remaking the city; ubiquity; not wanting to live in a world where there is such a thing as a girls’ drink; magical realism; putting bodies at the centre; the need for art to use technology as material, rather than as tool; and cabbages.

http://www.hannahnicklin.com/2011/07/imagining-better-cities/
http://www.hannahnicklin.com/2011/07/tedxyork/
http://npugh.co.uk/blog/19264_seconds/
http://npugh.co.uk/tag/colony/

What do you do that you consider to be a craft activity (or feels like it might be)?

I’ve increasingly been noticing parallels between the feeling of being absorbed in a soldering project and memories of working in more traditionally-accepted craft activities such as ceramics or silver-smithing.

Inviting ponderings on Twitter about the essence of craft turned into a really meaty discussion with lots of diverse examples and defining concepts being offered. It was important to me that this conversation was based on people’s personal experience rather than an abstracted argument.

Here’s the archived timeline:

Modes of Practice in [and out of] an Age of Austerity

Yesterday I went up to Stoke-on-Trent to take part in the Modes of Practice in an Age of Austerity event being run by New Generation Space, where 20 or so artists of different types met and discussed the issues important to them.

SURVIVAL

I was particularly attracted by the prospect of some interesting brain fodder from artists Emily Speed (‘Getting Paid’) and Rich White (“how a practitioner whose work is not saleable in the traditional sense survives in these difficult times”) as well as a chance to check out The Exchange, which seems to have been popping up on my radar a bit recently. Really though, it’s always good to get the chance to find out about the nuts and bolts of how others function as artists, so it was nice to just be in a room with other people talking about this sort of stuff and galvanising my own practice.

Rich's checklist for deciding what opportunities to pursue

The presentations from Emily and Rich were both very thought-provoking – naturally there were references to money, but there were also strong themes around questions of when we should say no to offered opportunities and assessing different types of value.

The five prompts for discussion

After the presentations we split up into smaller groups and spent some time responding to prompts for sharing our thoughts and experiences:

• What impact have the cuts had on your practice or the practice of other artists you know?
• What are your main concerns for the coming years?
• Have you started to employ any strategies for surviving the cuts, and how could artists help and support each other during these difficult times?
• What are the best and worst traits in an artist?

The Wall

Our fifth prompt was to decide on five rules to ensure good practice. These were then pooled and voted on until we had a mini manifesto of sorts.

Participants vote for the items they think are most important

I didn’t make a copy of the final list per se, although it was interesting to note that the rules all seemed to me to be independent of the current economic climate. The issues of prime concern to us were to keep making work of high quality; to be rewarded (financially or otherwise) fairly for our work; and to be part of wider, mutually and innovatively generous networks.

The blocks we are encountering to these come from perceptions and expectations from society as a whole and we have not always been guilt free of perpetuating them ourselves. If I have one hope for what might result from activism catalysed by the cuts, it is that we may do something towards addressing these attitudes.

If you would like to receive a copy of the manifesto that was produced during this session – or can think of people, institutions, organisations that you think should receive a copy – I suggest you add your request to the comments on the event’s page.

Update: Anna Francis’ post here: http://annafrancis.blogspot.com/2011/03/modes-of-practice-in-age-of-austerity.html

Total bizarre wonderfulness

I’ve always struggled with the “hacker” terminology, finding it quite limiting and a hurdle to explaining what hackspaces/hackerspaces are about to the various people I find myself having to explain what hackspaces/hackerspaces are about to. However, I’ve long been a fan of how Noisebridge presents itself. This extract from their wiki:

Noisebridge is a space for sharing, creation, collaboration, research, development, mentoring, and of course, learning. Noisebridge is also more than a physical space, it’s a community with roots extending around the world. […] We make stuff. So can you.

The definition is in terms of the verbs, not the tools that are used to realise the projects.

I’ve just come across this short introductory video to Noisebridge which I also find presses a lot of my buttons – loving the emphasis on creativity of all sorts: expressed in the space via the craft area, the darkroom, the kitchen, the gas cylinders in the background as Mitch talks, and the massive library! Check out the video below:

QUEST on KQED Public Media.

Note the importance of community. We always took this as our starting point for fizzPOP, but unfortunately we didn’t manage to get a cohesive group together last time. As you can probably tell, I would absolutely love it if Birmingham could support a Noisebridge equivalent, but ultimately it’s down to the community as to what happens.

Head on over to this recent thread on the fizzPOP discussion group where it seems momentum is gathering around fizzPOP 2.0. If you want to contribute, now would be a good time to do so.

Electronics, circles, people, contexts and vibrating hats

A few months ago fizzPOP – the hackspace I’ve been very involved with over the previous year or two – fizzled out. This left me not only with a slew of new skills and awarenesses of what might be possible, but also a fine collection of amassed bits and bobs.

What it hasn’t left me with is a clear idea of how all this new stuff relates to my art practice.

I’ve done a lot of learning, a lot of tinkering and a lot of making stuff just because I can. Now it’s time to start applying some of that rigour and circularity to the things I do involving electronics, sensors and microprocessors. (I still reserve the right to make flashing superhero cuffs if I want to, but, y’know, I want to make art too…)

I’m on limited resources at the moment and mostly having to make use of what I’ve got to hand, so thoughts returned to a wii nunchuck I’d managed to get an Arduino to read the data from back in August.

Arduino and nunchuck innards. The microprocessor reads the data from the wii nunchuk's accelerometer and then makes things happen accordingly...

I spent a long time barking up the wrong tree with an idea about modernising the old finishing school thing of balancing a heavy book on your head to improve your posture, however, after a few hours at the internet (and a few more at Central Library), I began to suspect this might be more urban myth than anything else. I couldn’t track down any nice references for it. Also, although in my mind’s eye I could easily see the book with accelerometer in it registering when it was no longer horizontal, I couldn’t figure out what it would do next. What would the output be? Why?

Anyway, at some point this thinking got bumped onto some different tracks and I’ve embarked on a series of concept pieces that I’m hoping will help bridge the gap between learning and Proper Work. This is where the vibrating hat comes in…

Starting point: what if well-known behaviour patterns were actually caused by devices?

Example (involving a vibrating hat): So, you know the pattern when someone’s falling asleep in public: their head nods forward three times and then they wake up with a snort and a small quantity of embarrassment. What if, what if, this is not actually the default behaviour? What if, when left to our own devices, we just keep on nodding? What if aforementioned falling-asleep-in-public person has had the foresight to don a special hat that recognises when nodding has commences and then discreetly wakes that person up rather than leaving them nodding indefinitely?

I’m making that hat.

A hat with working circuitry to enable it to detect 3 nods and then buzz the motor to wake you up...

After that I’d like to make a device that reads galvanic skin response and then taps your foot up and down when you’re nervous.

After that I’d like to make a device that… what do you suggest I make? What quirks of human behaviour might it be interesting to consider from another angle? Your thoughts in the comments please!

I’m still pondering what to do with this work once it’s made: I tend to like to see things being put into use. Documentation-wise, I’m thinking something like the way Sputniko! tells stories might work. Anyone up for a train-ride with video camera and vibrating hat?

Watch. Change paradigms.

Creative Partnerships and starting as you mean to go on

There are currently a wave of Creative Partnerships calls being circulated and, since this is where I earn most of my income, that means I’m currently writing a lot of Creative Partnership proposals and attending interviews etc.

A quick scan down the list of projects that I’m interested in reveals phrases such as:

• “working closely with the staff and children”
• “committed to collaborating with our staff”
• “a programme of staff development”
• “a project partner who will support them”
• “facilitate our shared generation of a project”
• “to work with Year One pupils (aged 5 – 6 years) and their teacher to help them”
• “work alongside staff and children to plan, model, deliver and share skills”

All good stuff, and what you might expect from a programme called Creative Partnerships. The proposals I submit typically include the following sentences in the opening paragraph

My work is intrinsically cross-disciplinary and I’m also a serial collaborator. My philosophy towards collaborations is that they should ideally enable both parties to work in ways that they would not have been able to do if they were working independently. I’m interested in processes of challenge and development for everyone involved.

and it’s not unusual to see something like

I aim to make my design process as transparent as possible so that elements of it can be applied to later projects. My skills and enthusiasms complement yours – when we work together (rather than me delivering at you) that’s when things start to be really successful. I can bring enthusiasm, sensitivity, strategies for engaging pupils, adventures, a can-do attitude, experience of what has worked well in the past, making skills, gadgets and cunning devices; I’ll be looking to you to bring knowledge of curriculum content, awareness of the pupils’ abilities, constructive criticism, and a willingness to give things a go.

as a closing paragraph.

I’ve done enough projects now that I can clearly identify the active participation of the teaching staff as one of the – if not the – most important factors in determining the long-term success of a project. Those things I say I’m looking for staff to contribute are there for very specific reasons, both to underline what I expect from them and what I am unable to contribute.

So, by the time I am invited to interview, both parties have been very explicit in setting out expectations of collaboration, partnership and co-delivery.

Why, then, is the next step invariably

• “deliver a 30 minute taster workshop to 6 of our year 5 pupils!”
• “a short exercise (20 mins) with a group of Y3/4 which the interview panel will observe”
• “deliver an activity for a group of children”
• “work with a group of 10 pupils from Year 3 for 20 minutes to introduce them to your practice”
• “work with a Yr 2 class of 29 children. […]a creative exemplar workshop session, that can last up to 40 mins.”

?

Turning up at a school I’ve never been to before, working with a group of children I have never met before and whose abilities I have no indication of, to deliver an activity that somehow responds to a pressing need within the school, but which I only know through maybe a few sentences as part of the published call for practitioners. No knowledge of the space, no knowledge of the people, minimal knowledge of the context, superficial knowledge of the curriculum and only guesses at where the children are in relation to it. Worst of all: no conversation and no collaboration. I have to prepare and deliver these sessions in isolation.

Apart from the obvious grumbles about having to prepare and deliver a lot of work without getting paid, I seriously question the relevance of interview workshops in this format. Certainly I don’t feel they reflect upon my practice or my approach to working in schools.

In addition to this, if I’m proposing an Agent N project in which I appear suddenly and initiate a several-day-long adventure, it’s difficult to frame popping in for a 20-min activity in the context of whatever that story may turn out to be. My main hooks and strategies only work properly within the context of that immersive experience and I have to be really careful not to damage that ahead of time.

So, how can we better address the needs of the school in selecting the right person to work with them on their project, and the needs of the creative practitioner in communicating their skills and approaches?

Fundamentally, I think the interview needs to establish whether the working relationships are likely to succeed.

From my perspective, Mowmacre Hill Primary School – a school I’ve worked for twice now [1, 2] and have a lot of respect for their approach – have come the closest to tackling recruitment in a sensible and constructive manner.

Candidates were invited to the school where we were interviewed, a few at a time, by the school council. Actually, we got a pretty intensive grilling! The children knew their agenda and what they wanted, and the questions they asked were searching and perceptive. I believe the questions were also prepared independently of the teachers. Being interviewed with a few other practitioners at the same time meant that we could bounce ideas off each other and also that the conversation could run for a significant length of time. Teachers were present to basically chair the conversation: making sure everyone got a chance to speak and to fill in extra details where needed.

The next stage in the (paid) half day was a workshop activity, but one working with a pair of teachers: three or four practitioners spent an hour or so ‘planning’^1 some initial ideas in response to the brief. This gave us a chance to really find out what was behind and under the brief as laid out in the tender document.

In the case of the thread of the project relating to the Foundation classes, this process actually established the brief in the first place – talking through the general context, identifying the concerns the teacher had and then exploring everyone’s responses. By the end of that session we were set to go with a project to do. We felt confident that we were going to affect some long-lasting changes. (This was in contrast to the way the meeting with the Y3 and Y4 teachers panned out, where we ended up with a project about and, for me, the feeling that the affects would be short-lived.)

I find this an interesting idea to go with Sally Fort’s comment that “[schools] don’t actually know what they need until the other end of the project in my experience”. Might it be nice if more schools felt that they could go into a project accepting/embracing that they don’t actually know what they need^2? (This is as much a comment on CP paperwork as it is on attitudes of school staff.)

What changes would you make to tendering processes for artists and other practitioners working in schools? How would you get a collaboration off to a good start? Can you represent your practice in 20 minutes from cold? How useful are interview activities in helping you identify the people you want to work with?

The comments are yours, I’m interested in getting some different viewpoints on this.

__


1: I’ve put ‘planning’ in inverted commas there because I think it’s dangerous to regard this as actual planning, but rather getting to know each other and getting a feel for the project in general. Sound planning comes later once people have had a chance to digest conversations and establish relationships to the point where people are comfortable to challenge suggestions as they are put forward and speak up about concerns. …another blog post sometime, perhaps…

2: I remember very clearly getting a rollicking in about 1996 from my A-Level art teacher about having too fixed ideas about what outcomes were going to be and being blind to the interesting stuff that crops up along the way. I generally consider that ideas at the start of a project are likely to be wrong ideas. Also, creating is, after all, about arriving at something new and that implies a journey of some sort without knowing exactly where you’re going to end up until you get there.