Image source: Eightronica

The following text was published in December 2008 in Inter/activos II by Espacio Fundacion Telefonica, Buenos Aires. The publication was produced in support of a new media workshop and theory seminar by the same name which took place in 2006, organized by curator and writer Rodrigo Alonzo. The text revisits my definition of Remix that has already been introduced in prior writings, such as Turbulence: Remixes and Bonus Beats. This definition can also be found in the section Remix Defined. “The Bond of Repetition and Representation” links the theory of Noise by Jacques Attali to my overall argument that Remix has its roots in DJ Culture starting in the seventies. In the conclusion it revisits and extends my analysis of Yann Le Guenec’s project Le Catalogue.

Some things have changed since I first wrote this essay in 2006. I did not expect the print publication to take as long as it did, but now that it has finally been published, as opposed to updating the text, I have chosen to release it online as it was originally written. While some cultural trends may be quite different from 2006, the argument proposed is still relevant. This analysis is part of a much larger and extensive project and will be eventually released in its remixed form in the future.

The term remix, today, is used to describe various cultural elements, from mash-up software applications[1] to projective architecture.[2] No matter what form it takes, the remix is always allegorical, meaning that the object of contemplation depends on recognition of a pre-existing cultural code.[3] The audience is always expected to see within the object a trace of history.

To entertain the importance of Remix in culture at large, we must come to terms with it according to its historical development. This will enable us to understand the dialectics at play within Remix, which at the beginning of the twenty-first century is the ideological foundation for remix culture. As it will become clear in this essay, in order for remix culture to come about, certain dynamics had to be in place, and these were first explored in music, around the contention of representation and repetition. This essay will focus on defining remix in relation to these two terms, and then move on to examine its role in media and art.

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Image and text source: gallery@calit2

The following interview with Sheldon Brown was commissioned by gallery@calit2 for the exhibition “Scalable City”. Exhibition dates: Thursday, Oct. 23, 2008 – Monday, Dec. 15, 2008

Sheldon Brown is an artist who works in new forms of culture that arise out of developments in computing technology. He is Director of the Center for Research in Computing and the Arts (CRCA) at UC San Diego, where he is a Professor of Visual Arts and an academic participant in the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology (Calit2). During his early career, Brown experimented with emerging technologies to develop works that explore the possible meaning of “virtual reality.” His installations were often designed for immersive audience participation. Many of these works have been developed for the gallery, such as “MetaStasis” (1990), an art installation consisting of a room that visitors enter to experience what appears to be, as Brown himself has called it, a “zoetrope of TV images.” Brown took his interest in mediated reality to the public sphere in installations such as “Video Wind Chimes” (1994), which projects broadcast TV images on the street sidewalk – images selected according to how the wind blows. In both of these projects, as well as many others, Brown emphasizes how metaphysical experience is contingent upon our increasing dependency in immersive media of all forms. Brown’s longstanding interest in mediation is further explored in “Scalable City.” In the following interview, the artist reflects on how Scalable City connects his interests in emerging technologies as well as longstanding traditions of art practice.

[Eduardo Navas] Unlike many artists who claim to be interested primarily in expressing their ideas and not being bound to a specific medium, you have chosen to focus on the development of art that is involved with computing technology. Having said this, the computer makes possible metamedia – meaning it simulates other media, and in this sense it allows artists to focus on idea development. It appears, then, that you share the interest of exploring ideas in the tradition of modern art practice with artists who might play down their preference for a particular medium. With this in mind, could you reflect on the shifts that art practice may be taking based on the increasing role of computers in all aspects of our lives? How do you see your art practice in relation to previous practices which may have downplayed their preference for a particular medium?

[Sheldon Brown] It seems you attribute conflicting claims for my relationship to “medium”, but I don’t see computing as a medium in the 20th century sense. Probably even the idea of it as a meta-medium does not capture its character. It may be more useful to think about computing as creating certain cultural conditions, and I’m doing work which utilizes and responds to those conditions. It might then be more like the interest in speed as a condition for the futurists, but I wouldn’t want to make too much of any analogies to previous art movements and their concerns. The impact of computing on culture comes after the modernist, conceptualist and post-modernist engagements, and just as I have called it a meta-medium, I could also call it a meta-ism – it is able to simulate any and all of these previous attitudes. Not that my interests in this begin and end at simulation of previous forms; this is but one of the gestures possible in this condition, but when it performs any of these simulations, they become rapidly engaged in a new dynamic which doesn’t stop at borders of previous operations.
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Image source: Front of Consumer Electronics Show, NYTimes

Just a few days ago I reflected on how networked culture is entering a new stage of consumption in which devices are becoming more than anything multipurposed due to the demand by consumers to access the network at all times. The New York Times on January 11 published the article “To Connect to the Internet, Just Turn on Your TV” by Saul Hansell. An article which entertains how people are becoming more invested in access to information than the devices of delivery. Hansell states:

If the most exciting thing about your phone or truck or TV is the Web sites you go to and the software applications you download, then the device itself is less important.

The article clearly exposes how companies who make televisions are trying to make their products appealing as actual objects, while also knowing that people in the end are becoming more concerned with the actual service the device offers. My observation regarding the article is that in the end TV’s are becoming more like other convergence devices that allow users to access anything from e-mail to games, no matter in what area of consumer goods the devices may be primarily being sold.

Hansell’s observation is an interesting point to consider in relation to my views about multipurpose devices facing the need to crossover constantly to provide services more than anything. As I previously mentioned, this will be a major challenge for media strategists when defining the identity or branding of the product being promoted. This trend of information defining the form appears to be in the air, and is definitely a development that will become pivotal in the evolution of web 3.0.

Image source NYTimes: Batman, Dark Night, Warner Bros. “Supporters say Blu-ray had a breakout year, crowned by “The Dark Knight,” which sold 600,000 Blu-ray copies in one day.”

Normally, I’m not so concerned with reflections on the old year at the beginning of the new. However, the NY Times article “Blu-ray’s Fuzzy Future” exposed some of the tendencies that developed in 2008, which will become more pronounced in 2009.

The article entertains how Blu-ray, even after displacing HD DVD in the digital video market is currently struggling. Blu-ray’s competitor this time is not another DVD based technology, but rather a networked technology. The Internet is Blu-ray’s next competitor, as the article notes. The preoccupation of Blu-ray developers is that it is very likely that people will be moving towards machines that allow for movie downloads much in the format of On Demand services in cable networks across the United States. So, Blu-ray is introducing in the near future a feature that will allow people to download material from the Internet:

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Image source: Flckr

(Click image to enlarge, or here)

The past, present and future of the web are presented in the above diagram. The image is peculiar for proposing a linear development towards AI. It appears that we are about to enter Web 3.0,or perhaps we may already be there. The mashup, social media sharing, and social networking, are presented as transitional elements from Web 2.0 to 3.0. However, It is not clear to me what lightweight collaboration might be.

Below are some interesting articles on the future of the web:

Dean Giustini, Web 3.0 and Medicine. British Medical Journal. December 2007

Nova Spivack, The Third-Generation Web is Coming

Resource, World Wide Mind Project

Tristan Zand, Web 3.0 back to the real world / back to our sense, June 2006

Various articles by John Markoff at the NY Times:

Entrepreneurs See a Web Guided by Common Sense
By JOHN MARKOFF. Published: November 12, 2006 … Referred to as Web 3.0, the effort is in its infancy, and the very idea has given rise to skeptics who …November 12, 2006 – By JOHN MARKOFF – Business

What I Meant to Say Was Semantic Web – Bits Blog
Until web 3.0 comes around or the monitors allow our comments I would like to hear more. …. John Markoff. Reporter, San Francisco …October 19, 2007

John Markoff – Bits Blog By John Markoff. Radar Networks is introducing Twine.com, a service that uses semantic Web technology, sometimes called Web 3.0, to improve sharing …

Image source: NYTimes

Here is my small note in the historic moment
that the United States is currently living.

Here is a small drop in the sea of Internet content
that is currently being written about Barack Obama.

Here is to one of the most successful presidential campaigns
that made the most of networked culture.

Here is to the United States entering a new stage in its history.

Here is to change, difference, and diversity.

Image source: Amazon.com

More information about Rebirth of a Nation: http://www.rebirthofanation.com/

DJ Spooky has performed live Rebirth of a Nation, a remix of D.W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation in various parts of the world. The multi-faceted media performance deconstructs Griffith’s historically important film to expose the politics of racism during and after 1915, the year when the original film was produced.

DJ Spooky is releasing a DVD version of Rebirth of a Nation on November 4 of 2008. The critically minded would not hesitate to think that the release date is not a coincidence, but rather a constructive move on Spooky’s part to remind people that the upcoming presidential election is historically important. The United States has come a long way since the days when Griffith released Birth of a Nation, and on November 4, the title Rebirth of a Nation will take on a new meaning, for no matter what happens after the fourth, the United states will certainly enter a definitive new stage in its history.

Information about the Film and DJ Spooky’s Biography follow below.

http://www.rebirthofanation.com/
http://www.djspooky.com/

———–

First released in 1915, D. W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation ignited worldwide controversy with its graphic depictions of racism and white supremacy in the post-Civil War south. Nearly 100 years later, Paul D. MIller- also known as conceptual artist/musician/writer DJ Spooky That Subliminal Kid- creates a daring ‘remix’ of Griffith’s epic to expose the film’s true meaning and relate it to the socio-political conflicts of America today. Originally commissioned as a live multimedia performance, Rebirth of a Nation- now featuring an original score by Miller performed by Kronos buy generic meds online Quartet- is ‘a DJ mix applied to cinema’ that challenges our legacy of revisionist history as it deconstructs one of the most influential and inflammatory movies of all time.

DJ Spooky (Paul D Miller, born 1970, Washington DC) is a composer, multimedia artist and writer. His written work has appeared in The Village Voice, The Source, Artforum and Rapgun amongst other publications. Miller’s work as a media artist has appeared in a wide variety of contexts such as the Whitney Biennial; The Venice Biennial for Architecture (2000); the Ludwig Museum in Cologne, Germany; Kunsthalle, Vienna; The Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh and many other museums and galleries. His work “New York Is Now” has been exhibited in the Africa Pavilion of the 52 Venice Biennial 2007, and the Miami/Art Basel fair of 2007. Miller’s first collection of essays, entitled “Rhythm Science” came out on MIT Press 2004, followed by “Sound Unbound,” an anthology of writings on elctronic music and digital media, published in 2008.

Miller’s deep interest in reggae and dub has resulted in a series of compilations, remixes and collections of material from the vaults of the legendary Jamaican label, Trojan Records. Other releases include Optometry (2002), a jazz project featuring some of the best players in the downtown NYC jazz scene, and Dubtometry (2003) featuring Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry and Mad Professor. Miller’s latest collaborative release, Drums of Death, features Dave Lombardo of Slayer and Chuck D of Public Enemy among others. He also produced material on Yoko Ono’s new album “Yes, I’m a Witch.”

Video-still source: YouTube

“Obama Roll” is a video mashup that has been making the rounds these last few days before the U.S. Presidential election.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65I0HNvTDH4&feature=related

The video is clever and funny, with a critical edge. It opens with Obama and Ellen Degeneres dancing to Rick Astley’s “Never Gonna Give You Up.” When Rick Astley begins to sing, clips of Obama from a number of his rallies are carefully edited to show the presidential candidate singing along with Rick Astley.

This video has developed a discourse of its own, as it was mashed up in a video response in which Senator McCain is shown during the Republican Convention presenting to the Republican audience the very same clip of Obama dancing and singing: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_TiQCJXpbKg

This second mashup appears quite believable and one can argue is even more successful but only because the “Obama Roll” mashup is quite effective to begin with. If not sure why the term “Roll” is included as part of the title, check out the brief definition of rickrolling on Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rickroll

Image source: Lessig blog

Lessig’s book on Remix was just released. Like his previous books, the emphasis is on the future of intellectual property. Unlike his other books, Lessig appears to focus on the act of “rip, mix and burn” that he often used to discuss different aspects of online culture. In “Remix” this act is the critical framework to discuss the future of creativity.

People heavily invested in the fine arts might find the use of the term “art” misleading, though. Lessig appears to use the term in broad terms to refer to creative acts that are becoming more common due to the spread of Remix principles.

I’m looking forward to this book making the rounds in networked culture. I hope it proves itself to be Lessig’s most popular publication of them all. Sadly, he claims that it will be his last on the issue:

This is (I expect) the last book I’ll write in this field. Dedicated to Lyman Ray Patterson and Jack Valenti, it pushes three ideas — (1) that this war on our kids has got to stop, (2) that we need to celebrate (and support) the rebirth of a remix culture, and (3) that a new form of business (what I call the “hybrid”) will flourish as we better enable this remix creativity.

I wrote this book last year. Many of the themes were described in 18 minutes in my TED talk. I am very eager to have it out.

Text source:
http://www.lessig.org/blog/2008/08/coming_this_fall_remix.html

Text and image source: Vague Terrain

Note: This text was originally published on Vague Terrain, Digital Dub Issue, August 08. It is reposted here with minor edits, and an additional quote by Bunne Lee, to clarify the history of dub in Jamaica.

Abstract: This text outlines the foundation of dub as a musical movement that found its way from Jamaica to other parts of the world, in particular NY and Bristol. Upon looking at history, it can be argued that dub and other musical genres that it has influenced have constantly thrived on the threshold of culture, feeding the center. In support of this argument the essay links the influence of dub to the theories of Homi Bhabha and Hardt & Negri. Dub is also linked to Remix as a discourse of global production.

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