{hhr, 200515}
While working out the movement for the Simularr project, we came to think of the complementarity between simultaneity and spatiality; that none of them can go without the other, but they are also incommensurable or require different descriptive levels.
When beginning with spatiality, one can distinguish at least three types of spaces, which one might call 1. 'thought space' (in German: Denkraum, there is no canonical English term; sometimes 'mental space', 'cognitive space' or 'conceptual space' is used, but the former two sound two psychological to me, whereas the latter is often used much more open than locating it more closely with an individual), 2. 'aesthetic space' (the space or spaces that are constructed through our artistic doing, experientially sensually in sound and image, or also artistically-conceptually-compositionally), 3. 'architectural space' (or physical space).
These modes of spatiality are not independent (that's a hypothesis, probably comprehensible), but they are in contact and exchange with each other. Now the interesting thing that happens in this project is that at least the thought spaces and aesthetic spaces are multiple, because each of us has their own, and these "eight spaces" come together in our simultaneous arrival. The architectural space as the support structure in which our work will be located, is more or less given (if of course interpreted and translated differently); also this space here, our online workspace, is a common space.
Then I posit that there is a movement in the ordering of the spaces, "nesting" them differently such that sometimes the thought spaces, sometimes the architectural space / workspace "work" towards an alignment between the four of us, they allow us to arrive at a common site. Not "by themselves" but through the exchanges we are doing here, through our moments of contact and sharing of ideas, commentary etc. In what we can see so far here on the RC, that are traces of our process, I imagine them as kind of condensations on the surfaces that the continguity between our thought spaces and the boundaries of our workspace and exhibition space give us.
An interesting question is about the conjunction of the aesthetic space, how the four aesthetic layers will come together in the exhibition, how do they form then an overall space?
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meta: true
artwork: ThroughSegments
project: AlgorithmicSegments
keywords: [simultaneity, spatiality]
---
{poz, 200519}
When working on my segment I was also thinking about the question of
space, and maybe some aspects that might (somehow) be related to your
notes here. Even if this has only to do with my individual space
(segment) I'll try to sum up some of those thoughts. then I'll
address your questions concerning the group at the end.
originally, when I began sketching sounds for my segment, I departed
from the recordings David made in the staircase in December, from the
physical or architectural space, so to speak. I also focused on
working with a reverberator, that is a model that is obviously related
to the idea of space. then I was tweaking it a bit, trying to make it
behave slightly different than a plain reverb. I tried for example to
sustain specific resonances and I started working with self
oscillating tones emerging from the FDN. In doing this I had the
feeling I was adding an /algorithmic space/ on top of, or parallel to,
the actual space contained in the sound recordings. Initially these
two spaces had a quite specific relationship, the reverb was much
dependent on what was happening in the actual space (no sound events
in the staircase, no sound events in the reverb). The more I was
drifting away from the model of the plain reverb, the more I had the
feeling these two spaces were also distancing from each other. I got
to a point where it was no more clear to me whether their relationship
had some effect, or importance, any longer. So i tried to remove the
sound recording from the FDN, and indeed that didn't affect much its
behaviour. The algotihmic space had grown to a point where it
inverted the original relationship (hierarchy?) between the two. At
the same time, since it was developed on the basis of the sound
recordings, I can hear traces or shadows of this 'other space' in the
plain algorithmic space. But maybe is just my biased impression. What
i find interesting is that this space came to be quite decoupled from,
but at the same time it maintains a relation to, the sound events
happening in the staircase. Now the algorithmic space has its own
temporality, so to speak. it can be thought as an independent space,
that nevertheless maintains a potential 'opening' to the physical
space contained in the recordings.
indeed when thinking about how to relate these two spaces, I found
really interesting your suggestion of alternating different
relationships over time. I might have several temporal segments, with
different balances between the actual acoustic space and the
algorithmic space, having bridges that can open or close between them
etc.
I also agree that this space on the RC helps in sharing and exchanging
ideas, also aligning sometimes, nevertheless my feeling is that we are
moving more inside a shared 'conceptual space' at the moment, to use
your term. The 'aesthetic space' is still quite individual and
segmented, that I find also nice. I enjoy this space quite much for
sharing sketches and experiments. but the (virtual) segmentation we
set up makes it hard somehow to think in what terms a common aesthetic
space will come together. I think the 'architectural space', the
staircase, will be a good catalyser in this sense, to perform also a
simoultaneous (aesthetic) arrival. And probably the approaching of
the opening will also be ;)
Maybe something we could try again now is to go back to a sort of
'observation mode' in which we visit the other individual spaces here
on the RC, looking for relationships with others and trying to
incorporate some aspects that might integrate with what we are doing
in our single segments. That might be a start in 'intersecting' our
aesthetic spaces (maybe).
{jyk, 200525}
I am the only one who hasn't seen the actual staircase. For me I had to rely on the images and pictures provided. Accordingly the imagination does not include the other surroundings (the fact that it is in a museum) but only the staircase. Not knowing what is outside of the door to the staircase gives me a feeling of a completely independent space where only the staircase purely exists, divided by 4 and I am -largely- in charge of one of them.
Such a 'closed' space in my imagination gives me an impression of constructing my own 'room' yet that is not strongly separable from the other ones, but it 'could' have its own role (like an open living room in a house) that it can only be fully functioning, or the function could be discovered when approached. This could be similar to what Poz mentioned about 'The 'aesthetic' space is still quite individual.' When an audience is approaching and has a willingness to see what this room is all about. What would be then the house (The whole works by all 4 of us) about?
The reason for which the room is not separable from the others is due to the simultaneous process that made possible to construct the house of which rooms are not compeletly independant. The main contribution to it could have come by the questions that we asked, and how we formed the questions, and found each other's interest and could go further with them. The process has become a 'bond' to the story(asthetics) of the house. Basically this description is not so different from Hanns' and Poz's ones.
I could twist some words from Hanns' :mentioning 'they -the architectural space/workspace- allow us to arrive at a common site' which could be :they allow us to depart from the common point. Accordingly I don't think that each of us has quite a different asthetic, but the opposite. We have a number of common factors in the starting point, process and the subject. The individual process allowed us to create own function of the room, yet we kept in mind that we build a house that talks about (the arrival), 'the space,' and its influence is all over the rooms, and perhaps has given us common asthetic points.
The conjunction could also be quite a conceptual one between the divisions: as each staircase exists and we four of us are different individuals. However the connection is as well made by those: the physical construction that does not have a strong division other than the need of walking towards the next staircase, but there some sort of leftover-from-the-last and -the-anticipation-to-the-next may very well be coexisting in between. This small 'break' -but not really, I would rather like to call it as a 'bridge'- could be the core element to creating a musical form.