In a decaying cyberpunk metropolis where corporations have eradicated nature, truth, and freedom, a lone bot glitches and walks down a rainy neon street. The bot listens to Debussys Clair de Lune, a piece of forbidden art, an artifact of the past. A distant radio crackles in the rain, spilling bits of truth, old news, censored history, and things they tried to erase.
Unknown Problem Toolkit
A creative thinking tool to help diminish assumptions about things. This tool will be a deck of cards each with a prompt that works to challenge the conventional thoughts of readers. The purpose of the cards will be to encourage unconventional thinking and bring attention to the tensions surrounding an unknown issue allowing new perspectives to form for the reader.
Vimeo- Homer UFO Animation
Animation
Among the videos we watched, Alien Afterlife by Jeremy Couillard really stood out to me. It was completely trippy, like a full-on fever dream. The realistic textures in the animation gave the whole piece an eerie, almost uncanny feeling. At times, it felt like I was actually inside that strange world, moving through surreal landscapes and witnessing everything firsthand.
Another piece that grabbed my attention was Op Hop—Hop Op (1966) by Pierre Hébert. This one also felt a bit unsettling, but in a different, more cerebral way—I could almost feel it in my brain. The animation was incredibly hypnotic, as if it was trying to lull me into a trance. It felt like watching a strobe-lit heartbeat echo through time: strange, rhythmic, and oddly meditative.
I had to mention a classic, of course, flipbooks. They hold a special place for me because they bring back memories of my childhood. I used to love making little flipbooks with mini post-it note stacks, filling each page with random shapes, patterns, and figures to create simple animations. It was one of my first experiences with bringing drawings to life through movement.
McLuhan- Media is the “Massage”
After reading this passage, I’ve come to understand McLuhan’s intent in using the word “massage” instead of message to describe media. His play on the words suggests that contemporary masses use mainstream media as a way of soothing and temporarily providing themselves with pleasure. This pleasure, however, is deceiving because it is temporary and because advancing technology creates these gaps between itself and the rate of progression of society. McLuhan states, “all media are extensions of some human faulty psychic or physical–“, meaning that all media in a way are our capabilities just on a greater scale; books are an extension of the eye, which helps us to take in more information; clothing is an extension of the skin, which provides protection and shelter for whats underneath. It’s interesting how McLuhan makes this comparison because it makes you think about how each type of media is catered to each of our senses, and therefore, which can be most influenced by that media. He basically refers to how media isn’t something we just use but has become a part of how we function as human beings. Today, when we look to our dependence on smartphones, the way they extend our memories (notes, reminders, and photos), our social lives (texting, calling, etc.), we witness just how ingrained they are in our lives and senses, continuing to blur the line between human and technology.
Percussive Beats
Luigi Russolo
A part of the reading that stood out was Luigi Russolo’s journey from medium to medium. He initially started off doing traditional art mediums like painting but at some point in his life had switched to doing music instead. This change of medium showcased his bold reimagining of artistic expression. His L’arte dei rumori. or the Art of Noises manifesto challenges the conventional ideas of sound and advocates for the use of industrial and mechanical noise. He argues in this manifesto that the human ear has become accustomed to such noises and that they should be integrated into music. Consequently, he developed this instrument by the name of intonarumori. This instrument was a machine designed to produce and manipulate the sounds of machinery and technology and explored the infinite variety of other noise-sounds that move beyond traditional orchestral limitation.
Lucia Dlugoszewski (1925-2000) |
SelfPortrait
Sounds…
-rain pattering against the sidewalk
-the sloshing, swishing of tires driving across the wet roads
-the faux fireplace crackling on the tv
-crinkling paper as I move it around to look at it
-the clickling of my keyboard as i type this