|
Home
Idea/Practice
Research
Key
Projects
Resumes
For
Sale
Links
|
This online research undertaken with support from the Site Gallery, Sheffiled, England involved a long term research and development project collaborating with a range of organizations and festivals. The project explored a range of online forums and chat interfaces, discussing issues relevant to network art and remote collaboration. Online presentations and webcasts were presented for the BTV Convergence Media Conference UK 2001, Mediaterra Festival - Pilot Operating Net Athens 2001 and the SC Global Conference USA 2001.
The
'Transact' project aimed to design a 'Net-Work' of interdependent,
performative installations connected by the Internet, inspired
by the combined principles of scientific ecology and ecological
ethics.
"What
evolved subsequently through our collaborations was a different
sort of ecology; a simplified system of inputs, interactions,
and feedback loops using visual, aural, and kinesthetic means
of communicating the idea of exiting within systems of energy
flows and their consequences. It provides an opportunity for
a person to be within a simplified version of a complex system
of which they are already a part and, perhaps, to understand
something about what 'being a part of' means."
(Dr. Liz Baker, Consulting Scientist
to the Project)
Stills
from the installation that arose from this project
in early 2002 (Image
Keith Armstrong)
The
'Transact Project' is a long-term research
and design project that will develop in several stages over a
period of approximately three years.
Transact features new, 'ecologically-inspired'
interactive script design
methods: image Keith Armstrong
The
project aims to allow participants in three international venues
(Brisbane, Sheffield and Rotterdam) to physically interact with
tangible interactive interfaces. These will be designed in ways
which collapse the traditional divide of bodily and aesthetic
experience. It will be achieved by the use of custom interfaces
that require participants to undertake distinct and sustained
physical activity in a visually and audibly rich environment.
Ecological energy exchange models
as a design principle: Image
Keith Armstrong
Through
this process the project seeks to identify a new model for distributing
media content that is clearly influenced by scientific and philosophical
understandings of ecology.
The work is therefore about shaping change by liquefying boundaries
in ways that ultimately encourage and shape experiences, rather
than providing a predetermined experience for consumption.
For
more details of the research process and images of the initial
showings of this work go here.
Creative Team
The
transmute collective is an international team of artists,
scientists, designers, programmers. musicians and performers.
Working
under the artistic direction of new media artist Keith Armstrong
the team consists of
 |
Lisa
O'Neill Performing Artist/Choreographer |
| Gavin
Sade Tangible Interface Designer & Acting Head of
Communication Design |
| Guy
Webster Musician and Electronic Sound Designer |
| Keith
Armstrong Media Producer, Project Management |
| Dr.
Elizabeth Baker Sustainability Scientist (Sinclair, Merz
& Knight) |
in
partnership with
Kelli Dipple
Director of Media Lab, Site Gallery, England |
in
association with the following global
partners
This
project has been assisted by the Commonwealth Government through
the AUSTRALIA COUNCIL, its arts funding and advisory body, the
BRISBANE
POWERHOUSE CENTRE FOR THE LIVE ARTS through the Live Art Incubator
Residency Program, ARTS QUEENSLAND SITE GALLERY, Sheffield UK, and
QUT COMMUNICATION DESIGN through the Creative Industries Faculty.
Our
Goals
The Transmute Collective's goals are to:
- advance
through a discursive, contemporary praxis the ethical
dimensions of ecology by drawing upon ecological theory
(as it relates to the development of a personal Ecosophy),
whilst extending and deepening the parameters of new media/interdisciplinary
arts to actively contribute to emerging creative cultures
- To
utilise principles drawn from science and the humanities as
a means for influencing the design of interactive, experiential
artworks, whilst correspondingly aiming to educate/inspire participants
to reflect and examine those same principles.
- To
further the ethical implications that have arisen from our understanding
of interconnectivty and interdependence of systems by integrating
them within a new media environments (that may see principles
of sustainable practice and use of technology as relatively
unimportant/of low priority)
- To
encourage and establish active exchanges with like bodies, both
nationally and internationally.
- To
seek funds for the resourcing these works.
- Most
broadly to stimulate ethical enterprise through the development
of innovative ideas through a process of mutually beneficial
respectful engagement of the arts, the sciences, commerce and
industry
Key
Research Phases
 |
Presentation
of a major dual site + Internet performance work, The
Liquid Gold Project, as part of our 1999-00 Live Art
Incubator residency at the Brisbane Powerhouse. |
 |
 |
Site
Gallery Sheffield establish a parallel
web site to document the process from their end |
|
 |
K
Armstrong, G Sade and K Dipple undertook an online presentation
& display of research outcomes for the European
Mediaterra
Festival, (a Festival which toured Athens, Belgrade,
Frankfurt, Lavrion, Maribor & Sophia) |
|
 |
The
collective developed a video presentation for the 2001
L'Attitude 27.5 Festival, Brisbane
Powerhouse CFLA |
|
 |
Keith
Armstrong and Kelli Dipple conduct a teleconferenced talk
for the SCGlobal/Access
Grid Network Festival (live from both Sydney
University VisLab & Nottingham University UK) -
15/11/01 |
|
 |
A
talk on the work of the 'transmute' collective for the Queensland
Academy of Arts and Sciences 17/11/01 |
|
 |
an
online artist talk for the B.TV. 'Convergence
Festival', Sheffield, UK - 30/11/01 |
|
 |
A
work in progress exhibition at The Tasmanian National
Gallery and Contemporary Art Services, Hobart, Tasmania,
Australia for Solar
Circuit, in Feb. 2002 |
|
Synopsis
of the Project
TRANSACT THEORY:
If
you tried to build a map of the work, it would have to be extremely
flexible and recyclable. The work could never be fully mastered,
never fully controlled - these are not design faults, they are
design intentions, which mirror how little we have yet to grasp
about our own ecology
Audiences for 'Transact' will be asked: What are my impacts upon
the work? What can I do to optimise my own actions? And how does
this contribute overall to the sustainability of the community
of users and the landscape?
This new work will seek to catalyse audience reflection upon the
broad (and profoundly difficult) question, how might we begin
to think and act ecologically? This investigation is scientist
Dr. Liz Baker’s key area of theoretical specialisation and
builds upon Keith Armstrong’s recent doctorate
studies into an "ecological design for interactive media
spaces".
The broadest, conceptual aim of this study therefore is to investigate
why we appear distinctly unable to organise our societies in ways
that might foster ecological sustainability, suggesting that such
a profound shift can only be approached through us each making
deep changes in the way we envision ourselves (contextualised
by the many ecologies that we inhabit). Hence we ask whether we
might be able to find new ways in which we act in relation to
others, set now with the context of tele-virtual and electronically
mediated living?
FORM: The central focus of the project will be an online
environment, which interacts with and engages both international
and local, audiences and artists with key themes and ideas. Interactive
systems will be installed at participating organisations to provide
pathways for live audience members to interact with the online
environment. The culminating form will identify itself as a "Network
upon which both contexts will contribute and impact. Real time
creation and manipulation of digital media forms within each space
and the distribution of these occurrences across the Internet
will allow each component of the work, and hence the entire work,
to continually adapt and evolve. Content will be formed out of
html, video, audio, and back end interactive programming, evolving
an intertextuality, woven from a network of texts, including the
visual, aural, performative, literary, scientific and political.
The project seeks to identify a new model for distributing media
content that is clearly influenced by the scientific and philosophical
teachings of ecology. The work is about shaping change by liquefying
boundaries, ultimately encouraging and shaping experiences, rather
than providing a predetermined experience for consumption.
OUTCOMES: "Transact" aims to fashion a mode of
practice, which mirrors its content. Collaboration, co-authorship
and interactivity are key elements in the description of its process
as well as its product. The resulting practice flows across a
number of existing disciplines, proposing a transdisciplinary
and intertextual methodology.
The remote site ‘installation/lab’ format will enable
the presentation of work, whilst at the same time, clearly indicating
the creative processes that lay beneath it. We therefore intend
that this process will actively stimulate debate and discussion.
Themes of ecological stability and nontraditional modes of collaborative
practice will be approached on a variety of levels. The provision
of an online discussion forum will open the debate to include
international perspectives.
Realised
Outcomes
A Dual Site Performance Work-
Liquid Gold
Initial Presentation at the Tasmanian Art Gallery in Hobart, Australia
Site Gallery, UK 'Transact' Pages
Dr. Liz Baker's Essay on Ecological
Ethics and the Collaborative Process
Technical Specs/Connectivity
Field research
Other
Media Available
Pdf
of Research Findings (1MB)
Contact
us
Copyright
© 1993-Date Keith Armstrong All rights reserved
|
Let
the ground rise
up to resist us..
let it assert
its native title..
and instantly
our engineering
instinct is to wipe
it out -
to lay our foundations
on rationally
apprehensible
level ground
Paul Carter
The
triple bottom
line is not an
'either/or' concept:,
it is an 'and/and'
reality ..
the concurrent delivery of .. thriving business, thriving society
and thriving environment"
Greg Bourne BP AMOCO
Considered
as an ecosystem
Canberra is impossible.
A monoculture community
whose energy goes
entirely into organisation..
Too little diversity,
means instability
Judith
Wright
|
