I can’t believe how quickly the last two weeks have gone by, our weekend retreat feels like an age ago and I suppose everything is slightly foggy and strange (you can take a sip if you’re playing the newsletter’s recurring phrases drinking game), and it’s a sign of tiredness that I thought I might have skipped a week. I’m so tired, we’re going to have to strap ourselves in for this one.
I celebrated another birthday at the start of the week and took myself off for a day to see some paintings. It was wonderful wandering around the Carnegie Museum of Art and finding myself amongst Rothko, Pollock, and Warhol. We’ve visited before, but tired legs never made it to the contemporary art galleries, so it was welcome bliss to be alone and spend time with these pieces. Coming across a painting by Chris Ofili, it was like bumping into an old friend, and although there are a few versions of “The Adoration of Captain Shit and the Legend of the Black Stars”, some that glow in the dark, the one at the CMOA is a beauty, sitting on a couple of varnished elephant turds, resplendent, stylish, a proper super-hero, surrounded by ninjas, with hands reaching up to touch their idol.
There was plenty to see and I’ll be back for more. We’re very lucky to have some wonderful galleries in the city and out in the countryside that we’ve visited once or twice.
I don’t feel older or wiser, just the same really, well maybe older, yes.
Stephan
Teaching & Learning
I finished teaching and spent a week tieing up loose ends and literally tidying up. We had a frustrating day attempting to build one of the room’s new installations, a projection piece which I really want to get working, but there are so many parts; some Unity coding, a string of phidgets that trigger various buttons for various content types, including a poll, a conversation and a series of media snippets, and some vinyl window stickers that we didn’t have the right applicator fluid for. After almost trapping myself in plastic, I ordered the right fluid and when it arrives on Monday hopefully, I’ll be able to try again.
Then, we’ll want some questions and content. When we first approached this project the aim was to talk about languages and survey the multilingual landscape of our campus through a series of prompts and engagements. I’m hoping we can still do that, and I’m already looking forward to the more nuanced (proper) research that we might be able to do when this kit is up and working. I’m also very keen to set this up in a few different places, here’s a sneak peek of what it is supposed to do. I want to say too that I’m hugely grateful to my colleagues in the ETC for helping me out and for the students who worked on the project, so cruelly interrupted by the pandemic. I kind of owe it to them to get this thing working.
I’m looking forward to working on a new project next year and I really want the focus of this one to be storytelling, I’m hoping we can create a dynamic and interesting experience, perhaps in our small immersive room that houses a projector array so that you can stand in the middle between three surrounding screens. There are so many wonderful influences out there and although I’m slightly skeptical about the proliferation of new immersive rooms, I am interested in something that could be a personal, intimate, and cinematic experience, maybe even a game.
Life Lessons
I’ve had a few conversations with colleagues lately about the use of personal pronouns, which I add to my signature now and to the end of my zoom handle when I remember. It’s interesting listening into conversations in France where some are proposing the use of “iel” as a gender-neutral pronoun. This hasn’t gone down well with a bunch of aging (mainly) white people called the Academie Francaise and the current education minister who has accused others of “wokism”, a particularly unwanted American import that would sully the good standing of the French language. I’m not entirely sure how you prevent a word from being used, that’s like trying to force the toothpaste back into the tube. This word is going to gain ground, like many of the other words that have entered the language over the years that are tied to the times and in this case speak to identity as a means of seeing, recognizing, and empowering people. You can’t ban a word much less make people invisible but I sense that the powers that be are going to try and it feels sinister and regressive to do so.
I’ve heard accusations of “wokism” or “woke culture” used to disparage and undermine so many discussions and topics that those who say it find uncomfortable. It’s the idea that being alert and open to social justice issues and starting with yourself and how you act is somehow insincere or over-zealous. I used to hear “political correctness gone mad!” which I also found slightly baffling and often said more about the person saying it than the supposed object of their ire. The mostly pejorative use of these terms is about shutting down the conversation, trying to block out the noise, with fingers in your ears. Maybe the opposite of being woke is being asleep, all tucked up under the duvet, and I’m sure that’s what many people feel. Why am I being bothered by all this? Because there are other humans around and many of them aren’t having a good time and we can change this. We can, you know. It’s a shame that the right has claimed it, it’s no longer much use to those on the left, “not an adequate descriptor” as these comments suggest.
Lost and Found
I’m dabbling in a few computer projects and it feels like finding bits of a puzzle scattered in my mind, some maths, remembering some I learned years ago, and all muddled up with various building and developing projects that I’ve worked on. I hope it flattens out.
I am enjoying this creative coding course on domestika and trying to make a few bits of generative art, if I manage to overcome my shyness (and shitness) then I’ll post a few experiments. I’d forgotten that I used to play with processing and add bits to title sequences or spacey backgrounds to videos I used to make, but Java seems so much more user-friendly for now. I sound like a beginner …and that’s what I hope to be.
So much so that I dug out this BBC Micro-Bit and hooked it up, there’s a version 2 that’s just been released which includes audio and a few other features. The card above is first-gen and once I had it hooked up and writing code the boys started joining in and seeing what it could do. I feel a parent project coming on.
Thank you
We decorated a tree and I spent an hour untangling our outside lights only to plug them in and find they weren’t working. I will have a weekend of finding the bulb that’s burned out and needs replacing.
Lights are up everywhere, on trees, buildings, fences, on the bus, and in the trolley. I thought there might be a bucket where I could drop some money for charity but no, that doesn’t seem to be the point of this, just festive cheer.
Our boys are hanging on for the holidays, they’re very tired which means they’re testy but also docile at times, their energy a frayed connection, fizzing on and off. There’s the same electricity in the trailer for the second Spider-Verse film. I absolutely adored the first one, all Kirby dots or crackle depending on how you see it. I just love the character of Miles Morales and I know I’ve told you already but one of my favorite reads this year has been Jason Reynold’s brilliant novel (sneaky affiliate link). I can not wait, more excited than the boys.
Only a few more issues until the end of the year and I hope to keep posting throughout the break and invite you to send me your recommendations and let me know how you’re doing. I would love to hear from you.
Okay, take care!