TICU & Poster Boy recipes

To present the activist art pieces I chose in a creative way, I made recipes for them.

Sketch 1 (#2/2)

Poster Boy
http://www.flickr.com/photos/26296445@N05/

Deconstruct/dissect these works in terms of their components

ART - His work is a mixture of vandalism, graffiti and collage using only a razor blade, he slices up posters, billboards and advertisements hence, re-contextualizing the posters found in New York’s subway stations.

ACTIVISM - The subway stations turn into his own art galleries filled with pieces that criticize politics, news media, popular culture and current events.

TECHNOLOGY - His Flickr account includes his work. Visitors who cannot not see these works where they are, can visit his website and comment on the individual pieces. He also uses his Flickr account to encourage others to take up the movement. 


How do they influence/contextualize each other?

First, the posters can be seen as works of art and the subway stations as art galleries. Second, the context in which he chooses to rearrange these pieces takes on a message. Third, the use of photography and the internet makes his work accessible to the world – at least those with access to the internet. 


Are some of these parameters mute (transparent), while the others are emphasized? Are all three present equally?

For the people of New York City who get the access the art first hand by seeing it on the subway, the posters as activist and political art are emphasized over the technology part. Poster Boy encourages other people to take up the act and to use the name “Poster Boy.”

Is technology considered critically or does it function as a tool for getting the job done?

Technology is used as a tool to network and get the message across. Anyone with access to the internet, can access Poster Boy’s Flickr account which increases the distribution of the message.

Sketch 1 (#1/2)

Tactical Ice Cream Unit
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5xOercTxx1o
http://www.tacticalmagic.org/CTM/project%20pages/TICU.htm

Deconstruct/dissect these works in terms of their components

Art

Art in the physical sense – the ice cream van is canvas for activist art. Their symbol is painted on the side of the truck.

Activism
The goal of the TICU is to “empower the public on personal, communal and transitional fronts.”
Two Menus:
Ice cream flavour and “Food for Thought”
Example: strawberry ice cream and mass media

Technology

The ice cream van is equipped with a 12-camera video surveillance system, acoustic amplifiers, GPS, satellite internet, a media transmission studio capable of disseminating live audio/video.

Additionally, the various surveillance technologies are used to accumulate recordings which will provide a unique audio/video account of the local geography.

The vehicle's GPS unit helps determine the routes taken as the Tactical Ice Cream Unit maps out the urban landscape through its daily tour of duty.

How do they influence/contextualize each other?

Using the “Food-for-thought” method, the TICU hands out treats but also information from local progressive groups.
The TICU is described as a “nexus” or link for community activities while providing treats and food-for-thought. These components contextualize each other by, first acting as an ice cream truck but also delivering information and, with a closer look, a surveillance system for community activities.

Are some of these parameters mute (transparent), while the others are emphasized? Are all three present equally?

Upon first glance, the most obvious variable is the “food-for-thought” or activist part. In the quick exchange of food and information, the technological part is often overlooked by visitors. The surveillance is inside the van and at, various times, the TICU will invite visitors to explore the interior.

Is technology considered critically or does it function as a tool for getting the job done?

The technology investigates the rhetoric of the “Big Brother” system by acting as security unit for the people. The surveillance inside monitors the local authorities to make sure that there is no abuse of power nor that there is an abuse of power of people’s rights.

Kaprow and CAE readings

The one thing that struck me from the CAE reading is that the idea of how our identity can be deleted in the physical world and erase our presence in the physical world with deleting our data information. It ties in with Kaprow reading because the art is becoming obselete and the artist is trying to come up with new ways of inventing art but yet it seems it is only making a copy or imitation of something else, it is not unique.
The other relation is that the art is becoming something else and that it combines more than one media or mediums such as in the Fluxus works and focus more on the aspect of the everyday life and the changes we experience. This made me think of how the CAE emphasized that we need a space to critique and protest in the cyberworld to exercise our free will but to not let it be mistaken for terrorism.
I think that the idea of art and the artist is more about collaboration to fit and work with more mediums to have an interdisciplinary work that engages us or to comment on the everyday experience such as the work called Body Worlds. The body being explored from teh inside out and also showing how our body looks and positioned in things we do everyday such as skateboarding. Again the body is being shown in a different way than from the past such as the nude body. I think that art is to be more of a critique and talking about a message to the viewer than being an aesthestic value and trying to explore how our world works and in this engages the viewer more as they can relate to the everyday. But again making art work for the institutions such as an art gallery, it depends really on what and how they define art and what is considered art. So I feel that in some ways, the artist will always have to deal with that context of the value and definition of art when they are making art work.

Both works, the culturejammers.org image of a silhouette man spray painting and American flag comprising of commercial logos rather than stars and the photo of Vietnamese Mahayana Buddhist monk burning himself, demonstrates an activist movement against government investing in other interests. Although both acts provide different consequences: on one extreme a man died and on the other the activist movement used commercial tactics against corporations. The difference between the two movements is associated with the severity of each action. The Buddhist committing suicide to act out against the direct oppression of Buddhist in South Korea and the culture jammers use of advertising to act out against indirect oppressive regime in the United States. The Buddhist monk setting himself on fire happened in 1963, which was an extraordinary event at the time.
Not because a man committed suicide in protest but because the footage was broadcast over the entire world – something that was only recently capable do to the invention of the T.V. Although not as extreme, culture jammers’ campaign to fight commercial advertising with advertisements is just as remarkably innovative in how technology played a key role in the demonstration of activism. In terms of activism, there are different extremities that groups make take, depending on the form of oppression and the severity of the situation, but would it be as significant if those forms of protest were reversed. If culture jammers lit themselves on fire to protest the corporatization of America or the Buddhist monks putting up advertisements, if they could, to rebel against a oppressive government. Each act is measured by what is needed to change an establish way of thinking and, consequently, needs the appropriate action to do so.

Sketch #1

Futurefarmers
"Futurefarmers are well known as innovators within the new media art and design contexts. They have exhibited internationally at numerous galleries and museums, including the New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York Museum of Modern Art, the ZKM in Germany and at America's most prestigious art exhibition, The Whitney Biennale.Futurefarmers employ a fertile approach to every project; Web design, Interactive Installations, Print, Illustration, Exhibition Design, Animation, 3d Character Development, Packaging, Book Design, Database Development, Flash, PHP, C++, MSQL They have received numerous awards including the Webby Award and the Transmediale award among others." -ZKM, Center for Art and Media in Karlsruhe, Germany, www.futurefarmers.com


Victory Gardens
"Victory Gardens is an ongoing project being developed with the City of San Francisco. It is a project that supports the transition of backyard, front yard, window boxes, rooftops and unused land into food production areas. It consists of growing, distributing and supporting home gardens, educating through lessons, exhibitions and web sites and planting demonstration gardens in public areas." - Futurefarmers



Civic Cycle
"Futurefarmers collaborated with Southern Exposure and Sabrina Merlo, Regional Advocacy Director, Bay Area Bicycle Coalition to create Civic Cycle. Civic Cycle includes a temporary bike share program, a public bike pump and a public forum to present existing city bike share programs as well as an open discussion to gather input on what San Francisco’s city bike program might look and operate like."- Futurefarmers

Are they artists?
I believe that this organization is a big group of artists who show there artistic ability by being active in the field by doing experimental work and interactive/real time projects. Since they are not hiding anything behind any doors like some other organizations, and getting people involved within the community, it shows that by being active within the community and making meaningful decisions that they are activists at heart. It is hard for artists these days to make a difference, but by creating an organization they are able to combine there artistic ability with other non-artistic organizations with makes the perfect duo to get things done and include the public to do something interactive with their community whereas other organizations turn people off by doing things to get the community interested. They have other projects like "Bingo Field" or "They Rule" which really tie in different situations around the world and they tend to show off the humorous yet serious side of things.


References
www.futurefarmers.com
-ZKM, Center for Art and Media in Karlsruhe, Germany i.e www.futurefarmers.com


-By Julian Bachlow

Sketch #1

Through art and activism, we are able to find new information through art pieces which at one point were more then likely not available to us in the past.
The first image which is an original piece of art by ‘Favianna’ is based on the farmers and crop harvesters in Latina America. They have been forced to constantly work day in and day out to survive and through all of this, the NAFTA trade agreement as well as the United States of America have not, in any which way helped but rather worsen the situation at hand because of the high demand of both the trade agreement and country.
“The domination of genetically modified seeds, along with unfair trade agreements such as NAFTA, is destroying the way of life for farmers all over Latin America as well as strangling bio-diversity. The U.S. model of big agribusiness is hitting our people hard from many angles, from how we work to what we eat to how we grow it. Meanwhile, back home, Latino youth grow up in urban food deserts, where access to clean, healthy and whole food is rare. This unsustainable food situation is beyond craziness!. The dominant model of globalized, industrialized food is costly for the earth, for the farmers, and for ourselves.”[1] (Favianna)
This represents the facts that globalization does not benefit everyone apart of it. The standards of living must rise for one area but only through demolishing another, this brings up the idea that if globalization were not to happen, would different countries and or cities look and feel very different then they do today if they had a lot more chances and if globalization was not to occur since in that scenario their farm lands and people would not be driven to work until death.

The Second image is depicted as a fight for water and the fact that water can be used “as a weapon” by anyone who is I control of it. Water is the main source of life for any living mammal or animal and humans need this liquid to survive in everyday life. If one country controls a large portion of water where as another country may not have any fresh water whatsoever, the country who owns the larger amount would control since they are the ones who are being asked upon. This can work in many ways depending on the countries government and should not be used to favour a country or bias a country but as the past has told, this isn’t evident in all parts of the world where this has been a case. Water should be preserved on a natural level and distributed through all since all humans need water to live. If you and I are able to drink the fresh water given to us, people in other countries should to since they have as much right to live as you and I.

Through both these pieces it is evident that technology is not so much apart of this art work but rather there to help the experience of it as well as using technology to gain more of an awareness for what is being exposed in this series of images through the internet and the artists blog.
[1] http://favianna.typepad.com/faviannacom_art_activism/2009/05/3-new-pieces-to-fight-big-agribusiness-gmos.html