While we were appropriating

While we were appropriating, the machine was learning. What we were appropriating and what the machine was learning may have run parallel for some time, yet the machine was more studious (trained by studious people) and concentrated on a large volume of structured data. Machine learning is massive; in comparison, humans can access only a small part of the existing and potentially learning material. However, an equally important difference is that humans attribute a concept to the product of their appropriation, while machines generate content on a given concept with the use of pre-existing content (appropriation). At both ends of the line is ‘the concept’ which for the moment derives from and stays with humans.

What is appropriating: To incorporate elements from existing works, like texts and images, into one’s own work without much transformation and without the permission of the creator. 

In the arts, appropriation has always been a practice, as in ‘Dali Mona Lisa’ or the African masks in the paintings of Picasso and in the artworks of the dadaists. Where in art limits are vague, in textual works there is more control. The academic world has sorted this out: In your writings you must mark every bit of text, phrase, or idea that is not strictly yours and put the reference in the foot/end-notes. In any other case appropriation is called plagiarism. In the art world, boundaries are loose and the issue is addressed case by case, usually attached to a legal process. However, an effort is made to draw some rules in image appropriation, such as the Appropriation Art Guideline, a policy drawn by Pictoright, the author’s rights organisation for visual creators in the Netherlands.

The recent release (November 2022) of generative artificial intelligence bots by OpenAI, along with increased media attention, has sparked once more the discussion about the relationship between humans and machines, the issue of property and copyright of the used and the generated material, and the eventual job loss as a result of increased automation. 

The talk is about generation of texts and images, including artworks, with the use of algorithms that analyze and recreate content and form/style. The AI uses text to generate text and prompts (commands) to generate images. The image generating AI also creates image variations based on a generated or an uploaded image. On text generative AI bot ChatDPT you can have a smooth conversation with the machine. You ask a question and the machine generates an answer. When asked about the impact of text and image generative AI on employment, the machine answers:

“As an AI language model, I do not have personal opinions or feelings. However, I can provide information and context on the topic of the potential impact of AI on employment.”

It also states that its training stopped in 2021, so information after that year is not in its set of knowledge. The generated texts seem quite general; they can be used as a basis for further editing and creating a specific text, for example for marketing purposes, (micro)blogging, reports, etc. For shorter advertising texts, the Ai-generated text suffices. 

While the generation of text seems to go smoothly, the generation of images is more of a struggle. For example, when experimenting with DALL-E, which is described as “capable of creating images from natural language descriptions” (such as ‘a red kitten with back light on ears’), it soon becomes obvious that one has to learn to ‘talk’ to the machine in order to get something other than a smudge or a caricature out of it. That means that there is a need for usable prompts (commands, string of text) in order to have generated something close to the desired image. Entering easy ideas for a start, numerous examples are images of kittens and puppies, or zombies and cartoon heroes. When moving a bit further, the generated images are less interesting, ranging from illustrative clichés to incoherent smudges or too close to the source image (without the flair) to be considered a new creation.

The machine still has a lot to learn about art and words alone will not do the job. That aside, and despite the fact that there has been AI experimentation in the art world for a few years already, visual artists start having dark thoughts about their role in the future, or the near future for what concerns illustrators and graphic designers. At present, it is good to note that DALL-E is still in research (beta) mode; the generated images do not fall under copyright law because they are not human creations; when you upload your own images, these are considered ‘feed’ and are taken into the database and anyone can use them.

DALL-E generated image ‘Van Gogh style painting Cat with bandaged ear’ [off topic]

Thinking backwards, a number of points line up: the question of quality of the generated images; the question of property and copyright of the appropriated material and of the generated as well; the question of prompts; the question of quality of the generated text; the question of quality and extent of the fed & learnt material; the question of impact on creative professions. 

In experimental and open mode these text and image generating tools are fun and fine. It is the extent and speed, as well as the natural-like language use of ChatGPT, that make these tools a mega-appropriation project. This will bring changes in laws, jobs, ethics and aesthetics. It is a game changer, worth checking. Try it and enjoy it before the serious questions, like ‘why’ and ‘what for’, will pop-up. There might be a little traffic jam on ChatGPT.

“We’re experiencing exceptionally high demand. Please hang tight as we work on scaling our systems.” [Sincerely yours, ChatGPT]

P.S. 1 The non-digitally-documented artifacts (and texts) are not part of this game.

P.S. 2 This is an interesting article; an interview with ChatGPT (read the comments too): Thoughts on AI’s Impact on Scholarly Communications? An Interview with ChatGPT

At the movies

Movies make a big part of my life. My WhatsUp static message says “at the movies”. I am the typical day dreamer. My brain makes space for a second life for day-time dreaming and a third life for sleep-time dreams. I admire film makers and script writers. Since young I had the chance to see movies from all over the world. Athens was – and still is – a city with geniuin cinema fans and cinema owners. These last ones admirably kept their cinema spaces through the 10 year crisis and their audience did not let them down. I will never forget going to see On body and Soul by Ildikó Enyedi in the cinema Asty in the centre of Athens in one of my last mama-bound trips. OK, it is one of the oldest cinemas in the city and has always been a culture place, but still! It was full and it is not a small space; rather the opposite. So, growing up – with culture as my guide and saviour – my aesthetic and intellectual being was formed by J.L. Godar, M. Antonioni, W. Wenders, etc. These as the main course with the common Hollywood blockbusters as side dish.

Here in The Hague, this part of culture is squeezed in tiny rooms of about 30 persons and only in a cinema called “Filmhuis”, the house of film. All the other cinemas are uniformly set up for blockbusters and mono-language films, English or the local Dutch production (and rarely French).

The other day, a youngster brought up the movie Fifty Shades of Grey on which I said that I watched 10 minutes and no more because I found it boring (he as well actually). During a short passage by the university recently, a professor kept banging on that the book would not have become so successful should it not have been available for e-readers (which was a standard example for e-reader benefits) because people would be embarrassed to read a physical book with the title on the cover exposed in public spaces, meaning in the train while going to work (and getting horny?). Then he would go further to talk about the film in cinemas and how shocking that was for people, etc. Whenever he would mention this I wanted to counter propose Lars von Trier and his Nymphomaniac (see my blog post). But as I discovered lately not so many people in The Netherlands know about him and his movies (or my environment is in a certain deep at the moment). The before mentioned young man that does know him said to me “If you like his movies then you should see this director’s films as well”, talking about horror movies. Von Trier’s films are not horror, they are masterly horrific, and I cannot say that I like them though I do watch them religiously (must have something to do). I certainly do like  the feel of crushing our domesticated bourgeois existence (mine included) with his extremities that seem to have no limit. It is more about getting things into perspective and re-focus. Anyway, life contains a big portion of horror and pain; we contain horror and pain and we walk around frustrated and disoriented in the world of the bold and the beautiful.

Talking about horror movies, my distance to them started somewhere after The Ring and its American version of 2002. Hadn’t given much thought about it, beside relating this with going through years of special sensitivities; bringing up a child, etc., until I recently read this article “The Ones That Got Away” (Douglas Coupland, Bit Rot, 2015, Witte de With Publishers, pp. 72-74) in a bundle of writings by Douglas Coupland (yes, the same person who wrote back in 1991 Generation X). One of the cases (that got away) starts with this statement “Back around 2000 I was having dinner with a film producer looking for ideas and I told him the future was in zombie films and TV. He asked why and I told him the truth, which is that in order to turn an actor into a zombie, all the actor has to do is put out his or her arms and grunt. Net cost? Zero.” I was shocked! So it is not about cheating our fears, throwing a laugh at them perhaps? Feeling happy in the end for not being a freak ourselves? Anyway, a horror film came on tv and I sat to watch it. It was made with teenage actors and apparently for the same age audience. It was horror without reason and somehow well in line with the tv news. It was horror as light entertainment that generates money. OK, one more on my list of things that I don’t get (see also ik-snap-er-niks-van project). Yet, I will look for intellectual horror movies and come back on the subject when I find them.

P.S. In the photo I am retouching a painting (not mine/ours) that was damaged and K_Van and I restored it; a paid assignment by an art collector (not mine/ours). Seeing the photo I remembered The Ring; yet, it was just another non-functional gig of mine: having no hair band while kneeling on the floor to apply paint (oil paint) on someone else’s work. To even out this horror, it kindly brought out all these thoughts about movies, in the night-dreaming space of my mind.

Acts of rebellion in a lifetime

My mother, Athina, from Ioannina-Epirus, lived most of her life in Athens; as youngster in Petralona, as married woman and mother in Kypseli and then later in Maroussi a northern suburb of Athens (and earlier times a village). She lived a simple life with a husband, two children, love, smile, beauty, some dramas and many sorrows. She didn’t enjoy eating nor drinking. She loved animals; she’d feed stray cats systematically and saved many of them from sickness and from street life dangers (unfriendly dogs, neighbors, cars, etc.). She was a tireless craftswoman in crochet and knitting; and somewhat in embroidery.

She kept her wishes dimmed, yet contributed her acts of rebellion just as we all ought to do (no matter how small). She got cremated in Bulgaria because the Greek State has not managed to surpass the church’s claim to our bodies (soul is not enough). It was her wish to be cremated despite the church’s commands and against most of her acquaintances and distant relatives’ expectations. Her own people had long before her departed. There was no ceremony; only my brother and I said goodbye to her body before the last trip to Sofia.

When still in Kypseli, on the first anniversary of “Polytechnio”, in 1974, she put in her bag the family film camera Standard 8 and went. The students’ rebellion against the junta – marked by the tank entering the Athens Polytechnic university in the early morning of 17 November 1973 and the accompanied brutalities by the police in and around the Polytechnio building – was then, just a year after and with the democracy freshly reestablished, a symbol of the fight for freedom, collective and individual; the Polytechnio ground was a highly emotional place. My mama filmed a roll or two. These films became a part of our family films; they were to be found in between summer holidays and Christmas dinners.

In 2007, based on these bits of film I made the video with the title “The importance of flowers” which was shown in the exhibition “Words-no-Words” in The Hague. It was the time of our housing and studio space renting in soon-to-be-demolished blocks of buildings. My mama did see the exhibition and her part in it. We were together then, our names connected closely as always.

From now on silence.

Athina Kapnissi-Tsanti, 1932-2018

 

 

The continent formerly known as Europe

In the 20^th century’s 90’s, deep in the bliss of spending in the name of consumerism (without a blush), the foundations were secured of what we are living now. Europe endorsed money as the major life value and its citizens were renamed into consumers; then the talk about (the) currency started and ruled over any other concern of the European existence.

This, the currency, was meant to be the main experiment and around it we saw all possible flaws sticking to the continent’s vessel. As real Europeans growing in self-criticism, should we first list the (criminal) flaws? Dublin 2 top of the list; the agreement regarding the refugees that touch land in Greece, Italy, Spain, Bulgaria, but also Hungary (till sometime ago); an agreement designed to protect the financially advanced, situated in the centre of this continent, at any cost (lives-dignity-resources). The economical flaws are equally crucial. Tax evasion (or accomplice to) as a person or as State; bribery and fraud counted in bills of hundreds or of millions (under this should we also mention the bonuses of bank managers in central continent?); corruption on the level of a police station officer or on systemic violations of citizens’ constitutional rights (e.g. strategic misinformation turning peoples against each other)?

Once flaws listed, every top meeting and every negotiation in Europe could start with reporting about the basics. On which ideas should we base our directions? What can your country contribute to the pool of historical knowledge and philosophical vision? The standard answer of eternal financial growth is here irrelevant; as it refers to an accountancy and investment bureau, not to the place that claims to defend democracy, etc. But the € union is systemically pushing humanities and culture to the side; starting by crashing the (university) studies that do not translate into present or future profit, those failing to produce present or future antagonistic individuals (humanities again). No need to mention the total dishonouring of the arts; though here more actors are involved. Governments are even applauded when scrapping in one go 40% of the spending on culture from their annual budget.

Europe was a continent and then, after multiple internal massacres, came the European community, then called union; then the Euro and the eurozone appeared. In this process, Greece received its share of benefits, while contributing – amongst a number of known and less known things – the name Europe, Ευρώπη. Within the recent dismay of everything Greek, and the non-memory of the people, the officials will cut off from the name, one way or the other.

On a time leap ahead, when our dear northerns will be visiting Europe, they can show their passports mentioning at forefront “citizen of €”, or else “citizen of the continent formerly known as Europe”.

P.S. 1 From the depth of my heart to a hero of my youth: Thank you Jean-Luc Godard, for your fiery defense for Greece and for the ideas that once seemed to unite this continent.

P.S. 2 This text was written in the midst of the Greek financial crisis. Since then, some things may have changed in the Greek situation; the tv has found other black sheep to point fingers at. I am not a journalist; my point remains.

I cannot travel anymore – books for short trips

‘I cannot travel anymore’ would be the next book to read. I would read it within a day or two: as long as a short trip for work usually lasts, or equal to the free time saved for reading when away for longer (work/duty) trips. It is a good title; a statement that shocks in real life. People ask immediately why. What to give as main reason: the physical strain (including the recovery time that becomes longer and longer), the shattering sense of loneliness among familiar faces (never managed to beat this one), the dislike of hotel rooms with their zombie tidiness, the limiting of the vital space within the frames of a suitcase and a crummy airplane seat, the food mostly under the acceptable standard (note: I like simple food), the goodbyes to loved ones, the current readings that must stay at home because of their volume and weight.

‘I cannot travel anymore’ does not exist as book title yet. I’ve had to do with other (more imaginative) titles, this recent period.

Here is a short selection of five:
A General Theory of Oblivion (2015, in EN) by Jose Eduardo Agualusa, an Angolan writer, famous (of what I read) and really special in his writing style and story building. I bought the book at Eason in Dublin; read it that evening sitting in my dorm bed and at the airport the next day before returning home.
The last days of New Paris (2016) by China Mieville, an English writer of fantasy fiction but also of history related to Marxism and the October revolution; here dealing with Surrealism and its role in history, with artists and Nazis in exploding encounters. I bought the book at Schiphol airport in Amsterdam on my way to Athens; read it during the trip and one night in the Athenian heat of August (air-co on of course).
Swing Time (2016) by Zadie Smith, an English writer famous enough not to need introductions I think. This one is about the inevitable crashing of lives no matter what the predictions or the first indications might be. But, open as an artwork, others have read in it tales about friendship and such which is indeed the first level of the story. I bought it also at Schiphol airport on my way to Marrakech for a conference job; read it there and then in between work, dinners, talks, and through hours of sleeplessness.
Batavia’s Graveyard (2002) by Mike Dash, a Welsh writer of history. This is a scholarly publication with 100 pages of annotations and a full bibliography; yet an absolute page turner. It is the story of the Dutch ship ‘Batavia’ that left Holland in 1628 and shipwrecked a few months later onto a group of islands off the Australian west coast. The mutiny that followed, the killings, the living conditions on and off the ship(s), the scum of the earth that manned the East India ships and populated the colonies, and the retribution by the authorities: exciting by itself and told by a fantastic writer, all into it! I bought the book at the American Bookstore in The Hague and read it on my way to Kassel; a road trip this one.
The Red and the Black (1830) by Stendhal, the classic 19th century French writer, yes. Where did this come from, one would wonder. Well, apart from doing a refresh of early readings, I wanted to read through a good account of ambition and hypocrisy, together with love affairs with a purpose, horrendous (real) love entanglements, and the all-time hopelessness of those lacking social/cultural/financial capital. I bought it online and read it somewhere between Athens and Amsterdam. Though reading it in English was difficult, I found, cause the long sentences of the French language sound awkward in  English, the tone was well transferred.

Since the fall of Napoleon, all appearance of gallantry has been severely barred from provincial manners. There is fear of being deprived of one’s post. The scoundrels seek the support of the Congregation; and hypocrisy has made most wonderful progress even in the liberal ranks. Boredom redoubles itself. There remain no other pleasures but reading and agriculture. [p. 52]

P.S. Dedicated to all those who travel more than often, with admiration for their physical strength.

‘Highways and a dream: on wet roads’, oil on canvas, 100 x 150 cm, 2015

 

 

 

 

Dublin in lost mode

You know that a city is a welcoming place when you can enjoy a long walk in lost mode without much; not afraid to take the wrong turn; no (terribly) wrong street to step foot on nor too long a distance to deal with.

Dublin is such a welcoming place: in the centre, despite the hordes of tourists (with the drunkenness and whatever else that often brings in the need for paramedics), in the high neighbourhoods with the coloured Georgian doors and the classy galleries, and just the same in the working class streets where you smell and see in full: open air food markets, small eating places, basic shops of anything, people doing their thing and letting you be.

No, I am not idealizing it as it is not a harmless joyful city; the word ‘disparity’ is here again more than obvious, just like in most of our cities; soup for the poor and homeless, high art for the delicate souls. Still, Dublin manages to keep it down to earth (no lepricorns  here).

The deep green colour is beautiful and heart breaking; the soups have a distinct blunt taste as if grandma made them (delicious); the dark beer flows and the rain falls whenever it pleases, and you can count the drops one by one.

 P.S. Getting lost with a smart phone in your hand is the easiest thing, trust me!

 

The authority of the button

 

Introduction no 1

Being, or not, a person who doesn’t like to be told what to do is of no importance; we all succumbed at some point to the button. Being aware, or not, of when the delirium started is of no importance either. At present, the button is triumphing.

The authority of the button in practice: you do when you press it. Yet, this authority goes beyond the physical action on to the power exercised on thought and will of each one of us.

The following text was a brief comment, expressed rather as a question, that was published in a closed wiki last year (2016) as assignment in the course ‘Media Philosophy’.  It refers to text as this was the subject of the study; but the visual and the arts are in the same stream.

The comment: the authority of the button

[…] in text-related technologies, we can take as example the structure of the digital text with its multilevel linking; all with the use of the button and the necessary user’s action of clicking.

The button is a technological device that entails simultaneously the option (free choice) and the command (authoritarian behavior). In these two contradictory traits, the first lays the foundation for the second to establish itself. A technology with innate capacity for organizing power and authority seems the only option in a democratic society; seemingly, the authority is diffused to the people that use this technology.

The use of the imperative form, either friendly as in “join, share, like, etc.” or service oriented as  in “listen now, download now, go there now, etc.”, and of course more directly commanding as in “buy now”, would not be accepted otherwise; not in politics, nor in social life. Instead, because of being essential to the structure of the specific technology, and through its material carrier, the button, the command has been accepted as normal. In its turn, the authoritarian behavior exercised on individual level, shifts the limits of acceptable authority that can be imposed centrally.

The question arises: is the authoritarian tendency innate to humans so that the central power contains it as much as the technology that they produce?

Introduction no 2

The button has been a peculiar element of modern times. It has been the focus of awe and of mockery since the moment that its use left the industrial terrain and spread in to everyday life. Between Chaplin’s uncontrollable machines in his movie Modern Times (1936) and The Matrix (Wachowski brothers, 1999), buttons became an accessory in the hands of literally everyone.

One push further, the statement ‘Never send a human to do a machine’s job’ (The Matrix) moved from the sphere of the joke to the common belief.

P.S. 1 I had a hard time in the Univ when omitting the conclusion/closure bit, faithful to the inconclusiveness of art. Cause, apart from believing in this as the only possible free area, I considered all my writings as being part of my artistic practice (no conclusions, only open space). That is why this blog post has two introductions; one to start and one to finish, with the question in the middle.

P.S. 2 The front image is a detail from a textile work of mine titled ‘The memory of a nebula’; embroidery with some padded parts.

‘Do not press’ – acrylic on canvas, 1998

 

Hedonism and the rest

Away with hedonism and the rest.

The problem with being against everything is that you slide down the whirlpool of being against yourself; and there you often find the start of your whirlpool too. I have a mind trained to make unusual connections, the ones that art permits and reveals to its disciples. This kind of mind is pleased whenever the web of links shows anomalies, like clots, stretches, or a hiatus.

The book ‘Against Everything: On Dishonest Times‘ by Mark Greif (London-New York: Verso, 2016) is a collection of essays that present in a cool minded way an array of protests. With the voice of a young man and a scholar, the author carefully unfolds on the dissecting table the passions of age groups, style groups, class groups, and the philosophies whereupon our world of today is lingering.

I had to show how every commonplace thing might be a compromise. [p. xi]

Why is it that I thought that this is also a common place, a common knowledge? Is it because of a nearly compulsory critical thinking or because of catching a big shift (or rather its final twist) at its start? Didn’t we see the aesthetic hedonism (the idea that aesthetic value resides solely in a thing’s ability to give us pleasure) taking over within the establishment of consumerism (triumphant for everyone’s consent); these two together eliminating life as we knew it, to the extent that things must be explained as before and after? The author searches the origins of today’s hurtful structures in a depth of more than a century when putting forth the authors Thoreau and Flaubert, and the derailment of the notions of aestheticism and perfectionism.

In the nineteenth century, Flaubert and Thoreau foresaw mud where others saw a perfectly rewarding way of life. Today we’re up to our eyes in it. [p. 88]

This is included in one of the interim chapters sharing a common by-title ‘The meaning of life’. There are four such chapters. Here is where the specific leads to the general, a contemplative step back is taken for viewing the structure with the aim to word it.

Part III of this series is titled ‘Anaesthetic ideology’. Within a few pages, Plato and Aristotle are put on the table, in connection to experience and non-experience, or restriction of it, with mentioning of Socrates and Diogenes the Cynic and the concluding presence of Epicurus. The Epicurean bliss is then connected to the apatheia (no passion, or better not responding to the world’s mud) of Epictetus, in the quest for absolute freedom, in which case self-ending is an option. Both sides of anesthesia (non feeling) are referring to pain. They are like the operas of Richard Strauss where the happy parts are the same hysterical scream as the tragic parts (an amazing thing). That is because despite all, you want to be here.

The sad truth is that you still want to live in their world. It just somehow seems this world has changed to exile you. [p. 227]

Philosophy does help us find a position, see what we do and maybe why; see also why we feel guilty and whether there is anything we can do to improve all that.

The essays look at subjects partly of our lived youth and further, carrying a question mark (with a kind of sympathy or inevitable association?). Radiohead, punk, rap, a good historical account of the hipsters (had no idea), teenage bodies of grown-up women, the fitness (have tried and failed; my body is a stoic philosopher on this), reality tv, and some sides of American reality which we can read only with the cognition (I’m afraid).

Decomposing things in present tense and in writing is interesting indeed, and wise. Surely wiser than counting the number of ‘NOs’ you’ve said in practice.

P.S.1 Epictetus was a presence in my youth, through the writings of Jason Xenakis who followed the path of self-determination to the end. I recently came across this essay: The post-existentialist neo-stoicism of Jason Xenakis and the stoic theory of suicide. 

P.S.2 Whatever happened to aesthetic beauty as the condition where the content falls into the form without flaw (in the same way that the soul falls into the body in/through martial arts and such)?

Digital analysis of a blog

What can distant reading say about a blog, when we know its theme and we follow it either from the author’s side or that of the reader? What is expected from a digital analysis of a non-commercial blog?

There are numbers and ratios retrieved, and lists of words (the most commonly used) as well as links between them. There is a web revealed and a mapping done. The analysis is both quantitative and qualitative, the two tightly correlated.

A good number of digital analysis tools for texts have been developed and are in use the last 10-15 years. Those who have more understanding of such tools set themselves the terms of the analysis, to some extent; for ex. which common words (a, the, and, etc.) to exclude when composing the word frequency lists. This is not an impossible task, it takes however a lot of work and a brave brain squeeze. Though I find something intriguing to it, I don’t feel that brave to meddle with commands, expressions, and you name it. I have done it, and even got some result. But, the ratio (!) of success towards failure is a negative figure. A simple job can be done with the ready-to-use free online tools, like the Voyant tools, and such (with thanks).

Summary of the five most recent posts (here seen as a ‘corpus’):
This corpus has 1 document with 5,077 total words and 1,541 unique word forms. Vocabulary Density (ratio found by dividing the Total Words by the Unique Words): 3,30 (not too bad) [see literary examples: Vocabulary Analysis of Project Gutenberg].
Average Words Per Sentence: 22.3
Most frequent words in the corpus: art (49); artists (33); artist (23); like (22); work (20); blog (15); authority (13); time (13); words (13); life (10); sea (10); book (9); march (9); music (9); way (9); world (9); april (8); arts (8); comment (8); january (8); p.s (8); people (8); read (8); status (8); books (7); don’t (7); end (7); essay (7); facebook(7); film (7); google (7); irony (7); kapnissi (7); kind (7); leave (7); linkedin (7); loading (7); market (7); order (7); pinterest (7); poetry (7); posts (7); reddit (7); september (7); share (7)

By this, the theme of the blog is already set, with a little surprise in the mention of the ‘sea’. The social media presence was inevitable, as they make part of each blog post (that is why I did not remove these words/ names) even though not in the actual text. While here we see about 50 words, in the visualization with the name cirrus we can view many more words in one look; I set it up to retrieve 150, so this is what this cloud-like word list shows:

Quite interestingly but not a real surprise, the word ‘depression’ pops-up as a prominent one, yet not as prominent as the ‘sea’, or ‘music’. And it is possible to go even further and expand the viewing of the words used in this part of the blog, in this beautiful arch, which works itself linking word for word in a rhythmical progression:

As artists, we find and we make links between whatever lies in this world of ours. Words are more specific in this, that is why they are regarded as more appropriate for conveying meaning and for transferring knowledge (make a note for another post, though just one will not be enough for this topic). Digital analysis tools also find links between words in the analysed text. The result of such a search can be presented for ex. like this:

In a very quick viewing of this visualization, the word ‘status’ is linked to the word ‘artists’, the ‘artist’ is linked to ‘authority’, and ‘art’ is linked to the ‘artists’, to ‘history’, and to the ‘market’.

Reversing the findings, what is not there also says something about the analysed text. In this case, what is absent are the names of people, and specifically of (famous) artists.

Text analysis tools give a variety of options for breaking down the text into its components and re-composing it in an untangled form. The new forms, rather in plural, are untangled from whatever we have in our mind regarding the text(s). However, these tools also entail to some extent the choice for manipulation (of input and result). This makes the analysis a game, which seriousness lies upon you. A lot of responsibility again; here is a knot representing the vicinity or correlation (not clear) of the words ‘art’, ‘artists’, ‘work’, ‘authority’, and ‘time’:

I must say, that the first time I saw a visualization of a data set (or of a text, not sure) I was so impressed that since then I look for such things, mostly with the artist’s hat on. There are sophisticated people out there that can make real use of the analysis tools, systems, methods, etc. I am happy I managed to take a glimpse (and, I have some fun ideas…).

P.S. Text analysis and visualization are not necessarily connected. They can also live apart. Visualization lives in science and in art, and relevant studies can be done in either field. Here is someone who combines both; have a look, there are interesting things in here: http://manovich.net/

 

 

 

 

Authority and the Artist, with irony as safety belt

The noise of time, by Julian Barnes
Vintage, 2016

I read the book twice; at first reading I could not hear the voice of the author, otherwise clear and solemn. The narration is in third person going through the life of the composer Dmitri Shostakovich. It is a fictional biography where while the facts may be deriving from research, the thoughts can belong either to the hero or to the narrator; the latter as most probable. It is a difficult book to enter. It seems fragmented and the time and place give away the drama. Yet, we don’t realize the volume of the drama unless we read through to the end. The noise of time talks about two themes: the artist in front of the authority, and irony in the life and work of the artist. For those who go through life as artists, or see artistic expression as an essential human trait, these are painful matters and unsolvable. Barnes has a remarkable sensitivity for the fate of artists, expressed often along the way; here, he turns the knife in the wound, masterly.

Life was the cat that dragged the parrot downstairs by its tail; his head banged against every step. J.B.

Wherever there is a monopoly established for art matters, the same motif is repeated. The monopoly draws a line of rules and separates those included from the excluded. And whenever there is state control to art matters there is artists’ persecution. Physical bodies may not be imprisoned (when not) but emotional worlds are destroyed, identities are annihilated, intellectual dreams are crushed. Totalitarianism disguised as a liberal state’s policy is in many aspects worse than totalitarian regimes. Because here any sense of solidarity is evaporated onto a surface of freedom. The artist is alone in front, or within, the ‘creative industry’ and guilty towards everyone and everything. ‘Independent committees’ follow similar patterns. There are keywords to be checked, like ‘political’, ‘dialogue’, ‘message’, etc., and a style to be detected as (currently) ‘innovative’, ‘interactive’ and most of all uplifting (and consequently successful in societal terms). Authority knows how to entrench what is acceptable and present it as the boundary-breaking art of today.

Khrennikov had an average ear for music, but perfect pitch when it came to power. J.B.

The three times that the authority talks to the artist, position him towards his work and his colleagues whether he likes it or not.

First, the artist is a victim. Tortured in real, living his precarious life (some stop or are stopped here).
Then he is a traitor. This is the phase when solidarity is dangerous because the artist may lose the crumbs that the authority feeds him. So, either he does not speak up for his colleagues (and his ideas), either he denounces them (even with some guilt).
In the end, he is an accomplice, and still a pawn (pawn-king, pawn-horse, …). This last phase is combined with the authority’s honours and tangible benefits (stardom, professorships, chairmanships, and financial comforts).

If the intention of the author was to defend Shostakovich and even more his music, he does give thumbs up on his wish to have his music be heard when the noise of time will have been drowned. We, are grateful that it does. For, music (and art for that matters) has a value in itself. No matter what authorities want us to believe, that it must reflect socio-political issues and relevant ideas (always to a certain direction of course). Music made on these prerequisites is mainly marches and guerrilla songs, or the non-poetical song of the authority. Shostakovich’s music was accused by the authority as ‘non-political and confusing’, addressed to the bourgeoisie and to the intellectual elite.

Then irony comes in, as the means for preserving one’s self and what you love, a disguise used ‘to smuggle things past the wrong ears’.  Irony is when you say something meaning something else; those who can listen understand. And in the same time, you save your life and you protect whatever precious. It is a way of cheating preserved for poetry and the arts, and for a specific kind of intellect. Not for the kind that grows close to authority. But, ‘there are limits to irony’. In which what you do in the end becomes what you are. The defendable joke becomes a degraded identity. Either way, in the end, you lose.

He wrote music for the ears that could hear. And he knew, therefore, that all true definitions of art are circular, and all untrue definitions of art ascribe to it a specific function. J.B.

P.S. We may have more to it if we transpose the story to present time (take it as an irony); check the art world, the creative industry, the authority full of itself as it is.