Tuesday, January 17, 2006
1/17
Well, the good news is that I (seemingly miraculously) managed to make contact with Jasia Reichardt (via fax, thanks to an unnamed friend of John Cayley’s), and this morning rec’d permission to use materials from Cybernetic Serendipity in my book. REichardt, like a few others before her, questioned use of the term “Prehistoric,” which I suppose is reasonable. I have a section in the intro that talks about this nomenclature, which basically says that the work under investigation lays the groundwork for the masterpieces that do not quite yet exist (though the work unveiled in the study is certainly regarded as important). What I do not say, although hopefully it is read between the lines, is that prehistoric=historic in many ways. But I’m really not inclined to frame it that way at this juncture of the genre’s development. The WWW – the now primary delivery mechanism for digital poetry – is posited as a firm point of demarcation, so now a historical view is possible, and a prehistoric period can be identified. Hard to condense a few pages of deliberation on the matter into just a few sentences, but that’s the gist of it.
Also, through the publisher of one of her recent books, I may have a conduit to reach Carole Sperrin McCauley. But all attempts to track down Carl Fernbach-Flarsheim (or his estate) have come up empty, and kind of perplexed as to how to get permission to re-present “The Boolean Image/Conceptual Typewriter” in the book. There is absolutely no publication information in the SOFTWARE exhibition catalog (1970), so maybe contact the Jewish Museum (NYC), where the exhibit was launched, and see if I have their blessing? That might be good enough. Otherwise, I’m glad to report that I’m almost completely out of the woods as far as that part of the process goes…
Jim Andrews and Geof Huth supplied valuable clarifying information for me via emails: thanks, guys! On schedule with the ms review, just a few more days to go…
This morning I met with Dr. Raffi, chair of the FCM, and enjoyed a couple of hours of dialog with him, which began with a couple of Powerpoint presentations about MMU and the FCM. Facts learned: MMU has 16,348 undergrads and 1,812 grad students (from a total of 76 countries) on its 2 campuses (one here and one in Melaka). The school offers 108 courses in its 5 “Faculties” (Engineering/Hardware, Infotech/Software, Management, Creative Multimedia, Language/Communcation). The defined areas of the FCM are Digital Art, Media Innovation, Film & Animation, Interface Design, Virtual Reality, and E-Learning. MMU is 100% private and receives no gov’t funding (though the government suggests grants that the school should apply for). About 12 corporate sponsors are responsible for providing necessary resources. The university is involved with intensive international collaborations, particularly with universities in South Africa, Iran, Thailand, Japan, Singapore, and Vietnam. The faculty is not only expected to publish papers but also to produce award winning works. Raffi also showed me a couple of amazing animations made by MMU students, which are currently the benchmark for quality of production in the school—and probably will be for a couple more years at least.
We are charting out my activities while I’m in residence, and beyond the campus-wide lecture series on the history of digital poetry, I will also be presenting weekly talks to a range of students on a variety of topics during February, March, & April (details to be worked out during the next week or so). Then, on top of the research I’ll be immersed in, I will begin to lecture on a national and regional level, and, as I think I mentioned previously, my stay here will culminate in some sort of grandiose performance on campus. So, these months will be an intensely busy time (i.e., no partying with movie stars on pineapple islands; not that I ever thought it would be that).
Not much else transpired besides the doldrums of work, though Khong and Wong kindly took the whole family out for lunch at the Ericsson corporation headquarters here in Cyberjaya—a bright, shiny place where we encountered (and consumed) “Western” food for the first time in weeks. Though we love the Indian/Muslim café we usually take our lunches at during the week, it was a pleasant diversion from that routine. The place reminded me of Lucent’s campus in NJ, where I did a consultancy a few years back.
Well, the video de Campos sent last night was short and sweet – if he sends his approval perhaps I’ll post it up on the WWW somewhere. He also sent a picture of the holographic poem that he did with Julio Plaza in ’85. Holographic poetry is such a trip—too bad that it is so difficult to handle and impractical. But as the technology evolves, this may become less so. I know that the avant-garde students at MMU are quite interested in using holographic interfaces and imaging, so perhaps we’ll see more poems like this in the future. In my book I have an Appendix that discusses holography—Eduardo Kac, Richard Kostelanetz, etc., but not a lot has been done since the initial surge of work in the ‘80s. I suppose because the machinery is so inaccessible.
Well, that’s the report from here. Send news anytime, OK, CF
Well, the good news is that I (seemingly miraculously) managed to make contact with Jasia Reichardt (via fax, thanks to an unnamed friend of John Cayley’s), and this morning rec’d permission to use materials from Cybernetic Serendipity in my book. REichardt, like a few others before her, questioned use of the term “Prehistoric,” which I suppose is reasonable. I have a section in the intro that talks about this nomenclature, which basically says that the work under investigation lays the groundwork for the masterpieces that do not quite yet exist (though the work unveiled in the study is certainly regarded as important). What I do not say, although hopefully it is read between the lines, is that prehistoric=historic in many ways. But I’m really not inclined to frame it that way at this juncture of the genre’s development. The WWW – the now primary delivery mechanism for digital poetry – is posited as a firm point of demarcation, so now a historical view is possible, and a prehistoric period can be identified. Hard to condense a few pages of deliberation on the matter into just a few sentences, but that’s the gist of it.
Also, through the publisher of one of her recent books, I may have a conduit to reach Carole Sperrin McCauley. But all attempts to track down Carl Fernbach-Flarsheim (or his estate) have come up empty, and kind of perplexed as to how to get permission to re-present “The Boolean Image/Conceptual Typewriter” in the book. There is absolutely no publication information in the SOFTWARE exhibition catalog (1970), so maybe contact the Jewish Museum (NYC), where the exhibit was launched, and see if I have their blessing? That might be good enough. Otherwise, I’m glad to report that I’m almost completely out of the woods as far as that part of the process goes…
Jim Andrews and Geof Huth supplied valuable clarifying information for me via emails: thanks, guys! On schedule with the ms review, just a few more days to go…
This morning I met with Dr. Raffi, chair of the FCM, and enjoyed a couple of hours of dialog with him, which began with a couple of Powerpoint presentations about MMU and the FCM. Facts learned: MMU has 16,348 undergrads and 1,812 grad students (from a total of 76 countries) on its 2 campuses (one here and one in Melaka). The school offers 108 courses in its 5 “Faculties” (Engineering/Hardware, Infotech/Software, Management, Creative Multimedia, Language/Communcation). The defined areas of the FCM are Digital Art, Media Innovation, Film & Animation, Interface Design, Virtual Reality, and E-Learning. MMU is 100% private and receives no gov’t funding (though the government suggests grants that the school should apply for). About 12 corporate sponsors are responsible for providing necessary resources. The university is involved with intensive international collaborations, particularly with universities in South Africa, Iran, Thailand, Japan, Singapore, and Vietnam. The faculty is not only expected to publish papers but also to produce award winning works. Raffi also showed me a couple of amazing animations made by MMU students, which are currently the benchmark for quality of production in the school—and probably will be for a couple more years at least.
We are charting out my activities while I’m in residence, and beyond the campus-wide lecture series on the history of digital poetry, I will also be presenting weekly talks to a range of students on a variety of topics during February, March, & April (details to be worked out during the next week or so). Then, on top of the research I’ll be immersed in, I will begin to lecture on a national and regional level, and, as I think I mentioned previously, my stay here will culminate in some sort of grandiose performance on campus. So, these months will be an intensely busy time (i.e., no partying with movie stars on pineapple islands; not that I ever thought it would be that).
Not much else transpired besides the doldrums of work, though Khong and Wong kindly took the whole family out for lunch at the Ericsson corporation headquarters here in Cyberjaya—a bright, shiny place where we encountered (and consumed) “Western” food for the first time in weeks. Though we love the Indian/Muslim café we usually take our lunches at during the week, it was a pleasant diversion from that routine. The place reminded me of Lucent’s campus in NJ, where I did a consultancy a few years back.
Well, the video de Campos sent last night was short and sweet – if he sends his approval perhaps I’ll post it up on the WWW somewhere. He also sent a picture of the holographic poem that he did with Julio Plaza in ’85. Holographic poetry is such a trip—too bad that it is so difficult to handle and impractical. But as the technology evolves, this may become less so. I know that the avant-garde students at MMU are quite interested in using holographic interfaces and imaging, so perhaps we’ll see more poems like this in the future. In my book I have an Appendix that discusses holography—Eduardo Kac, Richard Kostelanetz, etc., but not a lot has been done since the initial surge of work in the ‘80s. I suppose because the machinery is so inaccessible.
Well, that’s the report from here. Send news anytime, OK, CF
# posted by chris funkhouser @ 6:22 AM 
