Readings

Urban Computing and its Discontents
Part 1/3

As a pamphlet about urban computing; space, place, technology integration and architecture, the entire article ranges across each aspect/issue of urban computing in our society. I have clumped the reading into 37 pages of actual writing (while ignoring useless pages like titles, blanks and image-only pages), and separated them into 3 sections (of which each member of my group will include there “Part”). Part 1 comprises of (in its totality) pages 5-21 approximately.

Part 1 of the reading eases the reader in while reviewing the terms later developed in the text, such as: ubiquitous computing, urban computing as a separate element, urbanism and ambient informatics. In short, the main focus (ubiquitous computing) can be described as the thorough integration of technologies (i.e. computers/mobile phone) into the everyday objects and occupations relating to human activity.

The entirety of the text is a conversation between Adam Greenfield (both a writer and user experience consultant/instructor) and Mark Shepard (artist, architect and researcher) discussing the different types of urban computing in an urban space, its reaction to the public while raising (perhaps subtlety?) ethical questions about the effects of its uses. Mobile phones, so-called light pollution, urban screens, projects involving individual or mass human participation (whether environmental or corporate) all play with space and our understanding of the things that encompass this space (i.e. mentioned in the text are walls, windows, doors, sidewalks, streets…etc). It is also important as they note, to understand the response to these changes, how people accept and understand them and integrate them (i.e. if it were an object, they would find a use for it as well) into their life whether during that moment or everyday.

Naturally, (perhaps for those that know me) my opinion falls in line with questioning the use of these new technologies. For example the Oakland Crimespotting art piece, mentioned earlier in the text as a map displaying various crimes spotted throughout a city. As interesting as the concept may be, when is too much? Should people be aware of so much information? Of course, how will it change their course during that day, how will it effect them in knowing where the majority of crime is being spotted? Or more importantly, how will it affect a person in thinking about crime when they would rather turn a blind eye to it?

Some urban computing art/informative pieces are more fascinating (though not necessarily better) such as AmsterdamREALTIME where the image created from the GPS tracers are absolutely beautiful. It is incredibly artistic as a final visual piece displayed as information that can equally be used on a day to day basis, while allowing it to comfortably change the way they understand the city’s space from the view of their front seat.

All of the examples given in the text were relevant to understanding the concept of urban computing and how it works and reacts in its environment. Equally interesting are the notion of depth in concept and the question of what type of information we wish to project or incorporate into aspects of society. Everything described in the reading is relevant to our design practices as artists, whether we are from computation arts or studio arts. The art of today is continuously being incorporated into our spaces, and we have to question its use, its reason for being and its authority. As a group we are learning that there is more to the technical construction of a final project, such as the research and questions that come before it.

My reading partners include Laurence and Josie.

 

Strandbeest

January 23, 2008 – Concordia Hall – 6pm

THE ANIMARIS

An example to artists on the notion of sustainability, we may very well turn to Theo Jansen’s magnificent world of Strandbeest. It is a concept built into a reality of which closely mimics the elegance and fantasy element of Miyazaki’s films. It is also inspirational as a slow but working means of movement (i.e. transportation) to society’s rural and perhaps urban future; a process towards a more environmentally friendly mentality.

Jansen has created various works throughout his lifetime of which he presented not once, but twice on Wednesday evening. It is not simply the presentation of an enormous (and this is meant literally as well) body of work that becomes fascinating to watch, or the mechanics and physics of a graceful creation of which we listen to, but also the charm and elegance of the creator and presenter of the lecture.

There is a life to his work – his growing Animaris family which resides by a beach in the Netherlands. They may not be alive in the sense of the blood flowing through the skin in which you wear, but they have a genetic code much like our own that has created them, and an energy that must sustain them. Needless to say they are absolutely fascinating, and Jansen does not hide his love and affection for his family of plastic yellow tubes.

As a creation of artificial life through the use of genetic algorithms, the animaris retains a structure that imitates the number of genes in its particular genetic makeup (i.e. whether it is a rhino, a worm or a crab). Jansen describes his animals as if they were living and breathing creatures as you and I, for they eat and drink the wind which stores into their stomach (or plastic bottles) as energy to move. They have something of a permanent muscle memory and “feet” to keep their movements’ solid, water feelers to avoid the ocean’s waves and “children” to scout for danger.

There is much detail in the mechanics of these creatures that recalls a memory of Jurassic Park where the scientist and paleontologists discover how dinosaurs move, eat and travel in herds – how they live. It is as pleasant as it is hopeful to understand the conceptual development of Jansen’s project, and witness its realization as a flight of the imagination by use of sustainable products.

THE UFO AND
IMAGE CAPTURE CONTRAPTION

Jansen’s so-called scheming concept of his flying saucer certainly makes us wonder about the frenzy of UFO sightings from rural United States mentioned within the past month. The project is clever and without doubt drawing from Jansen’s good natured humor. During the course of the evening Jansen presented his audience with a DVD selection of his work and included commentaries and descriptions of the mechanics of his machines. A moist, foggy afternoon with the sheen of sunlight to shade the inflatable space craft certainly fell into good circumstances for the artist. It was perhaps equally his ability to create large-scaled objects that added to the experiment, as scientist from the small Dutch town had not yet witnessed a balloon of such magnitude.

The third element (in no particular order) to be mentioned Wednesday evening was what I like to call the Image Capture Contraption; for the reason that I did not fully comprehend the workings of it. In effect, it is a device that replicates what is in its field of vision (and it is a long and precise field of vision). What is canny about Jansen’s contraption is its ability to duplicate an object from the background into the foreground as if it belonged there – in matching size and presence. Perhaps it is a foretelling of Jansen’s later, again – large-scale projects.

Much to Jansen’s humble character, in concluding his presentation of the evening it was nothing but short and sweet, with a period of questions, autographs and for some such as me, a photo taken with the European star.