Reich and Cage: Sounds/Noises

Reich and Cage write about acknowledging the everyday sounds/noises we hear everyday such as vehicles, rain, wind, etc, and using those noises as musical instruments. I thought the article was detailed and thorough but also more complicated. Also, the author/s writes about sounds, composers, and the technology that is being used to create “music” or organized sounds. 

I should mention Steve Reich's artwork, Pendulum Music, 1966, because the piece is something different than just organizing sounds and refers to what he writes about. I thought the artwork was fascinating because of how he kinetically and electronically produced various sounds. He produced different noises by moving microphones above speakers in a different pace.

I like how Steve Reich mentions that “every software has a story, every sound has an origin” and John Cage refers to a composer as an organizer. I find that respectful. The technology/software part of his writing was more difficult for me to understand since I am not familiar with composing music and using such technology myself; though, I am familiar with music composed by artists who use digital softwares in their productions. Most DJs only use digital technologies and manipulate gathered sounds. They could make music with the sounds of eating food by adding different beats and organizing them together for example. I think that music composers are talented organizers who juggle with various sounds and noises to produce a beat. 

Dziga Vertov’s Kino-Eye

The article is about the differences between the perceptions perceived from the camera’s eye’s and the human’s eye's visuals in time and space. I found it very interesting how Vertov introduces the idea of how more perfect the “kino-eye” than human eyes. Vertov’s examples of how and why the human eye is imperfect compared to kino-eye are interesting as well.

This article focuses on film and video productions. The most important factor to perfecting or improving the visuals’ perceptions with kino-eye depends on the cameraman and the producer. The reason why that is, as mentioned in the article, because of the kino-eye’s abilities to zoom in and out and capture images from positions that a human eye cannot reach. Also, kino-eye’s ability of reviewing captured images while cutting-out certain scenes and/or attaching different ones together project various perspectives. In my opinion, Vertov’s complemented the camera perfectly.

Digital Divide

It is no surprise that analog media has been evolving into digital media throughout time since anything could be considered a medium for making artworks. The idea of digital media deriving from analog media refers to the concept of medium-specificity. Photography is a media that has been used long ago before it was evolved into digital photography, similar to video and film artworks. 

There are many advantages and disadvantages to both mediums. Analog media requires more time and work than digital media. New technology provides, not just convenience, but more options such as the ability to manipulate images more with Photoshop rather than cutting and pasting print images. Also, similar to the ability of blending-in different video scenes with computers rather than physically cutting and attaching film pieces together. However, I personally think that the medium-specificity and its usage is necessary to consider in the art world. 

Of course, there are many ways analog media could be manipulated similarly without new technologies. However, digital media such as computer-games graphics overpowers analog media's characteristics. Personally, I consider computer-games graphics to be artistic and undervalued to be seen as art. Similar to what Bishop mentions in her article about how our perceptions have been changing with digital media art and computer-games graphics like Second Life, even though how creepy Second Life may draw users in this other world or dimension.

Our society is a wide spectrum of digital. 

Meaning, everything has some form of digital influence: art, food, ordering, delivery, technology, news, transportation, advertising, media, etc. - the list is endless.  The question is just how digital involved is that one aspect? Some companies are engulfed by digital benefits and produce the majority of their products solely on digital assistance.  While other companies choose the original way and prefer a more hands on tangible way of creating the product.  Everything involves some form of digital, just depends where on the digital spectrum - slightly digital (McDonalds)? completely digital (Uber)? or somewhere in between (Starbucks)? Wherever the product falls on the digital spectrum, I believe everything is headed in the completely digital direction and everyone that does not keep up with the trend will die out. 

Take Bishop's leading question: While many artists use digital technology, how many really confront the question of what if means to think, and filter through the digital?

I think a lot of artists are using digital technology to their benefits, but not truly thinking about how their product will survive in a completely digital world and since the world is headed in that direction, what will they do?

Take the fashion industry for instance. 

Designers use to buy, cut, sew, alter, and create a clothing piece directly on the model - molding the fabric to custom fit the physical model standing in front of them. However, the fashion world is merging with digital and merging rapidly.  Designers are now using 360 degree scanners to measure the model's sizes, rather than tape measurers.  Then digitally creating the custom ensemble on an online program to fit the model perfectly.  Finally, a 3D printer prints the fashion piece ready for the model to wear. Within a few hours an idea can become measured, created, produced, and put on a model all while never touching any of the tangible materials that made the final product. 

No longer does the designer have to gather the fabrics, thread, needles, etc. to create the piece but simply design it online and sit back and watch a machine create the masterpiece.

Just like Bishop said, are other designers truly understanding what impact digital technology can have on their creations?  If other designers do not use digital technologies will they survive?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bfRVfqYEgNA

(video illustrates completely digital fashion shows - is that the direction the fashion industry is headed in?)

The Digital Divide

"While many artists use digital technology, how many really confront the question of what it means to think, see, and filter affect through the digital? How many thematize this, or reflect deeply on how we experience, and are altered by, the digitization of our existence?"

I think the main point here is the word affect... Because no matter what medium or form new art is in, it's about how the deeper meaning provokes one to think, and how a piece affects the viewers... New age art isn't just about the visual aspects but the deeper meaning to the piece that is not scene on the surface. The meaning of a piece doesn't necessarily have to jump out at every viewer, but it needs to be there in some sort of way. This is why there is a digital divide because modern art has made it acceptable for anything to be considered "art" and there needs to be more definition between the two. When art is thoughtfully made to affect the viewer through the viewer thinking, seeing, and filtering, then i think the digital divide when be vanished. Since art truly is, "visual code that gets transcribed inside our minds into thoughts and emotions," it is important that we continue to make art for the affect and the meaning rather than just for the hell of it and for the visual aesthetic. 

The Digital Divide

art¹

ärt/

noun

1. 1. 

   the expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power. (according to dictionary.com) 

   
   

   
   

   In this world, everything is or can be made digital. To me, this includes art. While it may not be traditional paint and canvas, clay, pen and paper, the ways one is able to produce art has evolved and that's greatly due to technology. If art is the "

   expression or application of human creative skill and imagination" then just because it is produced differently doesn't mean there is any less expression in it. 

   
   

   I found it interesting when Bishop discussed how modern art samples from previous artists, taking bits a pieces to make something else. This has been the case before digital and will continue to be whether it's in music, tv, books, painting etc. because is there the capability of having an original idea at this day and age? 

   
   

   Bishop also discusses the fascination with analog, and I believe this fascination exists because there is constantly a desire to make the old new, our own. This is where originality comes back into play. Everything is shaped from something else that no one truly owns their art anymore because it was "inspired" by someone else's. 

The Digital DIvide

I found this article to be rather interesting with respect to what seems in my eyes to be a rather understated concept that I feel has penetrated a lot of various art forms today. What caught my eye that Bishop touched upon was this idea of art relying now much more heavily on a selective process of picking elements from previously made art, rather than time being invested to make your own new art.

To me this selective process is the very backbone of modern art. Various examples seem to fit into how this is true not just in your conventional sense of art but quite frankly this "sampling" is the basis of most digital art today. My current definition of digital art includes musical pieces as well as film. In today's music industry countless instrumentals are created solely by taking a previous piece and chopping it up and rearranging the sounds to form something new but still musically pleasant.

Artists such as J.Cole and Kanye West made a name off of sampling old soul records but the buck doesn't stop with music. Filmmakers have consistently borrowed various ideas, or even occasionally re-made former films in there own artistic way and by smartly using some iconic characters that would put people back in the seats to view a new take in a heartbeat.

Conventional art, in the sense, sculpture, drawing etc. also draws heavily from inspiration of other artists and previous works to bolster a certain direction for many. Seeing how greatly a good selection can impact the outcome of artists message it makes me without a doubt believe that selection is as much of a tool in today's modern art world as a paintbrush.

Bishop hopes to highlight how the digital world doesn't seem to be as appreciated when it comes to art because people have this preconceived notion of what are is. Yet the the digital aspect is prevalent in many new modern pieces of art. This mental "divide" is what I believe is preventing artists from truly getting with the modern times and doing more and more innovative things with there pieces and embracing the fact that selection of previous work plays in creating art for a different age. A digital age.