Friday, April 3, 2015

[Yasmin_discussions] Light is my Business..So is Sound !

Paul, Guillermo

Thanks for your replies to my rather rash assertion
that if scientists want to communicate with the public-
as the NASA Solar Dynamics Observatory does in the vidio
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GSVv40M2aks#t=79

- they should not just add sound to their images as an add on
but try and create an integrated work that combines their images
with effective contemporary sound design or music

- my error was arguing that new music is necessarily better than
old music- obviously not the case

- but the discussion reflects a deeper asymmetry in the art science
community

- with the danger of over generalising, most artists are much more familiar
with contemporary science, than most scientists are of contemporary art

a contrary agument was given by sean cubitt who said about his new books
( https://www.academia.edu/11196517/The_Practice_of_Light_A_Genealogy_of_Visual_Technologies_from_Prints_to_Pixels
and
http://openhumanitiespress.org/digital-light.html)

sean: I was persuaded not to call the book "Glory". They thought it
might give the wrong impression to theologically inclined
Christians.My feeling is that light is too important to let it become
a metaphor belonging to sects, and that although my history is in a
certain sense political, the sense of wonder belongs to everyone, and
that while some scientists have been great in communicating the wonder
of the universe, oddly social and human sciences have simply ignored
it for fifty years.

anyway - i stand my ground that i find work that presents intriguing science
is much more compelling if the sound is intriguing also


Roger,

Good point. I agree with this. Even i liked the video (even i like old
music !!), i agree that there is no reason to use different music to push
for a more interactive video. This, as you say, could be a deformation from
scientific community. In fact, we are trying to deal with different
scenario, with art/sci interactions, and the video is not a good example of
a deeply colaboration. Yes, it is true. I think this is a kind of political
decision. Even the video is good, could be extremly better if there were
some political decision to colaborate between artists.

Guillermo.


Roger

You have raised an interesting topic. From my understanding of your
argument, you seem
to be suggesting that if someone produces a product that is multimodal
-- in this
case, (1) the SDO imagery and (2) accompanying music, then the secondary
modality (2) must be equally as novel or contemporary as (1). Not every product
has to contain novelty in every modality. So, while I would agree with you that
contemporary research in sound would have made for an equally interesting
presentation, I don't think that adding music which has withstood the
test of time
is a bad thing. The main point is the SDO imagery for this particular
product. The
music, in this particular case, is secondary.


paul



On Apr 3, 2015, at 8:23 AM, roger malina <rmalina@alum.mit.edu> wrote:

> Guillermo
>
> yes the images of the sun are fascinating- but its always disturbing to see
> scientists use musical styles from a 100 years ago to accompany the most
> contemporary of contemporary images !
>
> why didnt they commission a contemporary composer to write dramatic
> music using todays musical idioms !
>
> there is a huge literature on the connections of science and music
> and the musical avocations of scientists- but somehow there is
> a 'decalage" !!
>
> roger

--
Roger F Malina
is in texas
1-510-853-2007
_______________________________________________
Yasmin_discussions mailing list
Yasmin_discussions@estia.media.uoa.gr
http://estia.media.uoa.gr/mailman/listinfo/yasmin_discussions

Yasmin URL: http://www.media.uoa.gr/yasmin

SBSCRIBE: click on the link to the list you wish to subscribe to. In the page that will appear ("info page"), enter e-mail address, name, and password in the fields found further down the page.
HOW TO UNSUBSCRIBE: on the info page, scroll all the way down and enter your e-mail address in the last field. Enter password if asked. Click on the unsubscribe button on the page that will appear ("options page").
TO ENABLE / DISABLE DIGEST MODE: in the options page, find the "Set Digest Mode" option and set it to either on or off.
If you prefer to read the posts on a blog go to http://yasminlist.blogspot.com/