Image Practice Fall 2008

Wednesday Meet-up & Install

2008-12-09T13:29:00.000-08:00

We're on for putting the project up on Wednesday at 4pm. The location is the empty storefront at 34 E. Main, on the corner of Walnut & Main in downtown Champaign. I'll have the posters that folks left with me on Monday, please bring supplemental materials that are needed for your project (those of you with digital 3D renderings, bring a couple of rendered images). If you've made any changes to your poster, bring that as well obviously.
Those of you with physical models, have someone from your group meet me at my office at 3:30 to help transport them.

View Larger Map

Vermont Town Turns to College in Bid to Guide Change

2008-12-04T08:46:00.000-08:00

In today's New York Times, there's a story about Starksboro, VT and its attempts to create a sense of place with the help of students in a class titled "Portrait of a Vermont Town".

"The key is to project beyond immediate controversies over applications for subdivisions and to say, ‘Let’s envision the future that we would love to have,' " said Prof. John Elder of Middlebury, "at which point there is considerable agreement."
They have spent the semester attending town dinners, exploring farms and forest, and visiting dozens of homes. Some students grew up in places where sprawl is the norm, so they were eager to explore a small town and its singular sense of place.
"I'm guilty, like most of us, of really romanticizing Vermont life and Vermont towns," said Max Kanter, a junior from Phoenix. "Now I have a sense of the challenge they have to stay afloat."

Link

Following the Break

2008-11-17T13:43:00.001-08:00

Monday Dec 1, our first class back, groups should have (at minimum) mock ups of the poster concept and a clear plan for the secondary visualization. These can be worked out as a group, or done as individual sketches to be discussed by the group in class.
Our last reading will be Chapter 4 ("Working with Place") from the Cresswell text (the 5th chapter is a sort of annotated bibliography) . I'm sure many of you are glad to see that phrase...
Your summary post wille be due Wed, December 3.
Final group projects (Transforming Place) are due Monday, December 8. We'll have some kind of exhibition of the results on our last day of class, on the 10th.
Hope you all have a great break (+ Thanksgiving for those of you who celebrate it), although many of you seemed to have started the break early...

For Monday, Nov 17

2008-11-12T15:47:00.000-08:00

1) Groups need to have first draft proposals, in some visual form(s) and descriptions as necessary. These proposals should include photo-research of the site you're working with - think of the perspectives that will best facilitate the presentation of your proposal.
2)Your archival visualization montages capturing the "feeling" of your place ideas (that we started in class on Wed) should be uploaded to Flickr (remember to optimize your image to 72ppi if it's not already).
A map of our 2 locations.

Speaking of Global Senses of Place...

2008-11-10T21:44:00.000-08:00

(Professor of Urban Planning) Ken Salo will facilitate an open discussion with transnational studies guest speaker Prof David McDonald on Thursday November 13 at noon in Rm 223 Temple Buell Hall on "Spatial Inequality, Racism and Environmental Justice Movements in the Global South."
Temple Buell Hall is located at 611 Taft Drive, near the Education Building, south of the quad.
I will try to attend this discussion (but also have and will make a post here about it, but if anyone else makes it, please write a post to your blog about it (will be counted as extra credit, in the form of an extra reading post).

For Monday November 10

2008-11-05T20:05:00.000-08:00

You should have your groups formed for project 3.
Other things we will do:
1) discuss Cresswell, Chapter 3 (which you should already have read)
2) discuss Park Fiction & Buster Simpson short readings (look at this before we meet for class - it's not long or difficult reading)
3) watch Flag Wars documentary on gentrification
Also remember that groups should also be starting the interview process - interviews need to be completed by Wed, Nov 12. I'll be discussing these with the groups then.

Event of interest, Wednesday, Nov 12, 1pm - Beehive Collective

2008-11-05T10:39:00.000-08:00

For anyone interested in intensely detailed graphics and social justice causes, you should definitely check out this event if you can.
"Plan Colombia", a visual exploration of globalization and militarism in Latin America, by The Beehive Collective.
Wednesday Nov. 12 at 1 pm in the TBH Atrium
The Beehive Design Collective is a non-profit, volunteer driven, political arts organization based in eastern Maine. The group's mission is to "cross pollinate the grassroots" through the creation of images as an effective medium for deconstructing and educating the public about complex geopolitical issues.

The bees create collaborative, hand-illustrated posters of dizzying intricacy which are patchwork "quilts" of personal stories related to them in their travels by communities in the global south. In their incendiary "Plan Colombia" presentation, the bees take participants on a "tour" through a larger than life graphic narrative of the multifold effects of globalization and "drug war" policies in Andean region of Colombia. Interweaving anecdotes and statistics, they perforate dubious "drug war" rhetoric and expose broad connections between militarism and resource extraction.

This graphic is the product of many exchanges about the issue of colonialism in the Andean Region of South America that took place between our collective and organizers over the spring of 2002 in Ecuador, Colombia and the U.S. These exchanges of information and inspiration were collaboratively sewn together into a quilt of images, that are organized into a circuit of progressions and contrasts that inform and engage the viewer throughout their journey of the graphic.

For Monday, November 3

2008-10-30T16:05:00.000-07:00

Just a reminder:
Printed "disorientation" maps are due. Check out Edward Tufte's Micro Macro Chapter for visualization/design inspiration.
We'll be meeting back in the regularly scheduled 229.
We will discuss Cresswell, Chapter 3 on Wednesday the 5th, along with the new project parameters.
Have a great weekend.

Class Information for Week of October 27

2008-10-24T11:20:00.000-07:00

Monday, October 27, we will meet in the 336 lab at the normal time, before attending the visiting artist talk in KAM.
Wednesday, October 29 we will meet at 5pm in Armory 147, with Professor Margaret Flinn's CINE 395 New Media class. DO NOT BE LATE.
If you haven't seen John Jennings' Out of Sequence show on underrepresented voices in comics at KAM, make the effort to check it out.

Event of Interest, Monday, Oct 20, 7pm

2008-10-20T12:38:00.000-07:00

At Allen Hall, a double screening of two movies that are centrally looking at the intersection of image and place. Style Wars is a highly influential documentary film that looks at the emergence of graffiti as an aesthetic subculture in New York City in the 1970s, along with its connections to hip hop.
Michel Gondry's Be Kind Rewind is the director's recent film set in a fictionalized Passaic, NJ, represented as an anachronistic, deindustrialized, depressed city. Creative, DIY techniques of the town's residents are pitted against the megalithic entertainment monoculture. There is a lot to criticize about how Gondry depicts (or doesn't) place here, but it's worth a view, and is at the least very enjoyable to watch.
If you have the chance, and haven't seen these films, I would make the time.

Disorientation Project and Next Reading Due Mon, Nov 3

2008-10-20T12:12:00.000-07:00

We will review the Disorientation projects in class on Monday, Nov 3. These need to be printed and tabloid size as specified in the project description - USE THE MATTE COLOR PLOTTERS (not the laser printer).
Also, you need to have read and posted a summary of Cresswell, Chapter 3 ("Reading a Global Sense of Place").

Monday, October 13 Class Cancelled

2008-10-11T15:48:00.000-07:00

Due to some unexpected changes to the schedule, class for Monday October 13 will NOT meet as usual. See everyone on Wednesday (remember the photo essay assignment).

As Above, So Below? - follow up

2008-10-08T12:50:00.000-07:00

1) Finishing Part 1 (by Monday October 13)
A. Each group needs to archive the images used in your presentations (along with other pictures that perhaps never made it into the final show). Annotate the pictures in the description, so that there is some contextual information accompanying them - at the least you should note the source of the image, where, when, who. Additional background information, where present should also be added.
Tag these images with "ourcity" + "abovebelow" + other descriptive tags relevant to each picture (i.e. "Champaign" "UIUC" "watertower").
B. Send an email to me addressing the following questions:
+ What were your contributions to the group presentation?
+ What/How did each of your collaborators contribute (this is not a grade/rating)?

2) We will now work on individual production of images based on the research and perspective gained through the presentations. Specifically, each one of you will construct an interpretive map that uses the codes of cartography and sign systems to tell a story "from below". To get this started, you will present a proposal based on some preliminary fieldwork. You do NOT need to focus on the site presented by your group - it can be another site of interest for you, but must be within Champaign County.
** Your proposals must take the following form: 5 annotated images (taken by you, or procured via archival research) that present the story you want to focus on (think of it as a short photo essay). These must be uploaded (and annotated) on the class Flickr pool by Wednesday, October 15.

3) We will also begin work in Illustrator on Wednesday, so you will want to have your Illustrator guide materials with you in class (whether it's the Lynda.com subscription or one of the books).

Film Screening Wednesday - Radiant City

2008-10-07T20:59:00.000-07:00

I know many of you have class immediate following Image Practice, but for those of you who don't this film is a great, innovative documentary about suburban development in North America. It especially relates to our conversations about placelessness and non-places. It's also visually stunning and will likely surprise many of you.

What: Radiant City (2006)
Where: Knight Auditorium, Spurlock Museum, 600 S. Gregory St.
Across the continent the landscape is being leveled--blasted clean of distinctive features and overlaid with zombie monoculture. Politicians call it growth. Developers call it business. The Moss family calls it home. This look at urban sprawl through the eyes of one Canadian family also asks fundamental questions about design, planning, and technology. Covering topics from traffic and infrastructure to childhood, family, and ennui, it ultimately asks: How can we build sustainable systems that can grow gracefully as they age?

Winner of the Genie award for Best Documentary.

"an incredulous lament [of] eerie, sometimes monumental images…an asphalt-and-Sheetrock dreamscape" –The New York Times

"enlightening and disturbingly funny." –Village Voice

"the directors know exactly what they're doing with each beautiful image." –NOW

"[A] sublimely slippery, slightly surreal and not entirely 'just the facts, ma'am' documentary." –TV Guide Movies

The series of films as a whole is entitled "Movies Even an Engineer Would Love."
More information about the series.

Talk by Natalie Jeremijenko, Tuesday 5:30pm, 228 Natural History Building

2008-10-06T16:38:00.000-07:00

Forgot to mention this in class, but this talk should be of interest to many of you. Natalie's work is extremely interesting and combines concerns from art, industrial design, engineering, ecology and social justice.
Natalie Jeremijenko, an Australian artist, designer and engineer, has a doctorate in engineering and is an assistant professor of visual art at N.Y.U. Her work occupies a niche "between popular culture and high art, between art, science and engineering." In Jeremijenko's words: "People don't really know what to do about toxins in the air and global warming, right? So the whole thing is how do we translate the tremendous amount of anxiety and interest in addressing major environmental issues into something concrete that people can do with measurable and significant effect."
More information on the talk.
And if you want to know more about her work, check this out.

Readings

2008-09-29T23:05:00.000-07:00

The next section of Cresswell's Place (pp. 33-51) is due on Monday Oct 6.
REMEMBER TO POST READING SUMMARIES TO YOUR BLOG. Some of you have been doing great with this, some not so much.
Think of these reading summaries as a test.
<repeating myself>If I can't tell you read the selection, you don't get credit.</repeating myself>
If you write: "The author didn't say much, so there's not much to post," I read: "I didn't feel like reading this."
These readings may or may not be the most fascinating thing you've read since Everybody Poops, but I can assure you that the author does indeed say something that could be argued with, discussed, or at the least, simply restated in every section we read. Not everyone will, or should, pick up on exactly the same thing, but we should all be able to read someone's post and say, "Oh yeah, Cresswell was talking about X in this section."
The concepts in these readings should have an impact on the image-based work that we do in the class. Consideration of landscape, space, place, environments - these are all historical and contemporary concerns of art, from landscape painting to land/earth works to documentaries on graffiti.

For Wednesday, October 1

2008-09-29T08:50:00.000-07:00

You will be watching a film called "Los Angeles Plays Itself" (or rather part of the film) that I've set up with the grad student film screening crew. The film is an analysis of how Los Angeles has been protrayed and utilized in cinema. As usual, these screenings begin at 5pm in room 114.
I will be away at a conference, but you will need to sign an attendance sheet.
The lab will also remain available for the class from 4-6:40. I strongly encourage you to use the class time before and after the 1 hour screening to work on the group presentations.
** These presentations will be delivered on October 8 - next Wednesday.

For Monday September 29 (back in 229)

2008-09-25T14:23:00.000-07:00

We will discuss the first 2 sections of Cresswell's Place. If you haven't read the first section, this means that you need to read pp. 1-33. If you have read the first section already, you just need to read 15-33. Stop reading at the "Place, Practice and Process" heading.
Remember, a reading summary on your blog is required for all readings.
We'll also discuss this past Wednesday's tour with Dave Monk and the group portion of project 2, including presentation strategies.

Geographer Don Mitchell on Focus 580

2008-09-18T15:14:00.000-07:00

For people who have an hour to spare over the weekend and are interested in the politics of geography and how it relates to the everyday lives of many people, there is a great interview with Syracuse University geographer and author Don Mitchell, who also delivered a lecture on campus on Thursday. You can listen online or download an MP3 at the Focus 580 site.

Important Info for Monday Sept 22 and Wednesday

2008-09-16T11:42:00.000-07:00

On Monday, Sept 22, we will meet at the Geography and Map Library, where will be getting a tour of their resources.
Where is this library? In the Main Library building, room 418 (yes, on the 4th floor).
**ALSO: You need to have read Cresswell's Place: A short introduction Chapter 1, pp 1-12 - and REMEMBER TO MAKE YOUR BLOG POST-READING SUMMARY **

On Wednesday, Sept 24, we will meet in downtown Champaign to take a tour and meet with Dave Monk, a local activist/educator working on environmental and social concerns in the area.
Our exact meeting spot is next to the WEFT radio station on Market Street in downtown Champaign (see the map below).

Both days, we will meet at the beginning of our class time - 4pm, DO NOT BE LATE.
Carpool, take public transit, ride a bike - everyone is responsible for getting themselves to downtown. If you need to take a bus, you can plan it here. Basically, you need to get to the corner of E. University and Market St. (WEFT is on the North side of University).

For Wednesday, September 17

2008-09-15T11:25:00.001-07:00

Create a quick map that shows the places/spaces you inhabit in Urbana-Champaign. This should be created by hand (as in a drawing) and should not be simply a replica of a street map. In fact, don't use or refer to a street map AT ALL. Construct your map only from memory. Your map SHOULD NOT aim to be comprehensive, of either "reality" or your experience. It SHOULD locate your knowledge of this place in some manner by narrowly focusing on what has become part of your memory from the places you go (and go through). In other words, it should provide some geographically oriented information about your interests and actions as they unfold in space. Use drawn images, written stories, lines... you can even use collage if you want.
BUT NO EXISTING MAPS - not traced, plotted on, or drawn from.
Create your map on paper roughly tabloid size (11x17).
Where to start, you ask? Well, how about where you live, work, study, eat, take walks, see friends, play hacky sack, take naps, pass through on the way to get coffee... and go from there.
For some inspiration and guidance, check out the following:
Interview with Denis Wood on This American Life about mapping
and some examples of Wood's maps. (more examples and explanations here)

For Monday, Sept 15 - Project 1, Part 2

2008-09-08T16:38:00.000-07:00

What you need to have completed:
1. tagging of images on Flickr from Part 1 with themes and formal devices (metatag: cityarchive)
2. 5 pictures in 2 forms
a. printed (from 300 ppi close to 8x10 in)
b. uploaded to flickr as 72 ppi at < 600px in any direction. (no other tags needed except: ourcity)
Details:
Create a series of 5 iconographic pictures of Champaign-Urbana using a digital camera. Each picture should attempt to convey an interpretive notion of the city (as explored in part 1) through an economy of means, using visual conventions and pictorial concepts that you can argue are socially recognizable (again, as explored in part 1). Your pictures must be minimally modified in the form of color alterations, but can be as complex of montages as you want. But ALL pictures used must be created by you with a camera.

Metropolis and the City

2008-09-04T11:09:00.000-07:00

For people interested in the film (Fritz Lang's Metropolis) we watched on Wednesday, I thought I'd post some thoughts on the specific image of the city and its inhabitants presented. The film was produced in 1927 in Germany during the regime known as the Weimer Republic, a time between the first World War and the rise of Nazi Germany. You can get more German history if you're interested, but it's worth comparing it to some of the other visual representations of the time. It would be hard not to notice that a major theme in Metropolis is the divide between "working people" and the "visionary" elite that run the city and the obvious plea for a humanist reconciliation between them. The depiction of a mechanized, industrial utopia is also there.
To think about this, it might be useful to look at three other images representative of similar ways of looking at the Weimar city:
Ernst Ludwig Kirchner’s "Berlin Street Scene" (1913-1914)
A Drawing by George Grosz (unknown title and date, probably between 1915-19)
Church of the Minorities, Lionel Feininger 1926
We'll talk about the film a bit more on Monday, but how do the ideas represented in these pictures come together very specifically in Metropolis?

For Monday, Sept 8

2008-09-03T10:45:00.000-07:00

Here's what folks need for Monday (remember - in room 229):
Your completed "city" archive (project 1, part 1) in digitized form. This should be 10+ "images" - images can be literary passages, still pictures, video clips, sounds, basically any media form that you have not produced yourself, but are found in the broader culture.
How things should be digitized:
A. Still images - if not digital already, scanned in at 72 ppi and saved as a medium quality .jpg
B. Text/literary passages - either scanned in as an image (same as above) or typed and saved as a .rtf file.
C. Video - an isolated clip of relevant scene, saved as a .mov or .avi at 480x640 or larger (the name of the file should include the title of the video and year produced). For anyone who does not know how to do this, we can cover this in class, but at least have the timecode where the scene is located, and the DVD or other media that contains the scene(s).
D. Sound - sound, from film/video or any source, should be saved as a .wav or .aiff if possible. If it is already an mp3, that is fine. Sounds should also be edited to just the relevant segment. As with video, we can discuss how to do this - but have the timecode for the clip.
E. SAVE YOUR ARCHIVE TO YOUR PORTABLE STORAGE DEVICE, perferably in a folder named "archive" in a "project1" folder + Upload the jpgs to your Flickr photostream, adding them to the class group that everyone should have become members of.
In class, the established groups will work together to construct a meta-data/classification system that will help identify key themes and formal characteristics of the group's images. Each group will end up with a database.
We will also talk about using digital cameras, so if you have your own, bring it.

Flickr Group

2008-09-02T11:17:00.000-07:00

Once people have their Flickr account established, please join this group. All relevant photos will be added to this group and distinguished by tags. This way we don't need to link to everyone's individual Flickr page. We'll talk more about tags later.