liddlethought

We Are Watching - Video Documentation

2011-07-07T07:15:00.000+01:00

Just Another Artist Statement

2011-01-30T09:47:00.001Z

DIY Lover (Portland)

The performance consists of a textual reading that directs the onstage construction of a lover. The text Liddle delivers is compiled from a number of different dating guides, self help websites, and how to manuals. Semczyszyn reactively builds the lover from objects solicited in advance from participants who were asked to donate something they considered gendered. DIY Lover (Portland) is a performative inquiry into the material configuration of contemporary dating advice.

Part of the project was concerned with exposing the absurdity of these texts and their essentializing of gender in laying out rules to get a partner. The interplay between the text and the construction highlights the focus on control and responsibility in the dating advice, and the implications for identity in acquiring and maintaining a relationship.

Liddle and Semczyszyn are Vancouver based artists who have both shown internationally. They have an ongoing collaborative relationship using art practices as a methodology for analysis and criticism of social structures.

DIY Lover --the Not Sent Letters Show

2011-01-27T05:53:00.003Z

So, I didn't get into detail about the project in the last post on account I didn't want to spoil it. Some people think that you can experience the work in the same way by watching the video without having to be "there". Personally, I disagree because there is just something wonderful about how performance works on your body. And you have agency over where you look, the details you focus on and the moments you gloss over. In fact, Nola and I had a long conversation as to whether we were happy showing the performance in its entirety online. For now, we have decided that future DIY Lover performances will be discrete, stand alone pieces, so for now we will leave it. And YES, that is correct, DIY Lover will be reinvented in Portland on February 19th, for a special Valentines Day performance. Stay tuned!

Rina out.

DIY Lover --the latest collaborative project with the lovely Nola Semczyszyn

2011-01-14T04:26:00.005Z

Part of Jeremy Todd's ongoing project called Not Sent Letters, DIY Lover, had its origins, for me, in a collection of personalized email letters I received over the last year from Christian Carter, an expert in finding the perfect man. He intended, and succeeded, I believe to pray upon my insecurities around being chronically single, by repeatedly making the situation unacceptable and wholly my fault. Here is a small taste:

Ok Rina,
Do you have the love and the kind of relationship you want in your life right now? As you know, the holidays are for spending  
time with family and those you love the most. How are you going to feel when you're there  with your family and friends over the
holidays  and everyone else has great partners and  committed relationships or marriages? What about you? Why haven't things fallen into place for you?

This style of rhetoric goes on for about 500-750 words, with "OK Rina" thrown in at intervals. Receiving these emails for a period of about 6 months started to make me think that I should indeed shell out $100 bucks for the 4 set DVD. After all, $100 is not that much if he has already sorted out the mystery of relational happiness, and is going to give me the goods and I will find that man and be happy and desired forever!
Nola has a fascination with dating didactics. Her contribution to the text came in about 10 short bursts of practical, in the moment, what to do exactly to "get the girl/boy". An example is:

6. Never call the next day. You will appear to be desperate with nothing better to do. You want to project that you are "in
demand" and that you are busy, which will make you seem exciting, fun and mysterious. If you game a woman effectively
during your initial meeting with her, chances are you won't need to call her at all because she'll call you first. On that note, it
would be wise to always exchange numbers with a woman rather than only getting one from her. This is easily done by
handing her your cell phone and telling her to put her number in it, then once she's finished you simply call her immediately
so she has your number as well.

We have integrated both texts, and with all the mentions of "tools", "steps" and "skills", the construction metaphors became evident. I will say no more, but hope you can make it!

Rina signing out.

NOT SENT LETTERS
& GUESTS

@ dharmalab, Vancouver, 1814 Pandora (N. of Hastings, E. of Commercial @ Salsbury)

Friday Night, January 14, 2011, 8pm SHARP!

Please join us for an evening of interdisciplinary works by:

Anaka Schofield & Lori Weidenhammer
Katherine Somody
LeanneJ & My Name is Scot
Rina Liddle & Nola Semczyszn
Ron Stuber Colin McLaine
Soressa Gardner & Dennis E. Bolen
Jeremy Todd w/ Margot Leigh Butler, Natasha McHardy, Dinka Pignon, Yi Xin Tong, Dennis E. Bolen & Andrew Short
postlude music by CORNER & friends.

$5 suggested donation (toward production expenses)

Anaka Schofield & Lori Weidenhammer (two Vancouver-based interdisciplinary artists & friends) expand Schofield's dialogue w/ Helen Potrebenko's 1975 Vancouver novel Taxi! through an embodied exploration of transaction involving readers/listeners. Weidenhammer's Security Guard examines these encounters by providing "market research" on various sitters.

Katherine Somody (part artist, critic, skeptic & cautious romantic) screens the first in a series of self-portraits exploring relations between music & video, memory & storytelling, textual & somatic language - while trying (perhaps in vain) to disentangle the personal from the socially prescribed.

LeanneJ & My Name is Scot (two interdisciplinary artists engaging issues of class, identity & agency while living in Vancouver's DTES) screen Calculating 63: More than 15 years, over 63 lives, way too many excuses, endless questions, zero good reasons & only 1 perpetrator? Something in this equation doesn’t add up. This collaboration sifts through the statistics, looking for feeling & m Leaning behind the numbers and finding out that poverty, violence & exploitation can disappear just about anyone.

Rina Liddle & Nola Semczyszn (two interdisciplinary artists exploring art making as a methodology for analysis & criticism of social structures) present DIY Lover, a performative inquiry into the material configuration of dating guides.

Ron Stuber Colin McLaine (a drummer/percussionist & visual artist/composer) perform Shed, a work composed in a Strathcona shed for electric guitar and drums that might also involve the shedding of light, skin and inhibitions.

Soressa Gardner & Dennis E. Bolen(a singer/composer/performance artist & novelist/editor/teacher/journalist) combine prose, poetry and electronica within a new collaborative work @ Not Sent Letters & Guests.

NOT SENT LETTERS is an ongoing series of epistolary detours by Jeremy Todd (an entanglement w/ technologies of the self & the politics of meaning) involving online image/text posts, digital film shorts & multi-media performances. The dharmalab letters set will include live scores by ANDREW SHORT, image projection, & letters selected from the project blog (notsentletters.blogspot.com) & read by Margot Leigh Butler, Natasha McHardy, Dinka Pignon, Yi Xin Tong, Dennis E. Bolen

Explore previous Not Sent Letters & Guests events here: www.notsentlettersandguests.blogspot.com
Email Jeremy if you'd like to host or contribute to a future N. S. L. & G. event: jeremytodd [at] shaw [dot] ca

Hello, my name is Rina, and it is nice to meet you!

2010-08-06T00:42:00.002+01:00

By now, you have seen me with my message on live stream CCTV. Will we date? 604 722 1264. More to come later.

Rina

So things have a way of working themselves out, n'est pas?

2010-06-25T01:24:00.005+01:00

Giving up on the Libra Room happened a long time ago, it feels. And in hind sight, I am not all together disappointed for two very separate reasons. First: when I was introduced to a certain person, he immediately grab his chest, pushed whatever flesh he had in reference to my bust, which in all honesty is a bit on the ample size, and says to Davide "I love artists". Naturally, I ignored the lewd gesture and made my face of disapproval, accompanied by a very large eye ball rolling. And then we were back onto business. The second reason is purely practical. If the venue closes at 11, and daylight disappears around 10, then really, this project is not going to be as fab as it will if mounted in the fall or winter.

Project #2 is officially shelved and a new venue is in the works.

So how to write about a collaborative practice when there are no projects on the go you ask? Well, one of Davide's amazing qualities is that he is very social, and therefore, he has many friends and acquaintances, so many so that art opportunities just fly into his inbox, which simultaneously impresses and annoys me, specifically because neither does he have to try very hard to get great gigs, and nor does he bother with them in a timely fashion. And even after a proposal is 4 days late, or everyone else has confirmed a meeting schedule promptly, he still gets the gig. People generally wait, and for some reason, they are happy to do so. In this case, I make my I-can't-bloody-believe-this-guy-face, throw my arms in the air and tag along for the ride =)

Project #3 is also in the works, another collaboration as described by the forementioned dynamics, specifically my tagging along, that will be later revealed, as we are under a gag order, but it could be very exciting for many participatory artist in the Vancouver area...stay tuned!

And last but not least...

Project #1 a.k.a Working with What is Left

There has been so much going on that there has been a lack of time to sufficiently blog every workshop, but I will sit down and do that hopefully tonight for the simple reason that I do not know most of the people that I personally invited tonight, nor did I the other night, and the result is that the workshop was quite quiet, so I might have some time to write. Which brings me to the next important fact:

It is too much to have 2 workshops per week when you work than full-time. And what has suffered is my marketing efforts to get participants, no! say it isn't so, and whatever you do, don't tell my clients, although their marketing is going just fine ;-)

But in usual fashion, Heidi and I have come up with a brilliant plan that will help me continue my research on this project and get me out of Heidi's way so she can make room for Natalie Doonan and the collaborating team of Kristina Lee Podesva and Joni Low.

Here is The Plan......The Hammock goes offsite, as hammocks often do! We are both very excited to plan the first mobile residency. In July I will hold 3-4 more workshops with various groups, all unconfirmed, and in August, the build and public installation will take place -more on that later- and the open house / celebration, will be in early September, most likely the weekend after Labour Day. Heidi has also assigned a volunteer assistant, Lauren, who has just joined the Hammock, to help me carry out my plans. Yay Lauren!

Now off I go to see what's transpiring in the Tin Can!

What Was Once the Libra Room is Now ?

2010-06-09T05:25:00.003+01:00

Boys, boys, boys . Now I am not going to say that my boy was completely at fault, but I am not witness to the fact that he was not. Anyhow, long story short, we will not be showing at the Libra Room. And my advice to artists, make sure you don't piss the one in charge off, no matter who started it. At least it wasn't me this time. My mother always warned me not to get involved with Italians, although she was swept away with the kindness of this one just last night at my Dad's birthday party...but that's another story. Anyway, there will be lots of this from both sides I expect on account that we are both firey Italians.

Am I disappointed? You bet. Am I expecting that another venue will be found? Indeed I am. Will it be I who finds a venue and coordinates with the bar owner? Not a chance in hell.

So here we are at our first block in the collaborative process, and because I would still like to get laid tonight, I am forced to reconcile my own annoyance and pick the most tender words for a person who has had a difficult time lately. But I am not fixing it. And I wonder what he will think of this post.

Call For Researchers, a.k.a, Join Me in the Hammock

2010-06-09T02:04:00.003+01:00

Working with What is Left speaks to the detritus of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics, both figuratively and literally. Figuratively, the promised addition of social housing and arts programming, two of the benefits pitched by the City of Vancouver prior to the referendum, that were considered left wing, were reneged while the developers were bailed out of their financial losses. And literally, the detritus, the blue visa sponsorship posters that were distributed and displayed in many downtown retail and restaurant windows. These plastic laminated, stiff cardboard posters are a perfect building material, and will be fashioned into individual, portable housing structures / pods that will simultaneously solve the problem created by the lack of funding for artist projects and low-income housing.

Researchers are asked to participate in one or many of the workshops outlined below. Find a category that appeals to you, and please join us in the Hammock between 6pm - 10pm on the following nights.

Researchers are asked to participate in one or many of the workshops outlined below. Find a category that appeals to you, and please join us in the Hammock between 6pm - 10pm on the following nights.

June 1st: Artist's Friends and Balcone Reading Group - Making It Critical

June 10th: Art Students - Making It Exciting

June 15th: Suburban Ladies Over 60 - Making It Palatable

June 17th: Geographers and Urban Planners - Making It Functional

June 22nd: Landscape Architects - Making It Pretty

June 24th: No Fixed Address, Alternative Spaces + Off-the-Grid - Making It Practical

June 27th: Open House, 4pm to 8pm

Find the Hammock at: 1923 Graveley Street.

Enquiries can be made by contacting the artist at: liddlethought at gmail dot com.

Kind Regards,

Heidi and Rina

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Basic Logistics

2010-06-01T21:40:00.009+01:00

So now I have two projects on the go, and Blogspot is not really great for threading through multiple projects in a linear fashion, nor in clusters, as I am able to see. Any organizational tips would be greatly appreciated.

Here is the info:

Project I -- Title: Working with What is Left

Place: Hammock Residency

Synopsis: Taking the remnants of the Olympics and using them as both the subject matter and the material stuff with which the project will be built. The "remnants" include the condition of life in Vancouver as a direct effect brought about through hosting the 2010 Winter Olympics.

Details: In case you have, for whatever reason, not been following my seriously entertaining Blog posts, I will fill you in, as this is a project that follows out of a particular trajectory of work that looks at the way we look, including: surveillance, sousveillance and other controls of public space.
See: We Are Watching

Project II -- Title: Untitled Collaboration
with Davide Pan

Place: The Libra Room

Synopsis: Working with the frustrating City of Vancouver by-laws that serve to regulate the many small neighbourhood music venues, such as the Libra Room, Davide and I will play with what we can and cannot do, poke a little fun and have a little party. The Libra Room will be magically transformed in ways formerly unimagined by the proprietors of the art-hanging cafes, bars and restaurants. Issues of private and public are visited from the proprietor's perspective. What are the rules that serve to govern behaviour? What are the consequences for such transgressions?

Details: Davide and I are new lovers. And this tenuous relationship makes this project the perfect first try at de-sanitizing the participatory and collaborative practice, which, as mentioned in my last post, lives on as an after fact, by photography or other means of documentations, with all the messy bits edited out. There you have it, I said it publicly, and yes, it could go either way, and you get to decide what "it" is (and yes, I have asked his permission to blog about our process).

Incremental Time and my practice

2010-05-06T00:51:00.004+01:00

Process-based art-making is traditionally disseminated through displaying the remnants, detritus, tracings, photographs and other forms of documentation. But if the process is the emphasis, or the point of art-making, then doesn't it stand to reason that the process should be made explicit in the moment? Of course, writing is a reflective practice, and therefore cannot be considered within the parameters of what constitutes real time. As a way of undoing the tidy package of documentational exhibition that often, through circumnavigating a particular aspect or editing out the things that don't make sense, I am less interested in providing a nice sum-up, like I thought I started documenting this is public art. Now that I look back, the Alternative Methodologies class I was taking at the time, had already seeped into my psyche, and in the ever important re-read, I see already my interest in blogging in the moment, not editing out the difficulties in case they should make me look bad.

Instead, this blog, at this point is defined by me as a space for communal reflection on the process as it happens, not in real-time, but in incremental time. It is my hypothesis that if the process is the focus because its parameters ultimately determine how the work manifests (its material form), then the incremental time needs to be in the forefront, not just assumed within the methods; the messy bits, the moments when decisions are made in response to those messy bits, are integral to the process because they are ways reacting to the life of the work.

Revamping and Moving On...

2010-04-05T21:18:00.006+01:00

We Are Watching came to an end in Vancouver with the closing of the Paralympic games. All in all, I was pleased with my work and the audience response. Enough said about that. At this very moment, Danna, Kristina and I are creating the content for the second half of the book. I will keep you updated on its progress, specifically, when you can expect your copy, if you have already bought the first one.

If you are still interested in buying the catalogue/archive, there are still a few copies left, and I would be happy to mail you your very own for the small cost of $20. Please email me your request at weRwatching2010 [at] gmail.com. And yes, I am still accepting video submissions at the same address.

Since the last time I have posted, We Are Watching has gone to and left Finland as part of an exhibit curated by Anna Ruth. Originally from Vancouver, Anna has been living in Europe for the last fifteen years curating and art-making. She also showed work during the Olympics. To read about her mapping/drawing project, called Sensory Maps, click here. Anna also runs the gallery project called Äkkigalleria, that usurps spaces not in use and turns them into a temporary gallery. And this is where We Are Watching ended up along with my other project...

Working with What is Left is a participatory sculpture project that provides some musings through the detritus of the Olympic Games. The following letter of instructions/explanation was provided with a desk for the viewer to work at while they added and responded to the research. In an attempt to draw on "Finnish" design expertise, the viewer becomes the researcher/designer of homeless shelters made of the Olympic Visa sponsorship posters that were on display in many of the retail businesses during the games.

Dear Researcher:

The grumbling of the city started as soon as the Vancouver Olympic Committee first assembled for the intention of proposing to host the 2010 Winter Olympics. At first glance the proposal was rosy, with extra money to be spent funding a large number of arts programming in addition to the current civic and provincial funded art programs. There was also a promise that the Olympic Village, an area slotted for development (a.k.a. Concord Pacific style condo development) situated along the south shore of False Creek and which for the most part has served as Vancouver’s industrial district, would include mixed-market residencies after the Olympics were done. Specifically, there were to be a substantial number of units set aside for low-income housing. On this platform, the city passed a referendum by 51% in favour of hosting the events.

Of course (in my opinion), the extremely conservative provincial government under the head of Gordon Campbell and the vast number of profiting developing corporations sighed a breath of relief at the economic downturn as it provided the perfect excuse to back out of the social commitments made, and in fact, the City of Vancouver passed legislation allowing it to borrow more than it is usually allowed (and increase property taxes to cover the added expenses) to “bail out” the developers and consequently the developers and City reneged on the housing and cut the Arts funding by 92%.

This project speaks to the detritus of the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics, namely the worsened social conditions to be faced by Vancouverites and British Columbians and the physical waste, in particular the Royal Bank Visa sponsorship posters. The plasticized corrugated posters are perfect building and art material. Therefore, Working with What is Left will work with these conditions and detritus to provide an Olympic critique by fashioning the posters into life-sized homeless shelters, thereby solving the problems created by a lack of funding for artist materials and low income housing.

The research you see before you has been started by the artist. Please add notes directly on the pages, comments, highlight what you perceive as important, comment on the comments, add pages, make drawings, and literally contribute Finnish design solutions for these problems in Vancouver.

The notes will be synthesized into one design solution, and units will be built and put out in the streets of Vancouver this summer and documented for gallery presentation later this year.

Thank you in advance for your contribution!

Kind regards,

Rina Liddle

The Paralympics are coming, get your cameras ready!

2010-03-11T17:37:00.003Z

Well, the Paralympic Games are almost here, and I am looking forward to the added video footage! Also, if you missed my "Change in Plan" section above, The project will NOT be up until tomorrow. So sorry if you came by this week. Apparently, I was not in the loop regarding scheduling. I have had a few perplexed callers, and one insisting that our invitation card "implied that it would be running" which I tend to agree with. Apologies all around! Please let me know if you were one of the unfortunate people who made a special trip to the DTES.

I did not receive any footage of the Paralympic Torch Relay yet, if you are in possession of some clips, please send them my way.

We still have a few books left, if you are interested in reading about the project through the ideas of Danna Vadja and Kristina Podesva, please come by the gallery.

And for my good news!

We Are Watching will be travelling to Finland for exhibition, yay!

Tonight's the night

2010-02-28T01:19:00.002Z

Tonight is the last evening that I will be keeping gallery hours between 6-10pm, so if you are interested in seeing my project while I am around, drop by and I will make tea. Otherwise, the project is still viewable from public space, and alternatively, I will make myself available by appointment only. Of course, the gallery is open regular hours during the day, if you are interested in purchasing the book, but the projections start at dusk. To make an appointment, please email your request to weRwatching2010 [at] gmail.com.

...and in the Georgia Straight

2010-02-26T01:57:00.001Z

read it here

Juho Jäppinen, book designer & photographer

2010-02-22T05:20:00.005Z

For about 2 weeks prior to the show, I completely ignored my dear and lovely friend Anna in favour of her husband, Juho (a very Finnish name pronounced "youhoe"). "Hello, is Juho there"? "Can I please talk to Juho"? "I have a few changes for Juho" had replaced my usual girly and arty banter with Anna. I almost felt like I was having an affair, not because I was spending time with my friend's husband, rather, because my usual time and energy allotted for art-speak and collaboration with Anna, was now being spent talking art-speak and collaborating with Juho. I felt a bit dirty. However, the book part of the We Are Watching project is now available (and well received, thank goodness!). There are limited numbers, so please come by the Jeffrey Boone Gallery and take a look. The video contributors for the first half of the project are listed. All the others will be credited in the second book (which incidentally, is covered in the cost of the first book, $20). We will arrange pick-up or drop-off for the second part when you come into the gallery.

Three days in a row without a technical glitch, whew!

So, friend, collaborator, friend's husband, curator, and as previously mentioned, book designer and photographer is hereby credited with the following photographs taken at the opening.

Smooth sailing and enjoying the ride :-)

2010-02-20T22:50:00.002Z

It seems that Nathan has worked around the bugs on the player version we are working with. Even though I know first-hand, and have heard from others that technology is just plain finicky and can act up at any moment, I am going to say that all is well. The project is loading as it should and there haven't been any crashes as of late. On the down side, we have had to give up on the sound component. If I had this to do all over, I would have updated the OSX right from the get go, alas, hindsight...

It pleases me to spend time in the gallery during the evenings when people are Bright-lighting their evening away. I am an unexpected gallery component, but really, I have met the most interesting people, and it is really worthwhile for me to see how the audience interaction works. One observation that I find predominates, yet is not surprising, is the fact that almost all the walking traffic approaches from the west and impacts on the viewers' experience by making them work harder to tie the installation together. With the Vancouver Sun in hand, they know that there is a projection in the courtyard, but unfamiliar with the area, it takes a search to find, followed by a doubling back to the gallery to put it all together. I am intrigued by this doubling back aspect, although I am not sure why quite yet...

As I mentioned in the previous post, submissions were slower than I expected, yet there will be about 20 new clips added today. Come by to see the new footage, it is not like the rest ;-)

We Are Watching in the Vancouver Sun

2010-02-19T02:14:00.001Z

Here is a nice little ditty

Opening night and ensuing saga...

2010-02-18T01:30:00.013Z

The opening reception was lovely. Of course my parents were there, and look how happy they look! They don't get what I do, but amazingly, they are the first to buy memberships, donate cash and show up with flowers. They even come to Balcone Art Society General Meetings, go figure. I am lucky. But we can't talk about art, because, as my mum says, "It's just not my thing". Which makes me crazy because how can that be?! When I was learning welding at school and doing math for cantilever tables, my dad couldn't understand why I didn't get my Engineer's ticket, as both he and my brother did.

Anyway, I was a 1/2 hour late for my own opening, for reasons that will be stated under the "saga" part of this entry, but the silver lining was that I had completely avoided waiting on the first guests, and man, do I hate that part. I was shocked that there was a steady stream of people, and that I didn't know at least 1/2 of them, which is always a good sign because you can always count on your posse to show up, but people who come out of genuine interest are special. I had so much fun. Nathan and I let loose and apparently really needed to, on account of the "saga", and a small, yet lovely group accompanied me to the greedy pig for a late sup.

The pics you see here are of the gallery installation, for some reason, a.k.a. the rain, no one took pics of the exterior projection, even though it is clear that people went for a look. Perhaps some will show up.

These two photos absolutely amuse me.

The Saga...Well, the exterior projection has not been without glitches, and it has been, if I didn't take my work so seriously, a comedy of errors, first starting with only 1.7 GB hard drive space and a project that was to begin at 6.7 GB. Of course, this most irritating surprise was not discovered until the hour before opening, and required poor Nathan to re-write the code that was designed to automatically add new material, protecting the hard drive from crashing. Thank goodness Nathan is able to work such magic and we were only 1/2 hour late for our own opening. Not bad considering we were prevented from running the final tests remotely during the previous week. And, because, we were unable to run the final tests remotely in the final week before the opening, has, not surprisingly, led to a number of evenings of mishaps. So far, Friday went well, except the the project was not interactive, Saturday we were down, Sunday, and Monday --spot on. However, on Tuesday, everything came to a halt. Sadly, Tuesday was also a day of personal drama, and isn't that always that way, a major thing goes to shit when you are least able to deal. Thankfully, I have amazing friends and Nola ran me around town during the day in my little red Jetta on account that I was falling over with dizzy spells, and Alan, drove me down in the evening to a failed attempt to preform a fix. At 9:30, defeated, I took a cab home.

Today was fantastic. Nathan and I had a tranquil afternoon at Shawna's, where we were able to preform all sorts of tests to rule things out. There seemed to be one video clip that was initiating a bug in the player. Apparently, and frustratingly, this particular bug was eliminated in the next version of the player, but unfortunately, the old operating system on the mac we were given to use does not support this new software, so work around the bug we did, or rather, Nathan did. Then we discovered that when the projector turned off last night, it went into "stand by" mode. A tricky thing that happens after hours and hours of playing. Next we retested by sending a new video, and as we had no way of attributing exactly what was triggering the bug, Nathan decided to re-visit a remote access channel so that we can reboot from afar. However, Shaw doesn't allow for those ports to be open unless you pay for the "business" level of service. So, as a shot in the dark, we removed the sound clips, and that seemed to do the trick for tonight. After dinner at Hon's and driving Nathan home, I went back to Gastown to send one last file, crossed my fingers, held my breath, and the thing did NOT crash. So it is only a matter of checking it daily to make sure it runs. With that in mind, I will be sitting in the gallery, keeping vigil, should you wish to come by while I am there.

Oh ya, and the books are ready too. I will deliver them sometime in the afternoon.

Rina Liddle signing out.

Isn't Monique lovely?

2010-02-12T00:36:00.002Z

Monique is my neighbour, and doesn't she have a swanky and intelligent blog! Oh, and look, she's posted a blurb on my project. And they say that no one knows their neighbours these days...what would Brent say, the crazy landlord who told me it was against the tenancy agreement to knock on my neighbours' doors!

Here is her blog.

This could be a media kit...

2010-02-11T22:55:00.004Z

If democracy is to be a machine of hope, it must retain one strange characteristic –its wheels and cogs will need to be lubricated not with oil but with sand. ~Krzysztof Wodiczko

Rina Liddle is a visual artist, researcher and educator. At the core of her practice is the belief that art making is a polyvocal practice. Her work often takes the form of installations and interventions that deal with ideas regarding public space, and include digital media, photography, sculptural elements and collaborations. The material forms that she chooses are, for her, a means to renegotiate and make visible the conditions of the social body. Or something like that. Do you know what I mean? Subtle traces of the absurd in sociological methodologies are discernable in her work.

Part of the Bright Light program, We Are Watching is a participatory video exhibition that continues her trajectory of working with ideas focused on public space, surveillance, public art policy and representational power. There are two components: a large-scale projection in public space, and an interior projection within the gallery fed by a live surveillance camera. By using participants’ video clips documenting the Vancouver 2010 Olympic, Paralympic and related events, viewers are asked to consider the ways in which the City of Vancouver is represented officially, and the alternative views that are largely dismissed, or written over, by the spectacle machine, which serves to homogenize the Canadian subjectivity. Issues explored are surveillance versus sousveillance, the ways in which we watch events, the ways in which we watch each other and the ways in which we are being watched.

There is a two-part archival book project that accompanies the work. The first part has been printed and includes texts by Kristina Lee Podesva and Danna Vajda images of the Torch Relay. The second part of the book will be available after the show closes. It will function as an archive of the event as it unfolds over the time of the Olympic and Paralympic games. This book project will not only document the work, it will also function as a vehicle for the dissemination of the representations collected that provide an alternate view of the “official” versions sanctioned and circulated by VANOC and the City of Vancouver. Multiple subjectivities will add complexity to this overarching image of Vancouver. The book will be donated to select public libraries.

Liddle has a BFA from Emily Carr University and a MA from Goldsmiths College University of London. She has shown internationally in London, Los Angeles, Posnan (Poland) and Jyvaskyla (Finland) and currently resides in Vancouver.

Things of Desire

2010-02-11T16:35:00.002Z

Everybody wants to be desired. Now We Are Watching, an offspring of mine, has been blogged about (assuming "blogging" is a real verb) by Jen Simaitis on the Canadian art blog called Things of Desire. Check out the article here.

Eeny, Meeny, Miny, Moe...

2010-02-10T23:23:00.006Z

Pick a map, any map, check the time here
and take your video camera on a date. Only two days left to participate in Torch Relay documentation. Then I will be hounding you on documenting the Events proper.

Celebratory Sushi with Nathan

2010-02-07T20:07:00.012Z

Yesterday's install and test went better than I expected, not because I am a downer, but I have found technology unpredictable on the first go. So we now have the large projector installed in Shawna's apartment. Is it serendipity that Jeffrey knew Shawna before this project, and that she just happened to live in a loft facing the exact same wall that we would need to project on? Some days make me quiver with excitement...Shawna's apartment is fab,
I am almost hoping for some kind of laptop crash just so I can get in there again...hold on, I did say almost! Okay that is projector one, up and ready after many hours of fidgeting (see Jeffrey fidget-->) and the results are quite amazing. You can see here the cute little projection that lands on the glass window, where Shawna
can view the whole event from the comfort of her own home, glass of wine in hand.
(That is Nathan on the floor and Jeffrey standing standing behind him).
And this is an image of the reflection from the window on her couch. It's amazing how clear everything is, even the crappiest file quality shows well with this super-projector! So don't be afraid to send in your cell phone vids, it's all good.And lastly, the two images below are the sneak preview of what you can expect in the gallery. Notice the infrared technology looking like a bad case of pink eye.
Hope you can make it to see all the components together. The opening is this Friday, February 12th at 7-10 pm at 1 Cordova Street in Vancouver. See www.jefreyboonegallery.com for details.

Oh my goodness!

2010-02-06T02:30:00.007Z

Life has been a crazy lately, mind-blowing crazy. Crazy, like I'm going to throw up, crazy like my head might explode and crazy like I am so excited I can hardly stand it. And busy. oh my goodness, busy. It has also been over one week since I have blogged, and I am afraid I can only offer up an abridged version of progress without musings or funny anecdotes --never mind clever ideas! I just have none at the moment. But probably at about 3 am, my thoughts will start and I will wonder if I should jot them down instead of moving my furniture around, which is what I have been doing at 3 am as of late. Yes folks, I have a bad case of the butterflies.

Having said that, Jeffrey found long range wireless outdoor speakers for me, the book has gone through a most thorough editing (thanks Kristina and Jeffrey!), the postcards and brochures are available and I keep getting more submissions (yay!).

And that is where I am at folks. I will leave you with a series of video stills that I am particularly fond of. Stay tuned for a report on the hopefully final install test that will take place Saturday night.

The Book is Almost Ready!

2010-01-25T22:18:00.006Z

Lately, there has been quite the push to organize Book 1 of We Are Watching. As you might have heard, the We Are Watching project will have a book/exhibition catalogue accompanying the event/exhibition. The first book will be available at the gallery on opening day and will include some texts about the project, information on those people who have helped me get here and images selected from the video submissions of the 2010 Torch Relay. We have collected all the texts and I have selected all of the images, and Juho, my Finnish book designer (not only do I love having my own technician, I also lay claim to my Finnish book designer), is putting the whole thing together, and we will send it to the printer tomorrow. Yay! So if you have been missing my posts, or tweets, I am now back.

Other news includes:

I have a new ftp site, for those who have taken large files, or many files and would like to send them easily. I find this method better than downloading from Youtube on account that VANOC is now pulling the video down, even from my blog boo! And downloading results in a loss of quality. So, please feel free to contact me for the ftp site details.

As we have all heard, because we all pay attention to CBC radio ;-), the torch has reached British Columbia, and I am hoping to still collect Torch clips, so please help me get the word out. Other areas that are under representative are: Manitoba, Saskatchewan, P.E.I, our Territories, and most small towns. If you know someone in these areas, please send a request for video, it is out there, just needs to be found.

We have sound! Jeffrey, lovely Jeffery, has bought me a couple of wireless outdoor speakers. Yay Jeffery, I am so excited I can hardly stand it! It didn't take many submissions for me to realize that sound was so much part of the visual experience.

Mark your calendars, we open on Friday, February 12th at dusk. There will be many events and shows opening that night in the area, so bring your family and friends, leave your car at home, and come down for an evening of Olympic, but not Olympic, celebrations. See www.bright-light.ca for the program lineup.

Here is a lovely video that I think I will use in a future art project too! I am not sure if it is from Christina, or her brother. Either way, I can't wait to play with it.

Today was an exciting day.

2010-01-17T06:42:00.005Z

Some of you may have noticed from my tweets that I spent this afternoon in the gallery with Nathan, my back-end programmer (I LOVE having a back-end programmer, by the way, mostly because I love saying it) and Jeffrey. This is the first time that Nathan and Jeffrey have met, and that was a conscious decision on my part, only because I am possessive, and indeed, I found myself reminding Jeffrey that I found Nathan first! Nathan is an extraordinary team member, both in my art practice and in my money-making endeavours. We met almost a year ago through my lovely neighbour, and we have been happily collaborating on projects ever since. His problem solving skills are remarkable and he is really reliable (more so than the artist-come-techs that I have been used to dealing with, no offense intended). Through our projects, I have become comfortable in taking on tons of work that I have no idea can be accomplished, and when I bring the problem to Nathan, he always finds a brilliant solution where I don't have to compromise, and that is just great as far as I am concerned. In fact, I have been so spoiled, that I don't even worry about technical aspects anymore. I think I am in love.

So back to the gallery. As mentioned in Tuesday's post, the part of the software that performed the function of taking the video clips out of my email inbox and opening them was up and running. Today we tested the section of code that functions to slot the open video into a lineup which feeds to the player, whilst hooked up to a projector. Of course there were a few glitches, mostly because the mac we will be installing runs on 10.4 and Nathan was programming on 10.5. But with a little tweeking, the program is officially up and running. Next Nathan will work out the line-up parameters and the moderation component. He says this will take only about 4 hours and we should have the whole thing ready to test in a few days. I need to take pictures, I just realized hmmmm...

I am going to try to share another video with you. Fingers crossed!

This is a video taken in Stratford, Ontario, a place I adore mostly because it brings back wonderful memories of a time when I worked at the Stratford Theatre as a Jewelry Designer....ahhhh Stratford...lazy weekends...hobbies...dinner parties...killer parties...rooftop garden growing tomatoes...with good people...sigh...Oh ya, this video was submitted by Michaela McMahon, who skillfully demonstrates panning.

I got -16 on a Georgia Straight comment I made earlier today

2010-01-14T10:05:00.009Z

Okay, I want to address a common problem with participatory art practices. On the one hand, if an artist would like to really get a cross section of participants, s/he pretty much has to leave the academy behind, otherwise, through the use of critical and intimidating language, that artist may find s/he has inadvertently cut her/his audience and is now preaching to the converted. On the other hand, an artist can build a project that asks certain questions, while proposing that project with neutralized language. Everyone will inevitably make their own meaning in the end, but what that meaning is, will only reveal itself in the moment of engagement.

By no means am I saying that an artist, or a person in general, can't be critical. I firmly believe that critical people are the most positive people on the planet because they are hopeful for a better situation. They are intent on improving the status quo.

What the IOC and VANOC are asking the viewer to do is to experience the games and celebratory events in a very particular way. One that maintains the "official" visual packaging of the Olympics and Vancouver as a city.

What I am asking viewers to do is to consider what aspects of the games and celebratory events they think is important to engage with, and to present for others to see. My projection will be unedited, excepting things considered offensive, and I get to decide what is considered offensive, the clips will remain exactly as they are sent to me. So that takes care of the viewers of the games, now there are the viewers on Cordova Street, the people who are watching what the viewers attending the games are watching. Then there are the viewers inside the Jeffrey Boone Gallery who are watching, through surveillance, the viewers on Cordova Street, watching souveillence from the viewers at the Olympics watching the Olympics.

So, while I'd like to conclude that the negative ratings came from angry little f**ks who didn't take the time to read about my project, I am left wondering: Are my expectations too idealistic? And what are the limitations of participatory practice anyway.

Here is the link of the article that I responded to, with all the ensuing comments.

http://straight.com/article-280338/vancouver/antiolympic-paintings-appear-where-beatty-street-murals-once-dispalyed

Okay, I realize that the above is not a real link, but again, Blogspot is letting me down...

p.s. I had some trouble uploading my video on the last post, so either you saw a video that didn't match my clever description, or you didn't find one at all. For my lack of technical finesse, I apologize. I find it extremely hysterical that I insist on using technology in so many of my projects, hopefully you will too.

Phase one of the software building is complete and tested!

2010-01-11T18:02:00.006Z

Yesterday, I had a fabulous meeting with my most excellent programmer, Nathan Dickerson. He demonstrated the section of HTML code that he has been writing for me. It's action is to automatically take the video files that are emailed to me (by you) out of my inbox and open them. The test for this section of code went off without a glitch and the the next section will place the clip into a line up that will open in a video player. The completed software is scheduled to be tested with the projector this Saturday. Stay tuned!

The video submissions continue to flow in, thanks so much! It amazes me how much more information is offered up with every new perspective. And what has really come to my attention is how important the sound is in giving the visuals meaning. This observation has sent me furiously searching for cheap ways to project the sound, so much to do, so little time!

And to return to my ongoing conversation regarding videography, please see Wade Fitzgerald's climax submission from Newfoundland.

"Scenography"

2010-01-08T20:16:00.007Z

Scenography is the practice of making theatre including sets, costumes and texts from a theoretical and practical point of view. Scenographers work from the premise of a space that is constructed, updated, transformed and filled. The role of the scenographer is analogous to that of the dramaturg.

The word "scenography" is of Greek origin, coming from the words "skini" meaning "stage" and "grapho", meaning "to write" or "to describe". So the actual meaning of the word is "to describe something on stage". More recently, the word is also used for museography, the art of designing museum and exhibition sets.

It really only seems fitting that I use Wikipedia as reference, non?

As indicated in my previous post, please see the below example of a "scenographic" videography approach submitted by Kat Piraino, showing the celebration tent in Victoria on Day 1 of the Torch Relay:

Inspired By a Blog Comment

2010-01-08T05:45:00.000Z

I have been thinking lately about the ways that people take video. Surveying the submissions thus far, there are a few distinct approaches that are clearly definable, and for which I have taken the liberty to name by appropriating film jargon: "the climax", "character development" and "scenography". They are all pretty much self-explanatory; the climax refers to the passing-of-the-torch-moment, character development is the following of one particular torch bearer, either through camera panning, or the jiggly-running-next-to-the-torch-bearer technique. Scenography documents the scene, whether it be the tension build-up, the crowd warmer-uppers, the protesters, the crowd dispersal, the secondary players, a.k.a., and the periphery players --those setting up, organizers or, as they say in the theatre, those who strike (take everything down). To illustrate the different genres of torch relay videography, over the next few days, I will post a few clips from the submissions for your viewing pleasure, and to encourage participation, as I am sure you will find a technique, or clip that you have already taken, that will match the examples in technical rigour and artistic merit ;-)

Thanks for reading, and keep the clips coming!

Making Friends in Toronto

2009-12-18T03:54:00.000Z

Thanks to Christina, for the lovely blog entry, and all her tweeting on behalf of We Are Watching. Check out what she had to say here

La Flamme Arrivera à Belle Montréal ce soir!

2009-12-10T08:41:00.001Z

Bonjour tout les monde à Quèbèc, je cherche éncore des video de la Flamme. S'il vous plaît, pris avec des téléphones mobile video ou des caméras, merçi de me les envoyer à weRwatching2010 [at] gmail.com pour mon projet artistique.

La route est:

Montréal-Est, Maschouch, Terrebonne (ça c'est belle, j'ai resté ici 1992), Bois-des-Filion, Lorraine, Rosemère, Blainville, Sainte-Thérèse, Boisbriand, Sainte-Marthe-sur-le-Lac, Ceux-Montagnes, Saint-Eustache, Laval, Dollard-des-Ormeau, Kirkland, Pointe-Claire, Dorval, Montréal-Ouest, Côte-Saint-Luc, Hampstead, Westmount, Mont-Royal et Montréal avec les célébrations à Laval et Montréal!

Hello people of Quebec, again, I am looking for video of the Torch Relay. If you please, send me video that you have taken with your cell phone, or camera, and send it to me at weRwatching2010 [at] gmail.com

The route is:

Montréal-Est, Maschouch, Terrebonne (it's very beautiful here, I stayed with friends here in 1992), Bois-des-Filion, Lorraine, Rosemère, Blainville, Sainte-Thérèse, Boisbriand, Sainte-Marthe-sur-le-Lac, Ceux-Montagnes, Saint-Eustache, Laval, Dollard-des-Ormeau, Kirkland, Pointe-Claire, Dorval, Montréal-Ouest, Côte-Saint-Luc, Hampstead, Westmount, Mont-Royal et Montréal avec les célébrations in Laval and Montréal!

You may notice that I have changed the email account. That change was to improve twitter efficiency, and because I was getting too much spam. But both accounts are activated, so don't worry that your submission was sent to the wrong place. I was lucky enough to meet the lovely Alexandra Samuels who has changed so many of my bad internet habit, including rude twitter practices, who knew there was already an established etiquette! Ignorance is no excuse, but you will now find me on my best behaviour, so try following me at weRwatching2010.

Thanks, and pass it on!

Et Quèbèc Encore!

2009-12-05T13:46:00.000Z

Le Vendredi, Dec. 5

Le Torch va au Quèbec aujourd'hui. Les ville sont Saint-Prosper-de-Beauce, Saint-Georges, Saint-Beniot-Labre, Saint-Éphrem-de-Beauce, Sainte-Clotilde-de-Beauce, Robertsonville, Thetford Mines, Black Lake, Saint-Ferdinand, Plessisville, Princeville, Victorialville, Warwick, Danville, Asbestos, Saint-Georges-de-Windsor, Windsor, Lennoxville et Sherbrooke. Je cherches des video de Torch Relay et les célébrations. Envoyez à wearewatching2010@gmail.com. Merçi!

Friday, Dec 5th, the Torch is passing through Saint-Prosper-de-Beauce, Saint-Georges, Saint-Beniot-Labre, Saint-Éphrem-de-Beauce, Sainte-Clotilde-de-Beauce, Robertsonville, Thetford Mines, Black Lake, Saint-Ferdinand, Plessisville, Princeville, Victorialville, Warwick, Danville, Asbestos, Saint-Georges-de-Windsor, Windsor, Lennoxville and Sherbrooke. Please pass on info to your friends and family in this area. I am looking for video footage from cell phones and other video capturing devices. Email to wearewatching@gmail.com. Details at www.liddlethought.blogspot.com Thanks!

Finally, a Bone!

2009-12-05T08:57:00.002Z

Well after tweeting and littering news articles with my comments all day for two days in a row, trying to entice Canadians to play, and knowing from Google Analytics that people are, in fact, stopping by, I finally have real-life interaction from a person! A trace left in the form of a comment no less. Yipee! And what is even more fantastic is that Hodgepodge Grumblebeak blogged about my project. Here is her take, please let me know yours.

Le Torch va au Quèbec aujour'hui!

2009-12-04T19:38:00.000Z

Le Vendredi, Decembre 4th

Le Torch va au Quèbec aujourd'hui. Les ville sont Lévis Montmangny, Saint-Romuald, Saint-Jean-Chrysostome, Charny, Saint-Lambert-de-Lauzon, Scott, Sainte-Marie, Vallée-Jonction, Saint-Joseph-de-Beauce, Beauceville, Notre-Dame-des-Pins et Saint-Georges.
Je cherches des video de Torch Relay et les célébrations. Envoyez à wearewatching2010@gmail.com. Merçi!
(Je m'excuse, mais je parls français comme une grosse bébé!)

Friday, Dec 4th, the Torch is passing through Lévis Montmangny, Saint-Romuald, Saint-Jean-Chrysostome, Charny, Saint-Lambert-de-Lauzon, Scott, Sainte-Marie, Vallée-Jonction, Saint-Joseph-de-Beauce, Beauceville, Notre-Dame-des-Pins and Saint-Georges. Please pass on info to your friends and family in this area. I am looking for video footage from cell phones and other video capturing devices. Email to wearewatching@gmail.com. Details at www.liddlethought.blogspot.com Thanks!

Progress Report

2009-12-04T01:20:00.000Z

Everything has been full steam ahead lately. Yesterday, I gave an artist talk about my work to the Socs 201 Intro to Cultural Theory and it went really well, from my perspective, except that I forgot a couple of my punchlines. But the information fell into place, as it tends to do when you are talking about your work, work that you are both invested in and passionate about. Sharing my ways of thinking about praxis-based practice in relation to my process was great in that it really helped solidify my own understanding. The questions were great, and I had no reason to be nervous, even though there were 175 of them!

Danna Vajda and Kristina Lee Podesva have sent me their essays for the first book, I am so pleased, I can hardly stand it. Juho Jäppinin will have to provide some serious book design work to make a form worthy of such thoughtful words.

Video submissions are trickling in, always looking for more though, and I seem to be constantly posting comments and notices, twittering, facebooking, stumbling and otherwise browbeating my people into submission (pun intended). Help me get the word out people! I know I am getting about 50 hits a day on this blog, but there are no trace elements left behind to prove this, and thank goodness for google analytics for making me not lose my mind from the appearance of lonely. Feel free to leave comments, show me that you are there. Particularly tell me if you are planning to send in a submission, but haven't gotten around to it yet. That would be just lovely! Particularly of interest are submissions from Northern Canada and the Maritimes. Images of these areas are skimpy, and I would love to have every area represented in some way. Also, I am surprised to not have received any "protester" clips. I was expecting a tonne of those, as this will be one of the only ways that protesting will be viewed publicly from a non-media source.

On another note, Jeffrey, from Jeffrey Boone Gallery has found me a...get this...wireless surveillance camera! How exciting is that?! No crazy wiring and strata council approval necessary for this little lovely. Here, take a look for yourself:

the most beautiful surveillance camera in the world

Okay, that is all I have to say for now.

Bright Light Gets A Mention in the Vancouver Courier.

2009-12-02T22:16:00.000Z

Cick here to view

Robson Square Re-opens Today --Looking for Video Clips

2009-11-23T17:58:00.001Z

Today is the re-opening of the Robson Square ice rink, not sure if there is an official ceremony, info is hard to come by, but just in case there is some kind of Olympic ceremonial pomp, I will be heading down for the 12 pm opening to collect video clips. It would be great if you could join me. Send any clips to wearewatching2010@gmail.com to participate in my project. Find detailed information at liddlethought.blogspot.com.

can you believe this is the only link to more info.?

Today the Torch is in P.E.I --video needed pass it on!

2009-11-21T18:44:00.000Z

Today the Torch Relay and Celebrations pass through P.E.I. Send in video clips from your cell (or any other device) to wearewatching2010@gmail.com and have them projected large-scale in Vancouver during the Olympics and Paralympics.

Amherst, Wood Islands, Belfast, Vernon Bridge, Cherry Valley, Pownal, Stratford, Charlottetown with evening Celebrations planned for Charlottetown.

For project details, including link to interactive map, see liddlethought.blogspot.com

Thanks and pass it along!

Bright Light Gets A Mention in the Vancouver Sun

2009-11-20T03:29:00.001Z

I highly recommend searching your own projects --look what I found!

http://communities.canada.com/vancouversun/blogs/cultureseen/archive/2009/11/11/art-s-birthday-starts-bright-light-s-public-art.aspx

Nov. 16th - Nov 20th Olympic Torch Relay in Nova Scotia - Looking for Participants

2009-11-16T16:50:00.003Z

Torch Relay travels through Nova Scotia this week

I am looking for participants to video document (with your cell phone, or any other video device) and send the files to wearewatching2010@gmail.com. The files will be part of an art project and will be projected in public space in Vancouver during the Olympics.

Here is this week's route:

Monday, Nov 16th: North Sydney, Sydney Mines, Membertou, Glace Bay, Dominion, Scotchtown, New Waterford, Sydney, Baddeck, Wagmatcook, Whycocomagh, Waycobah and Mabou.

Tuesday, Nov. 17th: Port Hawkesbury, Port Hastings, Tracadie, Paq'tnkek, Antigonish, New Glasgow, Trenton, Stellarton, Bible Hill and Truro, with celebrations to be held in Port Hawkesbury and Sydney.

Wednesday, Nov. 18th: Truro, Millbrook, Stewiacke, Shubenacadie, Elmsdale, Enfield, Waverley, North Preston, Cherry Brook, Cole Harbour, Dartmouth, Beechville and Halifax with public celebrations to be held in Truro, Antigonish and Port Hawkesbury.

Thursday, Nov. 19th: Annapolis Royal, Bear River and Yarmouth.

Friday, Nov. 20th: Halifax, Sackville, Windsor, Falmouth, Grand Pré, Wolfville, New Minas, Kentville, Kingston, Greenwood, Middleton, New Germany, Bridgewater and Lunenburg with public celebrations to be held in Wolfville and Lunenberg

See liddlethought.blogspot.com for project details and link to interactive map for route and times.

Pass it on.

Torch Light Relay NEWFOUNDLAND and CAPE BRETON

2009-11-15T18:47:00.006Z

Well, the Torch is making it's way across Newfoundland and Nova Scotia in the next few days, and I am still looking for Torch Light Relay and Celebration video footage. Collect footage off your cell phone and mail to wearewatching2010@gmail.com to participate in my art project which will be projected during the Olympics in Gastown, Vancouver.

Here is today's route:

Badger, Springdale, Deer Lake, Pasadena, Corner Brook, Port au Port, Kippens, Stephenville and Channel Port aux Basques

Tomorrow's route is through Cape Breton:

North Sydney, Sydney Mines, Membertou, Glace Bay, Dominion, Scotchtown
New Waterford, Sydney, Baddeck, Wagmatcook, Whycocomagh, Waycobah and Mabou

Check out the ETA and celebration points on the interactive map found on the right of the screen.

Bright Light

2009-11-04T23:31:00.005Z

I found this page on the City of Vancouver website that outlines the Bright Light project that is the umbrella project for "we are watching". Feel free to check it out. More to come about my gallery shortly.

Bright Light on the City of Vancouver website

Day 6 & 7 Olympic Torch Relay and Celebrations

2009-11-04T03:08:00.003Z

On Wednesday November 4th, the Olympic Torch will pass through:

Dawson City
Old Crow
Inuvik

On Thursday, November 5th the Torch will pass through:

Detta
Ndilo
Yellowknife
Kugluktuk

With Evening Celebrations in Yellowknife, location to be determined.

Please notify any people you may know in these areas who can send cell phone video documentation (or from any other kind of device). wearewatching2010@gmail.com

Thanks

Yikes! Today the Olympic Torch Celebrations are in Whitehorse, and I forgot to get the info out!

2009-11-04T01:28:00.003Z

If you know me on Facebook, then you know I am neck-high in marking. And that is why I have foolishly not prepared any useful posts for my people in Whitehorse. So, as a last moment ditch effort, as I believe these celebrations go until 10ish, I will post now and hope that the message gets there.

Today the Torch Relay passes though:
Sandspit
Queen Charlotte
Taku River Tlingit
Atlin
Whitehorse
Kwanlin Dun

At 6 pm, there will be a celebration at Shipyards Park, so get out your phones and cameras, and pass the post on!

Introducing We Are Watching

2009-11-01T00:55:00.003Z

We Are Watching is a video / surveillance / book project that investigates ways of watching during the 2010 Winter Olympics and Paralympics that are to be held in Vancouver this February and March.

Currently, I am collecting video footage of the Olympic Torch Relay and Celebrations by soliciting participants to video document the events as they pass through Canada. The video documentation can be collected by cell phones (and any other video capturing devices one might have) and the resulting footage is submitted by email to wearewatching2010 [at] gmail.com.

For relay and celebration map and details, click the link on the right side bar.

The footage will be projected, unedited, on a building housing the Jeffrey Boone Gallery in the Lower Eastside of Vancouver during the Olympic and Paralympic games. During the games, people can send me their clips documenting any aspect of the Olympic games and celebrations that are happening in Vancouver and Whistler. These images will be instantly snatched out of my inbox and slotted in chronological order to be projected.

Also, the clips will be considered for publication in a book of the same name that will provide an archive of alternative-to-the-official images that will be flooding the world.

The on-site viewers watching the projection will be captured by a surveillance camera which will be projected in the Jeffrey Boone Gallery in real time.

This project is curated by Jeffrey Boone, from the Jeffrey Boone Gallery (for more information on the Jeffrey Boone Gallery see www.jeffreyboonegallery.com) and part of the Bright Light project and generously funded by the City of Vancouver.

Please inform your friends and family who might like participate, I am anxious about getting material.

Thanks!

Instructions for Participants - in 3 easy steps

2009-10-30T19:15:00.004Z

Go out and video document the torch relay and celebrations, Olympic and Paralympic events with your mobile devices, camera, etc.
Email the clips to wearewatching2010@gmail.com. If your files are large, try sending them through yousendit.com. They have a free membership option.
Include your name, or however you would like to be credited in the book version

Thanks so much for participating in "We Are Watching", this work is dependent on participation.

We Are Watching

2009-10-30T18:13:00.004Z

We Are Watching is a project I am developing in response to the 2010 Winter Olympics and Paralympics, to be held in Vancouver and Whistler this February. I am exploring ideas of surveillance by creating a place for "sousveillance", to stand next to, or confront the "Official" representation offered to the world through the regulations imposed by VANOC and the Olympic Committee. The collection of sousveillance will be accrued by asking attendees to collect and submit video footage of various Olympic events and celebrations. The resulting footage will be projected during the Olympics and Paralympics on the building which houses the Jeffrey Boone Gallery, in Gastown, Vancouver. I will write more, but hopefully this is enough info to inspire participation.

Day 5

2007-08-21T06:50:00.000+01:00

The place was under the Granville Street Bridge; it was our rainy weather location and it was deemed necessary earlier in the day. The space was remarkably different than the others; primarily it was the quality of the light, or lack thereof, that was in stark contrast to previous locations. Also, it was not as pretty. However, the space did lend itself to a chalk mural that Nola brought to the project. She outlined everyone in dance pose and then we filled ourselves in. Robyn followed suit, with yarn in hand, and connected us all by the hand. I, on the other hand finally found myself inspired to “install”. I must admit, my work is minimal by nature and I have resistance to decorate for decoration sake. It was the coloured cup cake papers that enticed me. They were delicate paper three-dimensional bits, and I was immediately taken by them. So, as we had all noticed the tendency for passers by to pass on by, marking as large a space between them and us, I decided to snake the cupcake papers in along the sidewalk, forcing people to engage with us, even if it is only to avoid stepping on a paper.

Unusually, I have described the place before describing my project. Hmmm, I wonder what that means? Perhaps I am being taken over by the group…something to consider. So tonight’s project revolves around art theory, art school and the tendency to wear black. I have heard the stereotype that artist’s wear black. I don’t know too many artists who do this; however I do wear black. But I’d like to point out that I have been wearing black since sometime in the mid-80s, long before I ever identified with being an artist, if that is indeed what I do now. But anyhow, I wore black tonight, and I danced to an art theory lecture, one from my MA at Goldsmiths college, something regarding the way in which the city is framed and how that can be a political thing and how representation can help to build and breakdown political agendas. The class is called Reading the City and it was given by Michael Keith sometime last September. The piece is called Self-Portrait While Mobile Dancing to an Art Theory Lecture.

I will post the self-portraits just as soon as I get them.

Day 4

2007-08-20T04:31:00.000+01:00

Tonight was magic. Our location was the Cambie Street Bridge, and I had been looking forward to this location from the beginning. It has a narrow pathway with the direction moving in only two directions. This configuration lends itself very well to public interaction of a different kind. This nights installation was pared down in contrast to the environment my colleagues provided. Their theme was party. It wasn’t necessarily a conscious decision for the group, but in the end, that is what one would suspect. There were streamers blowing off the bridge and decoration was everywhere. My project on the other hand was comprised of my camera set up on a tripod and a sign with the phrase “take a photo”. I didn’t necessarily mean that people should take a photo with the camera as I left it. I just thought people would be less likely to steal it if they also had to take a tripod. And then I started dancing. Jamie lent me his ipod after I complained that my minidisk player, which is not mac friendly, only came with two music discs, I usually use the device to record lectures and don’t have my own personal stereo. He also set up a “Rina needs to boogie” playlist with 3hours of dancing fun. That made a huge difference! I had such a good time, my dancing felt better, I was internal rather than focusing on the passers by, and I genuinely had a good time. In fact, the time just flew. Okay four sessions and a cynic like me is hooked.

These are the photos that other people took.

Day 3

2007-08-16T18:23:00.000+01:00

Tonight seemed hard, but in the end, it was all in my mind. The location was the community park on the corner of Richards and Davie. Now this park is long and narrow with water features at both the north and south ends. There is also a long, narrow trough connecting the two features. It appeared that we should pick one end or the other in order to maintain visible from the street. Initially I thought the north end was superior; due to the current civic strike, the water was not flowing and that left these amazing step-like stages to play with. However, by the time I rallied the troupes to have them move to the other end, the skateboarders had moved in to the space and I was intimidated into picking the other end. So our end was square shaped with a circular pool with a central raised platform where the water is usually pumped. That meant that we were not contained, and in fact, we were considerably separated, a figuration that I found discomforting, not to mention that we were surrounded by occupied benches, providing our first ready-made audience. In the one corner there were three young guys, they dressed hip and their body language was aloof even though they were obviously watching intently. I could see one of them had an ipod and I was irritated that they refused to dance. Then the most fun thing happened: someone I know joined us. He danced with vigor, and I was so happy. After the session, I asked him how he had heard about us. Apparently he was told by a mutual acquaintance and he came by to check us out because “he was on his way to get green onions anyways” And then Robyn told me that the “cool kids” would be joining us tomorrow, that they were really interested but that only one of them had an ipod on them. And it was all-fine.

Tonight I danced without a strategy. I needed time to reflect on the act itself.

This is us getting ready

Day 2

2007-08-15T23:24:00.000+01:00

In keeping with my plan, I head down to Science World, strategy in hand. Tonight I dance without a personal stereo device. I mean, if one of the points of mobile clubbing is to do something on your own simultaneously within a community, what happens when you try to enter that community without following the proper rules? Well, if I thought I was uncomfortable being looked upon by those who pass by, and my camera pointed directly on me for a whole half hour, this night was excruciating. Without an internal focus, ie. the music, my attention was propelled much further than the bubble-like boundary of space in which my body occupied. To further complicate the matter, I was without a stereo, the signifier that alerts people to why I am there and what I am doing. So, the gaze was not only from the passer-by, but also from other members of the group. Although I could be imagining this due to my heightened self-awareness, I am sure I did notice more eye contact that was not followed by a smile. Last night, eye contact was usually always followed with a smile, the smile of recognition that we were into this activity together. So there I was, trying to dance away with no music and not much connection with my comrades. It certainly felt as if I was on the edge of a dance circle, not able to get in.

Day 1 of Mobile Clubbing

2007-08-15T06:37:00.000+01:00

I have been thinking about my strategies –my art-making strategies that I usually use—and I am trying to employ them in this strange context. I always worry when I get involved with other people, other artists, and particularly the “public”, whatever that is. I am a bit of a control-freak. After all, I have been successfully indoctrinated by a certain art college, and that has had a profound and lasting effect on my ability to have un-analytic fun. So I am taking this project far too seriously and have decided that the best approach is to come up with a different strategy every night that pertains to my discomfort, and that the nightly experience of enacting out the strategy will help guide, or direct my decisions for the next night’s strategy bringing me ever-closer to the distilled visual version of my discomfort.

On the first day I head over to the site, it is the Granville bus loop at 5th Avenue, right next to the great waterfall that I love. I arrive much too early and I feel like I might throw up. I want this feeling to translate digitally. In my anxious mode, I grab on for dear life to the strategy I have used many times, and I ask the kind volunteer to take photos of me every minute as I dance in front of the lens. This project will be called Thirty Minutes of Sheer Hell, or Thirty Minutes of Discomfort, depending on my sense of humour when I hang the photos.

Mobile Clubbing? Me?

2007-08-15T06:18:00.000+01:00

I’ve hooked up with a duo that operates under the name Foolish Operations. They are the mobile clubbing scene in Vancouver. And what is my interest you ask? Well my interest is two-fold. First, I have always been disappointed in the lack of community and political engagement found in the citizens of Vancouver. I suppose it is easier to get a couple hundred people to show up to something, or even nothing at all, in London, a city with the population of about 10 million compared to our puny 2 million (both numbers include the greater area). But still, as long as I remember, it has been tricky to get Vancouverites to buy into anything that might be construed as fun, silly, or not cool. They will aloofly await another city to try something out and then proclaim that thing over. And although mobile dancing, or flash mobbing, as it, and similar spontaneous group actions, have been theorized through their politics, I have been giving it a second look through a narcissistic lens. My personal interest is not in its politic. Rather, I am interested in it phenomenology. How does it work on my body? How does it work on me when I act abnormally in public space, space where others, people not in the know, are going to see me acting silly and un-cool? So I decide to meet Robyn Campbell’s challenge and join her and her collaborator Julie Lebel for a half an hour a day of mobile dancing over the course of 2 weeks and see what I can see.

This is Public Art: Third Time Lucky

2006-08-26T17:49:00.000+01:00

documentation 4, originally uploaded by rina.liddle.

documentation 3, originally uploaded by rina.liddle.

It`s Monday morning, I called the HHS Hire people. I have found that if you present a problem and then feign as if you have no idea of any possible solution, Londoners love to find you a solution, particularly if you are a girl and they are not. If you find your own solution and ask them for what you want, you will get the big egg. Responses include: “No, we don’t do that”, “No, that is against our rules” and a particular favorite, “No, I can’t help you, that is another department”. So long-winded it was, I recounted the weekend’s activities for the technician and happily, he soon was at my house, picking up the defunct generator bringing another, bigger version in hand.

Well armed, off we went, and, as a descendent of Italian heritage, the kind that resembles a subject that is uneducated and superstitious, I was thinking. “third time lucky”. Thankfully Eleanor, a classmate of mine, helped with the driving, and being a rather confident Londoner, she was not afraid to park illegally. We arrived at our destination, set everything up –the only anxiety this night was of the technical kind—only discover that I needed an adapter for my mac. Bloody hell. So Eleanor zipped though the streets to South East London and thankfully I found mine exactly where I thought I left it.

Back again and everything was almost beautiful, except the projector wasn’t reading my computer. Thankfully the AV rental people had posted their cell phone right on their equipment and I called for a little emergency consult. Within minutes we had things running, finally.

The response was a mixture of what I had expected. There was a range of engagement, from people glancing and walking past, a few apologies from those who realized part way that they were walking through the projection (or perhaps through the videoing of the projection), to people who stopped to enquire about the project.

The woman whose response I had found most interesting was a resident of the neighbourhood. Just to set the tone, this area is in the financial district of London; and therefore, it is frequented primarily by office workers and tourists who come to see St. Pauls Cathedral and the surrounding statues. This woman was shocked to see the CCTV images. While understanding on an intellectual level that every angle of the square was imaged by the cctv cameras, she was quite unaware of what those images looked like. The project gave her a different understanding, one that she could relate to in a tangible way. This response was what I was after; to create a different way to apprehend the condition of London life, from that of knowing that you are being watched, into the experience of knowing that you are being watched. It is subtle in words, yet phenomenally different.

I am now off to the south of France to spend eight days writing my dissertation, what can a girl say about that?

This is Public Art, A Failed Event

2006-08-21T09:13:00.000+01:00

When you think you have accounted for everything, you are still not prepared for all potentiality. Or, put simply, the last laugh might be on you. I know this to be true, particularly after this weekend.

The “customer service” woman at the HSS Hire shop assured me three things before I placed my reservation on her hand-held generator for this weekend’s event. First, it was silent. Of course, I didn’t expect silent exactly, but quiet was what I was hoping for. Secondly, after explaining that I was a 5” 3 weakling, she assured me that indeed I would be able to carry this thing across London by tube. It was a handheld generator after all. And lastly, she assured me that there was 500 watts of power, plenty for my 150w data projector. (A fact I knew because she made me call the data projector “customer service” people, who much less confident and not at all interested in checking, told me that it would definitely be under 500w).

And my prep day went like this:

Carsten, my German friend who is on holiday with me at the moment and I walked down to Brockley Road. I sent him off in a direction for good coffee, Time Out travelers guide and A-Z in hand. I met Michael and we headed to the Home Depot store, can’t remember the English name for it, to source wood and various gadgety-things for our show in September. With a short stop at Comet, to buy a dvd player, we made our way to the gallery space where Tom was working on the roof and Alison was already waiting for us. Alison, Michael and I proceeded to test the infamous brick clips ™ (thank you Lee Valley) and measure the ins and outs of the space. The procedure ran like a well-tuned machine, efficient and satisfying.

Then I went home to run my last checks on the equipment for the event. The generator worked, but silent, it was not. Our first clue was the “must wear ear protection” sticker slapped on the side. Remarkably, we got the data projector doing its thing quite quickly and I phoned for technical support regarding the power surge protector. Then we packed up and were transported by a very large moving van from Poland –an extremely funny way of transporting our hand-held generator.

The thought of the loud generator in that space, with all the cameras and a parked police van not more than 12 feet from where I wanted to project and a building security guard sitting in a lobby, was torture. And then I remembered that the point of the game was to get things running and get them shut down. So I got everything set up saving the generator for last. Pulling the generator starter and hooking up was the climax. Get the power surge protector in, got that running. Hook the data projector in, got that working. Plug the data projector in, got standby power there. Turn data projector on, and the power ceased. The climax fizzled as I tried a few more times to get the power to get there. The generator sounded pathetic as it struggled to rev up enough power for my 150w device, never getting there. I phoned the rental place only to be told that the 24hour centre in Hackney was only 24hours during the week, a different story than the one I was told only hours before. We packed up and went home.

Ironically, I didn’t feel complete failure as I had expected; I had after all run a loud generator in public space for at least a half an hour without any attention, and in a paranoid anti-terrorist kind of place, that was something.

This Is Public Art

2006-08-18T08:41:00.000+01:00

this is public art, originally uploaded by rina.liddle.

liddlethought
Today is the day. It seems I have been preparing for this day for over 6 months. I am projecting my dissertation final project into public space, guerilla style. This Is Public Art consists of london cctv footage that is intermittently interrupted with the text: this is public art. I will be projecting the footage back into the space where the footage originated, near Saint Paul’s tube station, in full view of the camera that gave birth to my piece and possibly the same surveiller who helped me set up the camera to my aesthetic taste.

My anxiety is running high. With a lack of technical support from my sociology-based visual program, I have yet to confirm if, in fact, a hand held generator will in fact power the data projector for a half an hour without a power surge. Apparently, the tool rental technician advised me not to power such equipment with their generator, even with a power surge protector, which they will rent to me for an extra tener. The data projector, I acquired, is not insured, of course.

But perhaps I won’t even get that far, projecting into public space, I mean. The police are quite fast here, I have noticed, with all the terrorism hoopla, which is the point. When I was in the bank control room taking portraits of the lovely chief inspector (nice ass, I have never really been drawn to men in uniform…) I couldn’t help but notice that one of the operators had noticed some kind of disturbance and dispatched someone, I am assuming by foot, to go check it out. And when I was setting up for another portrait just outside the Liverpool Street Station, the foot patrol were on me really quick-like. I would like to know if terrorists are really so clumsy as to use medium format cameras and tripods.

I guess my question, as I set out to start me day is: If I am successful with this project, as in if I get to project a half hour of footage into the space unattended to, what does that say about my project and my dissertation argument? Only failing will prove my point.