Hi Heather, Thank you for your answers.
I'll hold back till tomorrow regarding any other questions so to leave space for Aymeric to come on board, later on. marc > Hi Marc, hi everyone, > > Thanks everyone for the welcome and interest in pure:dyne. That question > is interesting because Aymeric and I will have two different > perspectives, him as an artist and co-founder of the project, and me as > a curator/producer and newer to the project. Aymeric is actually > teaching a pure:dyne workshop this week with some of the other > developers at Goldsmiths, through Graham Harwood, so he might be popping > in and out of discussion in the evenings as he can. > > I joined the pure:dyne team about a year and a half ago though have been > near the project for about three. The team has grown quite organically > and socially – it was founded by members of the GOTO10 collective > (http://www.goto10.org) who themselves met through workshops and events > around London and Europe. When I first started working at Space Media > Arts (http://www.spacemedia.org.uk) in London I was looking for someone > to teach a workshop on Pure Data to some artists there and when asking > around, the names of two GOTO10 members, Antonios Galanopoulos and Chun > Lee, kept coming up. I booked them to teach the workshop and when we > were communicating about system requirements in advance, we had to run > through a checklist of externals and settings to make sure all our OSX > Apple machines were going to work and be compatible with what they were > teaching. It took a bit of time to get all the machines running in the > same way and Antonios told me about this project they were working on > that would eliminate a lot of that work. And, interestingly, it could > also run on a LiveCD where people could take the software and system > home with them to continue their work – a big bonus for us as we wanted > to see our participants, often from very different backgrounds, continue > their learning so the workshops would have legacy for them. That wasn’t > always possible if they had to buy proprietary software or get a full > Linux system working at home. An increased, meaningful uptake in > technology tools by wider groups of people was where I saw the culture > meaning in this project. > > My imagination was captured by the idea of an operating system by media > artists for media artists. Artists all work in different ways of course, > but there were (and are) definitely a set of tools that many of the > artists I knew were using in common (Pure Data being a big one at the > time). I was interested in something that could draw together those > tools in a way that was optimized for the way artists work, and also saw > an opportunity for media labs like the ones I’d worked in to input into > the development of a system that was close to their needs as well. So > although the FLOSS ideology is a big part of the pure:dyne project, I > was initially more interested in it from a functional, not political, > point of view. Also a community-building point of view – I imagined a > network of media labs (like the ones I worked in) and artists taking > collective ownership over a system that was optimized for the way they > work, learning from one another and creating a common platform. That was > where I saw the meaning for my field of work. > > In terms of my own involvement: I hadn’t seen a group of artists who > were working so closely with the mainstream/wider FLOSS communities > before to create something that was ‘up to speed’ with wider technical > communities – i.e. ‘not just art’. pure:dyne isn’t an artwork, it’s a > tool, and I was interested in how a bunch of artists had the technical > capacity to make something that functioned as such. Real h4x0r stuff, > but also interesting to watch them develop the system as a bona fida > FLOSS project and not an artwork inspired by FLOSS. I learned about the > day-to-day, boring parts of how FLOSS projects work. It’s an elaborate, > structured, disciplined, interesting working system – not just all love > and openness. But what it seemed like is that when the pure:dyne team > would get together they would have fun joking around about the things > they were working on and *making* things. The developer team all became > friends and the work was not always fun but doing it together, > especially crammed in a small room and sharing links and snacks, looked > like it would be. So I basically just wanted to get in on the party and > they graciously took me on as a developer. :) > > Aymeric will have more, from the artist perspective and the longer > history... > > H > > marc garrett wrote: > >> Hi Heather Corcoran & Aymeric Mansoux - a warm welcome to the >> Netbehaviour list, >> >> I know that there are few on this list who are interested in >> pure:dyne. Some have already used it and others are playing with the >> idea of usiing it. It would be great to hear from them as well, >> regarding their thoughts and experiences with pure:dyne, as the >> interview progresses. Anyone can take part in this discussion, but it >> is good to remember that it will end up on the front page of >> furtherfield for others outside of the Netbehaviour list to read. It >> will be edited, but not heavily. The interview starts today 16th Oct >> and ends the 23rd Oct 08. >> >> >> So, I would like to kick off this discussion by asking Heather >> Corcoran or Aymeric Mansoux why they decided to get involved with >> pure:dyne and what it means to them, as practitioners in their own >> field, and what it means to them culturally? >> >> marc >> >> _______________________________________________ >> NetBehaviour mailing list >> [email protected] >> http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour >> >> > > > _______________________________________________ NetBehaviour mailing list [email protected] http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour
