Hi all, I have posted a response to Pei's very interesting post which he originally sent to me personally. The group which Pei is part of, are pasting copies of the discussion on their own site here so I thought I might as well share the dialogue - http://2010.playaround.cc/tiki-read_article.php?articleId=16 - you can read other texts that may have been written by other collaborators from their end, also I believe.
Anyway comment and share in the dialogue if you wish, it's all very interesting. wishing everyone well. marc ------------------------------ Here is their project. playaround 2010 Electronic Art and Digital Environment Workshop – DIWO Culture (playaround10 – DIWO Culture). "playaround 2010 Electronic Art and Digital Environment Workshop – DIWO Culture;PlayAround10 is the third edition of an intensely parallel and collaborative workshop of mediating the creative use of FLOSS (Free/Libre Open Source Software) and DIY practices to an audience of young students and emerging artists of diverse backgrounds. It combines the knowledge creation and open distribution of new media technologies and contemporary art practices in a socially responsible and relevant context." http://tinyurl.com/2ud73v6 (external link) Hi Pei, Thank you for taking the time to discuss about 'DIWO'. Firstly, I would like to say that I think your project is excellent, it offers much value and is shifting and moving in directions which are incorporating agency and independent, creative thought and breaking through traditional concepts of learning and knowing; much needed in our world of over-mediated, mono-cultural dominated, top-down noise. >certainly I do not ask for your understanding Of course, this may not matter to yourself particularly, but it matters to me. I feel it is essential, for the well being of our human psyches that we, as imaginative beings engage in exploring beyond the given protocols and mannerisms, that too often enslave our essential selves. I am also, interested in how people share ideas and progress through the activity of independent and scale free situations, in respect of how they (or we) become more empowered through each other's crossing over of different values and (socially constructed) cultures, or national identities and beyond. Seeing others and respecting their context(s) is, one of the most valuable gifts anyone can receive from another being, whether this be from one or many. In fact, you could say that I have made it my life's work to see other's and breath in, other people's imaginative journeys and witness their engagements, explorations and developments with (hopefully) an open mind. Like most of our projects, they come about through real experience. Not from academia, even though to accommodate and appreciate intellectual stimuli and contextual reasoning, it is important to read and understand other people's minds and their own journeys. But, we have grown as an independent arts, collective since 1997, and have not asked to be referenced by academics who have been writing about certain aspects of media art and technologically used, culture, because we have never been part of an institution, like so many of these individuals were and still are. We did this all off our own backs - with others - developing gradually, without the support of the more 'official' art, technology historians and theorists' recommendations. Even though, we have known that we have answered many of the questions asked around art and networked communities through the years, with our shared practice. For instance, I taught myself technology in the late eighties/early nineties - hacking phones, transmitting into car radios, exhibiting in subways, running pirate radio stations etc, and running art, anarchist BBS Systems before the Internet. So what I am saying here, is that my decision in not going the traditional route is all part of what furtherfield is now, along with others who have shared in building something that we feel is special, it is not built on privilege but hard work and critical learning, and it has been tough. Because unlike many of our peers in the say 'net.art' world, we have never believed in the notion of a singular, modernist conception of genius or have followed the trappings of trying to be famous. We have always wanted something more substantial and inclusive, rather than the trivial action of getting known and shutting the door to others afterwards. It is only in the recent years that we are beginning to recognized and respected for our 'complex' engagement and different approaches towards, life, communities, social contexts. >BTW, even tho furtherfield made a milestone exhibition back in 2007, >i still think DIWO is a common phrase, just like Italo Calvino's great >title "invisible city" ... has already became a common phrase by its >often usages in many albums, art project world wide and transformed >into a sharable concept, some projects did referred to Calvino's book, >some doesn't. why? I do not think it is because of laziness or disregard, >because it is a good title also a state of mind shared commonly !! You >can't authorize a state of mind, that be crazy! should human society >operate only on the credit of others credit? Has human history ever >credit correctly? (those are the questions of confusion in me, >certainly I do not ask for your understanding) Our mutual conversation is based around some sense of understanding (or even some misunderstandings), and I would definitely want to understand and appreciate your context and reasonings in some way. Our dialogue is evidence that you may wish for some form of understanding, whether we agree with each other or not. If you read any of our texts you will notice that we never use the traditional terms that hegemonic art culture uses, such as innovative or the best artist, or genius, or milestone - for we feel that conforming to the 'Spectacle', of certain forms of language as a group, does not offer authenticity, or at least the potential of it. I agree that DIWO is now a common phrase, and I am proud that we have played some part in making it happen. We have accomplished something of value locally and internationally regarding the DIWO projects, and are glad that we have contributed in our own small way in bringing about DIWO as a term for alternative, creative practice for others to explore. D.I.W.O - (or Diwo's, or Diwo groups) Expanded from the original term known as D.I.Y. (Do It Yourself). D.I.W.O 'Do It With Others'. Is more representative of contemporary, collaborative - art practice which explores through the creative process of using networks, in a collective manner. marc garrett (2006-11-08) http://www.furtherfield.org/rosalind/definitions.pl?id=127 We know John Hartley very well. One of the references you linked to is by John, called - ‘The Future is an Open Future.’ Cultural Studies at the End of the ‘Long Twentieth Century’ and the Beginning of the ‘Chinese Century.’ We have been working with John Hartley on various projects and discuss ideas regularly. I remember reading this article when it was first put online, and wondered why, when using the term DIWO, that he did not mentioning our own explorations on the collaborative term? And I suspect, even though 'he knew' that we had brought about the term DIWO, he also felt it should be a common phrase. I do appreciate this. But, the issue here is not about the shallow need of whether one is referenced by another, it is more about respecting a grass-roots culture and recognizing its 'real' and active hard-worked contribution, sharing this information with others, contextually. Grass-roots groups do have the same frameworks and mechanisms in place to protect their discovered identities, successes and failures. Writing about all this stuff of course is, much easier than doing it in real life. If certain academics actually new (in their hearts and souls) how much of our lives is spent in making these valuable experiences and shared realizations happen, I think we'd all be in a better place right now. >should human society operate only on the credit of others credit? Has human history ever credit correctly? Very good questions. I feel that 'credit' as a word really does not really get anywhere close in explaining the actual dichotomy and its relational nuances, of what we are currently engaged with here. I think that it is much more interesting and also very complex. Unlike, most 'creative industry' orientated endeavors. Instead of falling into trad-art behaviours and neo-liberal banality, we have chosen to take risks and spent much of our time in building on our own shared contexts, bringing about social change, new or alternative meanings which are not so processed. We have built this, through constant communication from the bottom up. Spending many years so that our lives are not shadows of other people's ideas - they are lived out negotiations reflecting upon each others dialogues and creative spirits, and not interested in something so vapid or corporate, as social networking interfaces. But, from a position of engagement with 'real' people online and off line, in order to re-hack our socially engineered selves, mutually into something closer to what is worth more personally, than mere product. This is what makes such a thing as what we are discussing so important. We are not just discussing 'crediting' someone, we are discussing part of a group's mutually shared exploration, relating to actual community values. Yes, its messy, but that also makes it special, rather than it being mechanistic and efficient. This is also why it is essential for us to share such a dialogue as we are doing ourselves right now. Because, if I ignore your context and your community's nuances and reasonings, and just take from you and not acknowledge your message or imagination, then we as adventurous explorers in a world dominated by corporations who exploit us as resources themselves, will find it easier by 'default' to weaken our resolve, whilst we weaken each other's presence in the world. And when something is taken without the story of how it came about, we are merely diluted and more easily packaged and pushed out of the picture. This happens too much in history, we all know this. So, DIWO is not a product, it is not there for reasons such as 'accreditation', but about something more authentic in its spirit. It's a 'story' of how shared, mutual experiences have come about, which will hopefully inspire others and help in making our engagement with others more special in some way. Have a great time with your project. I'm on your side - wishing you much respect. marc Pei wrote: > Dear Marc Garrett, cc playaround-dev list, > > greeting, > > I am one of the co-organiser of playaround 2010 Workshop, my name is Liu, Pei-Wen or simply pei, your post on NetBehaviour mailing list caught my attention, in which concerning playaround10 used the term DIWO without contacting furtherfield because your post believed furtherfield invented this term with a milestone exhibition back to 2007 in UK. (which i knew about it much much later) and pls allowed me to skip historical references in this post. > > Do not worry, you ain't a pain, but brought up some good points for positive discussion, about the relationship of an co-operative concept, or the forming of a collective concept one would say, in a broader sense, if you agree, a contemporary concept is never a closest packed, that's why playaround promoted CC shared-alike, DIY, DIWO, and an approach of FLOSS. When we were in needs of composing the subtitle earlier this year, the TERM "DIWO" was inspired from Zach Libermann's preface for Japanese version of the book "Beyond Interaction" that Escher Tsai (another co-organiser of playaround) translated into Mandarin, and the following term "Culture" was inspired from another co-organiser of playaround - Marc Dusseiller's last year workshop - hackteria.org; DIY microscope taught me that the contents of petri dish is also called "culture" in english, before and after my prompted idea announced on playaround-dev list, I never thought of who is the inventor of this term, i thought it should be a common phrase, just like FYI ...BTW, even tho furtherfield made a milestone exhibition back in 2007, i still think DIWO is a common phrase, just like Italo Calvino's great title "invisible city" ... has already became a common phrase by its often usages in many albums, art project world wide and transformed into a sharable concept, some projects did referred to Calvino's book, some doesn't. why? I do not think it is because of laziness or disregard, because it is a good title also a state of mind shared commonly !! You can't authorize a state of mind, that be crazy! should human society operate only on the credit of others credit? Has human history ever credit correctly? (those are the questions of confusion in me, certainly I do not ask for your understanding) > > But I certainly agreed with you that playaround said very little about "DIWO Culture" on our website, DIWO Culture is the English subtitle, or 文化培養皿 in Mandarin, I did not use the term DIWO in our mandarin subtitle after discussion with Escher, simply because it doesn't mean anything in our language to be able to elaborate the concept we tried to convey, so translating mandarin title back to english would be " Culture Petri Dish", where an stimulating yet experimenting environment shared by creatures within, where a culture is cultivated that corresponding to the believes of DIWO as the method of workshop. > > Here I pasted short paragraph i wrote about DIWO Culture / 文化培養皿 to illustrate the theme of playaround10, which also could be found on our website ... http://2010.playaround.cc/spirits > > 2010 Theme - DIWO culture, each module is a smaller circle of the bigger circle of playaround workshop, each has it unique culture, specific motifs and potential of reconnecting to other circle. From Do-It-Yourself to Do-It-With-Others; digital culture and art offer countless potentials to connect shared interests among groups, this possibility has effecting how we deal with daily routing and later, our needs. On the other hand, it restructures the meaning of needs, and its by-product, twixt the communication, and reinforce a physical realisation from an abstract concept. Nevertheless, the most interesting emphasis of playaround workshop is how to co-operate with others. > > In fact, furtherfield's DIWO exhibition was never in my scope, i enjoy this coincident and happy to cycle it with cc shared-alike, any comments and suggestions are more than appreciated. > > have a brighter summer day, > (ya, cited from Taiwanese film - A Brighter Summer Day 1991 - by Edwards Yang) > > pei > > > http://2010.playaround.cc > www.little-object.com > > > > > > > > On 5 Jul 2010, at 17:27:000, Chun Lee wrote: > >> dear all: >> >> i have just read this message from the NetBehaviour list, which mentioned playaround, but not in a very nice way. i can see their point, and >> DO think that what ever influences we have drawn upon, they *needs* to be credited properly. >> >> i would advice either pei or escher writing to them as soon as possible. otherwise playaround would be at risk of been seen as something we >> had not intend for it to be. >> >> cheers >> >> chun >> >> ----- Forwarded message from marc garrett <[email protected]> ----- >> >> From: marc garrett <[email protected]> >> To: NetBehaviour for networked distributed creativity <[email protected]> >> Subject: Re: [NetBehaviour] early >> Date: Mon, 05 Jul 2010 15:36:11 +0100 >> User-Agent: Thunderbird 2.0.0.24 (X11/20100411) >> >> Hi Annie, >> >> yes, I will write to them. >> >> I do find it surprising that they have not contacted us, especially >> knowing that they have been influenced in some way, to use DIWO in a >> similar context. >> >> I am wondering if there is anyone on this list who know these people, or >> are part of the project 'playaround 2010 Electronic Art and Digital >> Environment Workshop – DIWO Culture (playaround10 – DIWO Culture).' >> http://tinyurl.com/2ud73v6 ? >> >> Just typing diwo & furtherfield, or even 'DIWO' on its own in search >> engines brings many results of DIWO's origins, their research is much to >> be desired. >> >> marc >> >> >> >>> Hi Marc >>> >>> I agree >>> it's ok but >>> you could write them anyway >>> >>> kisses >>> Annie >>> >>> On Mon, Jul 5, 2010 at 1:56 PM, marc garrett >> <[email protected]> wrote: >>> Another groups using DIWO Term... >>> >>> Hi everyone, >>> >>> This post will be especially interesting those who have taken part in >>> our shared 'DIWO' (Do it with others) projects in the past. >>> >>> I have been noticing various groups/projects out there, who have been >>> using 'DIWO', as a contemporary form of sharing, collaborative, >>> collective practice for a little while now. >>> >>> This a recent project I have noticed, but no references to ourselves, >>> the inventors of the term & practice itself - oh well. I suppose >> it's ok... >>> Marc >>> >>> wishing all well. >>> >>> >>> playaround 2010 Electronic Art and Digital Environment Workshop – >> DIWO >>> Culture (playaround10 – DIWO Culture). >>> >>> "playaround 2010 Electronic Art and Digital Environment Workshop >> – DIWO >>> Culture;PlayAround10 is the third edition of an intensely >> parallel and >>> collaborative workshop of mediating the creative use of FLOSS >>> (Free/Libre Open Source Software) and DIY practices to an audience of >>> young students and emerging artists of diverse backgrounds. It >> combines >>> the knowledge creation and open distribution of new media >> technologies >>> and contemporary art practices in a socially responsible and relevant >>> context." >>> >>> http://tinyurl.com/2ud73v6 >>> _______________________________________________ >>> NetBehaviour mailing list >>> [email protected] >>> http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour >>> >>> >>> >>> >>> -- >>> >>> Documentation of Huis Clos / No Exit - On Translation >>> Video, reactions of the performers and the public, photos and the >> performance protocol >>> http://bram.org/huisclos/ontranslation/indexfr.html >>> >>> Article IF NOT YOU NOT ME, ANNIE ABRAHAMS AND LIFE IN NETWORKS, >>> Maria Chatzichristodoulou in Digimag 54 May 2010 >>> http://www.digicult.it/digimag/article.asp?id=1793 >>> >>> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> NetBehaviour mailing list >>> [email protected] >>> http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour >> _______________________________________________ >> NetBehaviour mailing list >> [email protected] >> http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour >> >> >> ----- End forwarded message ----- > _______________________________________________ NetBehaviour mailing list [email protected] http://www.netbehaviour.org/mailman/listinfo/netbehaviour
