A collaboration with Joni Brown (choreographer)-Jonis' research is on the value of dance in nature and how the natural world revitalizes movement practices and educates an approach to a more holistic automation . She was doing a week long site residency at Haldon Forest, under the umbrella of the Centre for Contemporary Art and the Natural World @ www.ccanw.co.uk, and invited me to spend a day in the woods with her, doing a set of exercises and engaging in a dialogue around ideas of non-visual perception. The other users of the forest area we were in were happy to be enjoying the forest in their own fashions- bird watching, hiking, rambling, mountain biking, picnicking,using the play facilities, having leaf fights...
We began a series of exercises Joni devised as specifically non-visual. We both felt the senses of hearing, touch and smell became more sensitive and aligned closer together than sight would usually 'allow'- the natural world blossomed around us - autumnal crunch, crisp rustle and rot, slime and must, became pleasant again once the blindfold of assigning value to objects had been replaced with the immediacy and slow delicacy of investigating an environment as textural, without a desire above feeling our bodies align with that space to corrupt our adventuring.
We guided each other- turn and turn about, from a respectful distance, creating a area of non interference where serious danger issues such as deep crevices or unstable trees could be negotiated without risk.- flora and fauna became others, equals even, in the space, instead of items to classify from a removed view point.
Lying on my back on the forest floor, i became aware of the stereophonic aspect of the wind in the branches high above- using my hands i responded to the urge to conduct the wind, letting noise like interference, like waves, but twisting directional, playful, irrepressible. who was moving who? Friends who practice Ai Keido had taught me Ki exercises, and this was a experience not dissimilar- I felt so comfortable and poised on the knife edge of sensation, like the environment was pushing back responsive against my skin, playing me....
with eyes closed, though the forest around the centre is busy with cyclists, hikers, children and families, we felt hidden, safe to investigate and move freely, released from awareness of the gaze to enjoy more innocent pleasures - mushroom funk, flaking scales of bark, tacky resin under the fingernails, 1 inch high baby firs against the skin of your cheek,biurd song filling your nose and rich petey earth your ears, back pressed hard into a tree, supported in the slide round all limbs held loosely, then slowly tightly pressurizing to test to know to enjoy the weight and the unexpected encounter of something new to feel- less A - B , more, be here now.
I recorded our blind explorations- and we documented with film in the days' final performances. The audio recordings act as a sensual score-though the dances cannot be repeated (the generation of noises using materials disintegrating cannot really be reproduced, the work is a suggestion of movement rather than a reproducable recipe) the recordings do suggest exploration and free play...
My own interest lay in sonic scores from environmental sources. After broadcasting the work of artist Ricardo Reiss on a sslloowwssuunnddaayy, particularly 'You Go Where You Should Go', which flagged up listening, generating sound, and responding to noise in the environment. His work was generated for a dance performance and composed of urban sound elements, i found it simple and moving, and i wanted to expand upon ideas of the 'permissions to move' that hearing allows- ie to respond to sound physically in a creative way is called 'dance'. Culturally segregated areas with imported noises need not replace the natural environment as a venue and material with which to work.
To be culturally excepted a person must qualify as a dancer, the environment must become a stage, the audio of life must be recognised as a soundtrack. Which leaves responding physically in the woods or street to encountered aural phenomena the domain of... extremely rewarding challenging behavior :-)
A contextual enquiry for BA Writing at Dartington College of Arts: testing my own receptivity within the definition of a context: Community Radio. what do i mean by community? Living, sounding (broadcasting from) rural Devon, across the Southams, over the globe via the world wide web, on into outerspace. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
hi!
My practice as a writer has been developing towards audio work, and I have been more and more interested in the medium of radio as a platform for showing my own work, and also in radio’s possible uses as a tool of social empowerment. I am wishing to understand how radio is being used by artists and activists to create spaces that function as community centres, and how radio can be used to facilitate well being for individuals and in localities.
I will need to define what I understand by ‘community’, and also clarify which model of radio I will be studying.
I will be avoiding an ethnographic definition of community, as that is a life times’ work in itself- instead I will work around the ideas and writings of radio and audio artists (Gregory Whitehead, Allen Weiss, Charles Bernstein) and also other writers, artists and activists that offer definitions of community movements that I see Soundart radio as aligning itself alongside (Joan Retallack’s ‘dialogic community’, bell hooks’ ‘communities of resistance’, Felix Guattari’s ‘free radio’ etc.).
Radio for this CEP is a small local public broadcasting venture called Soundart Radio 102.5 FM, which broadcasts under a community license- it is not run for political or commercial gain, it is run by and on behalf of its listening community, and represents both the community of its geographical area, and also radio as a living and historic ‘hot’ media with a international community of listeners, producers, makers and enthusiasts. I will be seeking to understand how Soundart radio fulfils the role of community /ies, and how it serves the desires of said community /ies, and will be reflecting upon and monitoring my own interaction with these ideas as a individual participating, listening and producing, and process this into both audio and writing documentations.
Broadcasting can be considered as a mirror to the way we live, and I am interested in programming and stations that offer alternative and considered options within their scheduling.
Radio art requires a consistent body of research and practice that concentrates on sound at its point of signification, not a literal reading that will collapse into cliché, but a sensitivity to the ways in which meaning in sound circulates, dissipates and re-emerges. The development of an autonomous body of theory and practice regarding aural referentuality- in particular as it relates to radio and electronic media- will contribute to a better understanding of the role that radio art plays in the articulation of social and cultural ideas. (Lander,D. 1994, Radiocastings: musings on radio and art in Radio Rethink
The two community models I will be focusing on are individuals sharing a geographically related relationship within the area of FM reception, and also communities physically distant but still communing /communicating, thorough both FM and Internet radio. I will be looking the social benefits of participation in the arts:
Personal: growth in confidence, creative and transferable skills, social lives are improved through friendships, enjoyment and involvement in the community. In a wider social context: confidence of minority and marginalised groups is gained, promoting social cohesion. There is empowerment of a community to be involved in local affairs, a strengthened commitment to place and an ability to tackle problems. Provides the opportunity to take positive risks, contribute to education and personal and social change (Matarasso, F, 1997: ‘Use or Ornament? Social impact of participation in the arts’ p79-81).
I have secured a practical intern-ship at Soundart radio from September through till December 2010. This community radio station's location, programming and programmers, its geographical area, it's international and local outreach projects and its ethos and manifesto are all relevant to my enquiry.
My particular artistic interest lies with
Transmissions that Publicise the Private, or through an opening of dialogic space create new energy and directions within a social order.
Programming that re-instates the authority of chaos and chance, within the context of a functioning community.
Broadcasting that foregrounds and celebrates ambiguity and individuality, supported by structures of acceptance and value.
Work that transforms attention into action and revitalizes languages’ and radio’s uses in the public sphere.
I intend to immerse myself in the life of this small radio station for my time there.
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