Tuesday 11 August 2015


The Innov8 Invercargill team would like to invite you to the next Innov8 Invercargill Pecha Kucha being held on Monday 17 August at Level 6, Kelvin Hotel, from 5.30pm for a 5.45pm start.

Presenters this month are:

Stephen Daviesthe manager/curator of Anderson Park Art Gallery who will speak on the history and significance of the gallery’s collection.

Kathryn McCully –presents on Soft City: The Animation of Cultural Scenes and asks the question If Invercargill could be contextualised as a “soft city” providing the stage for the development of social scenes which intensify urban performativity, what could these scenes be and what role could they play in the revitalisation of the life of the city?

Mick Hesselin - architect with an extensive knowledge about Invercargill's heritage buildings who will talk about some of the buildings we have in the CBD.

 
For more information about Innov8 Invercargill Pecha Kucha visit our Facebook page

Sunday 2 August 2015

A Southland Museum

https://vimeo.com/135204716


a southland museum

Directed and Produced by Kathryn McCully

 

The definition of a museum in New Zealand is broad, recognising a diversity of non-profit entities that research interpret, preserve and manage collections on behalf of communities[1]. The Museums Aotearoa description of a museum’s purpose is indicative of the belief that collections are preserved for the purpose of interpreting histories, exploring ideas and creating dialogue that contributes value to communities. The majority of museums in New Zealand were relatively recently established[2] and are classified as small – employing between 0 and 5 full-time staff[3]. The most recent sector survey indicates 62% of museums identified funding, collection care, buildings, visitation/engagement and staffing as challenges in the 2013 year[4]. Performing the DIY Museum aims to establish a new paradigm by exploring the applicability of creative practice-based research methodologies alongside “critical reflection” and “reflexive action” following a progression from the “unknown to the known” to the purpose of and challenges facing a majority of New Zealand’s public museums.

 

The development of ideas as many artists will attest is not a process that can be controlled or structured “but one that starts connecting diverging elements” that explore the potentiality of new relationships. It is via the practices of the archivist that Crang suggests a process of working “through materials”[5] for example. Walter Benjamin’s affinity with collecting or the archive as a means of revealing “hidden dynamics” serves to support Crang’s argument for a non-linear practice that “reconfigures” and “recontextualises” existing relationships in order to encounter new insights.

 

 Method of this project: literary montage. I needn’t say anything. Merely show. I shall purloin no valuables, appropriate no ingenious formulations. But the rags, the refuse – these I will not inventory but allow, in the only way possible, to come into their own: by making use of them.[6]

 

Benjamin’s method of collecting, juxtaposing and reinterpreting his material would he hoped “make new truths erupt…from the conjunctures and disjunctures between elements.”[7] This archival practice of gathering “fragments and moments” he believed more accurately reflected the nature of experience, of one’s day-to-day engagement in the world. Benjamin’s thinking was in the 1920s aligned with developing surrealist and collage based practices however his intention was an attempt at more than just the clashing or and layering of disparate elements, he sought to perform the evolution of the city by allowing ideas to “emerge from and through the materials”. Benjamin’s method exemplifies the desire for a “mode of representation” that favours neither the experiential nor theoretical but allows experience in the world to be performed thereby signifying the “multiple interrelationships of material”.

 

The work has been influenced by a diversity of practices including the Life in a Day project. Seeking to celebrate its fifth anniversary YouTube approached Ridley Scott’s production company Scott Free UK and consequently began a collaborative project that would see the creation of the first crowd-sourced feature film. Inspired by the Mass Observation movement established in 1937 to study and record the everyday lives of people in Britain, director Kevin Macdonald said the feature documentary titled Life in a Day  “was a wonderful opportunity to hear the voices of ordinary people describing the world as they see it, telling us their fears and loves. I always knew this would say something fascinating about who [we] are as a species and what we value—but I never realized how emotionally affecting the result would be."[8]  Life in a Day was composited from over 80,000 video clips posted directly onto YouTube by people sharing their experience of one day - Saturday July 24th 2010.

 

The receipt of 4,500 hours of footage necessitated a team of people to view and catalogue each submission according to production quality and content to enable the process of narrative structuring that followed.  Confining the projects scope to one day facilitated some fortuitous synergies, for example there happened to be a full moon so the documentary starts with numerous shots of the full moon before moving into scenes associated with typical and perhaps not so typical waking and breakfast rituals. Evidently the documentary does not attempt to be seamless or pretend to be anything other than what it is. Scenes are filmed by professionals and amateurs alike and the final narrative decided via a process of identifying and compositing patterns and juxtapositions. 

 

“One could always rely upon millions of coincidences and rhymes in this material,” says Walker. “Just because of the sheer volume and range of it. So when we had to move big chunks of the film into a different order, and had to lose connections we'd begun to rely upon, we knew that other connections would swiftly take their place. Some of those only dawned on us later, such as how two very different contributors utter the words ‘because I'm a man,’ or how many clips feature a space where a mother should be.”[1]

 

Further discussion and research around the development of this project can be sourced via http://diypublicmuseumnz.blogspot.co.nz/

 

Thanks to:

Martin McCully

Rachel Mann

Sandi Couchman

John Wishart

Sam Mitchell

SIT

And all the fabulous people of Southland for being so inspirational!

 



[1] A Strategy for the Museums Sector, Museums Aotearoa, April 2005. www.museumsaotearoa.org.nz.
[2] Museums Aotearoa Sector Survey Report, Prepared by Lisa McCauley for Museums Aotearoa, March 2013. www.museumsaotearoa.org.nz.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid
[5] Crang, Mike. “Telling materials” In Using Social Theory; Thinking Through Research. Michael Pryke, Gillian Rose & Sarah Whatmore (Eds), Sage, London,2003.P136.
[6] Benjamin, Walter. As cited by Crang, Mike. “Telling materials” In Using Social Theory; Thinking Through Research. Michael Pryke, Gillian Rose & Sarah Whatmore (Eds), Sage, London,2003.P136.
[7]Crang, Mike. “Telling materials” In Using Social Theory; Thinking Through Research. Michael Pryke, Gillian Rose & Sarah Whatmore (Eds), Sage, London,2003.P136.
[8]
http://movies.nationalgeographic.com/movies/life-in-a-day/about-the-production/

Sunday 21 June 2015

"Radial" to "Gyroscopic" Museum Model?


Museums have evolved employing new methods to what Wayne LaBar identifies as “four pillars”[1] of engagement which continue to dominate the sector. Objects, their display, relative interpretive information and visitor hosts/guides, he suggests, “are being used in the same way as the original forms”[2] in what he terms a “Radial Museum”[3] or museums that may utilise contemporary technology but continue to control the unidirectional creation, presentation and ownership of information which is generated in and often limited to a particular physical location – the museum. The “Gyroscopic Model”[4], according to LaBar, uses two technological innovations – the internet and mobile telephones to facilitate “communication and personal creation”[5] providing opportunities for museum visitors to easily and quickly respond and contribute to what becomes an exchange of information and content with the museum, and even more importantly LaBar contends, with each other. Mobile devices allow this exchange to happen at any time and in any place providing innumerable new ways for a museum’s mission “to impact people while on their way to work, in school, at the park or in countless other places.”[6] The ability to engage at any time, in any place, with potentially anyone connected is what characterises LaBar’s “Gyroscopic Model”. Opposed to technology’s influence on the “four pillars” of traditional museum practice applied to the methods associated with the display and interpretation of objects, the “Gyroscopic Museum”[7] provides a framework in which the mobility of internet capable devices can impact relationships between people and museums before, during or/and after a museum visit or regardless of whether they ever visit the museum’s physical location.

 



[1] LaBar, Wayne. “The Gyroscopic Museum: Liberty Science Center” In Creativity and Technology: Social Media, Mobiles and Museums. Edited by James E Katz, Wayne LaBar and Ellen Lynch. Museums Etc Ltd, Edinburgh, 2011:P383.
[2] Ibid.
[3] Ibid.
[4] Ibid:P388.
[5] Ibid:P385.
[6] Ibid:P388.
[7] Ibid:P393.

Monday 1 June 2015

The Value of Not Knowing (presented at Museums Aotearoa Conference 2015)


My background is as a maker or arts practitioner but I have always been deeply engaged with thinking about the structures of power that determine what art is, how it is valued, where it can be seen and by whom. From my current research therefore I thought I would talk about, with reference to other contemporaries progressing this conversation; how practitioners approach making and the potential value of applying this approach to institutional frameworks such as those performed in public museums in order to confront issues of relevance, accessibility and inclusiveness.  
 
Why are the aspirations of institutions (such as public museums) and artists often disparate?

The process of making art is fraught with doubt and uncertainty which is at the very heart of what drives practice-based research. Intentionally steering oneself from “knowing” to “Not knowing”, Anne Hamilton states “is a permissive and rigorous willingness to trust, leaving knowing in suspension, trusting in possibility without result, regarding as possible all manner of response”[1] The practice of not knowing, waiting and finding can be perceived Hamilton purports with suspicion as an “in-between” experience that is not easily measured or categorised as useful or productive. The truth however, conveyed she says, in Plato’s Dialogues is possessed neither on one side or another but is present “in-between”. It is “in-between”, in dialogue or reciprocal exchange that Hamilton sees part of the answer to the question what is art for. Change according to Hamilton is achieved through the culmination of an infinite number of small acts, it is the role of artists, therefore, she says to be at the threshold, to unsettle, to experiment, to give material form presence in a social context. Honouring a life of making she says “isn’t a series of shows, or projects, or productions, or things; it is an everyday practice”[2] The decision to suspend knowing is freedom to explore, to test, to analyse and to discover. Actively performing questioning through practice embraces failure as a vehicle to progress the potential for innovation through working in uncharted territory. Putting things together that you never imagined could go together –  testing ideas that compel a particular way of working with materials, processes, communities, spaces and places is the basis of works of art that can truly challenge, interrogate, expose or delight.

 

“Doing things differently” said writer, art critic, museum director and curator, Marcia Tucker, “involves a high degree of discomfort, which is why most of us prefer not to.”[3] Tucker agrees that change is a surety but argues that it is a natural reaction to behave defensively and to even actively resist change which can, she says, consume considerable energy.  Becoming an expert she explains could be regarded as a way to resist change as one is prone to develop as a result of ones successes rather than from ones failures. An expert, she asserts “is someone involved with what they already know”[4] whereas art practitioners, she says have taught her that concentrating on process without a defined outcome and “confusion, disorder, mistakes and failures – all the things that we encounter when we try something new – are essential to the creative process”[5] Embracing the notion of the amateur, having multiple personalities Tucker seems to suggest recognises that we are constantly adapting to our circumstances, that despite the shock that can be the impetus for change, overcoming fear of the unknown is preferable to the repetitive assertion of what we already know.

 

Barbara Bolt references Heidegger and the notion of “handlability” to describe and reinforce an orientation towards a “way of being” and working in the world that generates the potential for seizing possibilities. It is only through the process of contemplation that follows according to Heideggar that we can begin to theoretically “know” the world. Don Ihde further supports Bolt’s contention that an artwork is not “the representation of an already formed idea”[6] but evidence of an emerging process involving “…materials, methods, tools and ideas of practice”.[7] Letting go is positioned as central to Heidegger’s notion of “handlability”  for example Francis Bacon’s desire to intentionally break-away from premeditation by random acts such as “throwing paint” illustrates Bolt’s assertion of the centrality of the “emerging”, accidental or unplanned in art practice. In opposition to a premeditated hypothesis, ‘letting go’, is employed to avoid the kind of planning that leads to an expected outcome. Such acts are employed to push one out of the comfort of routine into unfamiliar territory and it is in this ‘new territory’ that the potential of ‘new knowledge’ emerges. Bolt takes this a step further in referring to Deleuze’s claim that it is in a “state of catastrophe” that we have the potential to discover another world in which it is possible to abandon sight or the intellectual responses that fail to “attend to the rhythms that constitute the creative process”. It is in the resultant “shocks” or “catastrophes” according to Bolt that a rhythm emerges that constitutes ‘the new’.

 

Carter asserts that the value of invention in creative research “…is located neither after nor before the process of making but in the performance itself”.[8] This may be due he says to the catalytic nature of the social relations or “back-and-forth discourse” that stimulates the testing of ideas and materials both of which remain in a “state of becoming”. A key concern for Carter is to reverse what he describes as the “drift” separating knowledge generation from the “processes that produce it”. This reintegration he suggests requires a reconsideration of what matters. In the discourses often associated with institutional activity, inventiveness he says is intentionally removed from language as if “…truth were the elimination of interest”. A commitment to not knowing but embracing the discovery inherent in the act or performance of making should not be viewed as an activity which is disorganised or devoid of discipline. Artists are questioners of the status quo, every stage of a practitioners research often frustratingly involves critical reflection & reflexivity or continually asking why – developing strategies to question assumptions or habitual actions and working to try and understand the factors which shape them. Imagine what could be possible for example if the potentiality of the public museum model could be explored from a perspective of not knowing. We are all amateurs in imagining where and what our museums might be and do in the next fifty years particularly considering many museums did not exist or were in the early stages of development fifty years ago. What if all the options were on the table? Are decisions on your local museum’s future made via a process that involves inclusive conversation - exploring all the possible forms and practices that your museum could take and establish to best serve you and your community now and in the future? If not, why not? Are all museum staff valued equally and provided with the tools they need to progress professionally and personally – is professional development and research time available to staff members , can all team members contribute ideas and participate in conversations? Is there any space and time made for risk taking and innovation e.g. how is change managed in your organisation, who participates in decision making about the future of your museum? How are hierarchies performed in your organisation and what purpose do they serve – are they useful?

Most importantly what makes your museum a public institution – how well does your museum serve its unique community, how do you know?



[1] Hamilton, Anne. “Making Not Knowing” In In Learning Mind: Experience into Art. Edited by Mary Jane Jacob & Jacqueline Baas. School of the Art Institute of Chicago, University of California Press, Berkeley, LA & London,2009: P68.
[2] Ibid:69
[3] Tucker, Marcia. “Multiple Personalities” In Learning Mind: Experience into Art. Edited by Mary Jane Jacob & Jacqueline Baas. School of the Art Institute of Chicago, University of California Press, Berkeley, LA & London,2009: P35.
[4] Ibid:36
[5] Ibid:41
[6] Ihde, Don. As cited by Bolt, Barabara. “The Exegesis and the Shock of the New” TEXT Special Issue, No 3 April,2004. Julie Fletcher & Allan Mann (Eds). http://www.griffith.edu/school/art/text/
[7] Ibid.
 
[8] Carter, Paul. “Interest: The Ethics of Invention” In Practice as Research: Approaches to Creative Arts Enquiry. Estelle Barrett and Barbara Bolt (Eds). I.B. Tauris & Co Ltd, London & New York, 2007.