Category Archives: creativity

Digital Perfectionism?

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In stark contrast to my last blog on AI and digital humans, I’ve just been reading Damon Krukowski‘s book, “The New Analog – Listening and Reconnecting in a Digital World”, published in 2017. It’s an essential text for anyone interested in the impact of sound compression, noise filtering, loudness and streaming on the music industry (and much more besides).

The are two main theses the author explores:

1. The paradoxical corollary to Moore’s Law on the rate of increase in computing power is Murphy’s Moore’s Law: that in striving for improved performance and perfectionism in all things digital, equally we risk amplifying the limitations inherent in analog technology. in short, the more something improves, the more it must also get worse. (See also my previous blogs on the problem of digital decay, and the beauty of decay music.)

2. In the realm of digital music and other platforms (especially social media), stripping out the noise (to leave only the signal) results in an impoverished listening, cultural and social experience; flatter sound, less dynamics, narrower tonal variation, limited nuance, an absence of context. In the case of streaming music, we lose the physical connection with the original artwork, accompanying sleeve notes, creative credits and even the original year of publication.

Thinking about #1 above, imagine this principle applied to #AI: would the pursuit of “digital perfectionism” mean we lose a large part of what makes analogue homo sapiens more “human”? Would we end up compressing/removing “noise” such as doubt, uncertainty, curiosity, irony, idiosyncrasies, cognitive diversity, quirkiness, humour etc.?

As for #2, like the author, I’m not a total Luddite when it comes to digital music, but I totally understand his frustration (philosophical, phonic and financial) when discussing the way CDs exploit “loudness” (in the technical sense), how .mp3 files compress more data into less space (resulting in a deterioration in overall quality), and the way streaming platforms have eroded artists’ traditional commercial return on their creativity.

The book also discusses the role of social media platforms in extracting value from the content that users contribute, reducing it to homogenised data lakes, selling it to the highest bidder, and compressing all our personal observations, relationships and original ideas (the things that make us nuanced human beings) into a sterilsed drip-feed of “curated” content.

In the narrative on music production, and how “loudness” took hold in the mid-1990s, Krukowski takes specific aim at the dreaded sub-woofer. These speakers now pervade every concert, home entertainment system, desk-top computer and car stereo. They even bring a distorted physical presence into our listening experience:

“Nosebleeds at festivals, trance states at dance clubs, intimidation by car audio…. When everything is louder than everything else, sounds lose context and thus meaning – even the meaning of loud.”

The main issue I have with digital music is that we as listeners have very little control over how we hear it – apart from adjusting the volume. So again, any nuance or variation has been ironed out, right to the point of consumption – we can’t even adjust the stereo balance. I recall that my boom box in the 1980s had separate volume controls for each speaker, and a built-in graphic equalizer. To paraphrase Joy Division, “We’ve Lost Control”.

Next week: I CAN live without my radio…

Lightscape

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Melbourne is a well-known destination for the arts – with its major festivals, winter blockbuster exhibitions, and live music scene. The city itself is often the setting, not just the host – witness Open House, White Night, and more recently RISING. As the backdrop, canvas or screen for these events, Melbourne largely draws on its built environment. In contrast, and as the latest example to join Melbourne’s art calendar, the Royal Botanic Garden is currently hosting Lightscape, a major exhibition that literally sheds new light on its historic collection of flora, and allows us to enjoy the city’s lungs at night, when the gardens are usually closed.

“Flower Lawn” by Jigantics (photo by Rory Manchee)

The key pieces as you tour the installations are:

1. Sea of Light by ITHICA Studio – the sequence of programmed lights create an impression that the lawns are moving, rather like waves on the shore

2. Liquid Sky by Genius Laser Technology – lasers reflect on layers of mist sprayed among the foliage, creating psychedelic clouds in the night air

3. Winter Cathedral and Laser Garden, both by Mandy Lights – the former is a series of illuminated arches made from strings of fairy lights, that give the impression of a more solid structure; while the latter projects lasers into the depths of the fern gully, that flicker like fireflies.

4. Flower Lawn by Jigantics – enormous “plants” that are lit up by a changing sequence of colours

Throughout the gardens, there are a range of animated lights, illuminated displays and projections. I’m sure everything has been carefully designed and planned, but there are some happy accidents: the lasers from Liquid Sky extend beyond their misty clouds to flicker amongst the foliage of surrounding trees; many lights reveal the natural iridescence of flowers that we are unable to see by day; and the reflection of the Winter Cathedral on the nearby lake suggests the climactic scene in Peter Carey’s novel “Oscar and Lucinda”, when the crystal chapel sails down the river.

The only disappointment about Lightscape is the choice of audio to accompany the installations. The sound quality is fantastic, but the actual music is quite conservative, even pedestrian – at times, I was expecting a David Copperfield reveal. I wonder what artists such as Oren Ambarchi or Lawrence English would have done instead – a missed opportunity?

Next week: Dud Housing

William Kentridge – Modern Polymath

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For the next couple of weeks, an exhibition of work by William Kentridge is showing at Australian Galleries in Melbourne – and I highly recommend it. If you are familiar with his art, you’ll know what to expect; but if the name is new to you, then hopefully you will be curious enough to give it a go. Kentridge is both prolific, and proficient, across many media – this current exhibition includes prints, drawings, sculptures, tapestries and films.

William Kentridge – “Untitled (Drawing from Wozzeck 2)” (2016) – Image sourced from Australian Galleries

I think I first became aware of Kentridge’s work via his multimedia installation, “What Will Come (has already come)” when it was shown at the Städel Museum, Frankfurt in 2007. Thanks to his distinctive style and use of recurring motifs, once you see one of his prints or drawings, you can easily recognise other pieces by him. Using a graphic-based visual language and free-flowing lines in his mark-making, he also incorporates polemic and performance into his work. In addition to his stage design and production, his films and stop-motion animations portray the artist as actor, literally sketching out his lines across paper, wall and screen. Images of coffee pots, oil rigs, megaphones, tripods and windmills feature in many of his works, and he is also drawn to three key texts: Mozart’s “The Magic Flute”, Alfred Jarry’s “Ubu Roi”, and Nikolai Gogol’s “The Nose”.

Since that first encounter in 2007, I have been fortunate to see a few of Kentridge’s key exhibitions, most notably “Five Themes” (2010) at MoMA, New York (which later came to ACMI, Melbourne), and “Thick Time” (2016) at Whitechapel Gallery, London (and later at The Whitworth, Manchester). I also hope to see his major retrospective at London’s Royal Academy later this year.

All of which makes this exhibition at Australian Galleries a remarkable achievement for a local commercial space. If there is one piece that could sum up Kentridge’s artistic CV, it would have to be “Black Box/Chambre Noire” (2005) – this YouTube video does a pretty good job, but you need to see this mix of installation, automata, video, sculpture and audio in the flesh to appreciate the full effect. Luckily, there is a related video, “Preparing the Flute” (2004), based on a similar installation work, in the current show in Melbourne.

Next week: Lightscape

 

 

 

Renzo Piano & the Centro Botín

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In March this year, the Victorian Government unveiled the winning concept design for the NGV Contemporary, a new centre for art and design, forming part of the planned revamp of the Arts Precinct on Melbourne’s Southbank. Due to open in 2028, The Fox: NGV Contemporary (to give it’s full name, thanks to the benevolence of trucking magnate and close acquaintance of Premier Daniel Andrews, Lindsay Fox) is being heralded as an iconic, nation-defining statement in support of Melbourne’s claim to be the cultural centre of Australia. So far, so good – but I can’t help feeling the design competition has been conducted with some undue haste: Expressions of Interest were sought in March 2021, with a one-week registration deadline. The competition for Stage One of the project closed in August 2021, and Stage Two in November 2021, with the winning team announced in March 2022, barely 12 months from the EOI. Why the hurry (especially as Melbourne was in lockdown for much of that time), and up to now, there does not appear to have been any public consultation in the design process.

The Centro Botín, Santander, designed by Renzo Piano (image sourced from Wikimedia)

Contrast this with the design of the Centro Botín in Santander, Spain, by Italian architect Renzo Piano, whose story is told in an absorbing documentary, “Renzo Piano: The Architect of Light”. First, neither the architect nor the sponsoring Botín Foundation had any aspirations of creating an “iconic building”; instead, the goal was to have as minimal physical impact as possible, while reclaiming an area of land and returning it to public use. Second, there was a public consultation process, to overcome concerns expressed by some nearby residents. Third, while the documentary has no doubt been artfully edited, it does provide extensive “behind the scenes” access to the design and construction process over its 7-year development, which included a 3-year delay in completion. The fact that this was a private commission rather than a competition may account for this approach, but there was still a great deal of negotiation with municipal and community stakeholders.

The documentary itself is notable not only for the degree of transparency (we observe meetings between architect, client and project managers throughout the process), but also for the simplicity of its narrative, and the wise decision to dispense with any voiceover commentary – the subjects are allowed to speak for themselves. There are also references to cultural icons such as novelist Italo Calvino and film-maker Roberto Rossellini. The use of Mahler’s ‘Symphony No. 5’ in the soundtrack underlines Renzo Piano’s fascination with light as a construction material, as important to him as glass, concrete and steel – the music is most famously associated with the film of ‘Death in Venice’, a city renowned for its light.

If the primary inspiration for the design of the Centro Botín is light (and lightness of construction), I’m struggling, based on the available evidence, to see what the inspiration is for the NGV Contemporary. Despite being a statement about “art and design”, I fear that this project is as much about political statements and lasting personal legacies. Much has been made about the potential job creation during its construction, but much less about the design principles and aesthetic objectives. I hope this project does not turn into a municipal white elephant.

The original NGV (now referred to as NGV International) is a landmark building and one of the most popular destinations in Melbourne. I have known it most of my life, having first visited it aged 10, when it left an indelible impression on me. Having lived in Melbourne the past 20 years, I have been a regular visitor since it was extensively refurbished in 2003. As part of the Arts Precinct, the NGV is a focal point for the city’s cultural activities, and is a major draw card for local and international visitors. Any enhancement of the NGV and the surrounding facilities is generally to be welcomed, and certainly there are parts of the precinct that could do with upgrading. However, I’m not sure the design for the NGV Contemporary is the right decision.

Aside from the hastiness shown by the NGV Contemporary’s design phase, I’m surprised that the winning design team, Angelo Candalepas and Associates, do not appear to have built any comparable projects, despite winning multiple awards for their past work. The Candalepas studio has designed many residential buildings (and I lived very happily in one of their first competition successes, ‘The Point’ in Sydney’s inner city suburb of Pyrmont), but as far as I can see, nothing on the scale, significance or importance as NGV Contemporary. The proposed design looks very “blocky”, notwithstanding the internal “spherical hall”, which is highly reminiscent of New York’s Guggenheim Museum. It’s also not clear what the spacial relationship will be with the existing NGV and other neighbouring buildings, nor whether any of them will need to be remodelled or demolished to make way for this latest addition. I’ve tried, without success, to find a map or ground plan of the proposed development, or any details on how the NGV Contemporary will be accessed from adjacent streets, other than via a new garden that appears to envelop the NGV International – so what existing land will this garden occupy, and what current facilities might be lost in the process?

In conclusion, since its opening in 2017, the Centro Botín appears to have been enthusiastically embraced by the residents of Santander, and manages to be both utterly modern and easily accessible, unlike so many other examples of “statement” architecture. I hope we will see a similar outcome for NGV Contemporary.

Next week: Mopping up after the LNP