DAVID ROKEBY AND MARINA ZURKOW:
A FORMAL AND COMPARATIVE ANALYSIS
OF WATCHED AND MEASURED
AND PUSSY WEEVIL
(images taken from bing.com/images)
David Rokeby and Marina Zurkow are two contemporary, multi media artists that work with interactive video installations in the world today. My intentions are to analyze, interpret, compare and contrast David Rokeby's Watched and Measured, and Marina Zurkow's Pussy Weevil. I will begin by analyzing each work individually and then compare the two works in relation to each other and in relation to the Digital Currents text.
In 2000, David Rokeby was awarded the first BAFTA award for interactive art from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, for his surveillance installation, Watched and Measured (wiki.org/David_Rokeby). Today, Watched and Measured is a permanent installation in the Welcome Wing at the London Science Museum in the UK. A really great web page to view and experience the Watched and Measured installation is: http://www.horizonzero.ca/index.php?pp=12&lang=0
(images taken from homepage.mac.com/davidrokeby/wm.html)
Watched and Measured is an installation of video surveillance systems that selectively surveils different individuals walking into the science museum. The digitally processed real time images taken from the surveillance cameras are then projected onto three larger screens that can be observed and exhibited in a different part of the museum (horizonzero.com). Rokeby designed the software in the piece to be selectively interested in different kinds of things about the human body moving through time and space(wiki.org). The installation decides to investigate someone walking. It then may decide to zoom in on it's person of interest, the piece watches it's subject and then reflects the subject, sometimes in a distorted way, onto three larger screens that can be watched by individuals in another part of the museum. The piece sometimes offers single words seemingly measuring the person it has surveiled. In an interview with Rokeby he described the piece as a "work that presents a series of people looking at being looked at, watching and being measured" (homepage.mac.com/davidrokeby/wm.html).
Rokeby designed the work to explore ethical questions about surveillance systems: do they invade our privacy? Do they help protect us? The piece seems to be a kind of challenge celebrating technology and questioning it all at the same time. The piece brings about different feelings and emotions in the people experiencing it. The piece is disturbing, paranoid, voyeuristic, sexy, fetish ed, curious, seductive, safe, scared, distorted, raw, real and because of it's interactive nature the viewer experiencing it can feel all of these things about the piece, all at the same time or none of them at all. The piece reveals the curiosity and pleasure that human beings have in privately and secretly watching others, while at the same time revealing the paranoid horror that they might have also have been watched. Human beings cannot help but feel the paradox of the piece after they have experienced it, and that is the true genius of much of Rokeby's work.
David Rokeby is an interactive sound and video installation artist based in Ontario, Canada (foundation-langlois.org). Rokeby has been creating interactive installations since 1982 and has been a pioneer and inventor for digital interactive artwork in the world today (wiki.org). Some of Rokeby's most famous work's are still being developed like: Very Nervous System, and The Giver of Names (wiki.org). Rokeby and his work is noted in Chapter five of the Digital Currents text and will be more closely examined during the comparative and conclusory segments of the analysis.
(image taken from www.o-matic.com)
In 2000, David Rokeby was awarded the first BAFTA award for interactive art from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, for his surveillance installation, Watched and Measured (wiki.org/David_Rokeby). Today, Watched and Measured is a permanent installation in the Welcome Wing at the London Science Museum in the UK. A really great web page to view and experience the Watched and Measured installation is: http://www.horizonzero.ca/index.php?pp=12&lang=0
Watched and Measured is an installation of video surveillance systems that selectively surveils different individuals walking into the science museum. The digitally processed real time images taken from the surveillance cameras are then projected onto three larger screens that can be observed and exhibited in a different part of the museum (horizonzero.com). Rokeby designed the software in the piece to be selectively interested in different kinds of things about the human body moving through time and space(wiki.org). The installation decides to investigate someone walking. It then may decide to zoom in on it's person of interest, the piece watches it's subject and then reflects the subject, sometimes in a distorted way, onto three larger screens that can be watched by individuals in another part of the museum. The piece sometimes offers single words seemingly measuring the person it has surveiled. In an interview with Rokeby he described the piece as a "work that presents a series of people looking at being looked at, watching and being measured" (homepage.mac.com/davidrokeby/wm.html).
Rokeby designed the work to explore ethical questions about surveillance systems: do they invade our privacy? Do they help protect us? The piece seems to be a kind of challenge celebrating technology and questioning it all at the same time. The piece brings about different feelings and emotions in the people experiencing it. The piece is disturbing, paranoid, voyeuristic, sexy, fetish ed, curious, seductive, safe, scared, distorted, raw, real and because of it's interactive nature the viewer experiencing it can feel all of these things about the piece, all at the same time or none of them at all. The piece reveals the curiosity and pleasure that human beings have in privately and secretly watching others, while at the same time revealing the paranoid horror that they might have also have been watched. Human beings cannot help but feel the paradox of the piece after they have experienced it, and that is the true genius of much of Rokeby's work.
David Rokeby is an interactive sound and video installation artist based in Ontario, Canada (foundation-langlois.org). Rokeby has been creating interactive installations since 1982 and has been a pioneer and inventor for digital interactive artwork in the world today (wiki.org). Some of Rokeby's most famous work's are still being developed like: Very Nervous System, and The Giver of Names (wiki.org). Rokeby and his work is noted in Chapter five of the Digital Currents text and will be more closely examined during the comparative and conclusory segments of the analysis.
(image taken from www.o-matic.com)
Pussy Weevil was created in 2003 by Marina Zurkow with help from Julian Bleecker. Pussy Weevil is an interactive installation piece consisting of a flat screen monitor that is embedded into a wall or pedestal. The piece contains ultrasonic proximity sensors, microcontrollers and Macromedia Flash animations and ActionScript (o-matic.com). A really great demonstration of how Pussy Weevil works is on Marina Zurkow's webpage: http://www.o-matic.com/weevil/. Pussy Weevil is an interactive piece, a 2D animated character who reacts to the viewer's proximity depending on the viewer's distance from the actual installation. Pussy Weevil has three different reaction zones: close, near, and far away and Pussy Weevil reacts to the distance of the viewer in a number of different animated ways. Pussy Weevil displays many different reactions to the viewer. Sometimes he acts scared, and may hide from the viewer. Sometimes he ignores the viewer. Sometimes he mutates, splits, spits, grunts, or even sleeps. Zurkow describes Pussy Weevil as a, "sorrowful genetic experiment that has as much sense as a dull, reactive house pet" (wiki.org).
Marina Zurkow created Pussy Weevil during the beginning of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Pussy Weevil is a parody of George Bush, and Zurkow describes the piece as Pussy Weevil, or how I learned to love the war (o-matic.com). Zurkow wanted the piece to be a kind of avatar of George Bush and of her own frustrations about that time in U.S. history. During the time, the piece became innovative in questioning how digital characters can be affected by spacial interactions (wiki.org). Now in 2010 we live in a world of digital pets, virtual reality gaming and social networking, the interactivity between the viewer and the Pussy Weevil installation came at a time when all of these digital possibilities were being conceptualized, created and tested. It is the questioning of these concepts of interactivity that make the piece important for the time it was created.
Marina Zurkow is a multi media artist who works with character animations and creates narratives about humans and their relationships to plants, animals and weather (itpedia.nyu.edu). Zurkow's work can be seen world wide, in different installations, on MTV, even on clothing for other designers. She has recently been working with animations that are programed to simulate differently every playing instant. Her work is part pop art, part whimsy, and part activist. She always has a way of making a statement, in an understated, mesmerizing kind of way. Zurkow is mentioned in chapter six of Digital Currents, and will be discussed more during the comparatory part of the essay.
Watched and Measured and Pussy Weevil have many similarities and differences. Historically, they were both conceived in the early 2000's, originating both by multimedia artists that both specialize in interactive, digital works, much of the time. Both works are interactive and well known throughout much of the world. Zurkow and Rokeby are similar in that they are both pioneers for digital artwork. They question the boundaries of computers, and what computers can do, what computers can think or in fact what computers can make us think about ourselves and about the world around us. Zurkow and Rokeby have shown together during the Database Imaginary exhibition in 2005 at the Blackwood Gallery:http://www.blackwoodgallery.ca/Blackwood_exhibitionDatabase05.html.
They have also exhibited together during the Artificial Stupidity/ Artificial Intelligence project in August of 2002 (docstoc.com).
Pussy Weevil, and Watched and Measured have many apparent differences. They use different technological apparatus, format, style and size. They are completely different aesthetically, conceptually and thematically in most ways. Pussy Weevil is a piece that reacts to the viewer. It's tone is both curious and desperate, and in many ways sad, although for the viewer, the intent causes humorous emotion and questions of how the piece works more importantly than why the piece is. Watched and Measured is a far more complex work conceptually and technologically. The piece resonates in a deeper part of the viewers mind and soul. The piece questions the issue of surveillance, and privacy but at the same time raises the viewers voyeuristic instincts and curiosity, that most all human beings could not help but have, especially in this day and age where almost all media is somehow mixed with the mingling presence of "reality TV or reality networking". Watched and Measured is real, it is actually happening and the viewer becomes a part of it, whether they want to or not. Pussy Weevil is a kind of flirtation with interaction while Watched and Measured is a forced interaction. In experiencing Pussy Weevil the art reacts to the viewer, where as in experiencing Watched and Measured the viewer reacts to the art.
In the text, Digital Currents, the computer is described as a dynamic interactive partner that responds to the viewer, and vise versa (chpt 5). This changeable relationship between the viewer and art is described as a new kind of relationship that is no longer linear, but that has now become environmentally interactive. This interactivity comes in the art world from artists like Marina Zurkow and David Rokeby, and from their works like Pussy Weevil and Watched and Measured. Art used to be something to look at. Now art is something to experience. The text describes in Chapter five, the way that digital information has turned art into reality and not just imitation. Digital Media has made art, in many ways not only more accessible but more of a production. Sound, image, interactivity, these things deeply entwine the viewer, the artist and the work. Participation and understanding of Digital works have forever changed the insight of the piece, and the insight of the viewer. The function of art has changed along with the meaning, that is now something different depending on the level of interactivity and the level of interest and understanding that the viewer has to the artwork. Artists like Rokeby and Zurkow, have pioneered not only new kinds of art, but also the concept of giving up control over their work, in order to adapt the art world and culture to the concept of the work having control over the viewer. The meaning of the work is all about the exchange of control between the work and the viewer. This adaptation is discussed throughout chapters five and six of the Digital Currents text. The point of the text, and the point of learning about the history of art, is that making art is all about pushing the boundary of what we all believe art is to be. Art is ever changing and learning about the past helps us to understand how we process art of today and conceive about art of tomorrow.
In writing this essay, I had no idea who or what artwork I wanted to research and write about. I took about a week and went through every artist in the text and blog links. It was absolutely exciting to learn and view so many works out there that I wouldn't have known about before. I found Marina Zurkow in my notes from class I only had her name with a star by it. In googling her I discovered that I had starred her name on the day the teacher had shown her works in class. My favorite works that I discovered of hers was her Slurb, Weights and Measures and Elixir series. I also absolutely loved, loved, loved her Karaoke Ice project. But when I discovered Pussy Weevil, there was something intriguing about him that I felt I could evaluate soundly in an analytical essay paper. I new I simply had to have her work as one of the artists to discuss. The other artist I wasn't sure about. I didn't know whether I wanted to discuss David Rokeby or Stelarc. It was Rokeby's beautiful Long Wave and Cloud installations that made me dive more deeply into his work. The moment I read about Watched and Measured, I new I had found my other piece. I feel the artwork and the artist's have a nice correlation to one another, and I am appreciative for this project that has heightened my awareness of the art world and the world around me. I feel more interested in art now than ever before and am greatly appreciative for the digital media class, and assignments given throughout the course. I feel I am somehow better now for all of these new things that I have learned.
and David Rokeby's art images pictures include image from
Slurb, Elixir, Long Wave and Cloud installations.)
Bibliography Quicksites:
http://www.bing.com/
www.bing.com/images
http://www.blackwoodgallery.com/
http://www.davidrokeby.html/
http://www.docstoc.com/
http://www.foundation.langlois.org/
http://www.horizonzero.com/
http://www.itpedia.nyu.edu/
http://www.o-matic.com/
http://www.wiki.org/
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