Incredibly sad news from Toronto today. I am reposting part of an article from Spacing magazine, introduction by Shawn Micallef.

you can read the whole article here.

Will Munro, 1975-2010: Toronto has lost a great city builder

Very sad news today. After a long illness that he fought longer and harder than any doctor expected, Toronto has lost Will Munro. Will was a cultural force in this city and helped change the way we think about Toronto’s geography and expanded ideas of where various communities are supposed to live and play.  Along the way he created new spaces for untold numbers of people (many of whom may never even knew of him or that he was behind the event or place they were enjoying). He was an artist; a volunteer; a community councillor; a DJ, an impresario; an entrepreneur; and a friend to many and civic glue to so many more.

Below is a review of the Affective Economies panel that I organized for the conference Open Engagement.

Review by Krystal South.

Left to Right: Helen Reed, Henry Jenkins (via Skype), Anna Snyder, Kara Helgren and Harrell Fletcher.

On Saturday, May 15, 2010 as part of the Open Engagement Conference in Portland, Oregon, five unlikely individuals met and spoke to these themes: the role of the fan and the connectivity of the internet in creating Affective Economies or “economies of love”. Led by Helen Reed, MFA student in the Art & Social Practice program at Portland State University, the other patricipants included educator and author Henry Jenkins, artist and head of the MFA in Art & Social Practice Program Harrell Fletcher and PDX Browncoats members Anna Snyder and Kara Helgren.

Jenkins gave a presentation on the role of the fan within the development of Web 2.0 and how convergence cultures centered around popular cultural references (think American Idol & Buffy) create affective economies in which an online community engages in cultural production in addition to their consumption. Within these social networks, often centered around science fiction programming, fans exist as experts and spread information regarding their topic widely across the web. This benefits television programs or film productions, but what compensation is provided to the fans for their help? Jenkins was extremely knowledgeable about these topics and had prepared a wonderfully nerdy presentation on nerds.

The PDX Browncoats use their mutual love of the Josh Wheaden/FOX television show Firefly (cancelled before the end of it’s first season and revived years later with a feature-length film) to raise money for Equality Now, which aims to end violence against women. Snyder and Helgren spoke of their initiation to Firefly, their inception into the world of fandom and the online community surrounding it, and their experience upon joining and becoming actice officers within the PDX Browncoats, and their charitable umbrella organization Serenity Now and The Signal, their self-produced (with assistance from online members all over the world!) podcast. It was evident that the community they are involved in utilizes the strength of their mutual love of a TV show to achieve greater good for both themselves and the beneficiaries of their charitable contributions.

Harrell Fletcher spoke about Learning to Love you More, a work begun in 2002 with Miranda July as an online project which assigned sentimental, insightful questions and assignments to the internet audience. The results were diverse, numerous and sweet–an archive of a “chain of empathy” that developed over time through the call and response of the artists and their audience. Fletcher spoke to the development of these kinds of ideas within his work, as well as the climate of a pre YouTube internet audience. The project culminated in 2009 with a book of the same name and the acquisition of the work in 2010 by SFMoma.

Questions from the audience connected themes between the presenters and  wrapped up a successful afternoon thinking about the role that fans and their technology play in our economies and societies.

design by Chris Lee

“The poor image is a copy in motion. Its quality is bad, its resolution substandard. As it accelerates, it deteriorates. It is a ghost of an image, a preview, a thumbnail, an errant idea, an itinerant image distributed for free, squeezed through slow digital connections, compressed, reproduced, ripped, remixed, as well as copied and pasted into other channels of distribution.

The poor image is a rag or a rip; an avi or a jpeg, a lumpen proletarian in the class society of appearances, ranked and valued according to its resolution. The poor image has been uploaded, downloaded, shared, reformatted, and reedited. It transforms quality into accessibility, exhibition value into cult value, films into clips, contemplation into distraction.”

- Hito Steyerl, In Defense of the Poor Image, e-flux journal

“What keeps people together after the fleeting moment of action has passed (what we today call ‘organisation’), and what at the same time they keep alive through remaining together, is power.”

- Hannah Arendt

Kerby Ferris and Emily Baker came over for pancakes this morning.

Kerby was sporting this sweater:

I got super jealous and immediately bought one online.

You can get your own here.

Sorry for biting your style Kerby.

The Incidental Person show at apexart, curated by Antony Hudek, ended with a roundtable discussion with Claire Bishop, Noa Latham, Julie Martin, Barbara Steveni, and Stephen Wright.

Discussed:

John Latham’s theory of art and the universe – his cosmology

The aesthetics of administration – how does this kind of collaborative work translate to a secondary audience?

The structure of the Artist Placement Group – unlike other artists and artist groups interested in working and collaborating in the public sphere the APG went straight to the top, rather than allying with grassroots interests

The APG’s emphasis on the extension of time bases – their stress on allowing a long time (over 20 years) to understand the impact of a project

The group of montreal artists “At-Work” – making work on the clock of their employer

Quote of the event: “Dramatically undertheorized” – Stephen Wright

February 18-22, 2010, Bubby’s Pie Company, 120 Hudson Street in Tribeca, NY, NY
The Pancake Placement Group (PPG) presents The Incidental Pancake, a microbial enterprise designed to collaborate with multiple hosts.  For a limited time only, The PPG will introduce their 111-year old Yukon Goldrush sourdough culture into the mix of Bubby’s pancake batter. This particular strain of sourdough developed in some of the most remote conditions in the world. In sub-zero temperatures this culture survived and sustained thousands of would-be gold miners, dreaming of striking it rich in the Klondike. Incidental Pancakes will be served as special menu items between Feb 18 – 22, 2010.  Informational pancake placement placemats will be available at both apexart and Bubby’s Pie Company. As The Incidental Pancake is consumed, so too is it’s social and cultural history in the Yukon. Please stop by for your own nibble of the living past!

The Incidental Pancake is a part of the current exhibition at apexart, The Incidental Person, curated by Antony Hudek. ThePancake Placement Group consists of Hannah Jickling and Helen Reed. Jickling and Reed practice both individually and collaboratively and are students in the Portland State University Art and Social Practice program.

For more information, please contact The Pancake Placement Group

apexart

Bubby’s Pie Company

In undergrad, there were a few teachers that made a huge impression. For various reasons.

Some sort of traumatizing.

A teacher that left an overwhelmingly positive impression on me was Carole Itter – pictured below, as a raw egg.

Inspirational to the max!