photo essays

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tonight

txtual healing
I projected down on the corner of Douglass and Hoyt st. in carroll gardens tonight. Had dinner with my sister, niece and mom. It was nice, it was fun even. I then ran back to the apartment and set up the speech bubbles cause I wanted to show my mom the set up and what it was like to see the bubbles live in the public where they should be seen and participated with.

the kids from the Gowanus Projects or 'GP' were swarming around the set up. It was reall amazing. I was surrounded by 12 year olds that wanted to interact with the bubbles. They asked me to post some messages, so I did. I don't remember off what they were. Then those kids dissapeared into the night. Kelly, tommy, jason, sheila came by. Duncan and Faye. They all watched it with my sis, niece and momma.

Then they all made there way off to the evening and where they had to go and be and eat and sleep, and sit, and listen, and read, and drink, and talk, and love with people.

More kids came by, a couple of GP's teens out feeling out the night. 3 boys. They asked what was happening I told them how it worked, they seemed into it. The one kid was working out the text messaging on his phone, he had trouble with the prepending of the number and the colon on the message.

but he got it in there and he gave himself a shout out. Posted his name 'Tah'. Then I walked back to my truck. The kids were crossing the street and a black hunday SUV pulled up, one of the kids wacked the car. The car stopped and a fired up white guy got out of the car. shaved head. A shouting match ensued. The guy screamed at the kids asking which ine punched the car. The one fellow who had been stand offish before, was screaming back at him that no one had hit the car. The guy wanted to kick some serious ass. He was going to stick it to this kid.

The kid said to wait a second and he was gonna go fetch some others to fight this guy. the guy shouted that the kid couldn't fight his own fight. I'd say this guy fomr the car was 30 something. He shouted at the woman in the driver seat to shut the hell up. This guy was unhealthy. The rest of that night ain't gonna be much fun for those two.

The GP kid stood his ground, he was gonna get some boys, he shouted back at the guy saying that he was a grown man, tounting him with the fact that he was out of the car ready to beat up a a teen black kid.

A large guy from the GP's came over and stood between the white guy and the kid. The shouting continued. two of the three boys hung out on the street corner. The shouting continued. The white guy finally ahd his fill, and went back tot he car after the shouting match. They pulled off, it got calm again. The boys came back over, they texted some more, about girlfriends and who they liked. Once one message is successfully sent, the ideas start coming. I learned some of there names, from the postings. then some other boys came over a little younger, they kept putting dirogatory remarks about eachother into the bubbles. I snapped pictrues the whoel time I hope they come out. These kids were all over it. I showed them how the system worked. how the cell phone takes in the message and how it is posted.

They were into it. some adults came by. But for the most part did not pay attention. never looked up, they just moved through. some really young kids came by and i posted a message for the one kid who loves playing with his wrestling toys... so I posted 'where are my wrestling toys' for him. he went off and found an older man, Terry. Terry came back over with the 2 young kids. We talked I showed him how it worked. He said I could make a lot of money. I agreed. hmmm. I told him I didn't want to go commercial. I didn't talk about how to make money. That part scares me, I really don't know what I'm doing when it comes to making the money.

Anyhow, I explained how commercials make us want what we don't need. He agreed, it was a good little talk. He went off with the young kids. Probably time for bed, hopefully that's where they were going.

I really enjoyed mixing with the neighborhood kids. I hope they spread the word. I hope someone is asking. I think they felt empowerd, like when the how the same kdis reacted to the piece when I put it up on Smith and Douglass. I think it's such an empowering experiecne to put names and information up so big in lights. I let them continue. I told them that it was boring to put curse words up and to make fun of eachother. But they did. They fought a lot... I don't remember hitting eachother so much as a kid. A lot of energy in these kids, and really excited to learn.

A reaction I thought was really interesting was when people asked how much I was being paid to put on this projection, and I had to answer that this wasn't a commerciala nd was an art piece. I think the men from the projects couldn't believe it wasn't paid for or sponsored. I saw the deli owner and his wife... they seemed to like what was happening and we chatted for a few minutes. it was fun.

I ran out the battery in my truck. That sucked. well still gotta jump it now. ugh.

oh, the cops swung by once, they asked about the shouting fight in the street. I told them that everyone walked away. They said'they walked away?' I said yes, they walked away. and the cruiser lurked back down the street. I wondered about whether are being watched.

kids song

txtual healing
I remember singing this in Sunday school, we never sang the parts with jesus in it... instead we substituted it with 'voice'. but I like the relevance to of the song content to txtual healing.

This little light of mine,
I'm gonna let it shine
This little light of mine,
I'm gonna let it shine
This little light of mine,
I'm gonna let it shine
Let it shine,
Let it shine,
Let it shine.

Smith St.

txtual healing

I uploaded the results from projecting in public this past thursday.

Smith St.

txtual healing
public projecting on smith and douglass st. block from my apt. above the video free brooklyn video store and make your own jewelry store.

-the lighting was bad, too much street light.
-had to run power from truck battery.
-documented great use of the piece.
-able to watch people use the piece. a little explanation was necessary.
-no trouble with anyone.
-used postcards for instructions and as PR.

I tested batteries and cables that afternoon, the only cable I didn't check was the vga cable to go from computer to projector. so 5 mins before starting I go to plug in the vga cable and the one end is a male that needed to be female... I hailed a cab, raced off to radio shack on court street. Telling the cabbie to wait, I ran to the find the door bolted I pleaded through the glass to be let in. I wish I had a video of me arriving at the door and finding it locked. buying the vga cable I was back in business.

Set the truck up. had to keep the engine running (i didn't like doing that) hopefully for other shows I will have access to electricity, but when doing this type of work in public, being unknown and without a permit, the truck is what I have for power. Ivee pumped the gas. I used the ac/dc converter to power the projector directly from the truck battery. kept the phone and computer on there own batteries. I plugged the computer in eventually. using a lower wattage lighter plug.

The show went smoothly. A few miss formatted messages never made it up, but I believe the system tended to work successfully. kell did a great job of helping people use the phones and format correctly.

The crowd was good... it fluctuated, but people were into it, according to feedback I received and heard about. one guy mentioned that the lighting was bright. It's a trade off in location vs. foot traffic. The lighting on the corner was a bit brighter than I had anticipated. But all seemed to be fine, It was a good debut to the public.

I used 2 bubblesfor the first time. hence the slight difficulty with people understanding the instructions. it was fun to see the final results from the photos i took, since it was hard to catch all the posts while running around talking to people and snapping photos.

It appeared that people enjoyed hanging around to watch what would go up next. And many felt it was cool just to watch and not participate. I enjoyed watching kids use the system, they read form the flyer and posted their messages. When they saw there message go up you could see how excited they were. I wondered if it had anything to do with having an equal voice or equal input to the show. A sense of empowerment from posting a message that didn't say this came from a kid. I got excited because I would probably go to school the next day and tell people about what I saw.

all in all it was really great to see it all in action. I had fun

txtual healing

txtual healing if you consider time and space...

txtual healing

txtual healingeverything is unique...

txtual healing

txtual healing

nothing has been done before...

txtual healing

txtual healing

my creation... http://www.txtualhealing.com/

9/11

Does anyone else have the feeling, all over agian, that 9/11 happened yesterday? Our TV news coverage, newspaper coverage, and the entertainment industry. Our televisions are making us relive the imagery from that day... blow for blow. As if to feel that horror again, as if to justify any means necessary to protect us from the evil terrorists. Our movie industry has a list of movies that are now coming out about 9/11, flight United 93 getting the most play of all these ground zero centric films to watch. The one flight that never reached it's target is being used to reach it's target in the hearts and minds of U.S. citizens. Re acquianting us with the brave horroics performed by the passengers all while reacquianting us with how there was no choice, no discussion, no understanding, no serious investigation, no other way, but to take revenge by any means possible... The arrogance spoke. The bully in the school yard freaked out and now the state of the world is worse.

Moussaoui is fesh on the pages of our newspapers... here's the indictment from the U.S. government. Imagine getting that in the mail.

As we approach the 5th anniversary, all the visuals are fresh int he air, as if it happened yesterday. Everyday is 9/11 or at least that desire to fight back kicking and screaming without knowing what and why it happened?

Too much time has gone by, we're beginning to ask questions of why we're in Iraq. So bring us back to the more innocent times when we were unaware of spider holes, drones, iraqi press ministers, embedded reporters... So let's live it all again and refuse to ask the questions again and not cover what we need to cover again. And throw all of our support into the Bush easter basket again.

Do you know what happened on that day?

'bop'

how would yer sentences end?

gov is god

which came first government or god?

q. why did YOU cross the road?
a. cause you're a chicken

why did God cross the road

Gov is God

public projecting

...I've discovered I'm kinda of chicken shit and need to get over it. projetcingi n the streets makes you very self conscious. people whispering things as they walk by, looking at what you're doing. It's hard to tell if you should just pack up or continue. The answer is obviously to continue, but doign this public projecting has made me extemely aware of the space I'm in.

brainstorming

for the silhouette figures... I chose different chracters, clearly identifiable by what they do, but the idea is to think of what they would be thinking and share such important information with us... How do we as a society interpret the roles that these figures match? What would we say in there character? What or who do we think of when we play this game so that we can put something up that makes sense meaningful way, and by meaningful I mean something humorous or sad, creative or mundane, but put it in the context of the figure you attach it to.

txtual healing

try projecting bubbles with human forms... so as if standingon the sidewalk and their is a business man projected onto a wall with a thought bubble to be filled in. This could be a series of people, or the facades of people.

Or silhouette a human shape so it is lit when projected and people can stand in the form too.

Imagine a whole city block with bubbles and the ability to fill them in. like ghosts of the past. bubbles projected down on the street like cars talking.

The Facade

attack the facade. The facade created by our media. Get the voice form within the facade or even the facade only says what a facade wants to. The piece challenges the audience to move past the facade of conversation and lack of depth in thinking by our current popular media rhetoric.when we can start to slip inside those windows and doorways and hear the real conversations going on inside. Can others speak for us? Do we have our own stories to tell? Can this create dialogue?

When will we move beyond the facade of these structures that create the grid we follow everyday? Through conversation? through interpretation of what's happening on the inside? The intellectual is under attack because of the facade. The facade the media has put up for us to simply stop at and not be able to move past in terms of our ability to act on anything.

public & cyber space

Our communication and conenctions are increasingly growing in cyber space, where does that leave our public space, or our physical connections? Are our face to face meetings and discussions suffering? How are our conenctions in cyberspace effecting what we expect from our meetings in physical space? Lower or higher expectations? Lower expectations because we have found solice in the web and the kind of 'personal' connections that we can make. If you felt like a misfit before you can now 'connect' with others that share your interests. Perhaps this is what was considered an internet addiction in the past, when it may have just been a medium that fascillitated the social connecting of self perceived 'misfits'.

When we date, relate, and share online, what is happening to our public spaces? Do we begin to leave them up for grabs? Are we looking to the internet and cyberspace for our working definitions of love, money, social behavior, entertainment? This is not to say that the internet is a bad thing and is destorying out society... but to question how much of a role it is playing in de-socializing us from our physical connections.