At One Point Everyone thought the earth was flat” Microsoft Advertisement, 2007*Some words by the curators

TheThe Earth Not a Globe took its impetus from an advertisement in which Microsoft sought to implicate anyone dubi-ous of the potential of the new “Windows Vista” operating system in being as good as a flat-earther. Whilst, unsure of both Vista and the marketing campaign behind it we were Intrigued to consider the position of the flat earther. For us, the idea elicited themes of perception, of its extensions and limitations, and of how we may cope with, and resign ourselves to these on a tangible level. The concept provided a point of reference for an enquiry into how the emphasis on ̒ context ,̓ both artistically and curatorially, invariably perpetuates the relocation of meanings immanent tto works of art. As such, the truth or truths particular to a work are often quietly sidelined in an endless deference and deferral to other epistemologies and spatial constructs and the constructs and confines of discursive thought.

On the one hand, the Flat Earth Society doctrine may simply appear no more than the promotion of a factional Bib-lical literalism. Yet we would be unfortunate to neglect its other, more important and truer secular nature. The Row-botham doctrine, from which this exhibition takes its name, speaks of truth seen and deduced, embedded observa-tions and a maligned yet refreshing empiricism. Their emphatic refusal of an institutionally established transcendent reality and their preference instead for the enactment of a truth in renewal is celebrated. The operation of a global/local opposition, and the preference it maintains, is offset in favour of concentrating upon ulterior paths of knowledge and observation; these paths could lead towards unexpected possibilities. From the perspective of land-scapes such as these one would intuit in “Windows Vista” the patterns of something that strives toward an experi-ence of totality; one where such geographical markers as the horizon and the station-point (the subject) are not clearly visible. In opposition, flat-earthers contest this notion of a universal perspective; the airy vista. In an affirma-tive motion of flattening, ̒ Vista ̓and total systems are brought immediately into question. Thinking in this way, reduc-tiveness could be hot-wired to one of its apparent antonyms; connectivity.

>

At One Point Everyone thought the earth was flat” Microsoft Advertisement, 2007*Some words by the curators

TheThe Earth Not a Globe took its impetus from an advertisement in which Microsoft sought to implicate anyone dubi-ous of the potential of the new “Windows Vista” operating system in being as good as a flat-earther. Whilst, unsure of both Vista and the marketing campaign behind it we were Intrigued to consider the position of the flat earther. For us, the idea elicited themes of perception, of its extensions and limitations, and of how we may cope with, and resign ourselves to these on a tangible level. The concept provided a point of reference for an enquiry into how the emphasis on ̒ context ,̓ both artistically and curatorially, invariably perpetuates the relocation of meanings immanent tto works of art. As such, the truth or truths particular to a work are often quietly sidelined in an endless deference and deferral to other epistemologies and spatial constructs and the constructs and confines of discursive thought.

On the one hand, the Flat Earth Society doctrine may simply appear no more than the promotion of a factional Bib-lical literalism. Yet we would be unfortunate to neglect its other, more important and truer secular nature. The Row-botham doctrine, from which this exhibition takes its name, speaks of truth seen and deduced, embedded observa-tions and a maligned yet refreshing empiricism. Their emphatic refusal of an institutionally established transcendent reality and their preference instead for the enactment of a truth in renewal is celebrated. The operation of a global/local opposition, and the preference it maintains, is offset in favour of concentrating upon ulterior paths of knowledge and observation; these paths could lead towards unexpected possibilities. From the perspective of land-scapes such as these one would intuit in “Windows Vista” the patterns of something that strives toward an experi-ence of totality; one where such geographical markers as the horizon and the station-point (the subject) are not clearly visible. In opposition, flat-earthers contest this notion of a universal perspective; the airy vista. In an affirma-tive motion of flattening, ̒ Vista ̓and total systems are brought immediately into question. Thinking in this way, reduc-tiveness could be hot-wired to one of its apparent antonyms; connectivity.

>

The Earth Not a Globe seeks to emphasize the nature of the context of production, providing the space, or the landscape of a counter-production, is produced through dialogue rather than selection. The relationship between the earth and the globe, between the terrain and the territory, cannot concern a politics of resistance and a fram-ing of individual and collective views. The approach of each contributor can be read in terms of these wider con-cerns: as a flattening out of incomprehensible contradictions, of an existence lived within series ̓of multiplicities. An approach to both expanded and reductive fields of vision sees flattening not only as a coping strategy or unavoidable methodology (in the larger process of the consumption and controlling of information), but as a valid and af-firmative action in its own right. Thus the project becomes a trope of the ways in which we navigate the rivers of communication, whether or not this may consist in a re-deployment of information by a user-generation, a re-searcher of knowledge manifested through differing disciplines, or as masters of the levels of appropriation.

The Earth Not a Globe is composed of a multifaceted series of materialisations, each highlighting a specific aspect of the program. In the end the project resolved itself into an evening of performances, two back-to-back exhibi-tions, a publication, and a website. The first exhibition of The Earth Not a Globe, discusses appropriation as a leit-motif; expositing scenarios or feelings evoked by the methodologies of imaging. For its second incarnation the ex-hibition focuses upon the ruptures and circulations of images. The imaging processes available to us in the contem-porary world are at once both radical and yet highly direct. The apparent seamlessness of streamed images and montaged narratives thus evokes rhythms, which, in their intensity, speak out in schizophrenic banter against seam-lessness itself. For the publication we asked each of the artists involved in the exhibitions to create a commissioned piece that would work as a singular flat image. We also approached a small range of other practitioners and cu-rators, including a member of the Flat Earth Society, to contribute texts or images. The publication is a limited print edition, which will be available at both exhibitions. Each page will be stacked individually and visitors are asked to assemble their own version of The Earth Not a Globe publication, with as many or as few pages as they desire. The publication will also be available online.

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Knowledge is not a given. We are instructed in particular certainties when we are young, and we spend much of our lives in the process of re-learning a new type of knowledge; something akin to personal experience or explora-tion, which can be at odds with formal education, institutional or societal understanding. This consistent re-writing of new narratives must measure itself against the intensity and abundance of the information sources to which we are subject, and against the speeds and passages of reinterpretation. According to our definition, refusals are the matrix of the notion of a flattening. The artists chosen in this project create their own archives and pathways through which tthe thought-world of a total experience is renegotiated. By accumulating materials and building up new arenas, and flattening them outright into new manifestations, we are able to deal with globalization in new and complex ways, rather than simply accommodate ourselves to its modes.

In many respects, global perception is a concept at odds with itself. Globalisation has ushered in the increasing feel-ing for perceptual discontinuity and has contributed ironies to our observations. Rather than being consolidated, the spatial models we inhabit and the radical (but in essence abstracted) nature of how the planet upon which we live is shaped are made profoundly relative. It is in response to the illusion of a smoothly functioning, wholly comprehen-sive apparatus, which is unable to simultaneously encompass all sensory pathways, that a reductionism comes into play. This may disrupt the contemporary worldʼs need for interconnectivity, or participation. Yet this coping strategy is in no way an exercise in haphazard, self-assured cropping. It might be perceived less in terms of blindness than in highlighting the conditions under which mundane contacts or access are initiated. By refuting one established path-way for another route, ̒ flattening ̓could provide a way to identify previously established ideologies, and as a result, identify their grounds and their implications, so illuminating the inconsistencies and contradictions that a globalised perception adopts daily as it goes about its business.

As the title of the show suggests, the slippages between an earthly, telluric experience and a global apprehension are functions of scaling: features within an expansive or reductive series of idioms, events and knowledges. Information, in its many guises, may be considered a perpetually self-updating aggregator, where every instant is recorded and documented and is fed back to us in alternative formats. This abstraction of evevents presents the possibility of zooming in or out of its up-dates, the trajectories of which are distanced from an original source or diffusion of sources. Tangentially this reflects the state of artistic production and the act of display, which is inherently part of its very nature. The artwork is subject to a flattening and framing in the very instance of its being exposited. We are asked to regard it within certain parameters or guidelines; as art, as relative to the space, or to the other works present. The focus – even necessity - for us is to adopt a cartographic and partisan strategy of resisting one point of view for the coordi-nates of another set of potentials.

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The Earth Not a Globe seeks to emphasize the nature of the context of production, providing the space, or the landscape of a counter-production, is produced through dialogue rather than selection. The relationship between the earth and the globe, between the terrain and the territory, cannot concern a politics of resistance and a fram-ing of individual and collective views. The approach of each contributor can be read in terms of these wider con-cerns: as a flattening out of incomprehensible contradictions, of an existence lived within series ̓of multiplicities. An approach to both expanded and reductive fields of vision sees flattening not only as a coping strategy or unavoidable methodology (in the larger process of the consumption and controlling of information), but as a valid and af-firmative action in its own right. Thus the project becomes a trope of the ways in which we navigate the rivers of communication, whether or not this may consist in a re-deployment of information by a user-generation, a re-searcher of knowledge manifested through differing disciplines, or as masters of the levels of appropriation.

The Earth Not a Globe is composed of a multifaceted series of materialisations, each highlighting a specific aspect of the program. In the end the project resolved itself into an evening of performances, two back-to-back exhibi-tions, a publication, and a website. The first exhibition of The Earth Not a Globe, discusses appropriation as a leit-motif; expositing scenarios or feelings evoked by the methodologies of imaging. For its second incarnation the ex-hibition focuses upon the ruptures and circulations of images. The imaging processes available to us in the contem-porary world are at once both radical and yet highly direct. The apparent seamlessness of streamed images and montaged narratives thus evokes rhythms, which, in their intensity, speak out in schizophrenic banter against seam-lessness itself. For the publication we asked each of the artists involved in the exhibitions to create a commissioned piece that would work as a singular flat image. We also approached a small range of other practitioners and cu-rators, including a member of the Flat Earth Society, to contribute texts or images. The publication is a limited print edition, which will be available at both exhibitions. Each page will be stacked individually and visitors are asked to assemble their own version of The Earth Not a Globe publication, with as many or as few pages as they desire. The publication will also be available online.

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ANGIE HICKSExperiment with an Old Master and a Shredder

(2005)

JOHAN PERSSONDANIEL PEDERSEN

Johan & Daniel Photographywww.pedersenpersson.com

CHARLIE COFFEY &RICHARD HARDS

a draft for a set of citations (2008)

CHARLIE COFFEY &RICHARD HARDS

a draft for a set of citations (2008)

HAROON MIRZAArtwork for 'Storm' by Django Django, Dave Maclean

(2009)

The Earth is flat.

This is a belief I hold as the beginning of an ongoing search for truth and certainty. It is a starting point – an intellectual foundation on which I feel further knowledge can soundly be built. Much as Descartes did in his Meditations on First Philosophy, I wish to start from a place of certainty and build upon it. The Flat Earth is an obvious truth to me now. My senses show me and my reason confirms it.

HHowever, my belief that the Earth is flat is not a popular one and it is not a belief I have always held. Like most people, I was taught from an early age that the Earth is a rotating sphere which, along with a collection of other spherical bodies, revolves in an elliptical orbit around our Sun. To most of you, this will seem like an obvious and unarguable fact. It is something you have been told by teachers. Told by parents. Told by textbooks. It is something you are utterly sure of. And, more than likely, it is something you have never truly investigated.

It isIt isnʼt surprising, then, that people believe so strongly that the Earth is a sphere. We are bombarded every day of our lives with information. Television, radio, books and the Internet all compete to tell us things. Society agrees that some ideas are worth debating and that others are not. The idea of a spherical Earth falls into that second category. At some point, our society decided with great certainty that the Earth is a sphere and, consequently, that further consideration is unnecessary and anyone holding an opposing viviewpoint is unworthy of debate. That the Earth is spherical is a ʻfactʼ and we are, from an early age, told to accept it without question and in the face of our own first-hand experience. But as 16th Century mathematician Pierre-Simon Laplace stated, "The weight of evidence for an extraordinary claim must be proportioned to its strangeness." The Spherical Earth model is truly extraordinary and runs contrary to all of our senses. Consequently, the burden of proof is extraordinary – and this burden has never been met. But, because the idea is so firmly ingrained in our culture, few of us bother to hold the Spherical Earth model to account.

This This tendency to firmly maintain beliefs while intentionally disregarding opposing evidence – particularly evidence in the form of first-hand experience – is intellectually dishonest and unscientific. Manʼs quest for truth is furthered only through experience and reason. During the 19th Century, Samuel Birley Rowbotham pioneered an approach to astronomy called Zetetic Astronomy. Zeteticism stresses the importance of reason and experience over the trusting acceptance of dogma. This emphasis on experience as the only source of true knowledge dates back to ancient Greek empiricists such as Aristotle and was also prominent in in the more recent British empiricism espoused by John Locke. In his An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Locke states, “No manʼs knowledge can go beyond his experience.” While second-hand ʻknowledgeʼ is often a useful tool for dealing with practical, day-to-day tasks, it should not be mistaken for truth and certainty.

i

The Earth is flat.

This is a belief I hold as the beginning of an ongoing search for truth and certainty. It is a starting point – an intellectual foundation on which I feel further knowledge can soundly be built. Much as Descartes did in his Meditations on First Philosophy, I wish to start from a place of certainty and build upon it. The Flat Earth is an obvious truth to me now. My senses show me and my reason confirms it.

HHowever, my belief that the Earth is flat is not a popular one and it is not a belief I have always held. Like most people, I was taught from an early age that the Earth is a rotating sphere which, along with a collection of other spherical bodies, revolves in an elliptical orbit around our Sun. To most of you, this will seem like an obvious and unarguable fact. It is something you have been told by teachers. Told by parents. Told by textbooks. It is something you are utterly sure of. And, more than likely, it is something you have never truly investigated.

It isIt isnʼt surprising, then, that people believe so strongly that the Earth is a sphere. We are bombarded every day of our lives with information. Television, radio, books and the Internet all compete to tell us things. Society agrees that some ideas are worth debating and that others are not. The idea of a spherical Earth falls into that second category. At some point, our society decided with great certainty that the Earth is a sphere and, consequently, that further consideration is unnecessary and anyone holding an opposing viviewpoint is unworthy of debate. That the Earth is spherical is a ʻfactʼ and we are, from an early age, told to accept it without question and in the face of our own first-hand experience. But as 16th Century mathematician Pierre-Simon Laplace stated, "The weight of evidence for an extraordinary claim must be proportioned to its strangeness." The Spherical Earth model is truly extraordinary and runs contrary to all of our senses. Consequently, the burden of proof is extraordinary – and this burden has never been met. But, because the idea is so firmly ingrained in our culture, few of us bother to hold the Spherical Earth model to account.

This This tendency to firmly maintain beliefs while intentionally disregarding opposing evidence – particularly evidence in the form of first-hand experience – is intellectually dishonest and unscientific. Manʼs quest for truth is furthered only through experience and reason. During the 19th Century, Samuel Birley Rowbotham pioneered an approach to astronomy called Zetetic Astronomy. Zeteticism stresses the importance of reason and experience over the trusting acceptance of dogma. This emphasis on experience as the only source of true knowledge dates back to ancient Greek empiricists such as Aristotle and was also prominent in in the more recent British empiricism espoused by John Locke. In his An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Locke states, “No manʼs knowledge can go beyond his experience.” While second-hand ʻknowledgeʼ is often a useful tool for dealing with practical, day-to-day tasks, it should not be mistaken for truth and certainty.

i

Empiricism forms the foundation of the scientific method, a tremendously useful tool for learning about the world. One of the scientific methodʼs greatest strengths – when it is practiced honestly and sincerely – is its willingness to engage opposing data. In the preface of his book Zetetic Astronomy: Earth Not a Globe, Rowbotham makes the Zetetic dedication to this principle clear:

I advise all my readers who have become Zetetic not to look with disfavour upon the objections of their opponents. Should such objections be well or even plausibly founded, they will only tend to free us from error, and to purify and exalt our Zetetic philosophy. In a word, let us make friends, or, at least, friendly and useful instruments of our enemies; and, if we cannot convert them to the better cause, let us care fully examine their objections, fairly meet them if possible, and always make use of them as beacons for our future guidance.

DespiDespite its frequent criticism from mainstream science, the Zetetic approach to science is happy to take on board objections from its opponents because those objections will ultimately be used to strengthen the Flat Earth position.

The modern Flat Earth Society has its roots in Zetetic Astronomy. After Rowbothamʼs death in 1884, his ffollowers formed the Universal Zetetic Society and continued to publish Zetetic literature in the spirit of Rowbothamʼs Zetetic Astronomy: Earth Not a Globe. In 1956, the Universal Zetetic Society became the Flat Earth Society. While the Societyʼs focus became more religious throughout the 20th Century, the Zetetic underpinnings remained intact. In the 21st Century, the Flat Earth Society is returning to its original scientific focus and, despite its presently diminished size, is stronger than ever. We are patient because we know that the truth will ultimately be realised. Again, from Rowbothamʼs preface to Zetetic Astronomy: Earth Not a Globe:

In all diIn all directions there is so much truth in our favour that we can well afford to be dainty in our selection, and magnanimous and charitable towards those who simply believe, but cannot prove, that we are wrong. We need not seize upon every crude and ill-developed result which offers, or only seems to offer, the slightest chance of becoming evidence in our favour, as every theorist is obliged to do if he would have his theory clothed and fit to be seen. We can afford to patiently wait, care-fully weigh, and well consider every point advanced, in the full assurance that simple truth, and not the mere opinions of men, is destined, sooner or later, to have ascendancy.

IN VERIIN VERITATE VICTORIA.

Daniel ShentonThe Flat Earth Society

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The Interior, The Trace: Fragments from A Contemporary History on the Use of Space

Cecilia Wee

Key: Bellevue Hotel, Harbour House, The Island, Landmark Mall, Ngee Ann City, Speicher XI, Woodland Road

Z:2005 The Doll, The The Doll, The Automaton. What did we ever learn from the dérive? When confronted with alien environ-ments or unfamiliar formats we tend to either rely on predetermined responses or act intuitively, or at least thatʼs what I felt myself fall back on. Through the misty freeze of the revived, rebooted and regenerated docks this techno pavilion was a vehicle for articulating what we hope will and will not be. Running up the ramp to escape from the biting wind, my heels reverberated on the aluminium and I opened the door to find an electronic playground, whose clean, flat lines concealed intelligent capabilities. A temporary residence for the confluence of state sponsored research and theatrical experiment, the pixel walls tracked our movements to test the ability to react and interact, yet these statistics were not collated for the purpose of non-governmental bodies. All those who engaged with that controlled space for play and participation did so voluntarily, although one might otherwise consider the experience dangerous to personal liberty if conducted by persons other than artists. As such, public submission to these technologies can be interpreted as offering an alternative to the assumption that considers contact with them to immediately result in being under under their spell. In this context, the public is enticed to enjoy being controlled.

D:1998 Boredom, Eternal Return. For the irrational, overworked and those of a nervous disposition, constricted communal interior spaces force agitation and boredom on their occupants. Living on top of one another, our coping strategies took form on the street, in the main, provoking disdain from local residents and correlative satisfaction for my companions that “our task” was successful. Our performances of gentle parcours for an incidental public was merely to deflect resignation that we would be trapped along the few same streets for the next few years, continually destined to ask each other what we wanted to do next. On a (rare) relaxed evening at home, I attempted to translate into Chinese phrases such as ʻangry fire dragonʼ and ʻlucky tigerʼ at the request of my flatmates, but my pathetic language skills struggled to find a complement for ʻannoying thing that chafesʼ. Dancing across the street with my companion the following morning, as rain battered my head, the wind forced me to dodge two gutters with my umbrella at 45˚ angle, coinciding with my moment of lucidity: ʻmʻmóʼ (to grate) ʻdōng xiʼ (thing). As a phrase it surely made no sense. As an embodied action, it grasped the futility of the situation we found ourselves in, which would surely be further reproduced in macrocosm in the future. But for that moment, the gap between the two words was a source of delight for my friend - a byword for things that donʼt fit, the space “in between”, the location of mis-performance. We repeated the action until we reached the building.

1

The Interior, The Trace: Fragments from A Contemporary History on the Use of Space

Cecilia Wee

Key: Bellevue Hotel, Harbour House, The Island, Landmark Mall, Ngee Ann City, Speicher XI, Woodland Road

Z:2005 The Doll, The The Doll, The Automaton. What did we ever learn from the dérive? When confronted with alien environ-ments or unfamiliar formats we tend to either rely on predetermined responses or act intuitively, or at least thatʼs what I felt myself fall back on. Through the misty freeze of the revived, rebooted and regenerated docks this techno pavilion was a vehicle for articulating what we hope will and will not be. Running up the ramp to escape from the biting wind, my heels reverberated on the aluminium and I opened the door to find an electronic playground, whose clean, flat lines concealed intelligent capabilities. A temporary residence for the confluence of state sponsored research and theatrical experiment, the pixel walls tracked our movements to test the ability to react and interact, yet these statistics were not collated for the purpose of non-governmental bodies. All those who engaged with that controlled space for play and participation did so voluntarily, although one might otherwise consider the experience dangerous to personal liberty if conducted by persons other than artists. As such, public submission to these technologies can be interpreted as offering an alternative to the assumption that considers contact with them to immediately result in being under under their spell. In this context, the public is enticed to enjoy being controlled.

D:1998 Boredom, Eternal Return. For the irrational, overworked and those of a nervous disposition, constricted communal interior spaces force agitation and boredom on their occupants. Living on top of one another, our coping strategies took form on the street, in the main, provoking disdain from local residents and correlative satisfaction for my companions that “our task” was successful. Our performances of gentle parcours for an incidental public was merely to deflect resignation that we would be trapped along the few same streets for the next few years, continually destined to ask each other what we wanted to do next. On a (rare) relaxed evening at home, I attempted to translate into Chinese phrases such as ʻangry fire dragonʼ and ʻlucky tigerʼ at the request of my flatmates, but my pathetic language skills struggled to find a complement for ʻannoying thing that chafesʼ. Dancing across the street with my companion the following morning, as rain battered my head, the wind forced me to dodge two gutters with my umbrella at 45˚ angle, coinciding with my moment of lucidity: ʻmʻmóʼ (to grate) ʻdōng xiʼ (thing). As a phrase it surely made no sense. As an embodied action, it grasped the futility of the situation we found ourselves in, which would surely be further reproduced in macrocosm in the future. But for that moment, the gap between the two words was a source of delight for my friend - a byword for things that donʼt fit, the space “in between”, the location of mis-performance. We repeated the action until we reached the building.

1

K:2006Dream City and Dream House. The desert draws in people from far and wide to construct itself in a physical sense, with the promise of wealth and the potential fulfilment of its dreams. Life operates with measurements that are neither metric nor imperial but of another order. Missing the torch bearers by a few minutes I wwandered out to look at my reflection on the convoy of parked SUVs, furtively peering across the car park at the athletes. Unlike its nearby rival, communication is quietly and politely pleasant, yet (I fear) without much substance. Perhaps it is because there is nothing but air and grit – or at least that is what my hosts keep telling me, whilst reclining in comfort, this being the most important signifier at the substitution of anything more risky. The inhabitants of this place are risk adverse – tradition is paramount and change is scary – with the exception of road travel, where they lead the world with their perilous approaches. FFashion is kept for a select few. Waiting outside the mall, I had unwittingly become part of that elite (or something more insidious), as I watched the young boys unabashedly try to dive under the security guardʼs arm. A stiff hello and beep of the horn alerted me to my friendʼs presence, and under the watchful eyes of unidentified neighbours we navigated the wide and busy roads at high speed. We reached our destination, a modest looking restaurant above a tailorʼs shop and were led to a small room on the far side with four chairs and a large table. As the two of us sat down the waiter closed the door and a few seconds later my frfriend opened it, a charade between them that continued for 5 minutes without explanation or reference, so that the melodies of the singer positioned in the main restaurant floated in and out of the room. The tasty homestyle food echoed the attempt to replicate the intimacy of a private dining cabin, yet despite the pretty wall tiles, the one-way mirror lent to our table the air of a canteen for security personnel.

T:1990Modes of lighting. Proximity to the equator has the tendency to equalise timings of the rising and setting sun throughout the year. Fortunately, we were enjoying long summer evenings and as darkness fell, lights around the marina began to twinkle in time with the tide. This romantic exposure gave the town and even the empty expectant markets a gentle hue. In the mornings, the huge green cupola of the church proudly glistened on the top of the hill, luring visitors away from the baking heat of the town. Bored of avoiding the beach, we decided to board the tram and let it take us up the winding slope where we hoped weʼd be able to to find more tranquil surroundings. It was only then that the faded grandeur of the marina revealed itself as a once select resort for the rich and famous. As the train curved around a bend I pointed excitedly to our hotel and asked for a picture of myself in front of it. The dreary driver gruffly stated that my father should stop taking photographs, reiterated by a frustrated passenger angrily jabbing his fingers at the camera. We sat down in silence. The outburst opened an aperture –the other superficially calm passengers were only more adept at hiding their generic malaise under a modestly constructed uniform of colourless compliance.

F:2007Iron Construction. Ashes to ashes - metal monuments break up the continuity of the skyline and remain, de-spite the encroachment of the natural world on a once highly regulated setting. Continuity comes with the principle of flight – that of the unusual birds that fly over the area, and the extraordinary experiments on heavy projectiles designed to pass over adversaries. The spit still resonates with military concerns; indeed the flatness of the region is perfect for enabling and propagating investigations into the history of

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destruction. My guide looked like he had lived (and thrived) through all the political changes, embodying stoic resistance itself. During my short trip there, I could only begin to examine the topmost layer of that fearful archaeology. I stepped out of the jeep and as the shingle crunched beneath my feet, gazed at the sunken roof that had been a proud signifier and shelter for classified knowledge. Clinical cleanliness typified the building during its heyday, but wildlife has taken over those pagodas, it belongs to them. I wondered what kind of tests these animals now perform.

B:2001FFashion. As one adapts to increasingly smaller domestic spaces, sandwiched in tall buildings between a myriad of neighbours, spaces for leisure are correlatively enlarged. Perception of scale becomes a bargaining chip for cunning authorities, with one eye on social obedience and another on augmenting GDP. When people are accustomed to scuttling from one building to another, not from fear but out of self-pself-protection from the heat, the presence and purpose of a 3,000sqm courtyard in the centre of town poses a conundrum. The privately owned so-called Civic Plaza was thankfully decorated with a marquee that day. Its huge grey mosaic floor was only ever a prelude to its spotless façade and ridiculously loud giant TV screen. I arrived in a cab, late and slightly breathless as I walked across the wide pavement. The air was damp with hot rain, dirtying the oversized fake red marble columns, and the dull repetitive thud of Mando-Mando-Pop could be heard coming from inside. Entering the belly of the giant white tent, I was blinded by an aggressive cocktail of coloured lights, replica antique Perspex furniture and an impossibly long catwalk branded in neon. The unnaturally upbeat disposition of the eighteen year old girls who, one by one, sang to the same backing track functioned as a perfect instance of music as advertising, suggestive of - like all things there – the huge shopping complex that lurked within.

m:2003 Idleness. Caught in a valley between the sea and mountains, time is faced with a dilemma. The former enunciaenunciates dramatic desires in discussion with the heavens using quick movements we might liken to speech, whereas the imperceptibly slow changes of the latter are interpreted as almost static by our clocks. I had a lot to think about but nothing to do, except observe the mountains and wait for dolphins in a precarious building on the cusp of the sea. Where thoughts and words are absorbed or drowned out by geology, idleness becomes a clever disguise for the seemingly inactive. Eating a Tomato Bredie by candlelight on the side of a hill, I realised why everyone here spoke so loudly – there was, quite simply, more space aavailable. Loud voices were not hostile attempts to appropriate and assert ownership of limited space through speech, rather, gardens were larger and buildings were further apart, contributing to a notion of community community fluidly moving between the poles of private and collective. After the meal, on our drive back, my companion waved at a man with a broken bicycle at the traffic light and I asked if he knew him, to which he somewhat cryptically replied, ʻwe have seen each otherʼ. The man crossed the road, singing to the beach. All too conscious of manʼs inability to tame the landscape, or each other, love and fear con-verge in a concerted effort to reconcile a haunting past with a future of rich potentials.

3

destruction. My guide looked like he had lived (and thrived) through all the political changes, embodying stoic resistance itself. During my short trip there, I could only begin to examine the topmost layer of that fearful archaeology. I stepped out of the jeep and as the shingle crunched beneath my feet, gazed at the sunken roof that had been a proud signifier and shelter for classified knowledge. Clinical cleanliness typified the building during its heyday, but wildlife has taken over those pagodas, it belongs to them. I wondered what kind of tests these animals now perform.

B:2001FFashion. As one adapts to increasingly smaller domestic spaces, sandwiched in tall buildings between a myriad of neighbours, spaces for leisure are correlatively enlarged. Perception of scale becomes a bargaining chip for cunning authorities, with one eye on social obedience and another on augmenting GDP. When people are accustomed to scuttling from one building to another, not from fear but out of self-pself-protection from the heat, the presence and purpose of a 3,000sqm courtyard in the centre of town poses a conundrum. The privately owned so-called Civic Plaza was thankfully decorated with a marquee that day. Its huge grey mosaic floor was only ever a prelude to its spotless façade and ridiculously loud giant TV screen. I arrived in a cab, late and slightly breathless as I walked across the wide pavement. The air was damp with hot rain, dirtying the oversized fake red marble columns, and the dull repetitive thud of Mando-Mando-Pop could be heard coming from inside. Entering the belly of the giant white tent, I was blinded by an aggressive cocktail of coloured lights, replica antique Perspex furniture and an impossibly long catwalk branded in neon. The unnaturally upbeat disposition of the eighteen year old girls who, one by one, sang to the same backing track functioned as a perfect instance of music as advertising, suggestive of - like all things there – the huge shopping complex that lurked within.

m:2003 Idleness. Caught in a valley between the sea and mountains, time is faced with a dilemma. The former enunciaenunciates dramatic desires in discussion with the heavens using quick movements we might liken to speech, whereas the imperceptibly slow changes of the latter are interpreted as almost static by our clocks. I had a lot to think about but nothing to do, except observe the mountains and wait for dolphins in a precarious building on the cusp of the sea. Where thoughts and words are absorbed or drowned out by geology, idleness becomes a clever disguise for the seemingly inactive. Eating a Tomato Bredie by candlelight on the side of a hill, I realised why everyone here spoke so loudly – there was, quite simply, more space aavailable. Loud voices were not hostile attempts to appropriate and assert ownership of limited space through speech, rather, gardens were larger and buildings were further apart, contributing to a notion of community community fluidly moving between the poles of private and collective. After the meal, on our drive back, my companion waved at a man with a broken bicycle at the traffic light and I asked if he knew him, to which he somewhat cryptically replied, ʻwe have seen each otherʼ. The man crossed the road, singing to the beach. All too conscious of manʼs inability to tame the landscape, or each other, love and fear con-verge in a concerted effort to reconcile a haunting past with a future of rich potentials.

3

One or the Other. Sometimes Both

Paul Pieroni

a

One or the Other. Sometimes Both

Paul Pieroni

a

1

1

ʻThe earth is flat, as anyone can see, that is the view of orthodoxy… the world is in the middle and the sun goes round, thatʼs what ancient Aristotle found!ʼ

Memory can be so haphazard, so aleatory. These lines are from a play mentioned on another page of this text. They remain the only lines I recall from the play

b

1

1

ʻThe earth is flat, as anyone can see, that is the view of orthodoxy… the world is in the middle and the sun goes round, thatʼs what ancient Aristotle found!ʼ

Memory can be so haphazard, so aleatory. These lines are from a play mentioned on another page of this text. They remain the only lines I recall from the play

b c

A school – not my own – on a morning in the early 90s.

Later in the day I will be performing in a musical play themed around Christopher Columbusʼ first voyage to America.

The school is grey. A glass roofed modular fugue.

My face is shaded terracotta. Iʼm to play a Native Indian.

As discussed in the pre-text supplied to me by the curators of the exhibition this text is part of, it is apparent that the author of the play in question had taken his dramaturgical cue from the ʻfactionalʼ account of Columbusʼ journey con-tained within Washington Irvingʼs The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (1828). Irving, like the playwright, suggested it was Columbus who discovered that the earth was not flat and in doing so further encouraged the false myth that the prevailing cosmological view of the Middle Ages was that the world was flat.

2

2

d

A school – not my own – on a morning in the early 90s.

Later in the day I will be performing in a musical play themed around Christopher Columbusʼ first voyage to America.

The school is grey. A glass roofed modular fugue.

My face is shaded terracotta. Iʼm to play a Native Indian.

As discussed in the pre-text supplied to me by the curators of the exhibition this text is part of, it is apparent that the author of the play in question had taken his dramaturgical cue from the ʻfactionalʼ account of Columbusʼ journey con-tained within Washington Irvingʼs The Life and Voyages of Christopher Columbus (1828). Irving, like the playwright, suggested it was Columbus who discovered that the earth was not flat and in doing so further encouraged the false myth that the prevailing cosmological view of the Middle Ages was that the world was flat.

2

2

d e

Copernican Revolution.

The Copernican Revolution refers to the paradigm shift away from the Ptolemaic model of the heavens, which postulated the Earth at the centre of the Universe, towards the heliocentric model with the Sun at the centre of the Solar System. It was one of the starting points for the Scientific Revolution of the 16th Century.

Immanuel Kant (1724 – 1804) used the idea of a Copernican Revolution in order to mmetaphorically describe the effect of his critical philosophy on traditional metaphysics. He believed that he had cleared the impasse between rationalist and empiricist thought, heralding a new revolutionary age of transcendental idealism.

We might ourselves offer one further metaphorical turn: ʻCopernican Revolutionʼ as suggestive of any type of significant shift in human consciousness – for example the historical movement from one weltanschauung (worldview) into another.

This is, I suppose, what human development is: a gradual process of renewal and eerasure.

f

Copernican Revolution.

The Copernican Revolution refers to the paradigm shift away from the Ptolemaic model of the heavens, which postulated the Earth at the centre of the Universe, towards the heliocentric model with the Sun at the centre of the Solar System. It was one of the starting points for the Scientific Revolution of the 16th Century.

Immanuel Kant (1724 – 1804) used the idea of a Copernican Revolution in order to mmetaphorically describe the effect of his critical philosophy on traditional metaphysics. He believed that he had cleared the impasse between rationalist and empiricist thought, heralding a new revolutionary age of transcendental idealism.

We might ourselves offer one further metaphorical turn: ʻCopernican Revolutionʼ as suggestive of any type of significant shift in human consciousness – for example the historical movement from one weltanschauung (worldview) into another.

This is, I suppose, what human development is: a gradual process of renewal and eerasure.

f g

Though pioneered by Auguste Perret, it was Le Corbusier who popularised the architectural use of béton brut – ʻraw concreteʼ in French. After the war, British based architects such as Peter and Alison Smithson, Denys Lasdun and Ernő Goldfinger, further developed béton brut (as well other ideas inherited from early-modern architects concerning the functional socio-utopian potential of built space) to form a style described by critic Reyner Banham, as ʻThe New Brutalismʼ.

BBetween the 50s and 70s Britain built big in the Brutalist style. However time and fashion – as well as a number of perceived problems with the day-to-day actuality of living in Brutalist buildings – rendered the mode largely obsolete by the early/mid 80s.

h i

Though pioneered by Auguste Perret, it was Le Corbusier who popularised the architectural use of béton brut – ʻraw concreteʼ in French. After the war, British based architects such as Peter and Alison Smithson, Denys Lasdun and Ernő Goldfinger, further developed béton brut (as well other ideas inherited from early-modern architects concerning the functional socio-utopian potential of built space) to form a style described by critic Reyner Banham, as ʻThe New Brutalismʼ.

BBetween the 50s and 70s Britain built big in the Brutalist style. However time and fashion – as well as a number of perceived problems with the day-to-day actuality of living in Brutalist buildings – rendered the mode largely obsolete by the early/mid 80s.

h i