iwishicoulddescribeittoyoubetter. » work


the blog below is written from beijing, new york, vienna, sendai, thessaloniki, tokyo, berlin, osaka and zürich. there are a few of us, and this is the space in between.



“i realize i didn’t take so many photos recently. although i often see the people i really want to document. it’s always too late or i feel bad to do it.”

liuxiang_notsomanypictures_sm

从三月份在中国国内《穿》杂志可以在淘宝网买。在大阪可以在国立国際美術館iTohen买。

Wear journal is now available in Osaka at The National Museum of Art, Osaka and iTohen. Within China, online orders can be placed via taobao.

[drawing on left from 穿 Wear, photo on right by anyway. Thank you, 小蔡 and aka.]

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please don’t go, don’t go away
Get the Flash Player to see the wordTube Media Player.

——
Research material from part of the PUBLIC project by Elaine W. Ho and Fotini Lazaridou-Hatzigoga. Organized as a daily series of experiments, interventions and discourses, PUBLIC aims to examine the potentiality of latency and open spaces made possible in the relations between individuals and publics. Other activities are posted here. Some are open invitations to all, others are unannounced insertions in different locations throughout Berlin. PROGRAM - intitiative for art and architecture collaborations; 22 January - 1 February 2009.

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everything on sale this time of year

wearsale_466“Okay,” he said, “everything 90 degrees.” And we became temporary helmsmen, the act of organising one’s knowledge and one’s life to be a 2nd Captain job. Here, the sea is misty, the sea is cold, the sea is snowing, but we aim for 90 degrees, give or take a few, 90 degrees today or tomorrow relative. I missed the pounding on ice, her roommate bouncing before the ice turned sweaty; it’s dangerous but not scary. No, not scary at all, love, we just go, we just go, through broken ice or slippery snow, because the thing is the thing, and let us share this thing that is not ours to keep or own. Six shirts, everything on sale this time of year, let’s get rid of them all or let them go slowly.

Wear journal is now available in Berlin at do you read me?!, Motto and ProQM. In the post, on its way to Boekie Woekie in Amsterdam.

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ISBN: 978-3-00-026619-5; IMPRINT: HomeShop; PAPERBACK: 168 pp., 18.5 cm x 25 cm, sewn binding, colour and b/w sections, paper varied (no cover). Made in the People’s Republic of China.

期刊《穿》的第一期现已出版发行。ISBN: 978-3-00-026619-5; 出版:家作坊;规格:168页, 18.5cm x 25 cm,锁线胶装,彩色;b/w部份,特种纸(无封面)。中华人民共和国印刷。

询问/订买/发行请访问家作坊的网页或联系:
homeshop [圈a] iwishicoulddescribeittoyoubetter [点] org

The first issue of Wear journal is now available. For more information, please visit HomeShop’s page. For inquiries or to order a copy, please contact: homeshop [at] iwishicoulddescribeittoyoubetter [dot] org

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old news, recently

最近何颖雅和福帝尼于我们的新录象作品《公众》参加了2008北京独立电影论坛请访问看作品多信息和片段。关于北京独立电影论坛:
www.fanhall.com | www.lixianting.org | www.cinenotes.cn

The short film “Public” recently featured at the 2008 Beijing Independent Film Festival organised by the Li Xianting Film Fund. More information and an excerpt from the film here. More info about the festival: www.fanhall.com | www.lixianting.org | www.cinenotes.cn

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on iwishicoulddescribeittoyoubetter, eyh

Who made this? asks the naive moment.
My first stir of thought has been to think of making.
The idea of making is the first and most human of ideas.
“To explain” is never anything more than to describe a way of making: it is merely to remake in thought.

—- from Paul Valéry, “Man and Sea Shell,” in The Collected Works of Paul Valéry, vol. 1 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1956), p. 117.

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sous les pavés, la plage

BEFORE AND DURING AND AFTER: Three days’ thought on media culture and artificial life

…as responsible human beings, we forget (Ha, seduction!). Were we unable to, every horror and every pain experienced as the newly born would retain itself, excruciating, just as every moment of laughter and joy, but we would never recover. The mirrors of Lacan are as inevitably linked to artificial life as self and world. And forgetfulness is not so much saying no as being able to say yes again. Are you ready to rule the world?

—-From a small text written, weaving writing experiment, flow. June 2008, Saas-Fee. Read the full essay [here]. Apologies for lack of page numbers for notes/references, please write if you need more.

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a sofa, a table, a lamp, a bookshelf, a plant, a TV

a body, a living room, a vessel. “…maybe I would say all the kulturelle komponente that i have inherited…” oversea is a work-in-progress from simone, mon and e. [link to project blog] First showing at the Premio finale, May 2008 at Theatre Tuchlaube in Aarau, Switzerland. many thanks to all those who allowed us to interview you, Peter, Thom, Karin, Benji, Rahel, Nomsa, Flurin, Meret, Catja, Binh, Rudy, Lidy, Thi-Xiem and Chieu.

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forgetting “understanding the culture of collaboration”, propaganda, and a boy that looks a lot like Lucio

after and/or in collaboration with: participants of the ‘visionairs studio‘ (sng tong beng, minfu, konstantin, daniel, dirk, amit, helen, stefan, and sylvie), tino sehgal, michel houellebecq, malgven gerbes and david brandstätter (and their dancers Simone, Eva, Pedro, Ixchel and I-Fen) …and fotini

buero1.jpga series of solos later put together, a one week work-in-progress kind of workshop worked out a priori, a discussion.最后一天,他回答我,“没用啊…”buero4.jpg“and what do you think?” asks the situationist to the audience. a collective holding of breath before the girl that looks like litty speaks. “and what is it that you were expecting from our educational institutions?” he is held responsible. but, “WE were talking about” …something else. we welcome you to this situation. but now she must feel stupid.buero3.jpgregard the distinction. a series of solos that collide on occasion, when it’s a butterfly—–he holds his fingers to his lips—–’amazing’, but otherwise, precisely unaware of the other.buero2.jpgand a series of presentations about the future, the aesthetics of work and collaboration go a long way. but she doesn’t want to talk about the fear of aging. not right now.buero5.jpgi was constantly in fear that it would be like this. two bodies curled in fear of the infinity of three dimensions turn, clockwise. they must have been over aware, acutely, but he did not like to use the word ‘execution’. a series of solos passing on occasion.lookslikelucio.jpglet’s work hard. it turns autumn again.

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minutes. finally. we meet. others. minutes.

beds. dormitory feel. luggage. blanket. dishes. showers? toilets? they’re in a group but also individuals at the same time. artwork and also receivers of info at the same time. receiving more than giving out. selection. simple. profession. location. possible interest in the project. possibility of having an effect on their life. parents? eighteen to sixty. preference of the embassy. people who can determine their will. biggest worry. how to select people. where to get them. met with embassy first. documentary film. sixteen teams all over the country. already six-hundred hours of footage. people also need to answer ninety-nine questions from fake. about germany. the west. fantasy. religion. work through e-mail. make participants start to participate. the first step. already a part of it. even if the visa process may fail. june thirteen. announcement of the artists of documenta twelve. the project is impossible to keep a secret. logistically. not boat-people. boeing-people. usb-stick. memory stick. memory of today. infrastructure hardware. network infrastructure. upload. download. twenty computers. printers. a working office space that people can freely use. create an information landscape. info-booth. usb-stick will contain the memory of one individual. corporate gift. two sticks. one at start. upload. download. use. then at departure take in stick and give a new blank one. keep this memory, this accumulated knowledge. the used one you keep as a trace of this experience. memory of participant and memory of event. a thousand and one different eyes. one may be completely into all the artworks. another may not give a damn. i’ll be a cook. a barber. the teacher. informational storage. where to eat? where to sleep? what to buy? what to visit? most will not speak english or german. need information. mapping. computer technicians? doctor? impose on top of kassel another layer of information. modeled after a map of china. your own city in any city. when it’s gone it’s gone. traces in mind not in physical space. why products. so much stuff. unnecessary. what will be related to the stick? information centre. we want to be active. them to be active. interface architecture. set up a condition. we don’t know what’s going to happen. we provide a possibility. most fascinating thing. usb one GB. one thousand and one GB. a photograph of each? that’s the studio photo! ask people to do it themselves. assuming that most people have a camera. otherwise provide twenty or so cameras. each group roughly two-hundred. on the planes forty here. sixty there. some from beijing. some from shanghai. and insurance. one-thousand yuan per person. plane tickets non-refundable. over twenty people to coordinate the work. will have volunteers in kassel. can probably have computers and technicians. map-office sets up scenario. something personal. emphasize individual. the more unpredictable, unforeseeable elements we put in the better. when i started i didn’t know it was going to be like this. chinese people get very emotional. one girl wrote me that one day she was standing on a traffic overpass and started thinking about the fact that she will partake in this project and that she was so happy it made her cry. she said she never knew she could cry out of happiness.minutes.gifimage edited from: http://blog.sina.com.cn/aiweiwei

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