MAEEC 680

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View where I am sitting, writing at the moment. It is still cold up here this week. Last week was warm. This is only the 4th or 5th butterfly I see. Not a Monarque unfortunately, in decline as we know, this one looks like an eastern Comma, but I am really not sure. Could be a Vice-roi or a -faux Monarque, but not as defined... In any case, will just take a break to help him/her out the screen porch.

MAEEC EECO 680 is under way starting July 7th, and so is summer residency on august 4th.
Here I am, a year behind most of my 2011 cohort pals, and still feeling I have quite a long way to go.
I know Liz and Jen, -former teammates and 2011 colleagues- will join residency at the same time I will. Although I feel I still need ALL the time I can get, to write, I will be very happy to meet our new summer residency course mates and instructors, and to reconnect with previous friends, instructors, trees, peacocks, dears and racoons as well :-)

Since Peter Norman and Robert Pidgeon, our instructors for this last stretch of MAEEC specify : « this is not intended to be a time intensive effort.  The intent is to begin reconnecting and preparing to get the most of the residency. » I will take their word on it !  Hoping to take the month of July, which is my month off from teaching and related University program activities, as prolific as I can, in order to get last chapters of my thesis further done with.

After what was a little bit of a demanding process, I can add I was given the opportunity to do my thesis en français -in French-, my mother tongue, which will also mean translating everything to English will be a little time consuming, here as well. So I might stick to the very basics, in order to reach my goal of getting the thesis as far as I can, before my new university tasks arrive mid-August. Doing as much as you can and making priorities, is something you also learn during thesis writing. I am not always great at respecting my personal deadlines, since priorities do change. A family of five, and friends my age having great life/health difficulties have taken me out of my thesis responsibility path. I sometimes feel overwhelmed, but I know thesis must wait, when people can't.

So my thesis is coming along verrrry slowly, and my supervisor Lucie is among the most patient women I know :-) aside being a sweet sensitive brilliant being everyone at RRU would love I am sure. I am writing chapter IV at the moment, which I can see « avec du recul » (with some prospective reading of the situation? hmmmm sound complicated -verify on translate quickly..- google prefers -with some hindsight- I would have spontaneously written insight no H, no D...which is also a reason why French sounded like a better idea ) that it would have been useful to have chapter 4 on its way, right form the start, except I had no interviews yet. On the other hand, preparing sensitive and meaningful questions before starting the interviews also meant having chapters one and two on their way as much as possible to make some sense of this threading puzzle of subject, questions, hypothesis and methodology, for which I had and still lack clear knowledge on various levels. Learning to figure some things out through readings has been an ongoing process...

So this was intended to reconnect, brake the ice of 680, and make sure I can access my former blog as a starter. Back with a post as course starts.
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THESIS 2013...

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AN EXTRA YEAR...

I will be brief and simple in my posts, since my thesis is WAY BEHIND, and writing it has to be my priority. But since I was given the authorization to write it in French, I thought I could keep this journal, to briefly share on my whereabouts with the Thesis for RRU. I am still waiting to submit my Ethical Review, since my supervisor, Lucie Sauvé, still has little comments to share with me in that sense. It almost feels I am at the same point as last year, when I left RRU residency (picture above)...Except I have found a -directrice- I am really happy to have and I am now a member of her research Center Centr'ERE, which is a great pleasure for me.

I have decided to take a second LOA for the autumn again, since I can't get much done while teaching with the various tasks that come along with our role. I am also evaluated at the end of the summer, which means I have to prepare a document of everything I have done for the past 5 years. It is quite a fastidious piece to do, and in August I will have to be committed to that document as well as to my class preparation for September. I will take a leave from teaching at UQAM during the winter, in order to focus on my Thesis and ideally finishing it. I may also take a methodology class during my autumn semester, if I can cope with the timing, since I realize I have a great lack of understanding of what I should be doing to get the thesis started and understand what I should be doing... It left me with a great deal of insecurity of ever being able to get a thesis written...

At UQAM we have 3 fields to cover in our tasks: Teaching/course/students, Community/involvement inside and outside of University which often means many committees, and Research+Creation (since I teach in the design field). All 3 should represent approximately 1/3 of our time, teaching in my case takes quite a bit of time and so does community. Part of my research for this year should be getting my thesis together...

I am doing a July reading and writing retreat for thesis, and here it starts.
The images I will share will be my surroundings, in the country, which made sense with Environmental education and communication inspiration for writing...

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CLOSING

Little racoon from RRU last residency. Photo: Lyne
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I will be very brief in summarizing the closing of the English part of this journal. After a Leave of Absence last Spring 2012, to get back into the courses I was giving and into my teaching activities, I was (almost) ready to jump back in January.  I was kindly offered to take until Feb 1st, which was great, January also a month to prepare my teaching activities, which had been planned to be far more limited in the winter, in order to do my thesis work. I guess it is normal, but being cut off from moodle and from possibilities to connect with my colleagues and triads, as I was form the content we had shared on moodle, the RRU library, and the interdiction to do any research or Supervisor seeking, was to disconnect me for sure, from the whole process. I took a real time off from RRU.

I was happy to come back in February, I was crossing my fingers for Lucie Sauvé to accept being my supervisor. I was very happy when she did. I had to provide some documents and letters of approval to Liza and to our Dean, in order to have permission both for a French supervisor, as well as to do  my thesis in French as well, therefore, I feel I am just ready now, to start it all. I have a schedule I hope to keep as much as I can, and I will come back here to post a link to my first French entry thesis journal project blog.

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LAST CALL ON CLIMATE

Gaspésie 2008 clin d'oeil à Cape Farewell
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As Buckland answers Lertzman in her interview, in regards with the dialog an artist can engage with someone else he says that you are “communicating, through the art, with one person who has come back with a story. And that is what art does.” Storytelling. In that sense there is no hesitation in Buckland’s mind that art are “phenomenally powerful, persuasive, exciting, engaging.” (p.115) The Cape Farewell project could be seen actually answering McKibbens question of where is the art ?  Various emotions related to Climate change were expressed throughout and through art.  From novel (Ian McEwan ), to choregraphy (Siobhan Davies), painters, sculptor, to much more, Buckland said “ If you accept climate change as a complete reality, which we do now, it’s going to turn society around in order to solve the problem; it’s an enormous cultural challenge for society.” (p.114) I figured Art had also often been considered a great challenge to engage with, in previous or modern society. These two had therefore seemed to have something to do together. Reaching out was not going to be easy either way.

The fact that “the scientific community does not yet know how to engage effectively with the media.”(p.113) is something often heard as well in the recent years. Buckland took the bet of change, in a meaningful emotional, artistic way. I always find it risky or perhaps a little pretentious when someone claims “ There was no imagery, there was no way of saying: now look, think about this. There was no clear imagery for conveying climate change.” Perhaps there was not much, and certainly not enough, could be a little more modest, even if the project itself had huge uncovered objectives and beauties. We have been exposed to documentaries, photographer’s work, and many people have been reflecting on environmental issues in installations and exhibitions (Ukeles 1995, Sudjai Chaiyapan who’s focus has been environmental degradation since 1990’s (although I am not a fan of his surreal work at all, engaged artists of the 70’s, many of whom already addressed the environmental urgency by means of arts, and so did architecture pieces, design, urbanism etc. Which does not deny the fact Cape farewell has brought a terrific contribution to the too few projects aimed at this crucial and newly named Global warming/Climate change dimension. Conservation art, such as 1948’s Soviet posters were also part of a huge movement to recognize Earth’s degradation. Illustrated children’s book were many to address environmental concern. And what about Land art. Many of those artists had an environmental impact reflection and discourse. Anyhow, with all respect to amazing projects, it is just always strange to feel the uniqueness of one's goal instead of acknowledging a path or seeking for an emotional construction with previous artists. Of course many other projects came later. Like Bruce Mau's Massive change exhibition and project you may like if you have not already seen it everywhere.

In terms of finding new ways to communicate, I agree with Buckland's claim that “ there have been many examples in the arts in response to social issues in the past, there has been a great resistance to be seen as‘‘campaigning.’’ I wondered if such resistance he considered was from the public or the artists themselves to be seen as campaigners? Well it was time for a Farewell since the blog deadline was in 5 minutes :-) I didn't have time to talk of Natalie Jeremijenko's Environmental Health Clinic, I had really enjoyed in previous course, and which reminded me of the fun theory a little. Except her's was Art. Not advertising. As if advertising is always inspiring itslef form the arts...often out of imagination.

Bye Renee, and thank you ...so much

McKibben, B. (2009). Four years after my pleading essay, climate art is hot. Grist Magazine, (August).
David Buckland, Founder, Cape Farewell, with Renee Lertzman. (2008). Environmental Communication: A Journal of Nature and Culture, 2(1), 110-118.
The work of Cape Farewell (Cape Farewell website) (DVD, "ART FROM THE ARCTIC" PENDING RRU ACQUISITION PROCESS)Bibi van der Zee I am not denying the emotional impact of these artworks
http://www.guardian.co.uk/artanddesign/2009/dec/11/copenhagen-climate-change-art
Phillips, P. (1995). "Maintenance Activity: Creating a climate for change." In Nina Felshin (Ed.). But Is It Art: The Spirit of Art as Activism. (pp. 165-193). Seattle, WA: Bay Press.

FAREWELL...is hard to say.

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WHALE WHALE, WHAT HAVE WE DONE...
l was going to continue writing about art-based communications, and connecting it with Renee's interview of David Buckland's and his cape Farewell project, really trusting these type of communications are deeply needed, when I received another care2 petition email - whale killing in South Korea for this one-, except, this one, today, was just too much. The picture of that beautiful slaughtered mammal because the SK government gave permission to kill considering they eat -all the fish- on their end of the ecosystem spectrum- was too much.  I burst into tears.

«South Korean fishermen have complained that whales are eating all of their fish. Now, the government has applied to the International Whaling Commission for permission to begin killing whales - supposedly to research whether the whales are, indeed, fulfilling their end of the food chain.»

I sincerely thought to myself that minute -we are in a -fkg- war-. I know it is not very constructive to think, to say, to feel. I even thought about in English (the petition being in English could explain it) since the F word is not what would have come naturally.  I swear in French as I said when I joined the MAENVEDCO.  The war to whom gets to have the food.  I was plunged into «La route», «the Road», Cormac McCarthy's beautiful, powerful writing.  Totally art-based, a novel which could be seen as a metaphor to our environmental crisis reality. A novel offering an extra proposal to answer McKibben's post asking «where is the Art»?

I again wondered when would the awakening occur... never I think.  History of humanity seems we did not learn enough through centuries to overcome our greed. We sort of erase as we go, like on a computer Control-delete.  Art, communication, love, name them all, so many before us have tried all of these options, we just don't get it. We have never collectively reached any sort of wisdom as a species, we fight our gods, our truth of nature, our access to land, our greed to food, our disrespect of others, we consider ourselves above it all... and we will stupidly extinct form lack of love.  We oly deserve it. Well, some more then others I also think, but being part of it all, we are all responsible. I mourn for those who will never be allowed the world we were had. But human was not ready to live in harmony with other species, non-human beings, with himself.  Even so, I won't ever let go. I hope to evolve constantly, and fight my own contradictions and behaviors until I die. I want to plunge myself to this mystery fully, for a future whatever that means. Besides my personal citizen social political environmental agenda, communication and education are one way to do so I suppose. But is it ever enough. I stopped crying for the whales (or for myself) and took that once more given awareness energy, to do something with it.

I started my little personal brainstormings.
Raising awareness, not the sea level. Hmm.. a poster?
Pressuring politics, not nature.  And I went on to deal with the loss...

I will come back to Renee's interview. In the meantime I will share a few Art-Based images I have in some prentations. I feel worn out, for nature. Incapable of doing or saying more for now.

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LIVING GRAFFITI
Their is the reverse graffiti mais but the living one as well.
Edina Tokodi is a Hungarian Graphic designer who also received an urban design base in Milano. Her green moss -guerilla- reminds the urban dweller that nature is not so far, while stepping outside, away from Gallery art. She sees herself as a “cultivator of eco-urban sensitivity». Her work can be seen in Brooklyn among other places.
Others also use Lichen like Anna Garforth and Eleanor Stevens. (see November 2008 post )
much more here
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Alexander Orion in Sao Paulo

REVERSE-GRAFITI. CLEAN.
In  Montreal, we have our own «Banksy» through Roadsworth. But Reverse-graffiti adds another dimension to engaged grafitti art. Some sort of Eco-art. No spraying, just cleaning, with soap and water.  Reverse, clean the pollution.  Paul Curtis (Moose) is a London pioneer in that sense. Just as Brazil Alexandre Orion, is in Sao Paulo. As they say, they disturb authorities who wonder how to condemn their art since cleaning is not YET a crime... The urban world, the city, as a creative canevas. Paul Curtis also does commercial work through, Symbollix, (for clients likeMicrosoft.)
link on  youtube.

English article.
more>
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CENSORSHIP,  FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION
IN THE FLAG EXERCISE


China flag / Internet censorship / Maxime Brunelle


Blood diamonds / Liberia / Alex Blouin


Canada flag /  GHG / Émilie Bertrand


Lybien flag  / amputation torture / Claire Burelli
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Some of my students work.

“LOVE OF NATURE AND THE END OF THE WORLD”

This will be a sort of in-between posts.
Such readings usually invite us to dive into our own little worlds, our personal memories.  «Our sense of home» (Nicholsen, 2003, p.36).
I realized in Creative writing class that I could never write poetically in English. Should I say poetry at all perhaps, since I have no claim of being able to do so in French either. For poetry to emerge I believe means listening carefully to your senses, which is something each of us can do, if we choose to engage in it. And then we can express ourselves in many various forms.  But in terms of writing, what happens if you can’t name things, impressions, feelings; what if the metaphors don’t exist in your mind, in your body, to make the connections between your thoughts, your senses (I voluntarily don’t use your soul) and your language. When your mind almost needs a dictionary to be able to think and share it sensitively.  Or at least with a common language.   Should it be thought of as being our own voice, no matter who is listening? Perhaps, then, you can turn to other forms of expressions but the verbal.  Creativity is such a vast and complex part of ourselves.  Just as it is life finally.

I started wondering if speaking with the heart could be done in another tongue then the one gifted to you as a child, your mother’s natural way to reach out to you and to say how much she loves you (or for some experiences, the opposite, an inability to do so.) Reading Nicholsen offered a path to these musings, «the vividness and loss of it (childhood) are connected with the fact that this is not a world of words». We see poetry all around us. Poetry isn’t all colorful, but it still feels like deep beauty to me.  It brings us to life, love, emotions, memories. It brings awareness. It often brings me to sense my mom.

How people saw or were not able interacting with the «Alzheimer-self of my mom» was something they truly missed.  She had learned « a mysteriously living silence» (1) she was initially so afraid of.  Of loosing the ability to talk, to recognize the ones she loved, to forget her own stories, her past, to forget how to say how much she loved me, she would say. Starting to read Shierry Weber Nicholsen’s, which Renee recommended as an optional but meaningful reading, reaching chapter 2, I knew I couldn’t write poetically.  I lacked words, but not emotions and reading often brought those emotions to the surface, as much nature does for me.  And it was also part of the reason I was here for.  A story which starts in childhood, like for all of us. My life with my mom is a long beautiful journey, I cherish so deeply.  Since childhood, it helped me feel love for all other beings, I am sure of that, from my friends and our children, for our little -tribe-, to strangers, to all species, to nature itslef. To feel our connection to the world.  A journey she gave me, and which brought me here as well.  She gave me words to speak for myself, they were French, but the words of love she would say either.  I keep being fascinated and grateful how those were the only words she never forgot. I love you. I love you to. And July is a month I always think of both my parents. I adored my dad who said he would wait til I he could celebrate a last birthday and wait for me to be back before choosing to leave us to ourselves. I was convinced I would marry my dad until I was around 6 or 7. I even asked my mom if she was okay with that. She smiled and said of course she was. It later brought me to see how things repeat themselves. My daughter asked me, when she was maybe...4, if women could marry.  Her aunt had a girlfriend.  Like my mom I said -of course they can, and she said : Because I want to marry you...  How can you not trust the power of love when such unconditional thoughts are expressed.

Maybe for the same reasons Nicholsen had chosen those words for her chapter : «The love of nature and the end of the world.» In my mom’s case, the end of her known safe world, the one of her spoken words, of memory, and feeling connected. Loving my mom so deeply probably helped me to reconnect with my own «separate self».  She was like a little bird who could not sing anymore, wondering why.  Reading Nicholsen say we were «made of the same stuff as the rest of the world» has always been a profound feeling as a child. It quickly became a meaningful reality. One we can now name «the whole», the «interconnectedness».  The link. But the «same stuff as the rest» was quite clear.  We have all say goodbye to the child within at our own pace. I perhaps never completely did, until my mother said goodbye herself. The «sense of home» (p.35) I had always tried to find inside me, needed all that love to be fed and hopefully found. Hoping to provide our own children a «home» which would help them become a «self.» (p.41) I was also thinking I really wanted my forever struggle to give them with that sense of self, a future to trust that self could flourish.

Well, well…I am not reading this over. I let go. Hoping it’s not heavy to read. Personal stuff do us good but can be not so interesting for others to read.

(1) Colette Richard cited by Shierry Weber Nicholsen.
Nicholsen, S.W. (2003). Chapters 1, 5 & 6. In For the Love of Nature and the End of the World: the unspoken dimensions of environmental concern (pp.7-33, 129-159, 161-194). Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

ART-BASED STREET COMMUNICATION

Spain 2008



Paris 2009


Paris 2009

Berlin 2009

Parc de la Villette in Paris used to be a huge slaughterhouse.
Much more to see on their web.
Image Credit Flickr User Neozoon

 
I added this one for Kieran.

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DEAD ON ARRIVAL

I love reading Grist and really admire Bill McKibben's engagement as much as I think the Cape Farewell project is meaningful, so reading the suggested articles “What the warming world needs now is art, sweet art (and I initially read Street art!) and Renee's interview with David Buckland felt it was -right on- for me (will save this one for next post).  It felt a close as can be to my teaching matters and thesis interests. I agreed with McKibben's claim that in terms of Climate change/Global warming feels that “oddly, though we know about it, we don’t know about it.  It hasn’t registered in our gut; it isn’t part of our culture”.

When McKibben asks “Where are the books? The poems? The plays? The goddamn operas?” I figured this could take a few posts even just to get the on the surface of the subject, it got me really into it, hoping to share with Renee some other work I really appreciate (thinking Renee might be my only reader :-> for this course blog from now on).  Some Street-Art or Urban Intervention, (Gorilla Graffiti style, name them all...) examples I use for my class content and presentations or have shared on my course blog to get the students going on the projects they are asked doing themselves, since that is exactly what they do. (Art or design can be a matter of framing as well). They are asked to find creative ways to engage through their visual communications and through Urban Intervention engaged projects.  It won't be giving this blog a literary oriented angle as it perhaps could, but images are another way of trying to communicate our concerns, fears, musings, just as it is a short attempt to start answering McKibbens' question at the same time, I figured. A way which therefore felt the most appropriate.

 So I was hoping to start with a few projects for this penultimate post (or posts). UpCycling, a word used a lot in French as a trendy anglicism (I don't like anglicism in the French language, everything is -ing- now.  I even once read -green dating-... but my reaction to anglicism would be subject to another post.) ...Nevertheless, UpCycling* is of great interest since it aims improving the life cycle of -products- or services, or in such case, sends a creative message while adopting a coherent responsible way of doing so.  I saw this project a few years back, a life-free fur, which had a strong resonance for me. The use of fur, under this artistic form of communication, somewhere between recycling, awareness and critical provoking o thinking campaign, was inviting to reflection.  Neozoon is known to be a 2008 Parisien and Berlin born collective of artists, whom use the urban spaces, streets, web and public institutions as well, to question humans' relationship to animals (here with used furcoats).  Neozoon's original website (2008) would open with a quote from one of my favorite film when I was young "Planet of the Apes" **.   I mean, the 1968 original one of the recent one I haven't seen, although I usually love Tim Burton's work. (The original version of the film (by Franklin J.Schaffner I read on the net) will lead to a series of feature films long before the 2002 remake of it, as we know.)

* UpCYcling
I found it interesting to paste the UpCycling definition Oxford definition gives for UpCycling : “reuse (discarded objects or material) in such a way as to create a product of higher quality or value than the original”.  If indeed the artistic and awareness use of reused fur was of higher value then any fur coat, -in some people's framing (like mine per example)-,  nothing could ever have higher value then the animal itself...

** From the 1963 novel by Pierre Boulle

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Short  Neozoon interview from Wooster Collective on Good Is (photos de Vitostreet)

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