Beaverbrook Scholar in Residence at McGill

I am honored to be working as the Beaverbrook Scholar in Residence at McGill University in Montreal for two weeks. Information about the program can be found here: http://media.mcgill.ca/

ejection seats and contrail sculptures

I'm writing a short catalog essay about Max Greuter's work and am focusing on his ejection and contrail works. He's an artist based in Zurich and works like a tinkerer in a wood shop yet uses more and more 3D design software to craft various objects and images that explore the euphorias and anxieties associated with aeronautics and propulsion. Greuter pretends he has his own private space agency and always wanted to be an astronaut.

Roaming - Installation Description

This installation is designed to situate a visitor at the technological and financial interface of Mongolian white phone workers who operate on the streets of Ulaanbaatar. It includes a projection of a series of straight-on photographs of different phone workers with different stands offering time for sale. The visitor is positioned in front of the projection screen as if he/she is about to purchase a call. While standing at this interface, he/she will be encouraged to recognize a form of public mobile telephony. City maps of Ulaanbaatar are projected onto the floor along with the footprints of wireless phone corporations that operate in the city. The visitor is thus be positioned as if a user who is standing within the footprints of the Mongolian wireless infrastructure. The piece is designed to simulate and stage an act of "roaming" – wireless use in another country – but rather than being charged additional fees, the visitor will learn about a different configuration of mobile telephony. The installation is intended to emphasize technological variation in the context of globalisation, the figurative relocations that occur through transnational infrastructures, and the dialectics of distance and proximity that shape wireless encounters.

Transmediale 2008

I am in Berlin at the Transmediale festival and conference this week. I arrived on Tuesday just in time to set up my installation before the opening, which started at 7pm. My installation is called Roaming and is in the main exhibition hall at the Center for World Cultures. I will also be giving a lecture about this project on Fri Feb 1 at 5:30pm in the Bilderberg Salon. I'll be posting some comments about various talks as the week proceeds. Above are some photos of the opening night. There is more information about Transmediale available here: http://www.transmediale.de/site/en/transmediale/home/

Back on the Satellite Coast - Sputnik's 50th Birthday

October 4, 1957 is the 50th anniversary of Sputnik's launch. Francis Hunger, creator of the Sputnik Gazetteer,Germany has helped to organize a variety of international events. You can find information about them here: http://www.hgb-leipzig.de/~francis/irmielin/works/sputnik/_externalmaterial/issue6.pdf

I will be giving a lecture on Sputnik in my Satellite Media class at UC Santa Barbara from 4-5:20pm in Buchanan Hall 1920, which is open to the public. For anyone who wants to celebrate, come to Tupelo Junction restaurant in SB at 6:30pm.

Montana bound

I flew from Berlin to Montana this week and will be based here, working for the next couple of months, before returning to UCSB for teaching in the fall. The summers here are so beautiful, as you might be able to surmise from this photo of a late night sunset in Missoula. My year at the Institute for Advanced Study in Berlin was very interesting and productive. Our end of the year party was last weekend on July 13th, and many of the fellows showcased their talents by participating in original musical compositions, skits, cooking an enormous feast, and by tearing it up on the dance floor into the early morning hours! I will miss many of the fellows and staff at the wissenschaftskolleg, and am grateful to have had this past year of work abroad. I'm glad to be back home, however, and I look forward to making the adjustment here in Montana.

Budapest Seminar on Media Globalization

I am in Budapest for a media globalization seminar at the Central European University organized by faculty at the University of Amsterdam. There are participants from Poland, Hungary, Bellarusse, Ukraine, Latvia, Estonia, Romania, Russia, Bulgaria, and Indonesia, among others. It has been a fantastic week here and the participants in the seminar are amazing. We have been discussing post-communism, national identity, media and memory, the expansion of Europe and the EU, and a variety of other topics. We are creating a blog so that participants can post their thoughts and ideas about media research in central and eastern Europe. Here is the url: www.ceumediastudies.blogspot.com