Come on Petunia - the Loglady's story

19.09.04 (sunday)
Once upon a time - quite recently actually - a strange collection of humans from near and far sat round a table in a large room. It was evening time, and the view from the 7 huge windows did not reveal very much of the world outside. It was difficult to see the fjørd and the hilltops surrounding the building in the centre of the peripheral northern town of Bergen which was, as usual, shrouded in a grey cloak of clouds. As usual it was raining.

But the strange collection of humans were not deterred. Why should they be? They had a feast at their fingertips, and intoxicating beverages in their glasses. They were waiting in anticipation. They were waiting to hear what the next 6 days had in store for them, for at this point in time and at this particular point in space they had almost no idea at all.

Several of the dinner guests had never before set eyes on each other, but they were soon in fine spirits, even pointing at, and making jokes about each other (see image 3 from the top) until ...

20.09.04 (monday)
Monday morning. I am the moderator of Come on Petunia. I do not yet know that I am the loglady too. I leave my hotel room at about 9.50am. It is raining cats and dogs, but I have an umbrella. I am looking forward to getting the show on the road, and a little nervous about having to break the ice and dive into the seminar part of the Petunification process. We have such little time together for two days of seminar-like existence and 4 days of working together. There are several questions looming in my mind. Was it really so smart to spend two days listening to participants presentations of their approach to structuring time? Maybe the subject turns out to be too general to find any focus for working together in the end. I meet Torolf, our technical assistant from BEK in the dining-hall-turned-cinema, who is already preparing for the lectures. Shortly after, Ellen arrives and is told off by The Caretaker who did not like us smoking in our workspace last night. We re-arrange the space and by the time the other Petunias arrive (plus a few extras including Jeremy Welsh and some students from the Art Academy) we have something resembeling a seminar space .... 11am the show begins .....

The speakers have been given specific topics to talk about by Ellen. Most people have been asked to talk about specific artworks and their time relationships, while others have been given specific tasks. The lectures were well prepared and delivered. Included in this first day was Peter T's lecture on time structures in musical compositions which will hopefully give the group some general terms regarding time and structure, and Christian's analysis and working score of The 3rd Man. Both these lectures can hopefully serve as reference points and/or be contested.

Hopefully something constructive will be written about the seminar in the future, but in the meantime here are some of the definitions of time (space) that I managed to draw out of the lectures:

Amanda (me!)
Timing: anticipation, preparation, execution
Dynamics: Movement in time and space

Ivar: Describes his work as "sculpting with time"

Peter Tornquist:
"real time and off time"

ABSOLUTE TIME:
- the real time of the performance
- clocktime (of a sound file)
- social time of concerts (time framing)
- biological time (of the listner)

MUSICAL TIME:
- directed time, goal orientated
- gestural time, up beats, endings and beginnings
- durational time, proportions and perceived bytes
- vertical time, the extended now (doesn't point anywhere)

19th CENTURY TIME METAPHOR = railroad.
20th/21st CENTURY TIME METAPHOR = computer.

INGREDIENTS OF MUSICAL TIME:
- directivity (direction or not/goals or no goals)
- continuity /discontinuity (of linearity)
- directivity and continuity co-exist
- linear time (created when earlier events imply later ones)
- non-linear time (surface and texture)

Pepe
Radio time is linear time made up by the layering of sound.
Networked environment/dislocated space: the social space/time must work.

Christian
Room is a degree of time
Time is process that we can identify
Repetition helps to keep time flowing
Contrapunctal time is active layers (of material) with their own time
Real time = syntax (uncut time)
Slow time = stretched time

Per Kvist (guest speaker)
Aura - time space - remodelling with time

The night time procedure at the Petunification Palace is as predricted. We drink repetively. We discuss the events of the day. We smoke repetitivly. We leave.

DOWNLOADABLE DOCUMENTS FROM THE LECTURES:
Peter Tornquist: Powerpoint presentation HERE
Christian: Time codes of The 3rd man HERE [rtf]. Notes from his presentation in Norwegian HERE.

Timothee talks about Smog and Elephant Memory

Silje: the notion of perpetual motion

Geert

match of the day

Peter cuts up the 3rd man

21.09.04 (tuesday)
The caretaker has ticked us off for smoking in the space again. He is not a happy man, so from today smoking is restricted to a small room on the 8th floor.

The schedule of the second day of the seminar was constructed to point in many directions, which it certainly did! Hopefully a round up of the presentations will be written later, but for the meantime, here are the definitions of time (space) that came out of the lectures today:

Timothee
t = c/m
(t = time) (c = change) (m = memory)

Peter Pajchel
(in his work) Time is converted into space

Håkon
Conventional time (related to the expectations or "contracts" between the venue and the audience)
Inherent time (eg. candle burning)
Alien time (eg. apple europe time)
Conditional time (eg. opening time of a gallery, hours of daylight)
Random time (improvisation, machine rendering)
In "fixed media" time based art, time = audience (unless they leave)
In "unfixed media" time based art, time > audience

Verdensteateret (guest speakers)
Past is nostalgic
Future is fear
The two combined is anxiety

Manipulating time with leaps of distance
Intervals: simultaneous use of different speed and time intervals coupled with leaps of distance

After the Verdensteatret presentation by Lisbeth, Asle, Peter P and Håkon, we repeat the same procedure as yesterday. Repetition keeps time flying. Tomorrow the working together can begin!

22.09.04 (wednesday)
Time: 09.00. Place: Dromadar, the one-humped camel where you can get decent coffee. It is raining. I am waiting for Ellen to turn up. We have much to discuss before the morning meeting at 11.00 in the Petunification Parlour. What strategy should we take now that the seminar part is over? Should we aim for a public event format for presenting the results of the worklab on Saturday evening? Ellen's original idea was to avoid the "product" syndrome and concentrate on remaining in process to allow the potential of work being done here to continue in a post-petunia modus ...the rain stops, briefly, long enough to smoke half a cigarette outside the cafe ....

!! !! !!!
Time: 11.00. Place: The Petunificactory. Timothee tells me that the first ever photos of an atom have been taken today. He is disappointed because they match his expectations. The seminar room has been transformed to a round table discussion forum. Ellen speaks about herself for the first time. (The realtime is now 00.54 on Thursday. I am typing this log in retro time, from memory, as I became the Loglady later today. I am trying to be brief so I can keep up with the time, and enter the present. Ivar and Per are saying things like "Clipper det sammen og chopper det opp". Ivar has no more "kraft", which is norwegian for energy. Per says "ooooffff". But let's get back to the past.) The time is 11.30ish on the 22nd of the 9th two thousand and four here in Norway.

The sun is shining. Everyone is gathered in a circle, minus HC, Lisbeth and Asle who only could attend the first 2 days. Ellen and I have proposed a public event to round off the worklab, using the metaphor of the tunnel scene from The 3rd Man as a way of bringing different works together. We envisage a space where the guests can mingle, works can feed into each other, and the dynamics (sucks, spits and flows) of the tunnel can be implemented. Per refers to a conversation that took place the night before with Geert where the public event concept was put under scrutiny. Christian says "wallpaper", refering to the audio-visual results presented in a public event party-like setting. Geert seems to pull towards a non-public event, with an emphasis on a possible documentation process afterwards. No-one else comments much. We move on to hear what interests the individual participants have regarding working together, and agree that a decision should be made about Saturday evening depending on the intentions and ambitions of the group members. Having heard the proposals, we suggest that process should be placed over product. This may give the possibility of keeping the potential of the work we start here in Bergen as a basis for further collaborations in the post-worklab mode. It is risky though, becuase no one really knows what will happen in the future, and if an interest in such a project will stand the length of time. We do not want the worklab to fizzle out. Geert comments that he interpretted much of the work proposed by the participants as being compatible, or geared towards a public presentation, and seems a bit surprised, but no-one else really comments. By 12.20 a decision has been made. Process rules. It starts to rain and multiple rainbows are seen from the windows floating up the hillside. Per says they look like a transport system for the pots of gold at the end of the rainbows.I think he has read too many Donald Duck comics. Canons fire from the other side of the fjørd, and the meeting is slightly distrupted by conditional time. It is hard to talk with the canons booming. I think the canon fire is to mark the King's birthday, but I'm not sure. We can see the ignition flames clearly. We round up the meeting. We take a break, have lunch and set up the space with tables and equipment for working-together-alone.The space becomes a worklab. We all fill out a questionaire given to us by Geert who is analising our individual space/time relationships (see link below for questionaire). People are keen to get started on their projects. Some affiliations are made immediately, some exchanges and collaborations happen in the space of the next 12 hrs. Some people sit in the same spot for almost the entire time they are in space. Others circulate, looking at each others projects. The smokers meet regularly in the smoking room and terrace on the 8th floor. Geert has heard that I have taken notes during the seminar. He would like me to provide him with definitions of time given in the seminar. He keeps beeping me in ichat with requests, comments and drink invitations. By 2am, Per, Ellen, Ivar, Håkon and Peter are left in the space. Slowly the numbers dwindle, until Håkon is left alone. What he get's up to, only he knows.

DOWNLOADABLE DOCUMENTS/FILES:
Geert: Time, Space and You questionaire HERE (pdf)
Pepe found this audio file:
Orson Wells temper.mp3

23.09.04 (thursday)
(By special request of the Loglady, Timothee writes the morning report)

Hello, here as requested a detailed report on the activity observed this very morning in the lab.Upon arriving, Un was found clicking in a lingering scent of decomposing cigarette butt... the morning went on without noticeable incident, punctuated by the progressive arrival of sleepy workshoppers who would soon be informed that thorof, the mac system administrator, was to cook the lunch soup after the offical chef was found so ill that he had to be transported in emergency to hospital where his condition was declared life-nonthreatening. We all ate in relief.No rainbow was sighted in the harbor this morning.

Thank you Timothee!

13.15 meeting
Silje has left the building! Timothee tells me that the space has been shrouded in the ambient silent language of people working alone with their computers. Ellen and I have a quick meeting to decide how to proceed with the impending group meeting ..... we shall try to make it an efficient practical meeting so that the group can start to get on with their work as quickly as possible ...... we prepare the space as a discussion forum in the round ...

Resistance: It takes quite some time to gather in the group for a collective meeting. People are keen to use the time to continue their work. They are stuck to their computers by invisible glue. We take a session where everyone describes their projects and collaborations. I make a diagram which is supposed to illustrate who is collaborating with who and in what way so that folks can schedule themselves accordingly. Everyone seems quite clear about hown they want to spend their time here. There are many ideas going around. Everyone is working on The 3rd Man as source material. No-one seems to be bringing external material into their work. No one is working with concepts concerning realtime gesture, apart from "patch playing instruments" (midi controllers). There is little focus on physical space, apart from the internal references of the film material and the architecture of the analysis stuff, the patches, etc. Space is pretty virtual here. It seems to rest on a conceptual plane. It is difficult to get a grip of "acoustic space" as folks are using headphones.The work is basically audio-visual renderings. I miss seeing the realisation of works in a more physical setting, with more elements entering. Such elements may have been more present if the work was geared towards a public event. But maybe this is the pressure of the time. Possibly the thoughts surrounding the structuring of time, and the various collaborations are complex enough for the time being. The meeting takes a couple of hours. People eventually get restless, but I felt the meeting was important none-the-less to create a practical fundament for the next 3 days work. Rene puts up a jitter patch he has been working on on the big screen and his audio on the big speakers, and it obvious that it would have been better to have more time to see and hear examples of the projects otherwise described with words. While this may be relevant for some group members who will need more input for inspiration, or to trigger ideas related to plans to collaborate, others are working in a more insular way. A "showing" of max. 1 hour is plotted in for 19.00 for those who need to output, and those who want the input.

At 16.30 the food issue is solved. Thai take away this evening. Torolf will make soup for lunch tomorrow. Roar, the general manger of BEK will make a "simple" dinner tomorrow and Saturday evening we will bring in a sushi dinner (and as this is announced, the folks clap!). 18.00: Ellen's son Linus comes to visit. Sunshine enters the space radiating out from the little guy. Rain outside. 19.15 presentations of work by Ivar (movie clips with corresponding sound that function as loops - similar clips superimposed, etc, for jitterizing), Pepe and Peter P (sound renderings of The 3rd Man theme in different moods, and jitter patchworks - tunnel like), Håkon (video signals as audio signals, and vice vera on an Anne close up movie loop) Peter T (using sound analysis to make "new" music) and Geert (visualising inherent, conditional, extreme slow and alien time in correspondering video layers).

Later on Silje emerges with a friend to collect her powerbook, but talks to no-one. I think she has left the building for good.

01.00: Ivar is now working with Ellen to make a non-linear narative of his video loops. I am very very curious to see if he manages to accept a reduction in the resolution rate of his exquisit video work for the sake of experimentation, something he has been resisting for many years. Christian is experiencing the joys and pains of editing video. The results don't seem to fit into his scheme of things. But I think he is enjoying himself. Per is working on some audio material to conclude his work with Peter P who has to leave the worklab tomorrow. Similarly Håkon works on audio for his collaboration with Unn. Geert leaves at some point, but I can't remember when. Timothee is making Orson Wells fly about his screen in AE. I think he is working in a spiral time mode which I have been told is a sign of optimism. 02.00: I leave with Ellen with a feeling that things have got in a bit of a muddle. But maybe that is a good thing ......

24.09.04 (friday)
15.00: The energy in this space seems low. But I think people are just concentrating very hard. Christian hasn't shown up yet, but rumour has it that he was working all night. Weather report, sunny, windy, cloudy and rainy. We have just had a quick meeting and Peter P is about to leave. He has to perform with Verdensteatret in Stockholm. But the good news is that he'll continue to work with Pepe via email tomorrow if necessary. We have anounced the plan for the remaining time. As Håkon is leaving later this evening we'll have a showing of his work before dinner. We have set a deadline for rounding up the work at 15.00 tomorrow and final presentations at 16.00. Dinner at 20.00 to leave time for collecting all material generated in a repository.

- Oh yes: I have just put the log online.

16.00: I have to say that if you enter this space from the outside it is like a vacuum. People are so concetrated, staring at their screens. Without physical manifestations of the work, the only job I can really do now is to keep the schedule going. Hang on.Christian arrives. He was working till 6am and looks like it! Wait. HC has come to visit, so there is some conversation taking place. Oh. He left again. What a pity. Within 10 seconds of his exit, the room is quiet, except for the clicking and the air conditioning system. Wait a moment. Someone is ripping some paper up! A big event! That's the kinda thing that makes life worth living. Wow. 16.21: Geert stands up, whistles The 3rd Man theme. 16.21.30: he sits down again.

- Oh yes: our chef is back, but he can't talk. He makes great food though.

After dinner several of us go to watch HC's performance with Kreutzerkompani - a performance with one dance person, one sound person and one video person (HC). Most of the material in the performance was generated live from the motions of the dancer. The video was set up as live and buffered feedback. Through audio and visual analogue feedback combined with data feedback surprising combinations of audio-visual feedback were created or "tweaked". Does that make sense? The choreography was carefully created both dynamically and spacially as a rich material for this set up. After the performance, we returned to the Petunia place, and life went back to normal until Ivar got in a party mode and brought out some Russian Wodka. I love Vodka with a "W". Feeling very log-ish, I gave up being the Loglady and became more of just a Log, sitting in the lounge area, chatting to folks. Håkon leaves to join Peter P and Verdensteatret in Stockholm. A revalation happened! Ivar has been compressed by Ellen!

I'm not sure what time I left that evening, but as far as I can remember, Ivar, Ellen, Per, Christian and Timothee worked into the early hours ..........

25.09.04 (saturday)
Yesterday I was depressed. Today I am expanded. Today is the last day of Petunia. Breakfast in the hotel an hour later than usual. Per, Chrisitan and Timothee are talking about repetition - as in when younger artists repeat concepts that have already done by others before them. There are two views on this. One is that they should be more aware of history, the other that the new context of the new time makes this both acceptable and interesting. At least I think that is how it went.I met one of the Forced Entertainment people (theatre group from England) and invited her to our evening party, and anyone else she'd like to bring along after they are finished with their performance at Teatergaragen tonite.

12.00: I meet Ellen in the space. She is there with Patrik and Linus on his tractor. These people are already in the working zone: Peter T, Rene and Unn. Within the space of an hour the late nighters turn up. I talk to Peter T who plays me his new audio renderings of Anne. They are very lyrical compared to the previous renderings I have listened to, and though the resembelence to the source material can only be described in terms of extreme sublimity, they never-the-less seem to be almost musical character studies of Anne. Ellen and I have a quick meeting to plan the day's presentations, material collections, dinner and after dinner activities. We make a time and space plan so that presentations can run smoothly into the more social setting of dinner and postdinner time where some of the work created here can be left up and running in the latter stages of the evening. I then finish the log from yesterday and put it online. A Loglady's job is never over. Time flows on.

15.00: The deadline to cease work is announced. It is not welcomed by all! Material is gathered in on the Petunia hard disk, dvd, dv, etc.
18.00: The space has been re-arranged, and the sushi ordered. We are ready to start the presentations.

At this point in time I have to make a confession. I am now in my flat in Oslo, it is Sunday evening, 23.00. I have left my notes in Bergen. If only I could make a leap in space to get them I coluld finish this log. But it will have to wait ... so I am going to hop over the presentations for now, and make a leap in time to when the sushi arrived ..... with extra ginger and wasabe as ordered. Two whole packets of ginger! One large clump of wasabe the size of a pregnant tennis ball! But no rice. A telephone call sorts this out, and the rice arrives. The dinner was fantastic. A treat that felt very decadent.

During dinner Timothee tells me that he has really enjoyed the worklab. He said it was very relaxed - a situation he was not used to in his own workplaces. Sometimes he felt like stiring things up a bit and creating some tension, and he did try a couple of times too, though no heated group debates emerged. Throughout worklab there was a continous feeling of racing against time expressed in the atmospheric intensity of the space. The collaborations themselves were complex and intertwined, weaving between technical problem solving, discussions, exchanging generated material, looking and listening, over coming hurdles, arriving at dead ends, falling into black holes, changing tracks, ditching and swapping partners and medias, regroupings, etc. This is all a bit vague and metaphorical, I know. Without analyzing the hell out of the matter, the main conflicts that I was able to pick up on was a discord between those who work with (or seek out) formal approaches/methods to appply to their work and those who work "intuitively", with a swing towards the former group being the source of frustration for the latter. The matter of process as product versus a focus (or lack of focus) on delivering a product seemed to be connected to this. I think these are pretty general conflicts in any collaborative processes where (apparent) incompatiblities (of personalities, analogue and digital systems and medias, etc) may turn out to be a driving creative or distructive/unresolvable force. The Petunia method (or praxis) evolved as being not to focus on, or solve such (apparent) dualisms, but to fascilitate an ecological mingling of notions and methods with changes in the process occuring through the minglings and not from a curatorial strategy or imposed task-solving switches along the way......

And now, back to Dinner Time. HC turned up with his girlfriend Lena. Several Art Academy students ascended upon us breaking up the dinner party .... I'm not sure if they came to mingle with us or to enjoy the cheap booze and free food. Gisle from BEK appeared with his wife, Linda. Some of the Forced Entertainment people showed up - mixture of good and bad vibes. A couple of them were very rude guests, colonizing the lounge area and complaining about everything, while the others were friendly. But this did not pervent the Petunias from having a good time. The possibility of holding a follow-up Petunia sometime in the future was brought up. Things got in a pleasant muddle until about 03.15 at which time we had to break up the party because of security issues. The bad boys from FE started to throw Linus's toy cars around, smashing them into pieces - very insulting - and were shown the way out. The remaining Petunias did first-draft clearing up, goodbyes were hugged, and the party was over around 03.45, though it did continue in the hotel where the out-of-towners were staying until ???? (I absolutely have no idea.)

DOWNLOADABLE DOCUMENTS:
Geert: Petunia Time HERE (pdf)

Orson the antibiotic

lightening things up

Unn presents her work with Håkon

Petunia Time

Geert presents Petunia Time ... silly

Rene ....

Christian ...

Sushi arrives with "X"tra ginger and wasabe

A smooth transformation from presentations to dinner party

.. delicious!

all together

A bit later

The rude guys from Forced Entertainment

HC and Lena

A friendly guy from FE

Gisle from BEK with PP+T

PP+G