Rethinking biases: Een meerstemmig gesprek over postkoloniale blinde vlekken in cinema

Liesje Baltussen; Steff Nellis

doi:10.5117/forum2020.1.nell

Rethinking biases: Een meerstemmig gesprek over postkoloniale blinde vlekken in cinema

Forum+ ◽

10.5117/forum2020.1.nell ◽

2020 ◽

Vol 27 (1) ◽

pp. 34-35

Author(s):

Liesje Baltussen ◽

Steff Nellis

Keyword(s):

Financial Support ◽

Skin Colour ◽

Work Of Art ◽

Collective Work ◽

Dear Reader ◽

Two Bodies ◽

Blind Spots

Abstract Waarom is het tegenwoordig nog moeilijk om twee lichamen met verschillende huidskleur samen vast te leggen? Waarom ervaren zwarte performers zoveel problemen met make-up en lichtinval op filmsets? Hoe is het mogelijk dat projecten van filmmakers zonder strikt Belgische achtergrond vaak maar moeilijk financiële steun genieten? Het zijn enkele van de blinde vlekken in het filmmaken die PRISM (2020) blootlegt. Drie filmmaaksters met een verschillende huidskleur, An van. Dienderen, Rosine Mbakam en Eléonore Yameogo, werken voor PRISM samen rond het ‘dekoloniseren van de cinematografie’. Het resultaat is een gesamtkunstwerk dat uitgaat van het idee dat het filmisch medium de witte huid op technologisch en ideologisch vlak bevooroordeelt ten opzichte van donkere huidtypes. Liesje Baltussen en Steff Nellis gingen met de makers van PRISM in gesprek op allerlei manieren. Het resultaat is een collectief werkdocument waarin ze pogen ieders stem ‐ ook die van u, als lezer ‐ te betrekken. Why is it still hard today to capture two bodies with a different skin colour together? Why do black performers experience so many problems with make-up and lighting on film sets? How come it is hard for filmmakers without a strictly Belgian background to get financial support for their projects? These are just some of the blind spots in filmmaking exposed by PRISM (2020). With PRISM, three filmmakers with a different skin colour, An van. Dienderen, Rosine Mbakam and Eléonore Yameogo, take on the task of 'decolonising cinematography'. The result is a 'gesamtkunstwerk' that builds on the idea that the medium film favours white skins over darker skin tones, both technologically and ideologically. Liesje Baltussen and Steff Nellis entered into conversation with the makers of PRISM in various ways, ultimately creating a collective work of art in which they try to make every voice heard - and that includes yours, dear reader.

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Intersubjectivity at Close Quarters: How Dancers of Tango Argentino Use Imagery for Interaction and Improvisation

Cognitive Semiotics ◽

10.1515/cogsem.2012.4.1.76 ◽

2012 ◽

Vol 4 (1) ◽

pp. 76-124

Author(s):

Michael Kimmel

Keyword(s):

Social Cognition ◽

Time Lag ◽

Phenomenological Analysis ◽

Second Person ◽

Action Unit ◽

Single Action ◽

Image Schemas ◽

Small Increments ◽

Two Bodies ◽

Blind Spots

Abstract The article explores the prerequisites of embodied ‘conversations’ in the improvisational pair dance tango argentino. Tango has been characterized as a dialog of two bodies. Using first- and second-person phenomenological methods, I investigate the skills that enable two dancers to move as a super-individual ensemble, to communicate without time lag, and to feel the partner’s intention at every moment. How can two persons - walking in opposite directions and with partly different knowledge - remain in contact throughout, when every moment can be an invention? I analyze these feats through the lens of image schemas such as BALANCE, FORCE, PATH, and UP-DOWN (Johnson 1987). Technique-related discourse - with its use of didactic metaphor - abounds with image-schematic vectors, geometries, and construal operations like profiling. These enable the tango process: from posture, via walking technique and kinetics, to attention and contact skills. Dancers who organize their muscles efficiently - e.g., through core tension - and who respect postural ‘grammar’ - e.g., a good axis - enable embodied dialog by being receptive to their partners and being manoeuvrable. Super-individual imagery that defines ‘good’ states for a couple to stick to, along with relational attention management and kinetic calibration of joint walking, turns the dyad into a single action unit. My further objective is a micro-phenomenological analysis of joint improvisation. This requires a theory to explain dynamic sensing, the combining of repertory knowledge with this, and the managing of both in small increments. Dancers strategically sense action affordances (Gibson 1979) or recognize and exploit them on the fly. Dynamic routines allow them to negotiate workable configurations step-wise, assisted by their knowledge of node points where the elements of tango are most naturally connected and re-routed. The paper closes with general lessons to learn from these highly structured and embodied improvisational skills, especially regarding certain blind spots in current social cognition theory.

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Landart plein air “Between Sand and Foam” – Between the Everyday and the Ephemera

Visual Studies ◽

10.54664/pgdt7139 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 5 (2) ◽

Author(s):

Bissera Valeva ◽

Keyword(s):

Financial Support ◽

High Tide ◽

Research Fund ◽

Work Of Art ◽

Art Form ◽

The Everyday ◽

Traditional Artists

The text focuses on the realization of the plein air as a part of a larger project (ARTguments) implemented with the financial support of the Research Fund of Sofia University. The art form “landart” was chosen not by chance. It is characteristic for artists to “argue”, to transform their ephemeral visual sensations into art installations – materialized in nature, digitally stored emotional provocations, which also rely on the “co-authorship” of the elements. The pictorial focus is on “unnecessary”, discarded, marginalized objects, without utilitarian application, but discovered and recognized as necessary in the process of creating a work of art. This is the so called by Juri Lotman process of renaming “external” to the artistic installation elements in which they “invade” from the outside world implanting themselves in the imaginary space of the visual work. The art event aims to unite different artists as a way of expression, to gather and impose diverse, even dissimilar concepts.The forum realizes conceptual works by traditional artists, materializes the artistic reaction viewed from different angles, meets a random audience with non-randomly created installations, and last but not least, embodies different works as different visual emotion. The concept of the plein air is subordinated to the philosophy of Khalil Gibran and in particular to his sentences from the eponymous edition „Sand and Foam“:“I am forever walking upon these shores, Between the sand and the foam, The high tide will erase my foot prints,And the wind will blow away the foam...”

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The city, that collective work of art. Tools for graphic expression and participatory creation in urban spaces

EGA Revista de expresión gráfica arquitectónica ◽

10.4995/ega.2021.13237 ◽

2021 ◽

Vol 26 (41) ◽

pp. 230

Author(s):

Bruno Sève ◽

Zaida Muxi Martínez ◽

Roberto Sega ◽

Ernesto Redondo Domínguez

Keyword(s):

Urban Spaces ◽

Work Of Art ◽

Collective Work ◽

The City

<p>Una transformación urbana sostenible, democrática, resiliente e inclusiva significa trabajar con la comunidad local, dándole la oportunidad de colaborar en la creación de la ciudad. Esta investigación estudia la relación que existe entre creatividad gráfica y participación ciudadana para su aplicación en arquitectura y universidades, tanto en los procesos arquitectónicos para construir la ciudad como en los procesos de estrategias y medios para operar. En las Escuelas, se permite entrever nuevas maneras de aprendizaje alternativo. Como método de análisis, nos centramos en ejemplos, incluyendo disciplinas gráficas y de implementación tecnológica, pero también prácticas de arte urbano que surgieron de las luchas ciudadanas. Los resultados enseñan que se puede enseñar el proyecto urbano incorporando el diseño colaborativo, con herramientas como el arte callejero, el dibujo, los mapas colectivos o el urbanismo táctico, como medio de enriquecimiento de los procesos creativos y artísticos para la construcción de la ciudad.</p>

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