Contemporary Art Concepts

For the focus of my piece I chose to look at the Electronic Civil Disobedience (ECD) work done during the Michigan Medicaid Cuts of 2007. In this artwork the artists chose the medium of video to illustrate and share their message with the world. The videos created by the ECD show the reality of life dependent upon the help of others. Children and adults are shown attached to machines that help them live everyday. The lives that are shared with us without any defenses or glamor truly breaches liminality-we are in our world and theirs simaltaneously. The cameras show a life that is vulnerable and yet still filled with so much love and care.

This virtual sit in is an example of participatory art. The cause and the action do not exist if no one watches. Just the same way that the teacher must interact with the students for it to be a learning experience, the work is not progressed if the participants do not connect. In one of the video's the argument become that if you "don't walk in our shoes, you shouldn't be allowed to make choices about out lives". It is not just the equipment that we are speaking about, it is the lives and the experience. This reminds me of what Gude suggests we should teach our students how to encounter diversity. For these videos to be shared and then viewed by people all over the globe means people who weren't even concerned with the issue are not confronted with a life that looks different from theirs.

This work is also an example of collaboration. This website include the voices of many people who are working towards a common goal. I like to think of this as the way we run our classrooms. Students and teachers alike should be united by a common goal of creation. And in creation we should be asking questions and exploring. The video shows an example of collage. The change of a persons life over time through photographs. Even in this collage, it is unified by the one goal, to expose reality. As teachers, we must not be afraid to do the same thing. We must find ways to expose our students to the realities the construct our world so that they might be able to creatively change the way that they exist so they they can make a better future.

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When thinking of what work of art I wanted to share, I thought of what was most striking about the ECD sit in. It wasn't the political act itself, it was that video bridging the gap between private and public - local and global. This inspired me to share the game "Gone Home: A story Exploration"

Webpage can be found here

In most role playing games (RPG's) you have a very specific mission. You must save the world, or escape a trap or find the missing key. In this game, the problem seems simple enough. You arrive home to your family home and find that everyone is missing. The game is more of an experience, where you are prompted to, "...Interrogate every detail of a seemingly normal house to discover the story of the people who live there. Open any drawer and door. Pick up objects and examine them to discover clues. Uncover the events of one family's lives by investigating what they've left behind." It brought me back to one of the previous explorations where we considered the metaphor of home and the objects within. This interface takes that idea and gives it context, makes it temporal and overwhelms you with curious visual stories that make you want to keep looking. 

The designers of the game share some images of the objects found and the rooms you are confronted with in the game. One of the shared images is a book that seems to be in a cardboard box. Its content is assumed to be about patriarch and a revolution. These simple interactions with objects are a way for individuals to be introduced to ideas in a way that gives them agency. These objects are the opposite of simulacrum, instead they are bursting with signs and meaning. There is an uneasy feeling to walking through an empty house and looking at other peoples objects. It's almost as if you are waiting for people to arrive. This unease is increased by the many signs that tell the player that the family left in a rush. The TV's are left on, drawers are open, and pizza boxes are left out. The use of semiotics in this game is interesting because it weaves together the players bias, with the objective objects and then is either backed up or shattered by the information that is given when you pick up the object. I have not personally played this game and honestly I do not know if they ever tell you what happened to the family. There is a part of me that likes to think that you are always left wondering.