mica scalin

Notes on Video Blogging I use my videoblog as a practice space, a studio where I can experiment. The moving images I put here are not even sketches, they are more like doodles. The rules I set for myself to begin were simple: shoot video everyday, keep it short, and while content will not be limited - it is simply meant to describe me in the process of learning. I have always felt I could create art from my daily interaction with the world. That I could remove any barriers separating my life from my art. And if they are not to be separated in product they could not be separated in process. The `author as diarist' seems to be the proto-language of the blog. Like the painterly photo, or the film as `photoplay', or the TV as tiny proscenium theatre, blogging takes its first steps in the shoes of a preceding technology. And it is a very appropriate language to start with as blogging shares many common traits with letter writing / diary keeping – it is periodic, its is a dialog and unlike say, a phone conversation, it is author-centric(very much 1st person in its content) and it is a cumulative form of story telling. Being a diarist in that way doesn't appeal to me, personally. I'm more interested in the element of accumulation - a buildup of content to give relevance to the form – that meaning establishes itself over time. Adding video to this form will allow the medium to truly come into its own and begin establishing its unique language. So, what can a video blog do or rather, what can I do with a video blog that I cannot do with other mediums? It attracts me because of this unique combination of traits in a visual medium. It is irrelevant to me if its content is edited or `real' or `art'. What is most interesting to me is that it provides a way to tell a story that could eliminate worn-out narrative forms without relying on `postmodern' or ironic or self-aware tricks, most of which are rapidly becoming traps. When I started the videoblog I made a list of qualities specific to a blog. A blog is: open source, collaborative, dialog, accumulative, contemporary. This list also defines my ideal of what art could be. Open Soure because I have always liked for my work to reveal its seams and rough edges to give people an idea of how it was made - that it is held together with tape and not magic fairy dust and prayers. I Collaboration is the ultimate way to generate new exciting ideas. A dialog because art is really an exchange of ideas. It should leave you with questions to consider later when you are no longer in its presence. Accumulative because though a work may be created in one inspired moment - it is always part of a larger history and gains meaning and relevance with time. Contemporary because the most any artist can aspire to, humbling as it may be, it to respond to their own life and times, the reality of their surroundings. Leaving behind a record of what it is like to be a person at a particular time and place. Often artists have a room where they go to work, they invite people to visit, have discussion about their work in progress and ideas for future projects. I have never had a physical studio before and there was a time when I envied those who did. However, I am now using the videoblog to create this experience for myself, without the physical room. I can now get regular input throughout the process of making something. And this input will help to shape and direct the work. It is more than a window into my creative process, it is a wide open door. Anyone, anywhere, at anytime is welcome. And that is the point, not to lock myself up in a room alone to make art. The art is in the interaction between people.