nicole rademacher

Tuesday, May 25, 2010

I have no idea what title to give this post.

So here I am, 2am and with insomnia - ok, not real insomnia, more like anxious thinking keeping me awake, but you know me: I like to self-diagnose. Lots of news and work to share - don't know where to begin.

The residency is going well. The project itself has had a lot of false starts (due, unfortunately to participants backing out or just simply not returning calls and/or answering emails - thank you to those of you who have), but I think we are finally getting going. Despite the material specifically for the project we have been researching in and around the city and we have each started our own projects. Matías has started these photo-portrait-collages. Not sure how to describe them, but once his website gets finished - they'll be up there and you can check them out. I have been doing some drawings, writings, and video-ing. Oh and I have been taking pictures. Ya know, taking in all that there is to offer here. And yet another "unfortunately" there is nothing sufficient enough to post, YET!

The drawings are based on gestures of couples: couples that I have seen interacting on the streets (then drawn by memory), or from images that I have taken. Some aren't even real couples, they are just a "couple o' people". The drawings are, of course, abstract - really, what would you expect?? I'll have to take pictures of a few and post them. [Yet, another thing on my list of things to do tomorrow - always tomorrow, but tomorrow really does get here quick!]

The photos are the same things you have always seen from me: funny juxtapositions, people on the street, pretty buildings ... I have been looking at them trying to find a camino, but one hasn't revealed itself yet.

The writings started as things on the computer, then mutated to actual physical writing in my sketch book (really, should I still call it that?? "sketch" when have you know me to sketch?), and then they became transcriptions from pretending that I am talking to an old friend (not anyone in particular, maybe I should choose someone).

Do you feel like this post is as anti-climatic as I feel it is? Oh well. I am in the smack-dab middle of the damn residency - what can one expect, really?

Oh the videos. These I am excited about. Not that I am not excited about the other things, but I feel like these have started to take a bit more form, even though I haven't actually touched any of the footage yet. Or maybe it is just because I think with these I am straying a bit from the gestures, or rather looking at them in a different way - AND starting to work with narrative again (that's how those texts started). In intimate situations (someone's home) I have been taking a lot of mise-en-scène (like how I am working on my French?) shots, which is something out of the norm for me. I have also been clandestinely recording these people's conversations. I don't know how this will all come together, but I like breaking out of my current usual. Who knows, maybe it won't turn into anything.

Saturday, May 8, 2010

Alva Noë, again.



As I am updating some things on my website, without my original files, I have to find my references again on the internet. And so I am reminded of Alva Noë. His work/lectures are a great influence in my work.

I've embedded this from blip.tv.

Embodied Techne Series
02
Marlon Barrios Solano interviewed the philosopher of Alva Noë in his brief visit to NYC. He explains his line of inquiry on perception and action and why dance (and human movement) is relevant for the understanding of cognition. He also talks about his experience with the Lisa Nelson's "Tunning Scores" joint workshop and how certain approaches to dance training and composition can collaborate with science and philosophy in generating knowledge from an embodied perspective.

Enjoy.