Media Practice
A central part of my teaching and research concerns media practice, focusing on film technologies and on circuit building as ways to better understand the electronic media that we work with and that shape our lives. Hand building electronics has significantly shaped my view of media history and the way I teach media history.
I have also learned a great deal about older media through my work in film preservation at the University of Iowa Library's 16mm film collection. Over the course of three years, I cleaned, organized, and catalogued several large collections of international films being moved to the more preservation-friendly library and got some hands-on experience with the materiality of film, splicing it when it broke, learning the different projectors, and replacing lamps and exciter bulbs when they burned out. Working with the film collection also led to some unexpected screenings, such as a rare French-language version of Luchino Visconti's Le notti bianche (1957), adapted from Fyodor Dostoyevsky's "White Nights," under the title La nuit blanche (poster available here).
I have also learned a great deal about older media through my work in film preservation at the University of Iowa Library's 16mm film collection. Over the course of three years, I cleaned, organized, and catalogued several large collections of international films being moved to the more preservation-friendly library and got some hands-on experience with the materiality of film, splicing it when it broke, learning the different projectors, and replacing lamps and exciter bulbs when they burned out. Working with the film collection also led to some unexpected screenings, such as a rare French-language version of Luchino Visconti's Le notti bianche (1957), adapted from Fyodor Dostoyevsky's "White Nights," under the title La nuit blanche (poster available here).
Windfarm
Windfarm was an experimental noise project I collaborated on with Chad Vollrath and A.C. Hawley from 2009 to 2013 in Iowa City. The format of the group changed several times, from deploying an arsenal of nearly 40 tape decks in its earliest incarnation to building a wall of noise with hand-built electronics in later editions. Throughout, the group combined experimental practice with insights from media theory, allowing us to cross over between academic forums and music venues. Here is a video of a performance in 2010, thanks to the camerawork and editing skills of Joe Bookman.
Useless Box
Attributed to Marvin Minsky and Claude Shannon, the Useless Machine, or Ultimate Machine, as Minsky calls it, has the single purpose of shutting itself off. The simplicity of the device and its amusing function have made it a favorite of electronics hobbyists as a first project. I built this box from a kit made by ThinkGeek for an opening class demonstration in my course Digits and Digitalia: Art and Technics of the Hand at McGill University in Fall 2014. It had just the effect I hoped for.
Synth Project
After a number of circuit bending projects for an experimental noise group in Iowa City with Chad Vollrath and A.C. Hawley, this was my effort to make something with a little more control, exchanging happy accidents for a designed soundscape, however "weird."
Design, schematics, and printed circuit board from Music From Outer Space.
Parts sourced from Tayda Electronics.
Design, schematics, and printed circuit board from Music From Outer Space.
Parts sourced from Tayda Electronics.
