Ellipses
Ellipses
Journal of Creative Research
Have you ever noticed that the wild, or wilderness is always elsewhere? Another place, primordial forest, wild savanna, desert, mountain range unspoiled by the human, thriving elsewhere? Yet even a cursory investigation of dirt and crack reveals a complex biome of insistent thriving below our feet, bringing wilderness into the current urban landscape. This project investigates sites of decay on and around the Witwatersrand Ridge as spaces of geological and ecological enmeshment, where stoney matter presents a lively subversive material agency, intertwining with modern stoney materials, and other nonhuman agents. In this project, the writing and visual essays attempt to give voice to the stoney matter of urban spaces which we have rendered as terra nullius by narrating open urban space as wasteland. Resistance and Ruin attempts to engage the online reader in a multi-sensory experience of walking, being and becoming enmeshed in the weather worlds of stone. Page development: Andrea Hayes.
Author
Brigitta Stone-Johnson is an artist and architect. She currently lectures at the Wits School of Architecture and Planning, while completing a Creative Practice PhD in Visual Arts at the University of the Witwatersrand. The focus of her work revolves around themes concerning the Anthropocene, posthumanities, and new material theory. Her current work explores the intersectionality between urban landscapes and stoney materials.
Digital Creative Developer
Andrea is an award-winning video game developer and game studies academic. She is currently finishing her Masters Degree, through Wits University, which looks at the representation of women in video games. Andrea has a passion for creative coding, experimenting with digital art and making video games. Andrea is a freelance website and video game developer and is currently working on multiple projects for The Ellipses Journal of Creative Research, which is run through Wits University. Andrea is passionate about diversifying the tech industry and empowering women in development.
General Note:
[…] Ellipses Journal for Creative Research endeavours to make bare the process of research and development in creative and artistic research. This is for readers / viewers an opportunity and mechanism to see the types of academic critique engaged with creative research and to make visible the responses and development.
The following peer review was produced blind and in process, the artist / author has subsequently been given the opportunity to respond and develop both the theoretical and interactive parts of the article before publication. What you see published has been edited post this review.
Peer Review 1: Resistance To Ruin – Lithic Encounters (2020)
Reviewer: Anonymous
Which aspects of the submission are of interest / relevance and why?
‘Resistance To Ruin’ undoes the ways in which we often imagine a city: solid structures, imagined as carriers for human activity, decaying once such activity ceases to exist. Instead, this body of work interrogates the very notion of endings, lasts and lastings in ways that allow us to understand the city as being less obedient to our commands; in thinking through concepts such as ‘primal ooze’, this project understands cities in more of a liquid state than a rigid one. Through befriending rocks that lie across the Witwatersrand ridge, the artists ongoing practice of walking, thinking and making have resulted in a rich exchange between artist and city. The work layers an understanding of what a stone is onto impressions of cityness in convincing ways, placing the lively matter of stones at the center of the image of a central business district that houses ruin next to vital livelihood. Resulting from this connectivity, the work sinks the audience into an amalgamation of aboves and belows in ways that enable a questioning of the binary between disassembly and assembly. Stones are understood as odd kin, which have the potential of drawing us nearer to our more-than-just-human surrounds, and push us toward the potentials of understanding the human as being intrinsically integrated in earthly matter. The work enables one to understand the mutative potentials of the city in ways that disturb anthropocentric and temporal norms; the human is “composted” into the fabric of landscape and weathered into, making us think of ourselves in relation to deep time while simultaneously recognising that we are fragments of a future to come. It is the act of being present, over and over again, with the city and with the rocks along the ridge that enable the substance of this work to emerge -in this regard, the work is a convincing example of the values of practice led arts research.
How are the artistic and research outcomes represented?
This project is presented as a topographical map of the Witwatersrand ridge, the site where walks, thinking and encounters occurred. The viewer at first needs to take in the aesthetic qualities of a map that have multiple aesthetics of topography assembled together, and then begins to navigate and makes sense of it for themselves. Whilst immersed in this act, an image of the artist making sense of the ridge through the act of exploring the ridge came to mind. The map contains locations of importance, a clear route which indicates the ridge, and interactive keys that link with and lead to descriptors containing academic research and artistic work. All of these components are hidden within the map and the viewer can browse for as long as they want while remaining within the same frame of the map of the ridge. Again, the methodology of taking walks and gathering information is played with here in interesting ways.
The entire project is displayed through multiple entry points of engagement. This enables the viewer to choose the ones best suited to them which pushes artistic works up alongside theory and reading; the artworks talk to the theory and the theory to the artworks.Despite the high degree of technological innovation behind the project’s landing page, it still reads as quite analogue. It almost feels as if bringing analogue and digital together is an important aspect for the artist, as is the case with the highly rendered 3D scanned objects juxtaposed against the collage maps of taken photographs. I am now curious to understand the creative choices for the work more.
How well does the design support the submission?
The density of the written academic component that supports this work is lightened by the design of navigation for the viewer. I becomes important that you are never lost in the work -you always remain in the same frame atop the ridge. This results in a sense of grounding while you dip in and out of the information on the site. It is almost as if you too are roaming around the ridge vicariously through the information and affect present in the project. There is a stillness to the work, despite its many points of entry and bits of information. Time, somehow, feels like it has slowed down to a manageable pace where you can poke about and learn at a pace that suites you. This is set in contrast to a city often associated with a high pace and anxiety. Accessing the Johannesburg in this way does indeed highlight the possibilities of alternative temporalities that we all, in one way or another, become composted into.
Are there any ethical or legal concerns?
No.
Conclusions and and pre publication revision:
This project offers a strong rethinking of the city as seen from the perspective of all that it rests on. Once you have seen the city through the mattering of rocks it is hard to un see it. The project thinks through art as much as it does theory, which amounts in a strong argument for the potentials of artistic research into Johannesburg. Further, by considering rocks as odd kin, this project reframing of the city outside of human-centered norms and brings it into the lively conversations about worlding in more-than-human ways (along with oddkin).The work is strong and I recommend it gets accepted without changes.
Peer Review 2: Resistance To Ruin – Lithic Encounters (2020)
Reviewer: Anonymous
Which aspects of the submission are of interest / relevance and why?
The global view of the landing page is interesting as it offers a visually interesting image of what looks like a topographic map at first glance. The textual prompts and navigation create a sense of curiosity of what is presented and the form of presentation.
How are the artistic and research outcomes represented?
‘Resistance to Ruin- Lithic Encounters’ is a good topic, but I am left curious about how the artist’s proposed contribution will improve research quality. This needs to be much clearer. They key question for me is, “how does this study /presentation contribute to a more robust artistic research, production and presentation. Although I would like to see a presentation oriented towards a more bold disruption of the presentation of the submission in the research notes collection.
How well does the design support the submission?
This presentation meets a reconceptualised conventional academic research project designed for the screen.
Are there any ethical or legal concerns?
No.
Conclusions and and pre publication revision:
On a technical level the textual prompts for navigation are too small. The artist could consider a different colour scheme, or different font size as one hovers over the prompts, this in turn might enable for a better reading of the textual navigational prompts.
The search button acts as a magnifying glass, but it does not offer any other information when one hovers over hot spots (textual prompts). The menu at the top next to the search icon, could be better rendered to offer a visual clue to what the headings could potentially represent if a user where to click on the prompts. If possible, the artist could consider dimming of the background or reducing the opacity levels when there is a piece of writing on screen so that the writing stands out more clearly from the background artwork and this could result in an easier way to close the text tabs.
Therefore, with some adjustments to text, navigation and more contextual background in some instances that go beyond bullet points.