April WEB ARTIST :
ISABEL SAIJ / FRANCE
ENGLISH:
1- BIO AND INFORMATION:
Isabel Saij
born 1954
French
lives and works in Mervent (France) and Vienna (Austria)1984 : dissertation in "visual art and science of art“ La Sorbonne Paris 1
subject : "Egon Schiele 1890/1918“1983-1999 : Material painting, objects, installations exhibited in solo, group exhibitions and on art fairs
2000: Beginning of the computer generated art: 2D and 3D drawings, 2D and 3D animations, real virtuality, netart,...
2002: First online exhibitions of netart pieces.
2003: Reviewer for the californian e-zine "netartreview“
2005: Current activities:
-netartist, multimedia artist, copyleft activist
-critic
-photographer
-sound designer
-researcherThe works can be see directly on-line at the following adresses:
http://www.saij-netart.net
http://www.saij-copyleft.net
http://www.bibiche.net
http://www.digressions.net
http://www.saij-photos.net
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/isabelsaij-net
2- WORK (s):
Black & white. Black or white. Stacking layers. Interferences.
Geometrical 2D shapes, clear and good perceptible, easily moving.
Geometrical 3D shape swivelling, all facets looking perfectly polish, without any uneveness or roughness.We look at them, through them, around them.Story without words.
What to say?These constantly moving objects can’t go mouldy, can they? A black and white, a black or white system or wise of thinking, a binar one, a manichean one, in a grey zone with barred windows. Wrong or right, it’s easy, it’s funny, isn’t it?
Our western politicians (those I know better?)... Paragons, whatever you think of....What about Bush? The president of our dreams, living with a family of our dreams, in a land of our dreams, with a democracy of...
Isn’t he sacrificing himself a lot, acting out for a noble purpose, against evil! Your’re good or bad, don’t forget! You’re with him or against him, believer or infidel, for life or criminal, don’t forget. A woman’s life requires a new act overnight, even if there is no more hope for recovering health. In the same time, in Texas, new recruits are enticed. I heard they don’t act under pressure, great, that’s a relief. To summarize, to lost a vegetative life in bed is not wished by God, to lost life in Iraq is a pity, but it has to be, and the boys do their job! for a so good reason. For democracy. For a better world dicted by him, Bush, and he knows what’s good for us, and guesses and predicts what God says and wishes. For us. Bush as a political visionary with geopolitical correctness, with hawks and vultures stinking of gunpowder and oil.
New aims in a new american politic? Of course. Mrs Rice becomes so kind. were we wrong? American people get french fries again. Welcome to the
„old Europe.“ Mrs Rice is a music lover. Better, a musician. She loves France again, visit it, and answers hard selected questions among students... about democracy!What about Berlusconi, not tolerating any step aside from the press or the broadcast? Don’t worry, the boss is the boss, he knows an answer: to buy and become owner.
What about Putine? He muzzled the press and killed the democratically elected president of Tchechenia.
What about Europe and France at this very moment? We - France and other countries of the union - should vote – referendum - for a constitutional treaty for Europe, for an unreadable text which promises us the best! The best way toward an ulta liberalism? Silence... will simply be better, believe them. We should say „yes“ for more prosperity, more freedom or chances to change things if needed. Believe them. To say „no“ could lead to an apocalyptical disaster. The fight is bloody: clever minds against numbskulls... we spoke about the american system?... Broadcast and press push for an approval of this treaty, like a flock of sheep. And people get less and less purchasing power, lost their job, and shareholders, in the same time, get more and more. No limit. And now, after a few months, having carried out a few polls? Embarrassment. Who would take the risk of offending people. Dilemma. But anyway, government play with anguish. Political transparency.
We’re the sheep, whether we like it or not. The broadcast is perpetually lying, the press lies, manipulating and manipulated, and the politicians seem to orchestrate the whole, entirely bound, as we are.
What could they do, apart from making a marvellous shining show... We’re the sheep and the puppets. They are too.
Perhaps can we break the chains, cut the threads, and get red, red sheep, angry sheep!
And our politicians? Can they yell? They stay in a grey zone: not doing what they say and not saying what they do.
Political apparency.
Do they get power? no. The economic system ,yes. A few majors, a few decision makers. Be thankfully. We can admire these powerless political puppets. They are not dangerous.
Have a good time, relax, every thing’s fine. We can trust them, they do their job for our own good...they protect us...sure...Wolfowitz became administrator of the world bank.
OTHER EXTRAORDINARY SHEEP:
at: https://archive.the-next.eliterature.org/museum-of-the-essential/sheep (- find , page-bottom, look for Isabel Saij -)
THE FIRST COLLABORATIVE REVIEW 2005
WORKS:
AND
SHEEP (Isabel Saij I, II, III, IV)
1- Do you believe
My grandmother, who was born in 1896, told me:
"I like romances, I like stories. Yes, I like. Now I do not know, the time went by...
When I was young the women were different. We could not do things, stories... only sometimes. I had wish but I did not have perhaps competence to write a story. Neither I had the facilities of today. I belong to 96, I do not belong to 900. When I was born women did not study. Who am I? I went to school because my mother was a little bit more advanced. She was one of
the few advanced people..."
My grandmother Sylvia , 94 years old/ 1990
My grandmother studies were only the elementary school's studies, however she read one book a week during great part of her life.
It is interesting to compare the text of my grandmother and Saij's bio, who was born 58 years after 1896.
Isabel Saij
born 1954
french
lives and works in Mervent (France) and Vienna (Austria)
1984 : dissertation in "visual art and science of art" La Sorbonne Paris 1
subject : "Egon Schiele 1890/1918"""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
The first movements toward universal suffrage (or manhood suffrage) occurred in the early 19th century, and focused on removing property requirements for voting. Only in the late 19th and early 20th century, the focus of universal suffrage became the removal of restrictions against women having the right
to vote.""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
These few paragraphs above which I chose to start my comments on Isabel Saij's work evidence the XX century importance for the feminine gender."Political Transparency", Isabel Saij's work which we are analyzing, demonstrates political understanding and reveals that using Art and Technology, without any doubt, it is a consequence of the feminine gender's conquests of the XX century.
"Political Transparency" and the Author's text on the work ("A black and white, a black or white system or wise of thinking, a binar one, a manicheanone, in a grey zone with barred windows.") remind me "Mille Plateaux" by Deleuze and Guattari, where they affirm that the face is a white wall with a black hole and also they indicate the relationship between body and power. It is the despotic and authoritarian power's concrete arrangement which unchains the abstract machine of "visageité", which operates a "visagéification" of the whole body, of their surroundings and of their objects, turning into landscape all the worlds and ambients. The face is political. We are what the power wants!
"Political Transparency" or "Abstract Machine of 'Visageité'"
Saij stated:
"We're the sheep, whether we like it or not. The broadcast is perpetually lying, the press lies, manipulating and manipulated, and the politicians seem to orchestrate the whole, entirely bound, as we are. What could they do, apart from making a marvellous shining show... We're the sheep and the puppets. They are too.."
The face as Landscape - Salvador Dali , El Gran Paranoico, 1936
Undo the face is not a small work. If the face is political, undo it also is a politics. We can not fight against the face and against the abstract machine of "visageité", It is necessary to fight with these elements and to invent a new use for them.
It is only in the conscience and in the subjective passion's black hole, where each one connects to the unknown spaces of the other, that we can dismount that system... We have need of thinking head's intellectual availability (like the Isabel Saij's thinking head) which enable the abstract machine of "visageité" for a different operation, then a year zero will start, but for that it is necessary to break the previous codes.
"Have a good time, relax, every thing's fine. We can trust them, they do their job for our own good...they protect us...sure... Wolfowitz became administrator of the world bank." (Isabel Saij)
Will we be really in a labyrinth without exit * or does it remain some hope?
Another French Author, Jean Duvignaud, stated:
"Artistic creation is a bet on the human species capacity to invent new kinds of relations and to live still unknown emotions."
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*...labyrinths., dear Isabel, could you tell us anything on "e-motions". your surprising series of sheep? https://archive.the-next.eliterature.org/museum-of-the-essential/sheep (Isabel Saij [III])
Bibliography:
DELEUZE, Gilles et Guattari, Félix. Mille plateaux. Paris: Les Éditions Minuit, 1980.
DUVIGNAUD, Jean. Sociologia da Arte. Rio de Janeiro, Editora Forense, 1970.
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And you, what do you THINK?
1- Do you also believe in the human species' CREATION POWER to change our "political landscape"?
2- Do you believe in UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE to change the world?
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Isabel Saij answers:
Dear Regina, dear all,
First of all, thank you, Regina, for your invitation.
It’s a real pleasure to take part in the "collaborative review“.
Do you know that Brazil is celebrated in France this year?
Many (official) cultural exchanges! The "collaborative review"
is surely one of the most original, exclusive and unofficial project.""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
Question !:
"Do you also believe in the human species CREATION POWER to change our "political landscape"? "
It would be foolish to think that an artistic creation could change the world. Nevertheless I think it is necessary to be active in order to criticize. As an artist -as a "free" sheep?- I've the impression that some works provokereactions from the political/economical/financial side. For instance: the case Steve Kurtz in the USA.
And now the answer of Bill Gates to the question:
"What's driving this, and do you think intellectual-property laws need to be reformed?"
No, I'd say that of the world's economies, there's more that believe in intellectual property today than ever. There are fewer communists in the world today than there were. There are some new modern-day sort of communists who want to get rid of the incentive for musicians and moviemakers and software makers under various guises.
Bill Gates is clearly against people, artists putting works under a copyleft or a creaqtive commons license. The two instances show a fear. A trial against an artist, a sever accusation against people, artists who want to share and spread culture and knowledge. Well, artists with little power lead to strong reactions from the US-administration and from the richest man of the world. A change of the "political landscape", of course no, but the signification of the reaction should not be underestimated.
Question 2:
"Do you believe in UNIVERSAL SUFFRAGE to change the world?"
If I was living in one of the numerous dictatorial country of this world I would be very happy of course to get the possibility to vote. A vote = a signal of my own existence. Now what is the situation in some "old" democracy? Here in Europe (where I live and where I've some idea about the situation) we have a social-democrat administration in Germany and a liberal administration in France. About 10 years ago it was exactly the contrary. Currently in the 2 countries the unemployment is very high (roughly 10%) and the number of poor people is steadily increasing (as well as the fortune of the richest).
Conclusion: whatever your vote is and the changes of administration it brings the result is the same: no improvement for those who desesperatly want and expect it! I would like to get some opinions from other continents or countries.""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""""
Newsletter's Members answers:
(The answers are placed by order of arrival)
I)- Isabel Aranda Yto (Chile)
1- The political landscape has had the creative power's participation since it has existed, for good things or bad things... If the human being becomes aware that he can and that he must change the political landscape, the creative power will be a great tool. These two elements have to go united, the conscience and the creativity. It is difficult to change the political landscape because the majority of people is directioned from above, their natural instinct is manipulated in favor of the classes leaders' benefit. I believe that in modern times the creative power of some well-meaning people is not enough.
2- If the votings are manipulated, if people has no conscience, for what the suffrage servers? I believe that the Universal Suffrage changes the world permanently, but not always for the better. It is an indispensable tool, but it is not in itself our societies' salvation.
Isabel Aranda YTO
http://www.yto.cl
II- Brad Brace: (Canadá / USA)
1 e 2- Hi Regina -- I think there's a universal revolution brewing...
III- David Daniels: (USA)
1. YES! I believe in the human species creation power to change our "political landscape".2. No. I don't believe universal suffrage can change the world. I believe that the only thing that can change the world in a good way is Universal Self Knowledge. Everything is taught in schools except our own Self. People know so little about their own Self and its needs that they are easily tricked.
* Below a small portion of Daniel's interview, in which he explains poetically his thought.
"And if you want to see The Truth look in the face of a smiling child. Laughter is the truth flying up from the depths of the human being. Happiness is a buried treasure. If you realized there was a treasure buried inside you, would you dig inside you until you found it? Would you say 'Open Sesame' to a rock wall inside you and see it open to a cave full of magnificent treasure? To a tiny invisible engine surrounded by light messengers spinning a gigantic gold and ruby and pearl and blood cocoon around its Self?
When children are born they are a fine invisible engine as soft as the mirror on a pool of silk water inside a clumsy automobile. As they grow they crash in accidents and get dents and scrapes and road dirt all over their automobile. They are trained to forget they are an invisible engine inside. They are forced into believing the totality of their being is fender and bumper dents and scrapes and road dirt. They are taught by their owners to devote their life to speeding and crashing and hauling and listening to a loud ridiculous radio and repairing and painting their fender and bumper dents and scrapes. Whenever they say - "I have an invisible engine." (Which is as close as they are able to come to "I am an invisible engine.") or "I can hear the tune of my invisible engine."- They are told that they are crazy, or to go on a boring drive they hate, or it is God, or you must become as solid as a rock wall. Early in their young shining fluttering life most humans have totally forgotten they are an invisible engine."
IV- Joesér Alvarez: (Brazil)
1- The political landscape is a picture of doubtful taste that restoration and painter can not change, only a very powerful creativity for change that picture.
2- If Universal Suffrage's capacity was just like the meteor that fell into Mexico's Golf, I would tell that yes ...
V- Paulo Silveira: (Brazil)
1 e 2 - The answers are YES and YES, and I have satisfaction in answering that, even though the changes can be more discreet than we would like. I trust in this. And that is my seem, not only a hope.
VI- Jim Andrews: (Canada)
Yes, I believe 1 and 2 :)
VII- Paulo Villela: (Brazil)
1- Yes. But the almost impassable difficulty will be to thrill the human mass for make the transformation happens. A political work on a creative product.
2- I imagine an universal assembly to solve the subject. I really think that with the step by step smaller world we have nowadays, it finishes happening. And the result of this ?
A more powerful block squashing the rest...
VIII- Muriel Frega: (Argentina)
1- This is one of the themes in which I do not believe. Politics is something that basically bores me, because it gathers the characteristics that most displease me: lies, hidden things, conveniences, corruption.
2- mhmhmhm, I do not believe. I would be enchanted in believe that it is possible... but the reality in small scale shows me just the opposite.
IX- Ricardo Báez Duarte: (Venezuela)
1- Frankly ( and regretfully) I do not. History teaches that this is almost impossible. I believe in the forces of History " a la Spengler".
2- No, I do not. Suffrage is based in theory on the intelligence of the People, but as reality shows the People always lacks intelligence and is only moved irrationally and emotionally.
X- Marcelo Frazão: (Brazil)
1- Unfortunatelly not. Change is possible only through more objective information (at least in Brazilian reality).
2- No. Only the human being can change the world.
XI - Edward Picot (UK)
1- If you mean can we change the political landscape through the power of creativity, I think the answer is both yes and no. I don't think an artwork can change the political landscape, or at least it's very rare for such a thing to happen. However, I think digital technology, particularly the Web, is changing the whole shape of society, and creativity is a part of this.
2- If you mean should everybody have the vote, then of course. Or should everybody's voice be heard - of course again.
XII - Nilda Saldamando (Chile)
1- Yes it is possible. And it is in evidence in multiple occasions ...... because the creation power is the capacity of creating other realities that modify unavoidably the "political landscape" of immobile appearance under the powers that intend a permanent control .... and happens that suddenly human beings (men and women) create the unexpected marking one before and one after ... constituted today as historical landmarks of the human process ....
2- Which world ?? the one of each one of us .... the one of a group .... the one of a city ....the one of a country .... and sometimes yes ... understanding that there are not the absolute changes yet ..... the suffrage manifests an option to consider which does not allow doubts .... Like the NO to the dictatorship ... this No, yes, it changed our world ....
XIII- Aliette Guibert - France
1- Yes and not. No in establishing or constituting power (the same step to come); the only matter which reproduces best itself since a millennium they are the forms of the power of the men on the other men. Yes in social subject, in the field of the individual or collective autonomy (a landscape allowing a novative real time -no utopia).
2- Yes but the real one which books the useless or white votes as valid votes. Otherwise the universal suffrage navigates towards the abstention. For another hand nobody canoverestimate the change, it is according to the vote (good or bad:). I am for the universal suffrage in any thing and most frequently, as far as it is not manipulated by a proportional system. The universal suffrage to elect symbolically appreciative people in charge in front of the community. The Labor or creative councils as a cooperative basis for villages. At this point, the cognitive leader up to the end of theproject being the author of its concept but changing at the time of the next.
XIV- Elizabeth Curtis (UK)
1- Yes, I think that Art can change the "political landscape". There are many artists who have a new set of values: acknowledgment of our lives in an interconnected universe combined with achieving success in the world. Creative work in service to the whole encompasses this vision and makes it plausible. We could all be artists of social change.
2- Yes. I believe that Universal Suffrage can change the world. It has to be the right of everyone to vote.
XV- Clemente Padín
1- It depends on the historical circumstances. In general art is innocuous in relation to social changes and revolutions. Nevertheless, when the democratic communication channels are obstructed (as in the dictatorships or under a State terrorism) Art can replace that deficiency. Art necessarily expresses the social conflict (it cannot be avoid, it is impossible... ) and only can change the society if it gets to transmit the necessity of changes. That is to say, it is not Art that changes Society but people, people that assume the conscience of necessity of changes.
2- Under the capitalist democratic regime, as we know it, it is evident that Universal suffrage can not change anything. It only offers the illusion that history is in our hands. It does not matter if we are under a progressive government or a left governement it is obvious that it has not been possible to advance an apex forward of society great structural changes . On the other hand, as the votings are planned (by lists, regions or by social nuclei) it is impossible to obtain their legitimización, not even logical. Nevertheless, it is preferable to vote than to suffer under a dictatorship.
Isabel Saij explains poetically her labyrinth...
e.motion
by Isabel saij
(at https://archive.the-next.eliterature.org/museum-of-the-essential/sheep / Isabel Saij [III}, - find [page-bottom] -)
No motion. A sheep.
Getting aware of its loneliness.
Emotion = e.motion.
getting electrified.
Motion. A sheep meets a sheep meets a sheep.
Dialog. Communication.
Comfort of illusion.
e.motion.
3 sheep in motion.
in the labyrinth of life.
trying to go out of a muddling situation.
meeting other of them trying the same.
trying to leave a system.
exit. no exit.
exit by chance
illusion of freedom.
freedom is an heavy burden.
multiple choice.
sheep on the top of the cliff.
e.motion
One jumps in the abyss.
The other too.
To follow is pleasant.
so long it's a soft fall...
It seems to me very charming although dramatic this Isabel Saij's almost animated series of 3D images for which the Artist wrote the poetic declaration above. The use of colors is excellent and it punctuates the drama that is developed through the pictures. The way Saij uses different points of view increases the observer's interest who becomes more and more interested in discover what is going to happen in the next scene... The electric green sheep are teeny robots, a probable allusion to all that Saij has already revealed us in "Political Transparence". For me this is a fantastic series, I do not tire of observing it and everytime I discover new details and minutiaes which I really consider surprising. Congratulations Isabel! (The download is very fast!)Saij revealed us that she was inspired in two classical to develop her tale:
- In the myth of the labyrinth of Knossos
- In the tale "Panurge" by the "old" French author Rabelais.Both will be on line soon, near the series e.motions.
After you delight yourself with e.motions, click Isabel Saij [IV], at the same page ( https://archive.the-next.eliterature.org/museum-of-the-essential/sheep ) and have a good time discovering "how many sheep", but also do not fail to appreciate the minutiaes and colors of this magnificent 3D scene, a QTR movie. To move the 360 º scene, move your mouse on the picture. Ah, the "download" (1 MB) will make you wait a little bit, mostly if you do not have a fast connection, but it is worthwhile!
2- Because Today is Saturday, let's start talking about
classical movies...
Metropolis by Fritz Lang
"The year is 2026, a dickensian best of times, worst of times, where total oppression and manipulation of the masses is wielded by the unquestionable power of the few. Far bellow the City of Metropolis is the Underground City where machines are operated by the workers who live even further bellow. Day after day, in mechanical routine, they are forced to limits of human endurance."
Workers of the Metropolis by Elizabeth Curtis (UK)
Metropolis by Isabel Saij
The year is 2005 and ..." we're the sheep, whether we like it or not. The broadcast is perpetually lying, the press lies, manipulating and manipulated, and the politicians seem to orchestrate the whole, entirely bound, as we are. What could they do, apart from making a marvellous shining show... We're the sheep and the puppets. They are too."
Metropolis by Fritz Lang
"Maria leads the masses to the machines in the Underground City and orders them to be destroyed."
Metropolis by Isabel Saij
Perhaps can we break the chains, cut the threads, and get red, red sheep, angry sheep!
Metropolis by Brad Brace
I think there's a universal revolution brewing.
Metropolis by Edward Picot
I think digital technology, particularly the Web, is changing the whole shape of society, and creativity is a part of this.
Metropolis by Elizabeth Curtis
Creative work in service to the whole encompasses this vision and makes it plausible. We could all be artists of social change.
Metropolis by Regina Célia Pinto
Earth's sheep ... ants ... bugs let's join together on the net, let's change information, let's think together! Yeahh, perhaps the fortuneteller Lang has failed in his previsions ...
3- Digital sublimation and another classical movie...
"Digital Sublimation"
by Isabel Saij
Isabel told us:
"The starting point (first frame) of this animation is a drawing on a small plank of wood, measuring approximately 6x5 cm. After to scan this small plank I created new drawings using the computer, each time I worked on the preceding drawing to develop a new phase. Result: 110 drawings. As they follow one another I could make an assembly of them, therefore an animation. I called it "digital sublimation" because I was thinking of the chemical transformation. It's when a material goes directly from the solid form to the gaseous one.
Normally the 3 stages are: solid, liquid, gaseous."
Well, it would be good if we could make a small drawing of our political landscape, to scan it and transform it in the same way Isabel Saij transformed her engraving, from the very hard stage which we are living now directely to a much lighter and happy one.
Of course it is only a metaphor, but is it possible to get a much ligher political landscape?
Well, to answer this let's return to classical movies (2)
2001, a Space Odissey by Stanley Kubrick
Kubrick begins his film with a sequence that shows the dawn of the human being. The camera shows a tribe of human's ancestors. Sundenly two important things happen:
1- A strange monolith appears in that place. The strange beings (would they be apes?), circle the monolith.
2- One of the human's ancestors discovers the first tool while hiting a bone on another bone. That was the first creation act. Probably, in that moment, also the first weapon was discovered.
That "ape" keep on hiting the bones but after a while "he" throw the bone to the sky and in that moment occurs one of my favorite movie's scenes: the bone becomes a spaceship and we listen to a Strauss' valse. In a million years, man will reach for the stars with the same creative motion attempt. How many creative acts are there between these two that kubricks' movie tell us?
Humanity History is the Power of Creation History is not it?
So, I do believe that Creation Power builds the History and if it builds the History, of course it can change our political landscape... (for better or not...)
"One of the most disastrous illusions will not be that which consists in looking at the artistic expression as a specialists' activity, separated from the alive problems' reality? On the other hand, it seems to us, that any creation, whichever the level in which it situates and whichever are the ideologies that justify it, it is in immediate relation with this collective freedom, perpetually sprouting, which animates human reality, shakes the numbest or the most stratified structures and projects the human groups in the mutation, in the future, in the history." (Jean Duvignaud)
I would like to remind you some very interesting answers from our members, which I think that complement the texts above.
" The political landscape has had the creative power's participation since it has existed, for good things or bad things... If the human being becomes aware that he can and that he must change the political landscape, the creative power will be a great tool."
(Isabel Aranda)"Yes it is possible. And it is in evidence in multiple occasions.......because the creation power is the capacity of creating other realities that modify unavoidably the "political landscape" of immobile appearance under the powers that intend a permanent control .... and happens that suddenly human beings (men andwomen) create the unexpected marking one before and one after ... constituted today as historical landmarks of the human process ..."
(Nilda Saldamando)"It depends on the historical circumstances. In general art is innocuous in relation to social changes and revolutions. Nevertheless, when the democratic communication channels are obstructed (as in the dictatorships or under a State of terrorism ) Art can replace that deficiency. Art necessarily expresses the social conflict (it cannot be avoid, it is impossible... ) and only can change the society if it gets to transmit the necessity of changes. That is to say, it is not Art that changes Society but people, people that assume the conscience of necessity of changes."
(Clemente Padín)
4- Let's breathe the hilarious gas at the Bagdah Cafe...
I will keep on thinking on transformation and again I will start my review with “Digital sublimation’" by Isabel Saij. Please, watch this movie a little bit above.This is a small quick time movie but the graphic images are very rich, Edward Picot wrote me:
- “I very much enjoyed Isabel Saij's (II) animation. Beautiful shapes, colours and textures.”
That is it, as I have said before, I do not tire of observing Saij’s works. Everytime I do it, I discover new details and minutiaes which I really consider surprising. That statement can be used perfectly in “Digital Sublimation”. Saij told us the way she gets her 110 drawings and that they started from a small plank of wood. I believe that this is the reason why the images are very organic. To get so organic shapes is not very easy using only a computer. Also I liked the concept of sublimation, the way wood becomes digital - from a solid state to a gaseous one.
It is interesting that if you want to see the movie's first frame again you must click the button play, Saij did not make a loop. The work has an end in the last gaseous image. Perhaps it indicates Isabel Saij’s trajectory in Arts...Bagdad Cafe by Percy Adlon
Driving through the Mojave Desert somewhere between Las Vegas and Disneyland, a middle aged German tourist couple has a spat... and the wife, Jasmin, strikes out on her own. Trudging down the highway pulling along a large suitcase, she is so unlikely a sight that Brenda, the irascible proprietor of the Bagdad Cafe where Jasmin stops, is instantly suspicious. So begins a hilarious and touching account of the relationship that develops between these two women of different cultures. With the creator force help which Jasmin discovers in herself, the dusty and decadent Bagdah Cafe is completely transformed and suddenly, in the middle of the desert desolation, an oasis of friendship and creativity is created.
“...simultaneously poetic, dazzling and intoxicating. In Bagdad Cafe, we discover a kind of chemistry that all of a sudden transforms a down-to-earth reality into something utterly volatile, a blend of dream and enchantment.” (LE FIGARO, 4/20/88)he he he Le Figaro also realized the "Chemistry Transformation"
Once more we have a story which handles with the Power of Creation’s force (represented by Jasmin) and shows the way it can change the landscape (this time a not political one). There are other elements very interesting to be analysed in Bagdah Cafe, as for example, the friendship of two persons of different cultures – Jasmin and Brenda (How many persons of different cultures are nowadays friends because of the NET?); also the way Jasmin gets free from her husband and discovers her SELF and her Power of Creation, deserves our attention ( Do you remember David Daniels’ answer?, re-read it above - the answer number III.).
What gets me about ‘Bagdad Cafe’ is the movie’s feel for the creativity of unusual or outcast people. Nobody in this movie has a chance in the outside world, but together they make the Bagdad Cafe a great place to stop. It’s a story of lost people finding themselves. (Howie Movshowitz, THE DENVER POST, 5/18/88)
For a while, let’s breathe the hilarious gas at the Bagdah (!) Cafe. Let's become volatile in spite of the hardness of reality. Perhaps being volatile we can decipher our own labyrinth and to get a creative exit to our lives. Let's start to change the world by ourselves..., let's become colourful sheep like Paulo Villela's happy flock ... (https://archive.the-next.eliterature.org/museum-of-the-essential/sheep/ , click Paulo Villela and P. Villela & R. Pinto.)
5- I think therefore I resist
what, in Kubrick's Film, is an allusion to the birth of the technique in a simple society (hominids) that jumps for the current complex society, it can also be interpreted as Dawkins, in his proposition of a selfish genetics, the "memetica", in other words, the perpetuation of the ideas through the "memes": - memory units that transmit culture.since the first insights, until the last theories, our "history" has been a collective text, as well as the History, a literature of invention /criation. we have 3.000.000 years culture in our brains, we invent technical and company devices (the State, the Society, the Homeland, the Humanity, etc..)
the universal suffrage is a political creation, as well as the politics is a human creation.
to tell that man is a political animal is equal to tell that Man is a man's invention.
what, then, is equivalent to the maxim "everything is Maia" (ilusion / ficcion)
what, then, is equivalent to "In this dark night, only remains us literature"which is the best text?
which is the best script to follow?the reality as fiction, the fiction as reality
(Michel Moore, while it held an Oscar)in this point I agree with Saij: we are all sheep
but neither all of us are white (or green)
the sheep artist must be the black sheep:
to see when nobody sees.
to shout when nobody shout
we are all different (the biggest of the truths)
nobody is alike, before the law always there are some equaler than the others...because of this I think the resistance is the trench of the art, not of the Art
the philosophy, munition of the word, acceptable gun for build the history, not the History
can a work of art changes the world? can the GOOD win the EVIL? the doubt is the last that dies - or notI think therefore I resist
at the beginning it was the verb, and the verb was with god, and the men created gods as they own likeness.(Joãocrates)
the world as I wish (Schopenheiddger).
6- The Wolf in Sheep's Clothing
I think I finished my thougths on the first question: - Do you think that the Power of Creation can change the Political Landscape, so that now I am introducing my own comments to the question: - Do you believe in Universal Suffrage to change the world?The "Loup Mouton" (The Wolf Sheep)
Let's starting with the "Loup-Mouton". The "Loup-Mouton" is a drawing from Saij's series Fragments. This drawing is made of nervous but strong black lines. It is a gestual "Loup-Mouton" where the agressiveness of the black lines that sometimes are almost barbed wire contrasts with the inocence of the soft and faded wool of the almost white lines (visible only in the print version). So that Saij's drawing gets to show the double character of the well known "Loup-Mouton" - the "wolf in sheep's clothing".
Nowadays, the expression "wolf in sheep's clothing" is very used to indicate someone, generally politicians, that shows to be nice people but by the contrary, they are the evil.
I am sure that everybody knows the famous Aesop's Fable:
The Wolf in Sheep's Clothing
ONCE UPON A TIME a Wolf resolved to disguise his appearance in order to secure food more easily. Encased in the skin of a sheep, he pastured with the flock deceiving the shepherd by his costume. * In the evening he was shut up by the shepherd in the fold; the gate was closed, and the entrance made thoroughly secure. But the shepherd, returning to the fold during the night to obtain meat for the next day, mistakenly caught up the Wolf instead of a sheep, and killed him instantly.
* Nowadays thinking on some politicians and impunity, the fable always finishes in the word "costume"... ;-(
Elizabeth Curtis (UK) has just sent me this comment:
"Edward Picot's sheep's parade is very poignant - we have a general election May 5 and Mr Tony Blair's Labour Party may not be re-elected due to his lack of transparency over Iraq. A change of leadership would secure the vote. Most people have lost respect for the man due to his toadying to America. It doesn't feel good to be British at the moment."
Do you remember what our friend Clemente Padín answered?
....Art necessarily expresses the social conflict (it cannot be avoid, it is impossible... )
Edward Picot's sheep, essentially political and very intelligent, shows this clearly. When , we browser https://archive.the-next.eliterature.org/museum-of-the-essential/sheep/ ( click - Eduward Picot), we soon observe a white sheep peaceful flock, which eats the grass of a small elevation near a mirror of water (the sea?), in fact they are not real sheep but sheep painted by the Pre-Rafaelita English painter William Holman Hunt (1827 - 1910); who sought to revitalize the art of his time emphasizing the detailed observation of the natural world in an almost-religious devotion regarding the truth. We also hear a beautiful and very calm musical composition by Erik Satie (1866 - 1925). It reigns a complete peace in this landscape... Sudden, in an action of the mouse, the first fright: the black sheep Saddam Hussein appears on two different times - in the summit of the glory and in the bottom of the well. When we move the mouse, other surprises can appear: the scapegoat or some scenes of the current world (UK?) . We can not forget that the myth of the scapegoat today is related to extremists ideologies, and in it we can see Bin Laden X occident or George Bush X terrorism...). When I accessed the work for the first time, the last "sheep" which appeared was the ""the wolf in sheep's clothing." - Tony Blair... Perfect! So the Isabel Saij's "loup mouton" has a name now...
I do not have idea of the reason why Edward Picot chose "William Holman Hunt" to illustrate his work, but it is curious that the search of the truth is the same in Hunt as in Picot. A coincidence? If Hunt searched the natural world's truth, Picot searchs the political world's truth, Picot's search is much more arduous. As Muriel Frega affirmed:
"- This is one of the themes in which I do not believe. Politics is something that basically bores me, because it gathers the characteristics that most displease me: lies, hidden things, conveniences, corruption."
I agree fully with her. And it is exactly because of this that Edward Picot's "flock" excites me, through a simple game of images and through a music that enchants and that does not prepare the spectator for what is going to happen - a Picot's excellent discovery - a narrative that can be understood by everybody was built and it shows very well what politics and most of our politicians are - unfortunately!
7- Answers to Regina's Questions
by Isabel Saij
I'd like to thank all the participants for their contribution. It was a great pleasure to read comments from many artists living on 3 different continents.
Focus on question 1:
"Creation power" versus "political landscape"
After reading the statements I had the impression of 2 groups of answers:
-the strengh of creation (and the social/political danger it contains for the any administration or governement)
-the lack of illusion that "creation only" can change the political landscape.All this reminds me a private trip to USSR (Moscow and Leningrad). It took place in 1989 under Gorbatchow, a time where almost everything had not really changed. I was guest by russian artists and shared their daily lifes. The artists were not official artists: they were very poor and knew they were observed. To show a new creation was always synonymous of danger. An example: an artist (filmmaker) told me he had just finished a movie when, a day later in the morning, the KGB knocked at his door and confiscated immediatly the film. Who was the sneak? Nobody knew... The lack of freedom did not lead them to give up. A complete life with fear. A terrible experience I will never forget.
Joesér wrote "resistance is the trench of the art". Yes.
As artist in our current world it's impossible to avoid any political and social consciousness and I feel necessary to express it loudly. For many of us the conditions are fulfilled: a (relative) freedom of creation and an access to some unfiltered information with internet: the friends and contacts in many countries build the sources of this information. Otherwise the only "risk" is to be an official artist (we have some in France running after ministers and medals. A pity!)Just a question to Brad: can you tell us a little bit more about your "universal revolution brewing..."?
"Metropolis", "2001, a space odissey" "Bagdad Cafe"...
I really appreciate that Regina brought these movies in relation with my works (Something I've never mentioned before is that I love to watch movies). About Bagdad Cafe (other title: "Out of Rosenheim"), I would like to add that Marianne Sägebrecht, (Jasmin Münchgstettner from Rosenheim) isin the real life like Jasmin's character.She is a very special woman. She doesn't speak so much but is always interesting (with her very strong bavarian accent). I viewed the film in Austria (in the german version) and the way how she pronounced "Münchgstettner" (a particularly typical name in south Germany and in Austria) is irresistible, so that all people nearly died laughing! Marianne Sägebrecht writes books and reads sometimes in Vienna some of her texts in theaters. I think she is very reflective, brings a multitude of philosophical thoughts through personnal experiences. This woman is like a poetry.
I'm also very happy with the reference to Aesop's fable: using mythology and fables are 2 of my favorite ways to tell a story. Images and symbols can be widely understood in opposition to language and words. Mythology and fables (Aesop or La Fontaine) are old, a kind of common heritage, surely a good explanation that makes them so easily accessible.
Isabel Saij
8- Some answers to Isabel Saij
Isabel, thank you by the pungent report on your season among Russian artists. The dictatorship, be it from left or from right , is always very difficult for whom that experienced it. The authoritarian power has always the same face. Here in Brazil also dictatorship was present for twenty years. During that time the artists and critical 's life was very hard. However, for stranger than it seems, that was a very fertile period for Brazilian Art. Artists as Lygia Clark, Hélio Oiticica, Lygia Pape, Caetano Veloso, Gilberto Gil, and Chico Buarque de Hollanda among others became practically marginal but also created great works of Art, today internationally well-known.
"(...) many people hardly shake hands of Tropicalia's Folks, including the old friends, what reminds us the Neoconcrete period of time. The fact is that when there is real innovation, the sabotage always reigns: I never saw this quantity of stingy and idiot here _ it is political, artistic and human shit! In São Paulo there is a tremendous tension.
I was with Gil and in his home every time that the door's bell sounds it is necessary to look at (as a watchman) by the other door to see who will be, because he has received very boring phone calls and the menace hovers permanently. It is a hell.(...)
(portion of Hélio Oiticica letter to Lygia Clark> OITICICA, Hélio apud Costa, Afonso Henrique et alii. Special room of the IX Salão Nacional de Artes Plásticas. Rio de Janeiro, Funarte, 1986, s/p).
I believe that this is the right time to tell what I think on Universal Suffrage and I would like to register again Nilda Saldamando's answer:
"the suffrage manifests an option to consider which does not allow doubts .... Like the NO to the dictatorship ... this No, yes, it changed our world ...."
Yes, that is it, up to now nothing is better than the Universal Suffrage, it was through it that we said NO to the dictatorship here in Brazil. But it was a long walk until to get the direct elections and to abandon the authoritarianism - an enormous popular mobilization was necessary. Today, finally, we have freedom but regarding the social inequality, the unemployment, the poverty and the corruption, we live very difficult times yet. Will it be that the Universal Suffrage will manage to change that reality to a better one in the future? ...
I do not believe in great changes, as Deleuze and Guattari affirmed:
-"If the face is political, undo it also is a politics. We can not fight against the face and against the abstract machine of "visageité".
I also do not believe that the world be marching foward total happiness and justice. The paradise always will be further on, in the next corner, in the turning of the curve... Will there be the GOOD without the EVIL?
However I believe in small changes, changes almost microscopic accomplished by creative and interested people as Jasmin, the character of Bagdah Cafe (Isabel, once again thank you, this time by the information on Marianne Sägebrecht) . These small changes excite me. How about to look around us to start changing the world? That is for me the artist's political role.
To conclude, a very poetic end:
Someone has already affirmed that if a butterfly flaps the wings in Japan that action will affect the whole world. Well and if thousands of butterflies from several longitudes and latitudes flap the wings, what would happen?... And if that beat of wings could happen inside of the great net - the Internet?
9-Another Cuttings and Conclusion
Concluding this first 2005 Collaborative Review which had as guest the French Artist Isabel Saij, I should confess that there are a lot for being analyzed yet. However, the cutting we did, although small, was very significant (for me). If you visit the artist's sites, you will find an enormous variety of excellent works and projects:http://www.saij-netart.net
http://www.saij-copyleft.net
http://www.bibiche.net
http://www.digressions.net
http://www.saij-photos.net
http://perso.wanadoo.fr/isabelsaij-netNow I intend to comment some artist's ways that seduce me always I follow through of them:
- The digital photographies
- Her poetic criticism of new midias works
- Her copyleft site.
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1- THE PHOTOGRAPHIES:
Isabel Saij is an excellent digital photographer. A visit to her site http://www.saij-photos.net is an activity that can carry a whole day without tiring us. The amazing photos (see for example the ZOO's ones ) as well as the elegant way how they are introduced us always incite to a new click. At the Museum of the Essential and Beyond That there are two Saij's series of photos and both deserve some comments. The first of them is being exhibited at the Gallery Winter's Festival , and it is a series on the "thick fog". The artist's sensibility send us into the cold and loneliness of the Winter landscapes of "Vendée", France. Technically the different distances used to register the landscapes supplies us of an almost cinematic narrative. Very beautiful! Bravo! The other series belongs to the Project Sheep's Parade ( Isabel Saij [I]). This one reveals us some moments of a sheep flock. The Artist knew how to captivate very well the postures and expressions of those animals, you must repair that there is not a photo in which the point of view be lateral, because this would be the commonest representation and also less expressive of a sheep. In opposition to the first commented series, this one was worked on
a software (Photoshop?) and the photos, because of the
title of these collaborative reviews 2005, have received an electric green coloration that collaborates not only for the review ;-), but also contributes to give an exotic and full of humour touch to the seriousness of the photographed sheep.2- Her poetic criticism of new midias works:
Isabel Saij's formation in Sorbonne - Paris 1 ( area of "visual arts and sciences of art") and her poetic clink allow the Artist to toast us with a delicious kind of Art Criticism, where profound and perspicacious thoughts are introduced in a seductive and light form. The artist writes regularly for the electronic magazine Netartreview (Eduardo Navas' creation), but she has already given to the Museum of the Essential and Beyond That two reviews, one of them on the bathrooms of our institution and the other on our end of year's virtual dinner (2003 / 2004) at the Restaurant Eating Pixels. In case you have forgotten, the restaurant is situated at the the terrace of the museum. Isabel is seen for there frequently and she always supplies us with excellent hints of the good French "cuisine'.
3- Copy-left:
Politicized and up to date Isabel Saij is a copyleft activist, owning a copyleft site (http://www.saij-copyleft.net). Saij's copyleft site allows us to use her photos and works, since the terms of the Free Art be respected:
"Free Art license / Copyleft Attitude
With this Free Art License, you are authorised to copy, distribute and freely transform the work of art while respecting the rights of the originator. Far from ignoring the author's rights, this license recognises them and protects them. It reformulates their principle while making it possible for the public to make creative use of the works of art. Whereas current literary and artistic property rights result in restriction of the public's access to works of art, the goal of the Free Art License is to encourage such access.
The intention is to make work accessible and to authorise the use of its resources by the greatest number of people: to use it in order to increase its use, to create new conditions for creation in order to multiply the possibilities of creation, while respecting the originators in according them recognition and defending their moral rights. In fact, with the arrival of the digital age, the invention of the Internet and free software, a new approach to creation and production has made its appearance.
It also encourages a continuation of the process of experimentation undertaken by many contemporary artists. Knowledge and creativity are resources which, to be true to themselves, must remain free, i.e. remain a fundamental search which is not directly related to a concrete application. Creating means discovering the unknown, means inventing a reality without any heed to realism. Thus, the object(ive) of art is not equivalent to the finished and defined art object. This is the basic aim of this Free Art License: to promote and protect artistic practice freed from the rules of the market economy."
WONDERFUL is not it?
Much more at: Free Art
There is another group - the "creative commons" which also works at the same direction. I believe that it is a subject which can be exhaustively discussed yet. Mainly after Mr. Bill Gates statements which Saij revealed us at the starting of this review. I intend to develop more this matter as soon as I get time to finally conclude (or not ;-) the debate on the possibilities of Net. Art, Web.Art sales.
Thank you so much Isabel for your constant collaboration and for your extraordinary interest. It was really excellent to work with you. Sincere congratulations for your work and for your engaged participation at the cyberspace.
Many thanks for all that collaborated with ideas or only reading with interest everything that was discussed.
Rio de Janeiro May 12nd, 2005
Regina Célia Pinto
https://archive.the-next.eliterature.org/museum-of-the-essential
https://archive.the-next.eliterature.org/museum-of-the-essential/library.htm
