User:Mania/Project Proposal

Fragment of text about fragments

What is a fragment? What is a collection of fragments? Fragments can be combined, cut into smaller fragments, rearranged, juxtaposed. What is revealed by the scattered fragments on my desk? What is emerging? So far only a mess.

Deconstruction and reconstruction. These fragments will take a different form in the form of a zine, magazine or film.

A fragment as a tiny element of a larger whole. Fragment of a shoe. The lace and heel put together create a shoe, but on their own they can be used for something else. The shoelace can serve as a belt, and the heel itself can be the missing leg of the bed. The shoe itself is a fragment of a pair. A pair of shoes is a fragment of a crowded street. This street is full of other shoes that have owners, and they have their own dreams, fears, concerns, points of view. These fragments combined together bring a multitude of narratives and interpretations.

What interests me about these fragments is how easily they can be arranged in a different way. Act of becoming something else. Till now I focused on a landscape that I'm unfolding. We only see fragments of reality. Maybe by bringing them together we can celebrate our individuality and differences. But what I want to explore more is cutting, fragmenting and rearranging as a potential to construct something different or show what we demand from reality.

In so many areas of everyday life, cutting tools are used to build something else. The entire film is made of cut fragments. Hair cutting scissors. Tools for cutting wood used to build furniture. How it relates to the publishing theme? What would happen if leave a publication not bound and allow readers to rearrange the order?

Tools have mannuals, and those can be easily rewritten for a tool to serve a different purpose. So in a way they can stay open for interpretations.

V3

how a train station became a foodhall

transition

- pop up paper tools for observation

- rearranging fragments

- book as an object

- Vision, perception, and representation

-Image/Reimaginimng ....by changing the order of the fragments

- The image of the city/ ever incomplete/ what we demand from reality?

- paper tools and manuals allowing multiple exchanges

- how can I connect to the city by "reading" it with others

References, readlist:

• Beautiful Data: A History of Vision and Reason since 1945 by Orit Halpern
• Roland Barthes Camera Lucida
• Peter Olpe Out of focus
• Radical Technologies: The Design of Everyday Life by Adam Greenfield
• Nature Study Notes
• Future Books, Sharing ideas on book and art publishing

V2

What do you want to make?

- general introduction ( what is it, a book? A film, an instalation What audiance it aim for, what location, describe any specifics you can

A magazine that has several issues and forms a continuation. It does not begin with the intention of ultimately reaching a specific destination, but rather takes the form of continuous observation, exchange, conversation, layering, searching for meanings, adding notes, jotting between the lines, fragmenting images, and rearranging them anew.

The magazine focus on the act of observing and participating by displaing fragments of reality noticed through simple paper machines/ devices, viewing frames.

I wold like to opened up the potential for different narratives. Without favoring any of them, simply giving space for everyone to share what we see and how the myriads of stories constitute an urban environment.

How do you plan to make it?

How you will go about conducting your research and practice ( COMBINING, READING, WRITING AND PRACTICE) steps ill make to realise it Steps what steps ill take to realise it

- Paper machines devices

- Turn a room into camera obscura ( seeing, participation, describing what you see and checking with others what they see)

- Join a workshop on collective writing

- Invite people to play with paper machines, consider what we are paying attention to

- Work on a magazine

What is your time table

Steps and how it tranlstate to timetable Order in which thinks will be done

Think about your audience, how you will approach them Include that in your plan

Why do you want to make it?

What might other people find relevant about this project ?

I’m drawn to zine festivals, to playing with paper, images, and text. To quick, spontaneous zines, made together with others because they bring so much fun. I love festivals around printed matter and how they create a community of people sharing a common passion, while also contributing to the decentralization of knowledge, exchanging references, inspiring each other, and learning from one another. I love this environment and want to derive from it, but also be a part of it.

Why I want to read a city?

Because it allows me to walk without any apparent purpose

Because its an act againts efficiency at all cost

Because I can encounter unexpected objects

Because I never know where it will take me

Because it's inspiring

Because I can practice different walking patterns

Because I can see from perspective of someone else

Because I can find places for play

For reflection

For rest

Because I find places that otherwise I woulnt find

Because it encourages me to talk with strangers

Because there is so much beauty

Because I want friction

Surprise

Unpredictability

Because it made me notice houses that look like they are hugging the one in the middle

Bacause reading the city helps to see connections

Because I can notice others who are present in the space

Because it gives me time to observe "angry sky"

Because it allows to learn from each other

I'm intrested in collective resistance against efficiency, and success at all costs. In spaces collectively organised, shifting towards care, generosity, and attention rather than efficiency and perfection. Maybe a sense of humour and unlearning practices can help us mobilize us collectively, embrace differences and celebrate our individuality. Therefore I find it important to question how we learn and from whom. Thats why for now I want to continue with the topic of Learning City, and the question of how knowledge production can be more horizontal.

I'm curious what can be done through text. I'm inspired by uncreative writing where words are shared, reused, recycled, duplicated, gifted, reorganized. How the layering of these words can serve to overturn hierarchies and seek new meanings. How these words can convey someone's individual experience.

Who can help you and why?

Anyone that can help you with the project Stimlate you to think about the network around you that can help you with that project

De Boog - people that share passion for print and doing things together

Friends from the summer school - to critically reflect upon the experiences of (un)learning as a factor of urban transformation

Afke Mertens from Riso Pop Amsterdam - potential workshop or collaboration

Relation to previous practice

How it builds upon the previous practice

The topic of Learning city - I see it as a continuation of themes that last year that I still want to learn more about \

Relation to a larger context

Whre you situate your work in relation to other aryists or theory

Paragraph where you can pinpoint atoms of what is out there, showing the awareness of broasder context

References

Works taht inform your work Bibliography Use harvard method

Rapid prototypes

How to turn a room into a camera obscura

Rearranging Fragments

Observing a square

Shapes

Thoughts

9.10

I spent the whole summer looking through binoculars that I found at the market for 3 euros. Totally absorbed by this, I spent hours on Yana's balcony, observing the rooftops in Sofia. Textures, antennas, edges. I watched as the details of the city were revealed to me. Chance settled in during these observations, and I am extremely happy about it. Things were revealed to me that easily go unnoticed. Binoculars have become a tool for reading the city. The chances would settle in for good. In this way I observed Sofia, Warsaw, Frankfurt-Oder and Słubice, Rotterdam and Groningen

Even though this beloved tool made me feel like I was watching a documentary, I had my doubts whether I was really getting to know the city better through the act of observing? I started to think maybe it was just staying on the surface, maybe I should talk to the people I saw. I felt I had to prove that reading a city is not just an act of observing from a distance. After all, the more I observe, the more I realize how complex and multi-layered cities are and how many different stories they contain.

For me, reading a city means being interested in other people and what surrounds you. It means being open to the chances that may present themselves to you and welcoming them into your process. It means participating in this world and continuosly changing how you perceive it.

So for everyone who thinks that observation is a cold act, and mostly for myself to validate my process, here is why I want to read the city:

Because it allows me to walk without any apparent purpose Because its an act againts efficiency at all cost Because I can encounter unexpected objects Because I never know where it will take me Because it's inspiring Because I can practice different walking patterns Because I can see from perspective of someone else Because I can find places for play For reflection For rest Because I find places that otherwise I woulnt find Because it encourages me to talk with strangers Because there is so much beauty Because I want friction Surprise Unpredictability Because it made me notice houses that look like they are hugging the one in the middle Bacause reading the city helps to see connections Because I can notice others who are present in the space Because it gives me time to observe "angry sky" Because it allows to learn from each other

21.09

On the train to the exhibition, I sketched out paper machines for observation, experiments with the camera obscura, cut-out fragments of photos, I read about Bruno Munari, did few collages, and with the frames from this summer and fragments of recordings from Groningen in front of my eyes, I came to the conclusion that my subject is about seeing and observing. I got scared because when I said it out loud, it sounded trivial. How is it about seeing? What is worth seeing?

Does the act of choosing these fragments, placing them in a pblication, their materiality justify and confirm their importance? What is worth seeing, what should be shown to others? This process should be redistributed without exclusion, because, after all, self-publishing is about the possibility of presenting anything you think is worth seeing. I would like to step away from the dominant narrative, not focus on a single topic, because it's easy to eliminate even the most interesting things that don't fit into the imposed framework of the subject.

I'm interested in observing what happens before my eyes without bending reality to fit into my topic. I am inspired by observational cinema and getting to know a place through a camera. There isn't one correct interpretation, and I'm fascinated by the multitude of these narratives and interpretations, not prioritizing any of them. This relates both to the subject of seeing and to the question of self-publishing.

By asking what is worth seeing, what would you want to show others, whether it would be a burning question or perhaps something less serious, I wold like to opened up the potential for different narratives. Without favoring any of them, simply giving space for everyone to share what we see and how the myriads of stories contitte an urban environment.