steve roden
anything else &/or nothing at all
(drawing circles for jackson mac low), 2006
ink, scratching, and tape on pre-existing 16mm film.
15:30 w/sound.

exhibitions: draw a line, los angeles contemporary exhibitions (LACE) &
day ring / night ring, henry art gallery seattle, 2006.

this film was part of a joint project between LACE and the getty research institute. all of the artists were given access to the joan brown fluxus collection and archives at the getty towards finding a score to generate a new work. i used a score by jackson mac low which originally appeared in the book of scores and concrete poetry mac low edited with lamonte young called "an anthology".

mac low's score states: "the text on the opposite page may be used in any way as a score for solo or group readings, musical or dramatic performances, looking, smelling, anything else &/or nothing at all."

the image below is a detail of the "opposite page"


i created a simple instruction for each of the 93 different characters that appear in the score (letters, numbers, punctuation marks, and symbols), and used the score to generate a film work, a sound composition, and a "group" voice piece - all compressed into a film and its soundtrack.

the film is hand drawn with colored ink on top of an existing film (an educational film from the 1950's called "drawing the circle" which i discovered gathering dust in my studio while i was in the midst of the research for the show); and was drawn by following the connected instructions to the first 500 characters reading right to left top to bottom of the text (examples would be "d" = black pen for 4 frames, "Z" = colored pens for 52 frames, and "&" = add a different color to the last action). i worked with a magnifying glass and a light table so that the drawing would interact with the existing film, but having never seen the existing film projected, i knew there would be a lot of uncontrolled and inknown images that would have presences in the final film.

the sound composition put the 93 different characters into 4 categories, each equalling a single string on an old banjulele (a 1920's hybrid of a banjo and a ukelele), and followed the score to determine which string i would pluck and in what order, with the tuning as found.

the voice piece selected a series of random "phrases" from the score and divided them into 26 different categories each attached to a letter of the alphabet. i emailed the list to 50 people and asked them to choose one or both of the phrases connected to their initials and to speak them into my answering machine - these were generally things like GYZP  RU  EWZS, and  X@  BIP  GSutimOz.

the voices and the plucked banjulele sounds were layered and looped to create the soundtrack.







the list of actions associated with each character to generate the visuals from the score -

lowercase: scratched or black ink drawings / number = frames
a-1
b-2
c-3
d-4
e-5
f-6
g-7
h-8
i-9
j-10
k-11
l-12
m-13
n-14
0-15
p-16
q-17
r-18
s-19
t-20
u-21
v-22
w-23
x-24
y-25
z-26

capitals: colored ink / number = frames
A-2
B-4
C-6
D-8
E-10
F-12
G-14
H-16
I-18
J-20
K-22
L-24
M-26
N-28
O-30
P-32
Q-34
R-36
S-38
T-40
U-42
V-44
W-46
X-48
Y-50
Z-52

1 - 1 black frame
2 - 2 sanded white frames
3 - 3 black frames
4 - 4 sanded white frames
5 - 5 black frames
6 - 6 sanded white frames
7 - 7 black frames
8 - 8 sanded white frames
9 - 9 black frames
0 - a circle or series of circles for 10 frames
½ - repeat the last action, half or double it
¼ - repeat the last action, quarter or quadruple it

$ - 2 untouched frames
cents sign - 4 untouched frames
% - 6 untouched frames
! - 8 untouched frames

+ - an X through a single frame
? - tint an untouched frame 1 color
& - add something to the last thing done, in a different color.
# - repeat the same mark/form in opposite as a mirror
" - repeat last action twice
' - repeat last action once

, - color in relation to the image - one frame
; - color in relation to the image - # of previous

THE FOLLOWING RULES = THE SAME NUMBER OF FRAMES AS PREVIOUS ACTION:

* - a spiny star shape or asterisk shape
@ - a spiral drawn or scratched
( - a half circle horizontal
) - a half circle vertical
/ - diagonal line
_ - horizontal solid line
- - horizontal dotted line
: - vertical dotted line
. - dot in center of frame (drawn or hole punch)

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