vague terrain 13: cityscene – call for work
Submitted by Greg J. Smith on Fri, 12/12/2008 – 10:26
[Adrian Holovaty / Everyblock]
In the 1980s architect Bernard Tschumi posed the following question: “If writers could manipulate the structure of stories in the same way as they twist vocabulary and grammar, couldn’t architects do the same, organizing an architectural program in a similarly objective, detached, or imaginative way?” While Tschumi was speculating the foundation for a new type of architectural practice, his thinking can be applied to problematizing our current, informatized cityscapes. Ubiquitous computing, home-brew geospatial analysis and open source culture are rapidly changing our conception and experience of urban space. If “event” could be used as a catalyst in architecture, what paradigms might we employ to recontextualize the city?
Vague Terrain 13: citySCENE is dedicated to exploring urban representation. The issue will serve as a global index of strategies for abstracting, quantifying and documenting urban life. Subjective cartographies, architectural mashups, urban informatics, augmented reality gaming and field recording based work are all examples of research that we are interested in. What is important is that the work is ambitious and innovative.
We are seeking submissions in all formats – audio, video, photographic documentation and text. If you are interested in submitting work to be considered for inclusion in Vague Terrain 13: citySCENE please note the deadlines below and contact the issue curator, Greg J. Smith at greg@vagueterrain.net.
Additional Information
Format: Please see http://vagueterrain.net/content/journal/submission-guidelines for full submission guidelines. Please consult this document as it is very important to read when considering the scope and deliverables of a submission. All of these criteria will have to be met in order for work to be included in the issue.
Copyright: Vague Terrain publishes material under an Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike Creative Commons License. Potential contributors are welcome to propose alternative licenses for their work – but we prefer the flexibility and open nature of CC.
Submission Deadline: Potential contributors should establish contact and provide links/information about a proposed submission before January 24th. Selected participants will be contacted by February 1st and all submission material and supporting documentation will need to be uploaded by February 15th. The tentative publication date for the issue is March 1st.
Curator Information: Greg J. Smith is a Toronto-based designer and researcher with interests in media theory and digital culture. His work is invested in exploring how contemporary information paradigms affect representational and spatial systems. These dynamics have been explored in a range of mediums including drawing, visualization, writing and editing. Greg co-curates and edits the digital arts publication Vague Terrain and is a contributor to Rhizome and Augmentology 1[L]0[L]1. Greg has presented work at venues and institutions which include Medialab-Prado (Madrid), the Annenberg Center for Communication (Los Angeles), the Public Memories Project (Syracuse), soundaXis (Toronto), Université de Montréal and TAGallery (online). He has taught digital humanities at the Department of Communications Studies and Multimedia at McMaster University and been a guest reviewer at the University of Toronto, Ontario College of Art & Design (OCAD), Ryerson University and the Los Angeles Institute of Architecture and Design (LAIAD).