Journal articles on the topic 'Camilleri charles'

Great is the importance of names in literature. For modern audiences, good names are an important and enjoyable part of the experience of reading, and many authors have delighted their readers with new creations or especially apposite matches – one could cite examples as varied as J. K. Rowling (Malfoy, Dumbledore, Snape), Aldous Huxley (Tantamount, Burlap, Spandrill), Charles Dickens (Pickwick, Sweedlepipe, Honeythunder), Andrea Camilleri (Catarella, Montalbano, Boneti-Alderighi), or Franz Kafka (K.).

Nine years after its creation in Cairo and eight after the European premiere at La Scala, Aida was produced at the Paris Opéra for the first time on 22 April 1880, in a French translation by Camille du Locle and Charles Nuitter. Verdi himself conducted the first performances. This significant derogation, that was refused to Wagner at the time of Tannhäuser (1861), was contrary to the performance traditions of the Opéra, and drew the attention of the habitués. The artistic ocurrence of the premiere became one of the more relevant society events of the year, and its political dimension determined the reception of the work. Verdi himself was conscious of the advantages and the disadvantages of this situation. He knew that he wouldn’t be able to refuse the proposition of the Opéra without causing a diplomatic incident. From the standpoint of the music, the critical reception, too, was oriented by political reflections about the “nation” and “national music.” The question, why did the Opéra open its doors to an Italian work, which kept distant from the French tradition, even though the original version had been translated and modified in some parts, emerged in a few writings. The paper will set the reception of the opera in an aesthetical context that the book by Gustave Bertrand, Les nationalités musicales étudiées dans le drame lyrique (Paris: Didier, 1872) had provided.

I am grateful for the observations of these five wonderful and thought-provoking interlocutors: Camille Robcis, Todd Shepard, Suzanne Stewart-Steinberg, Regina Kunzel, and Michal Shapira. They have prompted me to read a whole range of clarifying texts—from Jacques Derrida's reflections on Friedrich Nietzsche to the work of classicist James Davidson on Michel Foucault and George Devereux (as well as more writings by Devereux) to historian Chris Waters's recovery of Edward Glover, and from literary scholar Shoshana Felman's brilliant Jacques Lacan-inspired rescue operation for psychoanalytic textual interpretation (in the special issue of Yale French Studies she edited in 1977) to Charles Shepherdson's turn-of-the-millennium revisionist take on Lacan and Foucault in Vital Signs. They have prompted me, too, to reconsider key texts by Sigmund Freud. And I am glad that the interlocutors challenge me with questions. These include: why the Left abandoned psychoanalysis (Robcis); how I have come to think about practices and desires and the relationships between “the sexual” and other realms of human existence (Shepard and Stewart-Steinberg, each in their own way); how a more integrated and comprehensive master narrative of psychoanalysis might be written, connecting the first and second halves of the twentieth century (Shapira); and how to delve more deeply into the role of analysands in shaping what counts as psychoanalysis (Kunzel).

When Charles Bannelier’s French translation of Hanslick’s Vom Musikalisch-Schönen was published in 1877, it elicited discussions among French musicians and critics that can seem puzzling from our twenty-first century vantage point. The French were almost entirely ambivalent to the issue of descriptive versus non-programmatic music and were perfectly comfortable disregarding this seemingly central point of contention in Hanslick’s treatise. French critics focused instead on issues that seem tangential to the main thrust of Vom Musikalisch-Schönen: German music education, the merits of philosophy versus philology, and so forth.The French reception of Hanslick becomes less puzzling, however, when we consider the conceptual framework within which French musical discourse operated in the late nineteenth century. By 1877, musical aesthetics and criticism in France were an extension of broader trends in French intellectual culture, in which a materialist, realist view of the world vied with a metaphysical, idealist conception of the divine. Between these two ideological poles lay a rich spectrum of ideas that had profound ramifications for music and art criticism. The degree to which works of art could be understood as products of historical circumstances, for example, or whether art embodied ineffable meanings resisting explanation, were questions whose answers depended on one’s position along this realist–idealist spectrum.In this article, I show how this tension between realism and idealism formed the conceptual framework for French critics’ readings of Hanslick’s Vom Musikalisch-Schönen. I survey writings by Théodule Ribot, Jules Combarieu, Camille Bellaigue and others to show how this network of texts, when placed alongside each other, was effectively a manifestation of the realist–idealist spectrum. By putting these writings in conversation with each other, this article brings to light the intellectual premises of French writings on music in the nineteenth century. Only by understanding these premises, I argue, can we make sense of the French reception of Hanslick.

The issue of education is never over to talk about because education is one measurement of a person's individual accomplishments and achievements systematically nation. The high education of human resources will give a lot of useful works for the individual and social. Unfortunately, the education that was developed based on this character only strengthen individual and social, it’s beyond the divine value . It is due to the historical roots of the character education by Immanuel Kant (1724-1804) and Charles Renouvier (1815-1857); Religious morality in the low education and August Comter (1798- 1857); secular morality. Renouvier said the weakness of youth responsibility, loss of justice equality, respect and others. The process of character education is faced with the application of secularization. Such as, in France Francois Camille Jules Ferry (1832-1893) , a French Education minister said; Moral education is important but explicitely teaching morality does not needed. The development of character education in America is very dynamic. It’s started from 19th century (1900-1950) until 1997.It’s established nationally. Finally, Thomas lichona explained the entire role of religion in the education of character with seven steps and the role of teachers in character education. Thus, the author conducted religious analysis which widely spread among society is that the teaching of Protestant religious. But, It successfully gives individual and social value as character education. On the contrary, the goal of our national educational in 1945 (Version amendment) Article 31, paragraph 3 states: The Government shall manage and organize a national education system. Which increases the Faith and piety as well as noble character in order to educate the nation that adopted by law. Article 31, paragraph 5, states that the government advances science and technology to uphold the values of religious and national unity for the progress of civilization and prosperity of mankind. Likewise, the purpose of philosophy Nasionsl Education Act No. 20 of 2003. The 1945 Constitution and the Law N0 20 of 2003. Strongly reflects the value of belief in one God as the first principle of Pancasila as the first principle says it is an acknowledgment that in developing the nation's education should not be separated from human relations and slave relationship with God the creator.

In a synthesis article (see ref. below), the double star expert Paul COUTEAU put the work of French pioneers of double stars observation in the perspective of the double star work carried in the world. After Antoine Yvon VILLARCEAU and Camille FLAMMARION, one prominent pioneer of double stars was Robert JONCKHEERE (1888–1974), an amateur before circumstances prompted him to become a professional astronomer, who devoted his life to double stars. Kenneth Glyn Jones wrote a biography and Charles Fehrenbach his obituary. Jean-Claude Thorel studied his life and career in double star observations (see Section 10 below). In the 1930s, another precursor of the Commission des Étoiles Doubles, Maurice DURUY (1894–1984) invented the micrometer with a comparison star, and applied the diffraction micrometer invented by Ejnar Hertzsprung to the measure of double stars, which he regularly observed at Nancy with a 275-mm telescope, at Lyon with a 162-mm telescope and in his observatory of Beaume-Mêle with a 40-cm and later a 60-cm telescope at Le Rouret (Alpes–Maritimes). He measured standard pairs of the list of Paul Muller and published his measures in the Journal des Observateurs; these measures requested by Paul Muller aimed at comparisons of between observers. He also collaborated with the Webb Society of Great Britain; Glyn Jones published his astronomical biography. Already in 1924, the pediatrician Paul BAIZE (1901–1995) had started the measurement of double stars as an amateur. He was granted permission to measure them with the 38-cm of the Paris Observatory and made an impressive number of measures during his long “career" (24044). He also made orbit calculations and established a formula for the calculation of dynamic parallaxes in 1946. He wrote articles explaining new observation techniques devoted to double stars in the magazine L'Astronomie and continued his astronomical activity until the beginning of the 1990s. Glyn Jones published an astronomical biography of Paul Baize. In the 1960s, Bernard CLOUET and the late Robert SAGOT (1910–2006) made double star observations for the book which was then in preparation under the title La revue des constellations. Their measures remained unpublished; but publication of the measures made by Robert SAGOT is in preparation. At about the same time, the neurology professor Jacques LE BEAU (1908–1998) made the acquaintance of renowned professional astronomer Paul COUTEAU and learned from him how to measure double stars. Each year, he stayed for two weeks at Nice and conducted his observations with the 50-cm refractor of the Nice Observatory. In 1978, Paul COUTEAU published the first book in French devoted to double stars: L'observation des étoiles doubles visuelles. That book triggered the interest of more amateur astronomers for double stars and indirectly influenced the creation of a group of double star observers which was transformed into the Commission des Étoiles Doubles

The marketplace is a recurring subject in the work of artist Frances Hodgkins (1869–1947). Her handling of it over the years, and in different contexts, shows how she developed as a professional artist and with what trends she linked herself. The market can be seen in the work of British artists (e.g., Charles Worsley) of whom she will have been aware before she left her home country, as well as in the work of French ones (e.g., Camille Pissarro) whom she will have discovered once she went to Europe. A study of her use of this motif is essential to locating her as a New Zealand artist who became a European artist.

TORONTO INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVAL MARKS ITS 25th ANNIVERSARY Stardom (2000) aka 15 Minutes & Fandom Canada-France co-production (102min in French and English and with English sub-titles)D: Denys Arcand; sc: Jacob Potashnik, Denys Arcand; lp: Jessica Pare, Dan Aykroyd, Charles Berling, Robert Lepage, Thomas Gibson, Frank Langella, Camille Rutherford A small-town girl becomes a famous model in this stinging satire, a biting comedy, a perfect parody of the mindless people who inhabit television; not forgetting the foolish fashion designers, the shams who call themselves artists, and the crafty politicians and synthetic media types, mixed with the public's obsession with celebrities. It is a broad and detailed canvas only a genius such as Arcand could fill with telling images and knowing performances. Yet above it all and throughout it's an appreciation of beauty, of women, and of what life can sometimes be like when dirty hands are not in...

Abstract The Society gratefully acknowledges the time and effort of the following individuals who served as reviewers of abstracts for this meeting: ASH ABSTRACTS COORDINATING REVIEWERS Blanche P. Alter Stephen M. Ansell Ralph B. Arlinghaus Scott Armstrong Asad Bashey Philip Bierman Neil Blumberg Chiara Bonini Dominique Bonnet Jacqueline Boultwood Rena Buckstein John C. Byrd Marc Carrier Lucio H. Castilla Selina Chen-Kiang Nicholas Chiorazzi Jorge Cortes-Franco Claire E. Dearden Mary C. Dinauer Harry Paul Erba Carolyn A. Felix Pierre Fenaux Debra L. Friedman Irene M. Ghobrial Jason R. Gotlib Brandon Hayes-Lattin Cheryl A. Hillery Achille Iolascon Jean-Pierre J. Issa Sundar Jagannath Diane F. Jelinek H. Phillip Koeffler John Koreth Robert J. Kreitman Robert B. Levy David Lillicrap Richard Lottenberg John D. McMannis Mark D. Minden Charles G. Mullighan Arnon Nagler Peter J. Newman Robert Z. Orlowski Antonio Palumbo Julie A. Panepinto Warren S. Pear Sibrand Poppema Barbara Pro Ching-Hon Pui A. Koneti Rao Aaron P. Rapoport Pieter H. Reitsma Douglas D. Ross J. Eric Russell Barbara Savoldo Kirk R. Schultz Radek C. Skoda Marilyn L. Slovak Susan Smyth Hugo ten Cate Herve Tilly John M. Timmerman Ivo Touw Amy J. Wagers Russell E. Ware Catherine J. Wu Virginia M. Zaleskas ASH ABSTRACTS REVIEWERS Camille Abboud Omar Abdel-Wahab Jeremy Abramson Suneet Agarwal Sikander Ailawadhi Onder Alpdogan Andrew Aprikyan Mary Armanios Aneel Ashrani Norio Asou Aglaia Athanassiadou Eyal Attar Mohammad Azam Maria Baer Jorg Baesecke Sarah Ball Karen Ballen Frederic Baron Shannon Bates Minoo Battiwalla Marie Bene Charles Bennett James Berenson Steven Bernstein Francesco Bertoni Monica Bessler Wolfgang Bethge Kapil Bhalla Deepa Bhojwani James Bieker Bruce R. Blazar Annemarie Block David Bodine Catherine Bollard Antonio Bonati Eric Bouhassira Benjamin Braun Christopher Bredeson Patrick Brown Ross Brown Jan Burger Dario Campana Jose Cancelas Paul Carpenter Andrew Carroll James Casella Rebecca Chan Roy Chemaly Benny Chen Jerry Cheng Linzhao Cheng Bruce Cheson Mark Chiang Athar Chishti Hearn Cho Magdalena Chrzanowska-Wodnicka Richard E. Clark Joseph Connors Kenneth Cooke Miguel Cruz Adam Cuker Sandeep Dave Janice Davis Sproul Lucia De Franceschi Philip De Groot Rodney DeKoter Richard Delarue Stephen Devereux Steven Devine Paola Jorge Di Don Diamond Meletios Dimopoulos John DiPersio Angela Dispenzieri Benjamin Djulbegovic Jing-fei Dong James Downing William Drobyski Rafael Duarte Charles Dumontet Kieron Dunleavy Brian Durie Dimitar Efremov Elizabeth Eklund Jonas Emsley Patricia Ernst Andrew Evens Chris Fegan Andrew Feldman Giuliana Ferrari Willem Fibbe Adele Fielding Thoas Fioretos Robert Flaumenhaft Rafael Fonseca James Foran Joseph Frank Janet Franklin Paul Frenette Alan Friedman Terry Fry Saghi Gaffari Naomi Galili Patrick Gallagher Anne Galy David Garcia Randy Gascoyne Cristina Gasparetto Norbert Gattermann Tobias Gedde-Dahl Alan Gewirtz Francis Giles Robert Godal Lucy Godley Ivana Gojo Norbert Gorin Andre Goy Eric Grabowski Steven Grant Timothy Graubert Elizabeth Griffiths H. Leighton Grimes Claudia Haferlach Corinne Haioun Parameswaran Hari Christine Harrison Robert Hasserjian Nyla Heerema Shelly Heimfeld Roland Herzog Elizabeth Hexner Teru Hideshima William H. Hildebrand Gerhard Hildebrandt Devendra Hiwase Karin Hoffmeister Donna Hogge Scott Howard Brian Huntly Hiroto Inaba Baba Inusa Shai Izraeli Suresh Jhanwar Amy Johnson Craig Jordan Joseph Jurcic Nina Kadan-Lottick Lawrence Kaplan Jonathan Kaufman Neil Kay Michelle Kelliher Craig Kessler H. Jean Khoury Allison King Joseph Kiss Issay Kitabayashi Robert Klaassen Christoph Klein Yoshihisa Kodera Alexander Kohlmann Barbara Konkle Michael Kovacs Robert Kralovics Amrita Krishnan Nicolaus Kroger Ashish Kumar Ralf Küppers Jeffery Kutok Ann LaCasce Raymond Lai David Lane Peter Lane Richard Larson Michelle Le Beau Gregoire Le Gal Ollivier Legrand Suzanne Lentzsch John Leonard John Levine Ross Levine Linheng Li Renhao Li Zhenyu Li Wendy Lim Charles Linker Jeffrey Lipton Per Ljungman John Lollar Philip Low David Lucas Selina Luger Leo Luznik Gary Lyman Jaroslaw Maciejewski Elizabeth MacIntyre Nigel Mackman Luca Malcovati Guido Marcucci Tomer Mark Susan Maroney Giovanni Martinelli Peter Maslak Alan Mast Grant McArthur Philip McCarthy Michael McDevitt Peter McLaughlin Bruno Medeiros Jules P.P. Meijerink Junia Melo Thomas Mercher Bradley Messmer Marco Mielcarek Ken Mills Shin Mineishi Arturo Molina Silvia Montoto Marie Joelle Mozziconacci Auayporn Nademanee Vesna Najfeld Eneida Nemecek Ellis Neufeld Peter Newburger Heyu Ni Charlotte Marie Niemeyer Yago Nieto Anne Novak Paul O\'Donnell Vivian Oehler Fritz Offner Johannes Oldenburg Rebecca Olin Richard J. O'Reilly Thomas Ortel Keiya Ozawa Rose Ann Padua Sung-Yun Pai James Palis Derwood Pamphilon Animesh Pardanani Farzana Pashankar Andrea Pellagatti Catherine Pellat-Deceunynck Louis Pelus Chris Pepper Melanie Percy Andrew Perkins Luke Peterson Andrew Pettitt Javier Pinilla-Ibarz Kimmo Porkka David Porter Amy Powers Claude Preudhomme Frederick Racke Margaret Ragni Thomas Raife Alessandro Rambaldi Mariusz Ratajczak Pavan Reddy Mary Relling Tannishtha Reya Lisa Rimsza Stefano Rivella Isabelle Riviere Pamela Robey Gail Roboz Aldo Roccaro Maria Alma Rodriguez Frank Rosenbauer Laura Rosinol Alan Rosmarin Giuseppe Saglio Jonathan Said Valeria Santini Ravindra Sarode Yogenthiran Saunthararajah Bipin Savani Alan Schechter Charles Schiffer Robert Schlossman Laurie Sehn Rita Selby Orhan Sezer Sadhna Shankar John Shaughnessy Jordan Shavit Kevin Sheehan Shalini Shenoy Colin Sieff Paul Simmons Seema Singhal Sonali Smith Gerard Socie Pieter Sonneveld Simona Soverini David Spaner Steven Spitalnik Kostas Stamatopoulos David Steensma Richard Stone Toshio Suda Perumal Thiagarajan Courtney Thornburg Rodger Tiedemann David Traver Guido Tricot Darrell Triulzi Suzanne Trudel Christel Van Geet Karin Vanderkerken David Varon Amit Verma Srdan Verstovsek Ravi Vij Dan Vogl Loren Walensky Edmund Waller George Weiner Daniel Weisdorf Karl Welte Peter Westervelt Adrian Wiestner P.W. Wijermans John Wingard Anne Woolfrey Mingjiang Xu Qing Yi Anas Younes Ryan Zarychanski Arthur Zelent Clive Zent Dong-Er Zhang Xianzheng Zhou James Zimring

« Le temps des avant-gardes. Peut-être la seule forme de vie excitante, parce que liée intimement à l’écriture » : voici la manière dont Chloé Delaume se remémore, dans Où le sang nous appelle (2014) son enthousiasme premier pour certaines expériences d’activisme poétique et politique, avant pourtant d’en dresser un bilan particulièrement critique. Cette citation, et la suite qui lui est donnée, résume toute l’ambiguïté du rapport qu’entretient Chloé Delaume au legs avant-gardiste, et en particulier situationniste. À la faveur d’une traversée des textes de Delaume – du Cri du sablier aux Sorcières de la République –, cet article tentera de déplier cette contradiction en montrant comment, malgré sa péremption annoncée, le concept d’avant-garde, dans ses dimensions historique, sociologique et pragmatique, permet de mieux situer Chloé Delaume dans le champ littéraire contemporain. Mots-clés : avant-garde, performativité, Chloé Delaume, Peter Bürger Références André, Marie-Odile et Mathilde Barraband (dir.). Du « contemporain » à l'université. Usages, configurations, enjeux. Presses Sorbonne Nouvelle, 2015. Asholt, Wolfgang. « La notion d’avant-garde dans Les Règles de l’art. » Le Symbolique et le social, la réception internationale de la pensée de Pierre Bourdieu, actes du colloque de Cerisy-la-Salle, sous la direction de Jacques Dubois, Pascal Durand et Yves Winkin, Presses Universitaires de Liège, 2015, pp. 169-178. Barraband, Mathilde (dir.). « L’Histoire littéraire du contemporain ». Tangence, no.102, 2013. Bonnet, Marie-Josèphe. « L’avant-garde, un concept masculin ? ». Itinéraires, no.1, 2012, pp. 173-184, www.journals.openedition.org/itineraires/1336. Consulté le 16 novembre 2018. Bürger, Peter. « Fin de l’avant-garde ? ». Écriture contemporaine, vol. 31, no. 2, hiver 1999, pp. 15-22. Érudit, doi:10.7202/501231ar. Consulté le 23 mars 2018. ---. Théorie de l’avant-garde. 1974. Traduit de l’allemand par Jean-Pierre Cometti. Questions Théoriques, 2013. Butler, Judith. Trouble dans le genre. Le Féminisme et la subversion de l’identité. 1990. Traduit de l’anglais par Cynthia Kraus. La Découverte, 2005. Citton, Yves. Mythocratie. Storytelling et imaginaire de gauche. Amsterdam, 2010. Cornelio, Dawn M. « Activism and Autofiction: Chloé Delaume's Response to the Patrick Le Lay Affair ». Contemporary French and Francophone Studies, vol. 22, no. 1, 2018, pp. 15-22, doi:10.1080/17409292.2018.1457614. Consulté le 15 mai 2019. Culler, Jonathan. « Philosophie et littérature : les fortunes du performatif ». Littérature, no. 144, 2006, pp. 81-100. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/41705146. Consulté le 23 octobre 2015. Debord, Guy. La Société du Spectacle. Œuvres, édité par Jean-Louis Rançon. 1967. Gallimard, 2006. Delaume, Chloé. Corpus simsi. Léo Scheer, 2003. ---. Le Cri du sablier. Folio, 2003. ---. Dans ma maison sous terre. Seuil, 2009. ---. Une femme avec personne dedans. Points, 2013. ---. J’habite dans la télévision. Verticales, 2006. ---. Les Juins ont tous la même peau. Points, 2009. ---. « Politique & Autofiction. » Culture(s) et Autofiction(s), Centre culturel international de Cerisy, 23 juillet 2012, colloque sous la direction d’Arnaud Genon et Isabelle Grell, http://www.chloedelaume.net/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/Politique-Autofiction-def.doc. Consulté le 20 mars 2018. ---. La règle du Je. PUF, 2010. ---. « Le Soi est une fiction. » Entretien avec Barbara Havercroft. Revue critique de fixxion française contemporaine, no.4, 2012, http://www.revue-critique-de-fixxion-francaise-contemporaine.org/rcffc/article/view/fx04.12/671. Consulté le 5 mars 2018. ---. Les Sorcières de la république, Seuil, 2016. ---. La Vanité des somnambules. Farrago/Léo Scheer, 2003. Delaume, Chloé et Schneidermann, Daniel. Où le sang nous appelle. Seuil, 2013. Farah, Alain. Le Gala des incomparables. Invention et résistance chez Olivier Cadiot et Nathalie Quintane. Classiques Garnier, 2013. Ferreira Zacarias, Gabriel. « Lettristes, situationnistes et terrorisme d’avant-garde ». TRANS-, no. 15, 24 février 2013, doi:10.4000/trans.776. Consulté le 30 septembre 2016. Gefen, Alexandre. Réparer le monde. La Littérature française face au xxie siècle. José Corti, 2017. Hanna, Christophe. Nos dispositifs poétiques. Questions théoriques, 2010. Kaufmann, Vincent. Dernières nouvelles du spectacle. Seuil, 2017. Keucheyan, Razmig. Hémisphère gauche. Une cartographie des nouvelles pensées critiques. La Découverte, 2017. Massera, Jean-Charles et Chloé Delaume. « Pour nous en fait, écrire c’est pas… mais plutôt… et contrairement à ce qu’on pourrait penser ». TINA. There Is No Alternative. Littérature, no. 4, 2009. Massera, Jean Charles. « It’s Too Late to Say Littérature (Aujourd’hui recherche formes désespérément) ». Revue Ah !, no 10, 2010. Piva, Marika. « Cybervariation autour de la littérature : Corpus Simsi de Chloé Delaume ». Fabula / Les colloques, 15 février 2017, www.fabula.org/colloques/document4173.php. Consulté le 18 février 2018. Quintane, Nathalie et Patrick Boucheron. « Comment réarmer l’idée de progrès ? ». Paris, église Saint-Eustache, 2 avril 2016, www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPk0ygvupNA. Consulté le 13 janvier 2018. Salmon, Christian. Storytelling. La Machine à fabriquer des histoires et à formater les esprits. La Découverte, 2007. TINA. There Is No Alternative. Éditions è®e, no. 1, août 2008. TINA. There Is No Alternative. Éditions è®e, no. 2, janvier 2009. Toledo, Camille de. Visiter le Flurkistan ou Les Illusions de la littérature monde. PUF, 2008. Viart, Dominique et Laurent Demanze (dir.). Fins de la littérature. Esthétique et discours de la fin, tome I. Armand Colin, 2012. Viart, Dominique et Bruno Vercier. La littérature française au présent. Héritage, modernité, mutations. Bordas, 2008. Vray, Jean-Bernard. « Chloé Delaume : la chanson revenante ». Revue critique de fixxion française contemporaine, no.5, 2012, http://www.revue-critique-de-fixxion-francaise-contemporaine.org/rcffc/article/view/fx05.03/656. Consulté le 12 février 2018.

In rejoinder to a New York Times’s article claiming, “the value of used pianos, especially uprights, has plummeted … Instead of selling them … , donating them … or just passing them along … , owners are far more likely to discard them” (Walkin), artists Kathleen Irwin (scenography) and Jeff Morton (sound/composition) responded to this ignoble passing with an installation playing with the borders delineating music, theatre, digital technology, and economies of value using two upright red pianos, sound and video projection—and the sensibility of relational aesthetics. The installation was a collaboration between two artists who share a common interest in the performative qualities of public space and how technological augmentation is used in identificatory and embodied art processes as a means of extending the human body and enhancing the material space of person-to-person interaction. The title of the installation, PLAY, referenced the etymology of the word itself and how it has been variously understood over time, across artistic disciplines, and in digital and physical environments. Fundamentally, it explored the relative value of a material object (the piano) and how its social and cultural signification persists, shifts, is diminished or augmented by technology. The installation was mounted at the Dunlop Art Gallery, in the Regina Public Library (Saskatchewan, Canada, 14 June - 25 August 2013) and, as such, it illustrated the Library’s mandate to support all forms of literacy through community accessibility and forms of public outreach, social arrangements, and encounters. Indirectly, (as this was not the initial focus), it also exemplified the artists’s gentle probing of the ways, means, claims, and values when layering information and enhancing our visual experience as we interact with (literally, walk through) our physical landscapes and environments—“to see the world for what it is,” as Matt Turbow says “and to see the elements within” (Chapeau). The installation reflected on, among other things, the piano as a still potent cultural signifier, the persistent ability of our imagination to make meaning and codify experience even without digital overlay, and the library as an archive and disseminator of public knowledge. The artists questioned whether old technologies such as the piano will lose their hold on us entirely as technological augmentation develops the means to enhance or colonize the natural world, through graphics, sounds, haptic feedback, smell and, eventually, commodified experiences. This paper intends to reflect on our work and initiate a friendly (playful) interdisciplinary discussion about material objects in the age of physical and digital interactivity, and the terms of augmentation as we chose to understand it through our installation. In response to the call proposed by this journal on the subject of augmentation, we considered: 1. How audio/visual apparatuses in the gallery space augmented the piano’s expressivity; 2. How the piano augmented the social function of its physical situation; 3. How the technology augmented random and fragmentary musical phrases, creating a prolonged musical composition; 4. How each spectator augmented the art through his/her subjective engagement: how there is always meaning generated in excess of the artists’s intention. Image 1: Piano installed outside Dunlop Gallery/ Regina Public Library (photo credit: Jeff Morton) To begin, a brief description of the site of the installation is in order. The first of the red pianos was installed outside the main doors of the Central Library, located in the city’s downtown. The library’s entrance is framed within a two-story glass atrium and the red piano repeated the architecture’s function to open the space by breaking down perceived barriers, and beckoning the passersby inside. Reflecting Irwin’s community-oriented, site-specific practice, this was the relational catalyst of the work—the piano made available for anyone to play and enjoy, day or night, an invitation to respond to an object inserted into the shared space of the sidewalk: to explore, as Nicolas Bourriaud suggests, “the art as a state of encounter” (16). It was the centerpiece of the exhibition's outreach, which included the exhibition’s vernissage featuring new music and performance artists in concert, a costume and prop workshop for a late night public choir procession, and a series of artist talks. This was, arguably, a defining characteristic of the work, underscoring how the work of art, in this case the piano itself, its abjection illustrated by the perfunctory means typically used to dispose of them, is augmented or gains value through its social construction, over-and-above any that is originally ascribed to it. As Bourriaud writes, any kind of production takes on a social form which no longer has anything to do with its original usefulness. It acquires exchange value that partly covers and shrouds its primary “nature”. The fact is that a work of art has no a priori useful function—not that it is socially useless, but because it is available and flexible, and has an “infinite tendency”. (42) In the Dunlop’s press release, curator Blair Fornwald also confers a supplemental value ascribed to the reframed material object. She describes how the public space in front of the library, as a place of social interaction and cultural identification—of “being seen”—is augmented by the red piano: its presence in an unfamiliar setting underscores the multitude of creative and performative possibilities inherent within it, possibilities that may extend far beyond playing a simple melody. By extension, its presence asserts that the every day is a social, cultural, and physical environment rich with potentiality and promise. (Fornwald) Juxtaposed with the first red piano, the second was dramatically staged within the Dunlop gallery. The room, painted black, formally replicated the framing and focusing conventions of the theatre: its intention to propose other ways of “being seen” and to suggest the blurring of lines between “on stage and off,” and by extension, “on line and off.” A camera embedded in the front of the piano and a large projection screen in the space provided a celebrity moment for anyone approaching the instrument and implied, arguably, the ubiquitous surveillance associated with public space. Indeed, a plausible way of reading the red piano in the darkened gallery was as a provocation to think about how the digital and physical are increasingly enmeshed in our daily lives (Jurgenson). Lit by a chandelier and staged on a circular red carpet, this piano was also available to be played. Unlike the one outside of the building, it was augmented by speakers, a microphone, and a webcam. Through a custom-built digital system (using MaxMSP software), it recorded and played back the sound and image of everyone who sat down to perform, then repeated and superimposed these over similar previously captured material. Enhanced by the unusual stark acoustics of the gallery, the sound filled the reverberant space. Affixed to the gallery’s back wall was the projection screen made up of sheet music (Bach, Debussy and Mozart) taken from the Irwin family’s piano bench, a veritable time capsule from the 1950s. Image 2: Piano installed inside Dunlop Gallery (photo credit: Jeff Morton) In addition to the centrally placed piano, a miniature red piano was situated near the gallery entrance. It and a single red chair placed near the screen, repeated the vivid colour and drew the eye into and around the space underscoring its theatrical quality. The toy piano functioned as a lighthearted invitation, as well as a serious citation of other artists—Eikoh Sudoh, Margaret Leng Tan, John Cage, and Charles M. Schulz’s “Schroeder”—who have employed the miniature instrument to great advantage. It was intended as an illustration of the infinite resonances that material objects may provide and the diverse ways they may signify contingent on the viewer. Considered in a historical context, in the golden age of the upright and at the turn of the twentieth-century, piano lessons signified for many, the formation of a modern citizen schooled in European culture and values. Owning one of these intricately engineered and often beautiful machines, as one in five households did, reflected the social aspirations of its owners and marked their upward economic mobility (Canadian Encyclopedia). One hundred years later, pianos are often relegated to the basement or dump. Irretrievably out of tune, their currency as musical instruments largely devalued. Nonetheless, their cultural and social value persists, no longer the pervasive marker of status, but through the ways they are mediated by artists who prepare, deconstruct, and leave them to deteriorate in beautiful ways. They seem to retain their hold on us through the natural impulse to engage them kinetically, ergonomically, and metaphorically. Built to be an extension of the human hand, body, and imagination, they are a sublime human-scale augmentation of a precise musical system of notation, and a mechanism evolved over centuries through physical augmentations meant to increase the expressivity of both instrument and player. In PLAY, the use of the pianos referenced both their traditional role in public life, and our current relationship with forms of digital media that have replaced these instruments as our primary means of being linked, informed, and entertained—an affirmation of the positive attributes of technology and a reminder of what we may have lost. Indeed, while this was not necessarily clear from the written responses in the Gallery’s guest book (Gorgeous!: Neat!; Too, too cool!; etc.), we surmised that memory might have played a key role in the experience of the installation, set in motion by the precise arrangement of the few material objects – red piano, the piano bench, red chair, and toy piano, each object designed to fit the shape of the body and hold the memory of physical contact. These were designed to trigger a chain of recollections, each chasing the next; each actively participating in what follows. In the Gallery’s annual exhibition catalogue, Ellen Moffat suggests that the relationship the piano builds with the player is important: “the piano plays and is played by the performer. Performing the piano assigns a posture for the performer in relation to the keyboard physically and figuratively” (Moffat 80). Technically, the piano is the sum of many parts, understandable finally as a discrete mechanical system, but unbounded in imagination and limited only by our capacity to play it. Functionally, it acts as an affective repository of memory and feeling, a tool to control the variables of physical and expressive interaction. In PLAY, the digital system in the gallery piano captured, delayed and displayed audio and video clips according to a rubric of cause and effect. Controlled by computer software designed by Morton, the installation captured musical phrases played randomly by individuals and augmented these notes by playing them back at variable speeds and superimposing one over another—musical phrases iterated and reiterated. The effect was fugue-like—an indeterminate composition with a determinant structure, achieved by intertwining physical and digital systems with musical content supplied by participants. The camera hidden in the front of the piano recorded individuals as they sat at the instrument and, immediately, they saw themselves projected in extreme close up onto the screen behind. As the individual struck a note, their image faded and the screen was filled again with the image of a previous participant abstracted and in slow motion. The effect, we suggest, was dreamlike—an echo or a fleeting fragment of something barely remembered. Like the infinite variations the piano permits, the software was also capable of expressing immense variety—each sound and image adding to an expanding archive in an ever-changing improvised composition developed through iterative call and response. Drawing on elements of relational aesthetics, scenographic representation, and digital technology, in PLAY we attempted to cross disciplines in ways that distinguished it from the other piano projects seen over the past several years. Indeed, the image of the upright piano has resonated in the zeitgeist of the international art scene with colourful uprights placed in public places in urban centers across Europe and North America. Wherever they are, individuals engage enthusiastically with them and they, in turn, become the centre of attention: this is part of their appeal. The pianos seem to evoke a utopian sense of community, however temporary, providing opportunities to rediscover old neighbours and make new friends. In PLAY, we posed two different social and aesthetic encounters—one analogue, real, “off-line” and one digital, theatrical, and “on-line,” illustrating less a false binary between two possible realities that ascribes more value to one than the other, than a world where the digital and the physical comingle. Working within a public library, this was a germane train of thought considering how these institutes struggle to stay relevant in the age of Google search and the promise of technological augmentation. The piano also represents a dichotomy: both a failure to represent and an excess of meaning. For decades replete with social signification, they have now become an encumbrance, fit only for the bone yard. As these monumental relics come to the end of their mechanical life, there is more money made in their disposal than in musical production, and more value in their recycled metals, solid wooden bodies, and ivory keys then in their tone and function. The industry that supported their commodification collapsed years ago, as has the market for their sale and the popular music publishing industry that accompanied it. Of course, pianos will be with us for a long time in one form or another, but their history, as a culturally potent object, has diverged. The assumption could easily follow that they have been rendered useless as an aesthetic, generative, and social object. What this installation offered was the possibility of an alternative ending to the story of this erstwhile entertainment console even as we seek our amusement by other means and through other devices. Not surprisingly, the title of the installation suggests that the consideration of “play,” as social and recuperative engagement, is significant. In his seminal work, Homo Ludens, Johan Huizinga discusses the importance of play, suggesting that it is primary to and a necessary condition of the making of culture. He writes, “In play there is something in play, which transcends the immediate needs of life and imparts meaning to the action” (Huizinga 97). According to games theorist Mary Flanagan, playing may serve as a way of creating something beautiful, offering frameworks for new ways of thinking, exploring divergent logic, or for imaging what is possible. She writes, “Games, both digital and analog, offer a space to explore creativity, agency, representation and emergent behaviour” (Flanagan 2010). In reaching out to Regina’s downtown community, the Dunlop Art Gallery dispersed some of the playfulness of PLAY in planned and accidental ways, as the outdoor piano became a daily destination for individuals who live rough or in the city’s hostels, some of whom who have enviable musical skills and considerable stage presence. One man came daily with sheet music in hand to practice on the indoor piano—ignoring the inevitable echo and repeat that the software triggered. Another young woman appeared regularly to perform at the outdoor piano, her umbrella raised against sun and rain, wedged under her arm to keep both hands free. Children invariably drew parents to it as they entered or exited the library—for some it may have been the first time they had touched such an instrument. Overall, in press, blogs, and the visitors’s book, responses to the pianos were enthusiastic and positive. One blogger wrote in response to an online publication, Art, Music, News (Beatty), chapeau June 13, 2013 at 11:51am this is most definitely up and running, and it would be interesting to see/hear all that will go on with that red piano. my two-and-a-half year old daughter and i jammed a bit yesterday morning, while a stranger watched and listened, then insisted that i play the same mostly crappy c-blues again while he sang! so i did, and he did, and my daughter and i learned a bit about what he feels about his dog via his singing. it was the highlight of the day for us—I mean really, jamming outside on a very red upright piano with strangers—good times! (Simpson) As evidence of public approbation, for the better part of the summer it stood unprotected on the sidewalk in front of the library encountering only one minor incident of defacement—a rather fragile tag in white spray paint, someone’s name in proper cursive writing. Once repaired and retuned, it became a dynamic focus for the annual Folk Festival that takes over the area for a week in August. In these ways, PLAY fulfilled the Library’s aim of encouraging literacy and reinforcing a sense of community—a social augmentation, in a manner of speaking. As Moffat writes, it encourages the social dimension of participation through community-engagement and dialogic practices. It blurs distinctions between spectator and participant, professional and amateur. It generates relationships between people or social actions. (Moffat 76) Finally, PLAY toyed with the overtones of the word itself—as verb, noun, and adjective—signifier, and metaphor. The title illustrated its obvious current potential and evoked the piano’s past, referencing the glittering world of the stage. While many may have more memories of seeing pianos in disrepair than in the concert hall, its iconic stage setting is never far from the imagination, although this too changes as people from other cultures and backgrounds recognize little cultural capital in such activity. In current vernacular, the word “play” also implies the re-imagination of ourselves in the digital overlays of the future. So we ask, what will be the fate of the piano and its meme in the 22nd century? Will the augmentation of reality enhance our experience of the world in inverse proportion to a loss of social interaction? Conclusion In her essay, Moffat notes that as digital technology replaces the analog piano, a surplus of second-hand uprights has become available. Citing artists Luke Jerram, Monica Yunus, and Camille Zamora (among others), she argues that the use of them as public art coincides with their disappearance, suggesting a farewell or memorial to a collective cultural icon (Moffat 76). What is there in this piece of furniture that speaks to us in art practice? The answer, it would seem, is potential. In a curatorial interview, Irwin suggested the possibility that beyond the artist’s initial meaning, there is always something more—an augmentation. The pleasure of discovering this supplement is part of the pleasure of the subjective experience of the spectator. Similarly, the aleatoric in music composition, refers to the pursuit of chance as a formal determinant and its openness to individual interpretation at the moment of reception. For Morton, the randomness of memory and affect are key components in composition. They cannot be predicted, controlled or quantified; nor can they be denied. There is no correct interpretation or response to music or, indeed, to relational art practice. Moffat concludes, as a multi-faceted media installation, PLAY proposed “a suite, chorus or a polyphony of things” (Moffat 76). Depending on your point of reference, the installation provided a dynamic venue for considering our relationships with material objects, with each other and with new technologies asking how they may or may not augment our reality in ways that supplement real-time, person-to-person interaction. References Beatty, Gregory. “Exciting Goings-On at Central Library.” Prairie Dog Blog 11 June 2013. Bourriaud, Nicolas. Relational Aesthetics. Trans. Simon Pleasance and Fronza Woods. Paris: Les Presses du Réel, 1998. Canadian Encyclopedia. “Piano Building.” ‹http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.com/en/article/piano-building-emc/›. Chapeau [David Simpson]. “One Response to ‘Exciting Goings-On at Central Library.’” Prairie Dog Blog 13 June 2013. Fornwald, Blair. PLAY. Regina, Saskatchewan: Dunlop Art Gallery. 2013. Flanagan, Mary. “Creating Critical Play.” In Ruth Catlow, Marc Garret and Corrado Morgana, eds., Artists Rethinking Games. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2010. 49-53. Huizinga, Johan. Homo Ludens. Boston: Beacon Press, 1995. Jerram, Luke. Play Me, I’m Yours. Site-Specific Piano Installation. Multiple Venues. 2008-2013. Jurgenson, Nathan. “Digital Dualism versus Augmented Reality.” Cybergology: The Society Pages 24 Feb. 2011. 1 Dec. 2013 ‹http://thesocietypages.org/cyborgology/2011/02/24/digital-dualism-versus-augmented-reality/›. Moffat, Ellen. “Stages and Players” in DAG 2 (2013). Regina: Dunlop Art Gallery, 2013. 75-87. Walkin, Daniel J. “For More Pianos, Last Note Is Thud in the Dump.” New York Times 29 June 2012. Yunus, Monica, and Camille Zamora. Sing for Hope Pianos. Site-Specific Piano Installation and Performance. New York City. 2013.