eleanor damaris jones

http://eleanordjones.wordpress.com

We had been beginning to use and experiment with linux on the terminal. For this project we were to find and create a linux command line that would do something INTERESTING, justifiably. 

Myself and Nabil started to think about commands that can create experimental texts, such as that in Concrete poetry (visual poetry), and Oulipo; mathematical literature, seeking to create patterned works using ‘constrained writing techniques’. 

 

Researching, we came across this command:

awk ‘0 == (NR+1)%7′ a.txt > b.txt

Using a text it takes the seventh line starting from the first line. We thought this would be an interesting and fairly simple way to experiment with some texts to create a programmed patterned poem. This was also similar to the Oulipo “N+7″ method, which is to replace every noun in a text with the noun seven entries after it in a dictionary, but obviously their method is non-electronic.

We originally chose three texts, randomly chosen from literature indexes lists, but always the seventh of seventh, and using the command taking the seventh line, to comply them together, to make visual poetry of our own. This worked successfully, however we downloaded a ‘virtual linux’ on a mac, which turned out to be temporary and all was lost. I will however demonstrate the command line using it on the mac terminal, which works the same.

In this project, we had to choose two products, steam off the labels, and redesign them, one in bitmap, the other in vector.  The idea was to buy, and then return a product secretly, with changed labels for a concept/ message of our choice, to exploit our own message using the consumerist products and enviroment, whether this be serious or tongue-in-cheek, or other.  Then with the hope that this affects a reaction with an  unsuspecting individual or indeed individuals. 

I was working on this project with Nabil, and we decided to choose two products that in some way complimented each other. 

Nabil came across this product:

Kilkof, claims to be the “Oral solution for the relief of coughs, colds and sore throats.” Attracted by the aesthetics and simplicity of this product, it was decided this would be a good product to play around with, particulary the text, and the facial figure of ‘Parkinson’s’. We started to think about the idea of “theory in a bottle”, as “relief”,  a paradox of what we ourselves practice in theory, and what can be obtained in a bottle as easily as the product claims to cure your throat; a criticism of what can be “solved” quickly, whether medicine, psychiatry, or theory. 

We wanted to use a famous figure within this field to replace the stamp of Parkinson. We chose to use Michel Foucault’s head and name, who combines these three elements, particulary that of his work Madness and Civilization. Read as a criticism of psychiatry itself, Foucault talks of the ’social and physical exclusion of lepers’ arguing that with the gradual disappearance of leprosy, madness came to occupy this excluded position. We decided this would be our idea for the “relief of madness” in bottle, or possibly the madness itself. 

I went looking for a second product that would in some way work with Kilkof, similar, but contrasting.

And came across this bottle:

The Food Doctor, claims to be Essential seed, “Changing the way you eat for good!”. We thought this worked well in both contrasting and complimenting the first bottle, as the ‘introduction’ to the dense theory that Kilkof offers, a lighter way to obtain health, or indeed knowledge, much like the introduction books that are on offer for thinkers like Foucault, and this being an introductory to health and a way to avoid madness.

The bottle itself is more modern than the Kilkof bottle, Kilkof being like an old book and The Food Doctor being like a modern pamphlet or small book. We decided that the font and slight imagery would also be suitable to manipulate, particulary the stamp on the side of the bottle, to compliment and coincide with the stamp of Kilkof. We came across the ’ship of fools’ whilst rearching Foucault’s Madness and Civilization. Used as an example, during the 15th century it was a literary version of one such practice, the practice of sending mad people away in ships. We decided to use the Ship of Fools stamp to replace the stamp originally on the bottle. 

We started to collect key words and facts from our research of Foucault’s Madness and Civilization. We used key ‘Foucault facts’ to replace the text on the side of the bottle of The Food Doctor (with amounts included), and key terms to replace the text of Kilkof. 

We renamed Kilkof ‘Cogito’ - cogito ergo sum, which means “I think therefore I am”. The orginal slogan “Oral solution for the relief of coughs, colds, and sore throats”, was replaced with “Oral solution for the relief of madness”, whilst the key terms, such as ‘confinement’, ‘delirium’, ‘folly’ and ‘discourse’, replaced the text of the ‘active ingredients’.

We renamed ‘The Food Doctor’ to ‘The Mind Doctor’, ‘Essential seed’ was replaced by ‘Essential read’, and the slogan was changed to “Changing the way you think for good!”. Underneath ‘Organic Omega oil’ was changed to ‘Organic Turmoil’, and ‘A nutritious blend of organic blend of organic seed and evening primrose oils’ to ‘A nutritious blend of organic read and evening prime turmoils’. The text on the side was changed with the facts; ‘lepers’, ‘purifying’, ‘madness’, etc. 

Again this was a mock of this apparent health bottle being a drop of oil towards health, parodying this with a mental state. 

We were amused by the advertising used for this product, as shown below, ‘The Hazeldine family’, users of The Food Doctor, lost lots of pounds, and are now ‘very very’ healthy. 

Nabil took upon the task of designing the new Cogito bottle and I the new The Mind Doctor bottle. This turned out to be harder than anticipated, as the lables were difficult to steam off, which resulted in the corners crumbling and a harder job in editing. Without successfully steaming my label off I chose to scan the whole bottle either side of the label. This was the result of both of the designs of our bottles:

I was disappointed with my design as it did not match with the original as much as I hoped, with the text and blending to make the bottle less conspicuous. Nabil’s design however worked well with it’s simplicity of manipulation. 

Next was to drop in the shop; back in the supermarket.

                      

                                          

We remained inconspicuous and stayed out of trouble. So this was a success.

 

We decided we wanted to write to the companies to let them know of our use and choice of their products for our ‘critical thinking’, and to engage, and perhaps to react a response. Which went like this: 

———————————

Bell, Sons & Co. (Druggists) Ltd.

Southport

PR9 9AL

Dear Sir/Madam,

We are Eleanor Jones and Nabil Ahmed and we took great interest in your product as a way of introducing critical thinking and it’s practice to the public at large. 

We decided the best way to do this would be to replace the graphic designs utilized to market your product with the thoughts of the venerable yet difficult thinker of our time, Michael Foucault.

We then placed this “Theory in a bottle’ in the friendly supermarket which carries your product for the public to view who might perhaps attempt to purchase it.

We enclose photographs of our work for your perusal and sincerely hope you will find it as an exciting way to think (no pun intended) about your fine product.

Please feel free to write back to us with your thoughts.

Faithfully yours,

 

E.J.       N.A.  

London, October 7 2008

———————————

Much to our surprise and joy, some weeks later, the product ‘The Mind Doctor’, was still sitting on the shelves. Particulary myself, with my previous worries of the design being inconspicuous. 

We took this as a sign of success of our drop shopping. 

 

 

 

 

 

Self-learning list

Objectives:

• A form of a Derive, (drifting) along the river.
• The plan is to gentrify the rivers banks and community; to find connections between the river and the people who live there, through laundrettes – the domestic into industrial process becoming derelict – post industrial.
• Laundrette via river
• Connections with laundrette routes and water
• Map within a map, (less obvious physical network), social relevance etc.
• Maps connecting laundries
• A journey of city space
• Documenting process.
• Data jam
• Connections of historical, political and social interventions
• Successfully making and using free media tool
• Transforming the space being the laundrette
• Connecting with our process and research.
• Transferring laundry OR the act of laundering via river
• Reignite the coin laundry and its communal function
• Explore social relationships that exist between its use

Resources:

• Research of London rivers
• Talk to people who use it/owners
• Researching connections with historical, political, social, with mechanics, and functionality of laundry systems
• Use Boats as an alternative view of the city in the journey
• Maps
• Archives
• Film the space, the journey.
• Field recordings.
• Images.
• Researching equipment.
• Finding en-route laundries that are relevant.
• Researching laundries and bodies of water.
• Researching the history to the relevant means of transport within waterways.
• Research the history of laundry.
• Get access to research material in the British Library.
• What do I know about the laundrettes, the people that come here to use it, the river it sits on?
• Use audio-visual techniques to create an emotionally real experience

Proof of accomplishing this activity:

• Acquisition of a cooperative laundrette
• Present examples of relevant research surrounding our investigations into laundrette culture
• Acquisition of cooperative boating organisations
• A definitive route based on map research
• Examples of archival material relating to laundrettes
• Examples of visual and aural media pertaining to our piece
• An equipment list containing necessary items
• Examples of historical, social, cultural and political connections between the washing of clothes and water
• Examples of historical use of the relevant waterways

Evaluation criteria and means of validation:

• Feedback
• Coherent project
• Connecting with our process and research.
• How pleased I am with personal development and the overall project.
• General publics reactions

——————————————————————

The coin laundry project was the final and main project of the term. Working in groups, mine being with Jeremy and Nabil, we were to do a ‘Data Jam’ in a laundrette; “an open event comprising of a group of people who pass content freely between themselves exploring the potentialities of data made live by its very immediacy.”

We started to look at what ‘data’ could be, as non-electronic forms, and ways of connecting through less obvious ways of looking at space, the community, and the city, like that of the Situationist idea of ‘Unitary Urbanism’; opposing to the temporal fixation of cities and space, and fixation of people at certain points of space.

“In the city one could create new situation by, for example, linking up parts of the city, neighborhoods that were separated spatially.” - Guy Debord

As a relic of the history of industrialization, laundry is a problem that refuses to go away, as a domestic process that has been displaced from the home, the washer and dryer were a persistent symbol of the middle class economic well being. Yet in parts of East London, our adopted neighbourhood, the symbol of industrialization occupying street corners is a sign of urban-spatial decay.

Along with the situationist critique, our research into the historical and political aspects of laundries as a place to do wash, but mainly the Laundry as a place for women wage-labourers in Britain came the concept of the project, that of looking at ways of creating an assemblage that included the iconography of the worshipful company of launderes into a set of actions. And could these set of actions (wanderings) effect a social community organized around a particular technological process? How far can we expand the media ecology of laundries?

“If you keep to where you know the roads are, you get some place, but you see less ‘nature’.” – Art & Language

We looked at communities and the history of laundries within London and this country, using the British Library for research resource. This proved to be an interesting and helpful experience, and to help put our project in political and social context.

 

 

“It is clear that industrialization never completely eradicated the work of the autonomous washer woman who eked out a living in her home or that of her employer.”1

“The laundry industry was an important part of the nineteenth – century shift in the economy toward services. Laundry trade was labour intensive.”2

“The large number of small scale workshops and the widespread practice of giving outwork set the tone for much women’s employment in Victorian and Edwardian London. Laundry work is a major example of the traditionalist of metropolitan women’s employments reinforced by the structural circumstances of the London economy.”3

“Laundresses can provided a microcosm of some of the some the issues played out around women’s employment by feminists, trade union organizers, and other reformers.”

 

“FIGHT FOR INDUSTRIAL RIGHTS.”

We came across the Worshipful Company of Launderers while looking for institutions that represented laundries in Britain. The coat of arms for the company of launderers of the city of London did not come into existence until 1960 as a heraldic aggloremation of the industry’s origins that is suspect of Hobsbawm and Ranger’s thesis that many practices which are considered traditions are in fact quite recent inventions.4

The descriptive diagram or a matrix, borrows some ideas from the coat of arms as a way to make a working plan for the project and the social-political questions we asked ourselves i.e. the displacement of the traditional tools of female workers by mechanization and they in turn becoming machines, labor relations, and the shifting of domestic process to industrialization.

The idea of re-enacting history of laundry also meant that we had to make a journey, and we chose to do this journey on a boat, as a different perspective of looking at the city, through our connections and journey, and exploring a ‘other’ community in the city which uses different methods of the use of laundries. With the obvious relationship between water and washing in mind, this resonated with the connection to the origins of the act of laundry made on the bank of rivers, of simply agitating clothes to a molecular level, much like one of the figures in the coat of arms, Nausicca, daughter of King Alcinous in Homer’s Odyssey who meets and helps a shipwrecked Odysseus while doing a wash.

Earlier we had found a laundrette list of the UK Canal system that helped in creating a route for the journey.

 

 

 

An old map of Regents Canal.

 

Documentation was made with field recordings, video, conversations, text. Interested in the properties of water sounds and underwater sounds, we built a hydrophone that also worked as a free media tool.

 

Hydrophone Construction

Introduction:

Build plans for cheap underwater microphone.

Prerequisite skill: basic soldering.

Parts Needed.

1. Piezo transducer : this is a small, thin brass disc used in everything from greeting cards to smoke detectors, to make sound – in this case, we are using it as a microphone element. Try for a 28mm one, available at Maplin for 59p. Electronics suppliers sometimes give samples – ask! Price: 59p or free.
2. Perspex: you’ll only end up using 120 mm square section, but get some extra – it cracks easily! 2mm to 5mm thick. We got ours from a friend with an endless cellar, but plastics suppliers offer free samples of Perspex – sometimes there is a small charge for shipping, but cheaper than buying a huge sheet when we only need a bit. Price: £10 or free.
3. Rubber o-ring seal. 3mm thick, 40mm diameter. 30p at any hardware store. Price: 30p.
4. 6 brass bolts and nuts to fit – 20mm long and 4mm thick. Longer screws can be used. Price: £5.
5. Epoxy (Araldite), quick dry. Price: £3
6. Thin coaxial cable (3mm diameter), 3 – 9 metres (dependent on desired depth of hydrophone) Price: £5
7. XlR, Jack, or Mini jack, depending on desired connection. Price: £1
8. 4mm drillbit. Price: £2
9. Plastic clamps. These can also be found at Maplin. £2
10. Fine grit sandpaper.

 

Step 1

Cut Perspex in to 60mm circles or squares (your choice). Use a ruler and a Stanley knife to cut into the Perspex until it can be broken by hand- don’t go too quickly with this step! Also, be careful not to scratch the Perspex in the centre where the Piezo element will be – this will compromise sound quality. Lay O-ring on one side of the Perspex and draw a circle around it. Drill 4 holes halfway between the outside of the circle and the edge of the Perspex. Place Piezo disk inside the circle and mark on the other piece of Perspex the approximate place where the wires connect to the disk. Drill 1 hole at this mark point. Alternatively, you can get a local plastics supplier to do this for you.

Step 2

Use Sandpaper to roughen the area in the centre of the circle defined by the o-ring – this helps the epoxy adhesive work. Mix epoxy and place on Perspex. Glue Piezo disc brass side down. Use clamps to hold the Piezo in place, being careful to avoid the ceramic centre. Alternatively, use rubber bands. Wait an hour.

Step 3

Trim ends of Piezo leads. To about 5mm. Strip insulation off the ends, and tin with soldering iron. Strip ends of coaxial lead, remembering which coaxial wire you connect to positive (red) and negative (black). Solder ends of Piezo disk to ends of coaxial cable.

Step 4

Feed the O-ring around the other end of the coaxial cable until it rests around the Piezo disk. Feed the other end of coaxial cable through the hole in the centre of the other piece of Perspex until it rests against the o-ring. Important: make sure the hole in the Perspex remains outside the area of the cable where the Piezo leads meet the coaxial leads; the solder joint should remain inside the assembly case, and the insulation of the coaxial cable touching the rim of the hole.

Step 5

Bolt assembly together using the brass bolts and nuts. These should be “finger tight”; using hand tools to tighten the bolts may break the Perspex. Apply a good amount of epoxy to the hole out of which the cable is coming.

Step 6

Strip the insulation from the other end of the coaxial cable. Tin ends of positive and negative wires. Wire the positive end to pin 2 (signal) of the XLR, and wire the negative end to pin 1 (ground). Pin 3 can be wired to pin 1.

Step 7

You’re done! After waiting for the epoxy to dry, test your hydrophone – remember a preamp is necessary to boost the signal to line level for recording.

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