Remix Studies Conversations Part 4: Media Art & Design

The focus of the discussion is on the role of remix in creative practices in art and design. Remix can offer a critical methodology artists and designers use to create juxtapositions that ponder the state of human existence in relation to cultural production. Works by these artists and arts educators are defined by principles of modularity, consisting of nonlinear means to create new content, and new conversations, with digital technology. Invited panelists produce work and do research that relates to the current moment remix is moving through. Presentations followed by a discussion with moderators, and a public Q&A.

Public Zoom Event: ADRI, College of Arts and Architecture, Penn State
Moderated by Eduardo Navas, Owen Gallagher, and xtine burrough

Speakers

Joycelyn Wilson is an educational anthropologist, essayist, and assistant professor of hip hop studies and digital media in the School of Literature, Media, and Communication at Georgia Tech. She is the principal investigator of the HipHop2020 Innovation Archive, an Ed-tech startup inspired by hip hop music and culture, and creator of the OUTKAST Imagination, a critical design hermeneutic applied throughout her humanities and computational media-making courses. Dr. Wilson also coordinated the development of LMC’s recently established minor in Black Media Studies.

Her current research leverages the connections between hip hop’s techno-pedagogical affordances and relationships to design thinking in computational and creative media-making. This work is highlighted in Amazon Future Engineer’s “Your Voice Is Power” (YVIP), a coding competition that uses hip hop as a design remix to explore how computer science, music, and entrepreneurship can help students learn to code and advance racial equity. The project is a collaboration with Georgia Tech’s Center for Education Integrating Science, Mathematics, and Computing (CEISMC), EarSketch, and Pharrell Williams’s educational equity non-profit YELLOW.

Dr. Wilson has published in these areas across academic, popular, and documentary platforms including Teachers College Press, UGA Press, International Journal of Africana Studies, Routledge, and Proceedings of Research on Equity and Sustained Participation in Engineering, Computing, and Technology (RESPECT). Her essays have been published by InStyle, Billboard, The Root, and Google Arts & Culture. She is a co-producer of the Emmy-nominated docufilm “Walking With Guns,” produced in collaboration with UN Ambassador and former Atlanta mayor Andrew Young. She has contributed expert commentary to MSBNC, Netflix’s Hip Hop Evolution, VH1’s ATL Rise, and TV-One’s UnSung.

Dr. Wilson can discuss the cultural histories of civil rights and social justice in the South, Black maker culture, and topics related to curriculum design, digital archiving and preservation, VR, interactive narrative, and experimental digital art.

Victoria Bradbury is an artist and researcher working with virtual reality, code and physical computing. She is a featured artist on the Radiance VR Blog. Her work has been shown at IEEE-GEM (curated by Nicholas O’Brien), xCoAx, Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center Re-Happening, Harvestworks, Revolve Gallery, Albright Knox and The New Britain Museum of American Art. She is co-editor of “Art Hack Practice: Critical Intersections of Art, Innovation and the Maker Movement” (Routledge, 2019) and co-taught “The Glass Electric: Glassblowing, Electroforming, Interactive Electronics” at Pilchuck Glass School, 2019. Victoria holds a PhD with CRUMB at the University of Sunderland, UK and an MFA from Alfred University. She has been a member of the New Media Caucus Board since 2012 and is Assistant Professor of New Media at UNC Asheville. www.victoriabradbury.com

Andrew Demirjian builds linguistic, sonic and visual environments that disrupt habituated ways of reading, hearing and seeing. His interdisciplinary artistic practice examines structures that shape consciousness and perception, questioning frameworks that support the status quo and limit thought. The works are often presented in non-traditional spaces and take the form of multi-channel audiovisual installations, generative artworks, video poems, augmented reality apps and live performances. Andrew’s work has been exhibited at The Museum of the Moving Image, The New Museum – First Look: New Art Online, Fridman Gallery, Transformer Gallery, Eyebeam, Rush Arts, the White Box gallery, the Center for Book Arts, The Newark Museum and many other galleries, festivals and museums. The MacDowell Colony, Nokia Bell Labs, Puffin Foundation, Artslink, Harvestworks, Rhizozme, Bemis Center, LMCC, the MIT Open Documentary Lab and the NJSCA on the Arts are among some of the organizations that have supported his work. Andrew teaches theory and production courses in emerging media in the Film and Media Department and the IMA MFA program at Hunter College.

“Remix Studies Conversations Part 4: Media Art & Design” was a public event organized to highlight interdisciplinary research on remix as a form of creative production and communication across disciplines. The event featured distinguished scholars and artists: Joycelyn Wilson, Victoria Bradbury, and Andrew Demirjian, who were brought together to continue our ongoing discussions on remix as a creative variable at play across culture. Our invitees are contributors to The Routledge Handbook of Remix Studies and Digital Humanities (2021), a special issue for Media-N: The Journal of the New Media Caucus: Forking Paths in New Media Art Practices: Investigating Remix, Keywords in Remix Studies (2018), and The Routledge Companion to Remix Studies (2015), edited by Eduardo Navas, Owen Gallagher, and xtine burrough.

WATCH VIDEO

Remix Studies Conversations – Part 3 – 28th October 2021

Remix Studies Conversations – Part 3 will be happening this Thursday 28th October at 9.30am EDT (1.30pm GMT). Hope to see you there! #remix #remixstudies #criticalremix #remixculture with Eduardo Navas, Xtine Burrough, Ethan Plaut, Christine Boone, Steve Anderson, and Eran Hadas. Register here: https://tinyurl.com/remix-conversations-3

 

Remix Studies Conversations – Part 1 (5th May 2021)

On Wednesday 5th May 2021, the inaugural session of our new research series, Remix Studies Conversations, took place via Zoom, facilitated by the ADRI, Penn State University. The event was organised by Eduardo Navas, xtine burrough and myself to coincide with the launch of our latest book on remix, The Routledge Handbook of Remix Studies and Digital Humanities, which was published earlier this year. The session was well attended and featured presentations from four of our contributors from this book and previous anthologies, Anne Burdick, David J. Gunkel, Paul D. Miller, and Virginia Kuhn.

Remix Studies and Digital Humanities by Eduardo Navas, Owen Gallagher, xtine burrough

Top (R-L): Eduardo Navas, Owen Gallagher, xtine burrough; Middle (R-L): Anne Burdick, David J. Gunkel; Bottom (R-L): Paul D. Miller a.k.a. DJ Spooky, Virginia Kuhn

Eduardo hosted and introduced the guest presentations, which were followed by a lively discussion and q&a session. It was an absolute pleasure to be part of such an invigorating event and to hear our colleagues speak so passionately about remix. There were so many more questions we could have asked and tangents to explore, but the 2 hours flew by, and judging by the messages we received, the event was enjoyed by our participants too, remix enthusiasts and digital humanities scholars alike. One of the most amazing things for me was to see and hear our contributors present their work live and in-person – I felt it really brought their ideas to life in a visceral way that printed text simply cannot. We have spent the past 3 years editing and rewriting the Handbook, going back and forth with almost 40 contributors, reading, re-reading, editing, suggesting, re-writing and doing this process multiple times for each chapter, but hearing Anne, David, Paul, and Virginia talk about their work so passionately in person was a truly memorable experience for me. It felt like we were all at a real conference, except it was far more efficient using Zoom! Participants could ask questions via chat during each session and speakers could respond in real-time, ahead of the allocated q&a sessions. The only thing that was missing was being able to go for a drink with everyone and elaborate further into the wee hours of the morning over a few glasses of wine or whiskey. For now, these virtual sessions are an excellent alternative, but I look forward to meeting our contributors IRL at some point in the hopefully not too distant future.

For me, this book, and this research series are about bringing remix scholars/practitioners and digital humanities scholars together – to create a space were cross collaboration can occur and ideas can be shared, borrowed, combined and remixed. There are so many practical applications of remix to be utilised in the digital humanities, as evidenced by many such examples contained in the chapters of our book, and likewise, remix studies, as an emerging academic discipline can benefit greatly from the influence of digital humanities scholarship.

The session kicked off with a brief introduction by Eduardo, myself and, xtine, and then Anne Burdick took centre-stage, with her talk on “Designing the Remix Library“, also the subject of her chapter in the Handbook. She discussed four libraries in particular, the Seattle Central library (which we remixed for the cover of our book), the Mansuetto library, Sitterwerk, and the theoretical Universal Programmable Library. For Anne, SCL’s architecture and operations reflect an ordered universe, Mansuetto, an efficient machine, Sitterwerk – aesthetic practice, and the UPL, a perpetual state of becoming, or what Eduardo refers to in his work as a regenerative remix.

Anne Burdick – “Designing the Remix Library”

A thought occurred to me while Anne was presenting, that all of the examples she discussed are physical libraries in the real world (with the exception of the UPL – but it is a model for a hypothetical physical library). Given that my recent research on remix is concerned with the role of virtual environments and video games in the digital humanities (my chapter in the book investigates this topic), I was curious whether Anne has considered the possibility and potential of virtual library spaces? That is, could networked, social, virtual libraries (actual virtual spaces one can move around in via VR or through a video game-style platform) take the place of physical library buildings, which have been waning for years?

In my home country of Ireland, the role of physical libraries has shifted more towards becoming like glorified Internet Cafes for the socially and economically-challenged, rather than sites of silent, contemplative reading and learning for all members of the community. I have been passionate about libraries for most of my life – some of my earliest childhood memories are of checking out books at our local library in Dolphin’s Barn, Dublin – I can still see and smell the books and the little green tickets that were placed inside the sleeve inserted into the front matter of the book, and stamped with the date when the book had to be returned. I also much prefer reading physical printed books than ebooks – although I occasionally use an iPad for reading, I would take the printed page any day of the week. But still, I am fascinated by the potential of recreating the experience of a physical library in virtual reality. Bringing all of the benefits and feelings of a quiet place to study into the virtual environment, with the added benefits of networked digitality and social exchange that can occur within virtual spaces. Once VR becomes more normalised, I think this will be a natural next step for the library, as we have already seen similar shifts occurring in the visual realm of art galleries and museums.

David Gunkel

David J. Gunkel – Computational Creativity, Algorithms, Art and Artistry

Next up, David J. Gunkel presented a fascinating talk on “Computational Creativity, Algorithms, Art and Artistry“, again, directly related to his chapter in the Handbook. David argues that computational creativity remixes remix as the art of posthumanism. His talk was concerned with the relationship between AI, machine-learning applications that produce various forms of creative output, such as music, art, and literature, and the (possibly diminishing) role of the human in this creative process. He led with a contentious example of a “new” Nirvana song called “Drowned in the Sun“, created using Google Magenta’s AI neural network, which analysed all of Nirvana’s back catalogue for musical style, and chords and lyrics for songwriting elements ultimately leading to what I would consider to be a “musical deepfake” of a Nirvana song. It sounds similar to many of Nirvana’s previous songs, and the singer sounds like Cobain, so to an untrained ear, one would be forgiven for thinking it could be an unreleased Nirvana demo, but it was in many senses created/produced by a machine.

However, the debate became more interesting and muddied once David revealed that the various iterations spit out by Google Magenta as midi files were “evaluated by human curators”, and the melody and lyrics of the song were recorded in a traditional manner by a human Kurt Cobain soundalike singer. David alluded to the process of remix as outlined by Kirby Ferguson in his documentary, Everything is a Remix – “copy – transform – combine”, which this Nirvana “remix” arguably follows. For David, remix is a tool used by human artists, and the question is, can computational creativity exist without humans to hear, see and evaluate it? Could machines create art purely for other machines? To me, as a Nirvana fan, at first listen, the Nirvana deepfake “Drowned in the Sun” does not sound artistically “good” to my ear. Obviously, this is a highly subjective reaction and the question of what makes art good is far beyond the scope of this topic, but I wonder what the remaining members of Nirvana think about it? And how would Cobain himself feel about this track if he were still with us?  And what about the legions of Nirvana fans beyond myself – would any of them embrace and love this as an unexpected addition to the Nirvana catalogue? I would love to see a survey designed to measure this. The results could be quite interesting. The whole area of deepfakes is directly related to this topic, and NFTs were also touched upon by Paul Miller during the Q&A, but one thing that was not mentioned at all, is copyright. This Nirvana deepfake, which is being openly declared as such, does not directly sample from any Nirvana recordings, or lyrics, yet it captures the “feel”, “sound” and “essence” of a Nirvana song. Where does this fall on the spectrum of copyright and fair use? A question for another day.

Paul D. Miller a.k.a. DJ Spooky

Paul D. Miller a.k.a. DJ Spooky presents during the Remix Studies Conversations sessions

Paul D. Miller, a.k.a. DJ Spooky presented next, commenting on the previous speakers contributions and alluding to his own ongoing remix work and its relationship to current global developments. One comment I loved was the idea of the remixer as being like Anansi, the “Trickster”, originating from West African and Caribbean folklore. I have often thought that tricksterism, or “mischief” is a core theme that runs through so much remix work, from the Yes Men, to culture jamming, to my own critical remix videos. The act of repurposing words, images, sounds, and videos without permission is inherently mischievous. I also think Anansi is a fitting metaphor for the remixer, as he is a spider, with multiple legs/arms enabling him to do several different things simultaneously, and uses his cunning, creativity and wit to overcome adversaries. Paul also mentioned the recent Gamestop fiasco that occurred on Wall Street in recent months, where, as Paul says “kids were remixing stocks” – stocks became memes and trading became a mischievous act – so-called meme “stonks” like Gamestop, AMC, and Blackberry, were traded en-masse by new money online day-traders through platforms and apps like Robinhood, which artificially inflated the value of these stocks, causing old money Wall Street hedge funds to lose billions of dollars and some lucky individual traders to become millionaires overnight. It was a fascinating experiment in a kind of coordinated online activism, but for the purposes of Paul’s talk, I had not heard it being referred to in relation to remix before and I think this is a very astute observation.

Paul has himself famously remixed D.W. Griffith’s racist KKK film, “The Birth of a Nation” (1915) into his own version entitled, “Rebirth of a Nation“, which has been screened all over the world. As Paul was talking about this, I was fascinated to find out what Paul thinks of the current “cancel culture.” Given that Griffith’s “Birth of a Nation” is an openly racist film, controversial and condemned in many circles, it seems like it would be a prime candidate to be fully “cancelled”, – “erased from existence”, removed from acceptable cultural memory. However, this would be a travesty. As all film scholars know, D.W. Griffith was almost single-handedly responsible for developing the early “language of film”, particular in terms of shot types, camera angles, and continuity editing, that informed almost every film that came out of Hollywood over the past century. It’s importance in the history and development of cinema cannot be understated. Yet, it is openly racist.

In the more recent past, “cancel culture”, i.e. pressure from sensitive consumers, has led to studios and media conglomerates like Disney, HBO and the BBC restricting, re-editing, or simply removing content from their platforms because they contain “negative depictions” of minority groups, for example. Disney’s “Dumbo” and “Peter Pan” were slammed for racist depictions, HBO removed “Gone with the Wind” from HBO Max, and the BBC removed particularly offensive episodes of Little Britain and Fawlty Towers from the BBC iPlayer. As a staunch defender of freedom of expression, I find these acts cowardly and reprehensible for the same reason that I do not believe “Birth of a Nation” should be deleted from history. We can all learn from the mistakes of the past without pretending it didn’t happen. Paul also recommended a 2020 documentary film “Coded Bias“, which is an exploration into the fallout of MIT Media Lab researcher Joy Buolamwini’s discovery of racial bias in facial recognition algorithms. Referring back to David’s talk in relation to “remixing the algorithm”, Paul also mentioned the example of Japan’s Hatsune Miku, a completely virtual pop star developed by corporations to help sell Toyota cars, but she took on a life of her own and has packed thousands of fans into stadiums for “live” concerts. Her voice is computer-generated and her image is essentially an anime-style animation. Is this the future of music?

Virginia Kuhn

Virginia Kuhn – Remix and Lettered Aurality

Finally, Virginia Kuhn presented her talk on “Remix and Lettered Orality“, referring to the idea that “lettered orality” has often been considered an oxymoron in a similar way to “media literacy”, yet Virginia sees the value of both terms in relation to remix. Virginia’s talk, and her chapter in the Handbook dealt with the cultural artefact known as the “video essay”, which she has been teaching and helping students produce for more than a decade. Virginia highlighted the importance of words, which are often relegated to second, third or even fourth place in video content, (if they are included at all) after moving images, still images, and sound. I quite agree with Virginia on this point, and I also teach motion or kinetic typography to my students for inclusion in remix videos. Seeing particular keywords on screen as they are said, or in reference to a visual that appears can be an extremely impactful way to reinforce an idea or concept in the mind of the viewer. It’s almost like a form of subliminal programming, but often the act of including actual written words on screen as a core part of a video is neglected. In terms of remix, and especially sampling, words occupy a unique place compared to other media types. Sampling an image or video clip, for example, is visually undeniable – we can see the sampled image on screen. Likewise with music, we can hear a sampled audio snippet in a new musical mashup. However, sometimes, DJs and remixers might re-record a musical riff rather than directly sample it, as occurred with the famous bass line from Chic’s “Good Times” in The Sugarhill Gang’s “Rapper’s Delight,” which muddies the waters somewhat.

When it comes to words, as Virginia mentioned, we don’t tend to think of words in the same way as we think of images or sounds, as fixed media components. We are so used to copying and pasting text from Microsoft Word or from websites into new documents that we don’t consider pasting it in the same font and at the same size that it originally appeared, for example. This is an aspect of text and words that I am quite interested in and would love to explore further in the future, i.e. directly sampling words as they appear on pages in a book is truly sampling text, as opposed to copying and pasting and changing the positioning, font etc. Virginia memorably stated that “print changes consciousness”, a fascinating concept, and during her talk, she recommended a documentary, the Quantum Activist, in which Dr. Amit Goswami challenges traditional views of existence and reality – I look forward to watching it. For Virginia, remix video essays use all of the available semiotic resources – words, images, moving images, sounds, and some kind of argument. The questions I wrote down for Virginia were in relation to her perception of the power of video essays, i.e. their persuasive power and potential to influence many viewers over time, and potentially instigate real, measurable social or political change, in a similar way to how propaganda material has done in the past. Virginia’s chapter in the Handbook describes how she worked with a number of other scholars to produce a series of collaboratively remixed video essays using the online platform, Scalar – a fascinating insight into the process of video essay creation, which may be of interest and benefit to many digital humanities scholars. 

Overall, I thoroughly enjoyed this session with Anne, David, Paul, Virginia, and I’m already looking forward to the next one, which Eduardo, myself and xtine are hoping to organise during the summer, followed by several more in the Autumm/Fall. Thanks also to our participants and other contributors who will definitely be featuring in our future sessions.

The full Zoom session can be viewed via ADRI’s Zoom page here.
An audio recording (for podcast listening) is available here, and the text-chat transcript, here.

 

Published: The Routledge Handbook of Remix Studies and Digital Humanities

Three years in the making, I’m very excited to announce that the third book in our trilogy on remix studies has finally been published today! Thanks to Eduardo Navas, xtine burrough, and all of our contributors for helping to bring this project to life. 🥂📚

The Routledge Handbook of Remix Studies and Digital Humanities by Eduardo Navas, Owen Gallagher, and xtine burrough

 PDF Intro Preview

The Routledge Handbook of Remix Studies and Digital Humanities (2021),
Edited by Eduardo Navas, Owen Gallagher, and xtine burrough

https://www.amazon.com/Routledge-Handbook-Studies-Digital-Humanities-dp-0367361426/dp/0367361426/

Book Description: In this comprehensive and highly interdisciplinary handbook, contributors reflect on remix across the broad spectrum of media and culture, with each chapter offering in-depth reflections on the relationship between remix studies and the digital humanities.

The anthology is organized into sections that explore remix studies and digital humanities in relation to topics such as archives, artificial intelligence, cinema, epistemology, gaming, generative art, hacking, pedagogy, sound, and VR, among other subjects of study. Selected chapters focus on practice-based projects produced by artists, designers, remix studies scholars, and digital humanists. With this mix of practical and theoretical chapters, editors Navas, Gallagher, and burrough offer a tapestry of critical reflection on the contemporary cultural and political implications of remix studies and the digital humanities, functioning as an ideal reference manual to these evolving areas of study across the arts, humanities, and social sciences.

This book will be of particular interest to students and scholars of digital humanities, remix studies, media arts, information studies, interactive arts and technology, and digital media studies. #remix #remixes #remixstudies #digitalhumanities #mediastudies #routledge

“Remediation” Book Chapter Published in The Routledge Encyclopedia of Citizen Media (2021)

A chapter I wrote on “Remediation” has been published in The Routledge Encyclopedia of Citizen Media (Routledge, 2021), edited by Mona Baker, Bolette B. Blaagaard, Henry Jones, and Luis Pérez-González. 

https://www.routledge.com/The-Routledge-Encyclopedia-of-Citizen-Media/Baker-Blaagaard-Jones-Perez-Gonzalez/p/book/9781138665569

Remediation by Owen Gallagher in The Routledge Encyclopedia of Citizen Media

Remediation by Owen Gallagher in The Routledge Encyclopedia of Citizen Media (2021)

Abstract

Remediation broadly refers to the representation of one medium within another medium, often, in practice, leading to the incorporation of the ‘old’ into the ‘new’. This process can occur in a number of different ways, from the faithful adaptation or translation of a text into another media form, to the improvement, refashioning, absorption or repurposing of content into a more advanced technological state. This can have the effect of causing the medium of consumption to become either more transparent or more opaque, highlighting its relative immediacy or hypermediacy, respectively.

The theory of remediation is important within the sphere of citizen media because non-affiliated citizens are increasingly expressing themselves publicly using remediated content such as remixes, memes, mashups and bricolage. The figure of the independent remixer or meme-artist has become representative of a cultural desire to ‘talk back’ to the media, to politicians and big business, to highlight injustices, expose irresponsible behaviour and engage in various forms of socio-political action, potentially inspiring real change.

This entry considers the role of remediation in citizen media, focusing on a number of relevant examples and case studies from the past decade where newer forms of remix have been used to engage in political discourse or support social action. For example, critical remix video has emerged as an extremely potent form of citizen media production through its remediation of existing source material in order to critically engage with ideological biases and highlight perceived wrongs. The Cambridge Dictionary offers an alternative definition of remediation as “the process of improving or correcting a situation”, which, as this entry shows, is precisely what citizen-engaged remix aims to do.

References

Bolter, Jay David and Richard Grusin (2000) Remediation: Understanding new media, Cambridge: MIT Press.

Deuze, Mark (2006) ‘Participation, Remediation, Bricolage: Considering principal components of a digital culture’, The Information Society 22(2): 63-75.

Jenkins, Henry (2006) Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide, New York:  NYU Press.

Jenkins, Henry et al. (2017) ‘Participatory Politics’, in Eduardo Navas, Owen Gallagher and xtine burrough (eds) Keywords in Remix Studies, New York: Routledge, pp.230-245.

Gallagher, Owen (2018) Reclaiming Critical Remix Video: The Role of Sampling in Transformative Works. New York: Routledge, pp. 131-204.

McLuhan, Marshall (1994) Understanding Media: The extensions of man, Cambridge: MIT Press.

Navas, Eduardo, Owen Gallagher and xtine burrough (2015) ‘Section IV: Politics’, in Eduardo Navas, Owen Gallagher and xtine burrough (eds) The Routledge Companion to Remix Studies, New York: Routledge, pp.321-408.

Special Remix Issue of Media-N Journal, Guest Edited by Owen Gallagher, xtine burrough, and Eduardo Navas

For anyone interested in new media art and/or remix, I’m very happy to share the latest issue of Media-N journal, which I guest edited with xtine burrough and Eduardo Navas.

Special thanks to Paul O’Brien, Kelly McErlean, and Kevin Atherton for their recommendations and reviews, and to all our contributors for their fascinating and varied articles.

This special issue of 
Media-N on contemporary approaches to remix was inspired by Jorge Luis Borges’s short story, “The Garden of Forking Paths,” a recurring point of reference in the development of media culture. 1 Prior to terms such as new media, digital art, media art, and remix, Borges’s narrative exploration of bifurcation as a means of reflecting on the possibility of multiple simultaneous realities with no clear beginning or end has offered a literary and philosophical model for creative uses of emerging technology throughout the twentieth century. The essays included in this special issue provide a glimpse into the relation of Borgesian multiplicity and remix as an interdisciplinary methodology.

MASHED Research Workshop: Oslo, Norway, 13-14 November

MASHED-Workshop-Oslo2019-Owen-Gallagher

Source: L-R: Ragnhild Brøvig-Hanssen, Ellis Jones, Alan Hui, Miloš Novović, Irina Eidsvold-Tøien, Eirik Jacobsen, Elisabeth Staksrud, Owen Gallagher | Photo Attribution: Eivind L. Engedal, Olaf Christensen, Maddie Manning, Finn Feldberg, Ole Olsen, Hallstein Lysberg, Annica Thomson

I recently had the honour and privilege to be invited to spend a few days with members of the MASHED research group in Oslo, Norway. The initiative, which is funded by the Research Council of Norway, supported by RITMO at the University of Oslo, is a three-year research project involving three full-time post-doctoral fellows and a number of other part-time participants with expertise in a variety of inter-disciplinary fields including copyright law, media, communications, and musicology. As well as this, the group conducts regular workshops with invited guests to share ideas, consider different perspectives and ignite discussion on mashups and remix in a focused environment. For me, it was an absolute pleasure to spend 48 hours talking about nothing but remix with a group of like-minded academic colleagues.

My published research is focused more on remix video than music per say; however, I have been a gigging musician and songwriter for three decades, and my early experiences of remix involved music before I diverged into other media forms, so I was delighted to be able to refocus my research on mashup music specifically during my time with the group.

The project is led by Ragnhild Brøvig-Hanssen, who has been active in the remix space for a number of years. The post-doc fellows are Ellis Jones and Alan Hui, hailing from the UK and Australia, where they completed PhDs on DIY music and copyright law respectively. The diverse interdisciplinary backgrounds of all involved resulted in highly engaging discussions, offering constantly shifting perspectives based on each speaker’s unique experience. A common interest shared among the participants is music. Most members of the group have written, recorded and performed music in many different forms, from EDM to Jazz, punk to folk, rock to musicals. In addition to the full-time members, we were joined by Irina Eidsvold-Tøien, an actress and law professor, and Miloš Novović, an expert in data privacy, as well as the project research assistant, Eirik Jacobsen. It was a lovely mix of people and opinions. I was just sad we didn’t get to bring our instruments so we could have formed a supergroup and jammed into the wee hours of the morning. However, our discussions on remix and mashups more than made up for that.

The workshop took place at a conference centre in the stunningly beautiful setting of Leangkollen, in the snowy mountains overlooking the famous Oslofjord and the city of Oslo. We were each allocated 2 hours to present our research ideas and answer questions, followed by lively discussions. Inevitably, many conversations circled back to the copyright debate at one point or another, although other facets of remix were also discussed in depth. The focus of this particular project is limited to mashup music, specifically mashups that remix only musical sources, thus excluding political speeches, television series or films, for example (of which there are also countless musical variations). The research is very much directed towards the music industry and its fringes, although video is also a secondary consideration, given that the majority of mashups also have music videos to go along with the music tracks.

MASHED started in August 2018, funded by the Norwegian government through the Young Research Talents scheme, supported by the University of Oslo through its Centres of Excellence scheme. The project is divided into three main areas of focus broadly divided under three headings: aesthetic, political and judicial. Three Work Packages are being developed by the group, focusing on mashup music, copyright and platforms. These areas correspond to considerations of aesthetics, specificity, mashup producer motivations, corporate interests, the legality of mashups, and platform regulation vs actual law. The group are considering the conceptual construction of mashups in relation to real-world consequences. Ragnhild’s focus is on the aesthetics and psychological aspects of mashups; Ellis is interested in the broader context that mashups operate within and the relationship between key stakeholders – the music industry, mashup producers and audiences; and Alan’s focus is on legal interpretations of the term originality, notice-and-takedown systems of various platforms and the development of fundamental rights for mashup producers.

There is an overarching concern that the recently passed Article 17 (formerly Article 13) in EU Copyright Law could lead to the eradication of Mashups altogether, if platforms respond to the directive by erring on the side of legal caution, as mashups are not explicitly protected and in most cases may be considered infringement under current copyright laws. However, copyright can be incredibly complex because each country has their own different laws, even though in the EU attempts are made to harmonise these differences as much as possible through a variety of copyright directives such as the Copyright Term Directive, the Information Society Directive and the Directive on Copyright in the Digital Single Market, which supersede copyright laws in individual EU countries. The interpretation of these laws is further dependent on international conventions to which all parties are signed, such as the TRIPS agreement and the Berne Convention. The USA has their own independent copyright law, which differs in many ways from the European equivalent, making things even more complicated, given that many of the platforms hosting mashups are based in the USA, while numerous actual mashups are produced and published online from IP addresses in Europe. Clearly territorial disputes are an essential factor to consider in this debate. I found all of this fascinating, as in my own research I have tended to focus primarily on US copyright law, so it was extremely interesting and illuminating to discuss many specific equivalents in European copyright law.

Irina and Miloš, coming from legal backgrounds, naturally brought the conversation back to copyright concerns, which is certainly an important consideration, but can be a limiting factor when attempting to drill down into other aspects of remix. It can be useful to impose a temporary ban on copyright-related perspectives, in order to fully explore the many other facets of remix – aesthetic, semiotic, rhetorical and ideological concerns, for example. My own presentation focused on the formal properties of remix, in terms of medium specificity, with a particular focus on sampling, and subsequently a breakdown of my ideas for an alternative economic system that could potentially balance the right to remix with the rights of artists and authors to profit from their work in networked digital environments. These ideas can be found in greater detail in my book, Reclaiming Critical Remix Video: The Role of Sampling in Transformative Works (Routledge, 2018).

Within each presentation session, probing questions were asked and comments offered on the material presented by the other participants, with reference to our own experiences – in my case, as an online producer of amateur remixed content for over a decade. These were followed by extended discussions between presentations, which continued unabated during our lunch and dinner breaks. The proposed outputs of MASHED include a monograph, jointly-written by the three full-time participants, based on the findings of their surveys and interviews with numerous mashup artists, as well as conference papers and journal articles. There may also be potential  from this project to make useful recommendations to European copyright policy makers in relation to the protection of mashup music specifically and remix more broadly. I am so happy that I was able to meet these wonderful people in person and share our experiences and I hope that we will have the opportunity to collaborate again in the future.

I was grateful also to have had a little time to take in some of the touristic sights and sounds of Oslo before flying back to Bahrain, including the beautiful Opera House, where you can climb up to the rooftop and look out over the fjord and the city lights, and Oslo Cathedral, where I experienced an impromptu live performance by local musicians in a gorgeously atmospheric setting with wonderful acoustics. I also saw the iconic Storting building (Norway’s supreme legislature), the Osvald Hammer monument and the national museum; however, the gallery was just about to close when I got there so unfortunately I didn’t get a chance to see Edvard Munch’s The Scream up close. Maybe next time. Being November, it was quite cold outside, but not debilitatingly so. I will definitely be returning to Norway again in the foreseeable future!

Oslo-Norway-Owen-Gallagher-2019

More information on this ongoing research project can be found here: https://www.uio.no/ritmo/english/projects/all/mashed/mashups-copyright/research/

Listed below are the bios of each participant in the MASHED research workshop, Nov. 2019.

Ragnhild Brøvig-Hanssen

Ragnhild is the Associate Professor in Popular Music Studies at the University of Oslo, and the leader of the research project Mashup Music, Copyright, and Platform Regulation (MASHED).

One of her main focus areas in the MASHED project is to examine underlying principles and values within the mashup scene in order to delineate the specificity as well as the historical and cultural rootedness of mashups.

Another focus area is to theorize relevant concepts such as creativity, originality, authorship, and ownership from both a theoretical and empirical point of view.

The research project MASHED reflects her enduring interest in music production, digital media, sample-based music, remix- and mashup culture, and authorship and ownership.

Ragnhild is the co-author with Anne Danielsen of the book Digital Signatures: The Impact of Digitization on Popular Music Sound (2016) and has also published articles and book chapters on these topics. She has also a background in music production and songwriting.

Ellis Jones

Ellis Jones is a Postdoctoral Candidate in the research project Mashup Music, Copyright, and Platform Regulation (MASHED).

His primary responsibility in the MASHED project is to investigate how the regulatory systems of online platforms impact mashup producers, in terms of the music they make, the ways they distribute it, and the social and cultural implications of this activity.

This role reflects his long-term interest in researching the relationship between music cultures and the internet. Ellis’ PhD thesis, completed at the University of Leeds’ School of Media and Communication, explored the changing nature of “DIY” (do it yourself) music in the age of social media.

He’s also a musician, and have toured and released several albums as lead singer and songwriter of the band Trust Fund.

Alan Hui

Alan is a Postdoctoral Candidate in the research project Mashup Music, Copyright, and Platform Regulation (MASHED).

He is a researcher, policy adviser and musician who has spent the last decade at the intersection of music, communications and law. His research interests are in copyright law in relation to mashups and music platforms.

His primary responsibilities in the MASHED project is to examine the ways in which mashup music can be understood in terms of transnational but also localized legal copyright concepts. He will also critically assess the notice-and-takedown systems of internet platforms from a legal perspective in light of the case of mashup music.

Hailing from Australia, Alan completed his copyright law PhD, 99 problems but a riff ain’t one, at the Australian National University. He was an Assistant Director for copyright policy in the Australian Government, where he also advised on telecommunications, broadcasting and digital productivity.

As a musician, Alan is fluent in improvised theatre music and musicals and continues to dabble in jazz and DJing.

Irina Eidsvold-Tøien

Irina is Associate Professor at the Department of Law and Governance at BI – The Norwegian Business School, and an affiliated researcher of the research project Mashup Music, Copyright, and Platform Regulation (MASHED).

Her primary responsibility in the MASHED project is to consult and conduct research on copyright concepts, such as transformative use, originality, parody and quotation, across U.S. and Norwegian law.

Irina is an expert in intellectual property and copyright related to performing artists, with expertise in Scandinavian copyright laws.

She completed her doctoral theses at the University of Oslo, in the field of intellectual property and copyright.

She has previously worked as legal director for the Norwegian composer organization TONO, and as an attorney with intellectual property rights and computer law as her main focus area.

Irina also has a bachelor in acting and is still participating in different movies and TV-shows.

Miloš Novović

Miloš has a PhD in law and is an affiliated researcher of the research project Mashup Music, Copyright, and Platform Regulation (MASHED).

His primary responsibility in the MASHED project is to consult and conduct research on the regulation of online platforms.

With an LL.M. in intellectual property law from the George Washington University and a PhD in copyright law from the University of Oslo, Miloš has significant experience in researching copyright-related terms found in mass-scale digital agreements.

He believes that any attempts to regulate digital platforms and consumers’ rights must take the application of national laws into account, and therefore actively uses private international law and contract law as a background for his analysis.

Miloš currently works as a senior privacy advisor in a major international telecommunications company.

Eirik Jacobsen

Eirik is a research assistant in the research project Mashup Music, Copyright, and Platform Regulation (MASHED). His primary task in the MASHED project is to transcribe and code the interviews conducted with mashup producers.

Eirik completed his MA thesis in 2017 and has since worked as a musician, music teacher, and research assistant in another RITMO-project.

 

Invited Guest: Owen Gallagher

Dr. Owen Gallagher, SFHEA is the author of Reclaiming Critical Remix Video: The Role of Sampling in Transformative Works (2018), and co-editor of Keywords in Remix Studies (2018) and The Routledge Companion to Remix Studies (2015). Owen received his Ph.D. in Visual Culture from NCAD, Dublin and is Programme Manager of Web Media at Bahrain Polytechnic where he also lectures in film, sound, animation and game design. He has published a number of book chapters, journal articles and conference papers on remix culture, intellectual property and visual semiotics and is particularly concerned with the changing role of copyright in the networked era.

Call for Papers: Special Issue of Media-N Journal on Remix

Call for papers for special issue on Forking Paths in New Media Art Practices: Investigating Remix for Media-N Journal

We invite paper proposals for a peer reviewed special themed issue for Media-N Journal titled “Forking Paths in New Media Art Practices: Investigating Remix.” Inspired by Jorge Luis Borges’s short story “The Garden of Forking Paths,” this issue aims to include essays that function as samples of the sprawling role remix continues to have on cultural production beyond the arts. Contributions to this issue will focus on in-depth evaluations of remix in the digital arts as part of the wider interdisciplinary spectrum among the arts, humanities, and social sciences.

Remix studies is a field of research that, with the implementation of digital technology, increasingly bridges creative media practice across various areas of research and production. Over the last decade, the rise of remix as a cultural activity has been explored in a number of international conferences with the aim of evaluating its importance beyond music, thus crossing over to various fields in the arts, humanities, and social sciences. Remix as an interdisciplinary subject of research has found its way through many forking paths to appear across different peer reviewed journals; yet it has seldom received attention as a dedicated topic for journal issues. For this reason, we request papers for a Media -N special issue on Remix with a focus on its diverging influence on criticality in digital media. The issue will reflect on, and be an indirect update on, subjects previously discussed in the Media-N issue “Found, Sampled, Stolen: Strategies of Appropriation in New Media,” FALL 2012: V.08 N.02. Since the previous Media-N special issue, remix has evolved to become both a subject of research and practice beyond the arts; therefore, the aim is to include interdisciplinary contributions that come from diverse and unexpected paths across different fields of research and practice. The goal is to reflect on the broad effects of remix as an interdisciplinary cultural activity, and how this broadening reshapes remix practice in the visual arts, particularly digital media.

We look forward to the inclusion of scholarly essays (approximately 5-7k words) as well as focused studies of creative projects (approximately 2-4k words). The essay proposals can vary in terms of their focus as long as they directly relate to the role of remix in digital art or creativity.

Questions for potential contributors to consider include but are not be limited to:

  • How do creative individuals and collaborative groups relate to creative practices now that remixing has become fairly common and is acknowledged across various areas of culture?
  • What type of changes has remixing experienced as it is increasingly used across networks for diverse purposes?
  • What are the implications of remix as a proper field of research that also influences different disciplines?
  • How do practitioners utilize remix as a strategy—for instance, for disruption, change, or communication?
  • How does remix creativity impact so-called ‘original’ content creation and where does the line exist between derivative work, plagiarism, and originality in new media art?
  • What are the implications for political / media credibility and accountability in an age when advanced technologies and remix creativity can be used to significantly alter political speech and journalistic media broadcasts for artistic purposes?
  • What is the future of remix itself as a creative paradigm?
  • How does remix function in education, from early childhood to college?
  • How does remix function in relation to fake news and/or deep fakes?
  • What role does remix play in the ongoing emergence of Artificial Intelligence and machine learning?

Artists and scholars are invited to contribute essays, reflections, interviews, and experimental forms of publications relevant to remix as both a field of research and practice.

Please submit a 250 word abstract by [November 31, 2019]. We will request full papers of 2000 – 7000 words (see above), which will be due by [March 31, 2020]

Please forward any questions and your submissions to [email protected]

 

About:

Eduardo Navas, Owen Gallagher and xtine burrough are artists and researchers focusing on remix’s role in art and culture. Their collaborations can be found at http://remixstudies.com

Book Review: Margie Borschke’s This is Not a Remix, by Owen Gallagher

[via MediaTheoryJournal.org]

Below is a video review of Margie Borschke’s book, This Is Not A Remix, I recently produced for the open access journal, Media Theory. Thanks to editors Janneke Adema and Simon Dawes for the opportunity!

This is Not a Remix: Piracy, Authenticity and Popular Music by Margie Borschke

Reviewed by Owen Gallagher

Publisher’s website: https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/this-is-not-a-remix-9781501318948/

This is Not a Remix is a densely-packed academic monograph based on Margie Borschke’s research into the changing meaning of remix in the context of music culture.[1] Borschke offers perspectives on questions regarding the nature of remix and the role of copies in how we understand media. I read This is Not a Remix twice for this review, first as an ebook on an iPad, swiping right to reveal more of Borschke’s thesis, and then as a paperback—an altogether more tactile experience, due to the smell of fresh ink on paper, the physical act of turning the pages and the eye-catching cover. The content of both versions was exactly the same, yet the experience of reading each book was fundamentally different. Following Borschke’s argument, each is a copy but also a different instance of the source material. In this case, the form of the content is also different, even though the arrangement of words, sentences, paragraphs and chapters is precisely the same.

In the opening chapter of the book, Borschke outlines her vision for media studies and asks ‘why copies, why remix, why vinyl, and why redistribution now?’ She offers a critical approach, which focuses on the analysis of different forms in each of the subsequent chapters (remixes, disco edits, mp3 blogs, anthologies). Borschke’s study operates on several levels—material, formal, rhetorical, historical—with a central focus on the transition from analog to digital music formats, particularly the recent resurgence in popularity of analog vinyl, despite the availability of faster, cheaper and more effective digital delivery systems. One of Borschke’s key observations here is that the term “remix” has been appropriated, transformed and expanded to refer to all contemporary digital practices of copying and recombination.

The book begins by outlining a brief history of the copy, revealing the romantic tendencies of analog pasts and how they persist in 21st century network cultures, leading to a critical comparative reading of contemporary media forms and how they are used. A  comparison is drawn between the historical use of remix with its current rhetorical use as a metaphor for digital culture, and how this leads to potential problems in understanding what remix really means.  In chapter 4, Borschke provides an in-depth case study on the analog disco edit, comparing its history with the current unauthorized circulation of digital and vinyl edits, and considers what these two practices can reveal about the materiality of media. She argues that analog representation seems to afford users qualities of personification that digital representation does not, and the persistence of vinyl in a networked culture may be seen as a digital tactic of rhetorical resistance against the corporate music industry.

Borschke’s study, perhaps to its detriment, focuses solely on music—mp3s, vinyl records, CDs, tapes and DJ culture. Drilling down a little, the analysis of musical artifacts leads to more pertinent questions, including “is remix an apt metaphor for digital culture?” In asking this question, Borschke makes the perceptive observation that the term “remix” has dramatically expanded in scope in recent years. Remix now refers to many media production practices, in numerous different forms, such as remix videos, photoshopped images, text cut-ups—the fundamental process of recombining samples into a new composition is the common factor that ties these practices together.  While I agree with Borschke that using the term “remix” to refer to the entirety of digital culture is counter-productive, resulting in the dilution of its meaning, the real danger is in expanding the reach of the term to include the simple copying of non-sampled content. Borschke’s argument suggests that the term “remix” should be confined to its origins in 20th century music culture, however this would be too restrictive as remix has now evolved beyond music culture to include many other media forms such as video, games and animation. The ideal may lie somewhere in between these two extremes.

Central to all of this is the question of copyright and though Borschke states that she does not wish to focus on copyright in relation to music, it is discussed at regular junctures throughout the book. This is not a problem in itself, as the copyright debates are still regarded as the highest stakes issues in relation to remix; however, Borschke tends to downplay this association, perhaps because copyright is an over-discussed issue in the existing literature. This is Not a Remix remixes many ideas published by other authors; for example, in chapters 2 and 3 Borschke uses Google Ngrams to trace the development of the term “remix” over time, and analyzes the work of Rosalind Krauss and Sherrie Levine in relation to copies, as does Eduardo Navas in his 2012 book Remix Theory.[2] David Gunkel’s Of Remixology focuses on the concept of the copy over the remix, and introduces very similar ideas to those presented by Borschke in relation to Deleuze’s theory of repetition and Baudrillard’s  simulacra, as well as Plato’s theory of universals.[3] These overlaps may be considered a case of “multiple discovery,” whereby findings and insights are uncovered independently more-or-less simultaneously by multiple researchers in different parts of the world.[4] I can personally attest to this, as my own book on remix shares one of Borshke’s insights regarding the over-expansion and dilution of the term “remix” and I was not aware of her unpublished work, nor she of mine when we were both developing similar ideas on this a number of years ago.

The emphasis on mp3 blogs and disco edits in chapters 4 and 5 shifts the focus of the book towards a historical analysis, rather than a contemporary study, apart from a brief addendum in Chapter 6 discussing streaming music services (such as Spotify and Apple Music). Just as Borschke describes how countless mp3s, playlists and online music collections were lost when Kim Dotcom’s Megaupload servers were raided in 2012, streaming services—legal or otherwise—are susceptible to being shut down for economic or political reasons. Perhaps mp3s will go the way of the vinyl record and come back into fashion someday—having a copy of one’s entire music collection safely stored on a hard drive offers a certain security and peace of mind which streaming services simply may not be able to provide.

Margie Borschke’s This is Not a Remix offers interesting in-depth studies into DJ culture, mp3 blogs and the history of vinyl, and despite its obvious audio-centrism, provides useful insights into the nature of the copy in relation to remix. It is a fascinating read that provides much food for thought, and notwithstanding the criticisms outlined here, This is Not a Remix is a valuable addition to the growing remix canon.

 

References 

Alloco, Kevin (2018) Videocracy: How YouTube is Changing the World, USA: Bloomsbury.

Ferguson, Kirby (2011) Everything is a Remix, USA: Vimeo [https://vimeo.com/25380454].

Gallagher, Owen (2018) Reclaiming Critical Remix Video: The Role of Sampling in Transformative Works, New York: Routledge.

Gunkel, David (2016) Of Remixology: Ethics and Aesthetics After Remix, USA: Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

Harrison, Nate (2015) “Reflections on the Amen Break: A Continued History, an Unsettled Ethics” in The Routledge Companion to Remix Studies (eds. Eduardo Navas, Owen Gallagher and xtine burrough), New York: Routledge.

Jenkins, Henry (2006) Convergence Culture: Where Old and New Media Collide, USA: NYU Press.

Lessig, Lawrence (2005) Remix: Making Art and Commerce Thrive in the Hybrid Economy, USA: Penguin.

Navas, Eduardo (2012) Remix Theory: The Aesthetics of Sampling, New York: Springer-Wien.

Sinnreich, Aram (2010) Mashed Up: Music, Technology and the Rise of Configurable Culture, USA: University of Massachusetts Press.

 

Notes

[1] Borschke is a Senior Lecturer in Media and Journalism studies at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia. I have personally worked with her in the past in relation to remix, as she contributed a chapter based on the ideas in her PhD dissertation (originally published in 2012) entitled “The Extended Remix: Rhetoric and History” to The Routledge Companion to Remix Studies (2015).

[2] Borschke does not cite Navas’s book Remix Theory (2012) at all in her book, although she does reference the 2009 PhD dissertation on which Navas’s book is based in the bibliography.

[3] David Gunkel’s 2016 book Of Remixology is neither mentioned nor cited in Borschke’s book. A number of these overlaps and omissions were pointed out to me by Eduardo Navas during a number of email exchanges.

[4] This idea of “multiple discovery” is discussed in part 3 of Kirby Ferguson’s Everything is a Remix (2011).

 

Owen Gallagher was born and educated in Dublin, Ireland and moved to the Middle East in 2011. He is the author of Reclaiming Critical Remix Video: The Role of Sampling in Transformative Works (Routledge, 2018), co-editor of Keywords in Remix Studies (Routledge, 2018) and The Routledge Companion to Remix Studies (Routledge, 2015). Owen received his Ph.D. in Visual Culture from the National College of Art and Design (NCAD), Dublin and is a lecturer of Web Media (filmmaking, animation and game design) at Bahrain Polytechnic. He is the founder of Total Recut and maintains a number of remix-related websites, including criticalremix.comremixstudies.com and reclaimingremix.com.

President Higgins vs Rubber Bandits – Horse Outside Remix

Congratulations Michael D! President of Ireland for another term, starting 11th Nov. 2018. Keep up the great work! President Michael D. Higgins v Rubber Bandits-Horse Outside Remix