Amphibian

Amphibian is an 10’00’’ musical work which explores new musical interfaces and approaches to hybridising performance practices from the popular music, electronic dance music and computer music traditions. The work is designed to be presented in a range of contexts associated with the electro-acoustic, popular and classical music traditions. The work is for two performers using two synchronised laptops, an electric guitar and a custom designed gestural interface for vocal performers - the e-Mic (Extended Mic-stand Interface Controller). This interface was developed by one of the co-authors, Donna Hewitt. The e-Mic allows a vocal performer to manipulate the voice in real time through the capture of physical gestures via an array of sensors - pressure, distance, tilt - along with ribbon controllers and an X-Y joystick microphone mount. Performance data are then sent to a computer, running audio-processing software, which is used to transform the audio signal from the microphone. In this work, data is also exchanged between performers via a local wireless network, allowing performers to work with shared data streams. The duo employs the gestural conventions of guitarist and singer (i.e. 'a band' in a popular music context), but transform these sounds and gestures into new digital music. The gestural language of popular music is deliberately subverted and taken into a new context. The piece thus explores the nexus between the sonic and performative practices of electro acoustic music and intelligent electronic dance music (‘idm’). This work was situated in the research fields of new musical interfacing, interaction design, experimental music composition and performance. The contexts in which the research was conducted were live musical performance and studio music production. The work investigated new methods for musical interfacing, performance data mapping, hybrid performance and compositional practices in electronic music. The research methodology was practice-led. New insights were gained from the iterative experimental workshopping of gestural inputs, musical data mapping, inter-performer data exchange, software patch design, data and audio processing chains. In respect of interfacing, there were innovations in the design and implementation of a novel sensor-based gestural interface for singers, the e-Mic, one of the only existing gestural controllers for singers. This work explored the compositional potential of sharing real time performance data between performers and deployed novel methods for inter-performer data exchange and mapping. As regards stylistic and performance innovation, the work explored and demonstrated an approach to the hybridisation of the gestural and sonic language of popular music with recent ‘post-digital’ approaches to laptop based experimental music The development of the work was supported by an Australia Council Grant. Research findings have been disseminated via a range of international conference publications, recordings, radio interviews (ABC Classic FM), broadcasts, and performances at international events and festivals. The work was curated into the major Australian international festival, Liquid Architecture, and was selected by an international music jury (through blind peer review) for presentation at the International Computer Music Conference in Belfast, N. Ireland.

aa-cell in practice : an approach to musical live coding

Live coding performances provide a context with particular demands and limitations for music making. In this paper we discuss how as the live coding duo aa-cell we have responded to these challenges, and what this experience has revealed about the computational representation of music and approaches to interactive computer music performance. In particular we have identified several effective and efficient processes that underpin our practice including probability, linearity, periodicity, set theory, and recursion and describe how these are applied and combined to build sophisticated musical structures. In addition, we outline aspects of our performance practice that respond to the improvisational, collaborative and communicative requirements of musical live coding.

Catherine or Kate : the tertiary spaces of collaboration, performance and humour in contemporary art

The traditional model of visual arts practice is one that privileges highly individuated and predominantly material investigations and outcomes. This approach overlooks and devalues the formal and informal dialogues and collaborations that take place in the process of making art. This Masters research project considers how the experience of working in collaboration can generate a new model for thinking about practice-led methodologies in visual arts. It aims to do this by mapping out and elaborating on the processes and approaches to making that fellow Masters student Catherine Sagin and I have come to use in our alliance as ‘Fiona Mail’, ‘Catherine Sagin’ and ‘Catherine or Kate’ respectively. The fluidity of our collaborative moniker is one example of the way this project creatively explores and re-assesses the implications of collaboration. Drawing upon the contextual frames of conceptual art, performance art, and comedy this research looks at the significance of and possibilities for working as a collaborative duo.

Re-made in Asia : transformation across Asian markets and popular culture

The thesis is an examination of how Japanese popular culture products are remade (rimeiku). Adaptation of manga, anime and television drama, from one format to another, frequently occurs within Japan. The rights to these stories and texts are traded in South Korea and Taiwan. The ‘spin-off’ products form part of the Japanese content industry. When products are distributed and remade across geographical boundaries, they have a multi-dimensional aspect and potentially contribute to an evolving cultural re-engagement between Japan and East Asia. The case studies are the television dramas Akai Giwaku and Winter Sonata and two manga, Hana yori Dango and Janguru Taitei. Except for the television drama Winter Sonata these texts originated in Japan. Each study shows how remaking occurs across geographical borders. The study argues that Japan has been slow to recognise the value of its popular culture through regional and international media trade. Japan is now taking steps to remedy this strategic shortfall to enable the long-term viability of the Japanese content industry. The study includes an examination of how remaking raises legal issues in the appropriation of media content. Unauthorised copying and piracy contributes to loss of financial value. To place the three Japanese cultural products into a historical context, the thesis includes an overview of Japanese copying culture from its early origins through to the present day. The thesis also discusses the Meiji restoration and the post-World War II restructuring that resulted in Japan becoming a regional media powerhouse. The localisation of Japanese media content in South Korea and Taiwan also brings with it significant cultural influences, which may be regarded as contributing to a better understanding of East Asian society in line with the idea of regional ‘harmony’. The study argues that the commercial success of Japanese products beyond Japan is governed by perceptions of the quality of the story and by the cultural frames of the target audience. The thesis draws on audience research to illustrate the loss or reinforcement of national identity as a consequence of cross-cultural trade. The thesis also examines the contribution to Japanese ‘soft power’ (Nye, 2004, p. x). The study concludes with recommendations for the sustainability of the Japanese media industry.

Saliva-derived DNA performs well in large-scale, high-density single-nucleotide polymorphism microarray studies

As of June 2009, 361 genome-wide association studies (GWAS) had been referenced by the HuGE database. GWAS require DNA from many thousands of individuals, relying on suitable DNA collections. We recently performed a multiple sclerosis (MS) GWAS where a substantial component of the cases (24%) had DNA derived from saliva. Genotyping was done on the Illumina genotyping platform using the Infinium Hap370CNV DUO microarray. Additionally, we genotyped 10 individuals in duplicate using both saliva- and blood-derived DNA. The performance of blood- versus saliva-derived DNA was compared using genotyping call rate, which reflects both the quantity and quality of genotyping per sample and the “GCScore,” an Illumina genotyping quality score, which is a measure of DNA quality. We also compared genotype calls and GCScores for the 10 sample pairs. Call rates were assessed for each sample individually. For the GWAS samples, we compared data according to source of DNA and center of origin. We observed high concordance in genotyping quality and quantity between the paired samples and minimal loss of quality and quantity of DNA in the saliva samples in the large GWAS sample, with the blood samples showing greater variation between centers of origin. This large data set highlights the usefulness of saliva DNA for genotyping, especially in high-density single-nucleotide polymorphism microarray studies such as GWAS.

Permissionary work

The Los Angeles-based collaborative duo responds to the community-focused mission of the Center for the Arts Eagle Rock by asking themselves what kinds of invitations they want to extend to others publicly and privately. The resulting works depict various attempts at engagement and include examples that are insider, narcissistic, exclusive, inclusive, and imaginary. This new body of work furthers CamLab’s ongoing investigation into intimacy and how the political becomes personal by making its existing networks palpable and by giving its potential networks form.

Bits and bumps: Understanding gender in contemporary physical comedy

This study investigates how the gender of a performer affects the way they produce physical comedy in a theatrical context, framed through Kristeva's theory of abjection and Butler's notion of gender as performance. As a thesis by creative work, it produced an original piece of theatre, The Furze Family Variety Hour, which featured a male/ female comic duo, where the female performer enjoyed an equal share of the punch lines. The study generates a new understanding of how the body operates in physical comedy, namely, a system of bodily registers, as well as a new understanding of the female grotesque comic body.

Gentlemen Songsters

This project was initially envisaged as a compare and contrast proposition between two performances in music venues, a year apart, at the Melbourne Ukulele Festivals 2013 and 2014. The covert intermedial incorporation of scripted, theatrical elements into an ostensibly musical performance was the initial focus. However, the opportunity arose to continue the creative practice towards a performance outcome at the Queensland Cabaret Festival at the Brisbane Powerhouse in June of 2014. This expanded project was titled ‘Gentlemen Songsters’ and enabled a refinement and honing of the event beyond what was initially planned. In addition to the composition, recording and curation of original songs, this process involved two cycles of performance, videography, transcription, re-writing and re-performance. Led by this creative practice, the research investigated the potential for sonata and song cycle as influences on performance structure, in the creation and performance of Composed Theatre. This manifested as a theatricalisation of compositional processes. Performed by ‘Tyrone and Lesley’, performance personae of David Megarrity (lyricist/composer/performer/ukulele) and Samuel Vincent (composer, musician, performer), Gentlemen Songsters played at the Brisbane Powerhouse as part of its inaugural Queensland Cabaret Festival on June 13 2014

Warmwaters

This project originated from both investigation of the musicalisation of theatre and impact of gender upon contemporary physical comedy. Developed as a ‘music first’ proposition, the initial experiment was to blend music and theatre so they were indistinguishable. Musicalising theatre, and theatricalising music. This established a covert intermediality with the potential to work in theatre or music venues. An iterative cycle of writing, performance, and videography over two years in venues ranging from small cafes to Woodford Folk Festival resulted in a full-length performance premiering at Brisbane Powerhouse’s Queensland Cabaret Festival 2015. The soundtrack to the show was recorded as a full-length album at QUT’s Gasworks Studio and released in 2014. It’s become clear that male/female musical comedy acts are an extremely rare pairing. Certain preconceptions about gender and comedy complicate the field; indeed the comic tropes of the double act which the Warmwaters flow around and through. Brian Logan (2011) even poses that “the male-female dynamic militate[s] against comedy”. This performance-led research draws on Comedy Studies to examine three classic formulations of the comic duo as they are manifested at critical incidents in the Warmwaters’ show. These moments are examined in terms of comic functionality and gender, evaluating and potentially reformulating them, whilst working towards a better understanding of the relative scarcity of the male/female musical comedy duo. Prototypes have been performed in various venues, utilising performance as research: cycles in which discoveries made during unpredictable gigs in music venues are captured on video, transcribed, rewritten, then fed back into live performance.

How your shopping choices will help Coles and Woolworths take on the banks

The days when Coles and Woolworths only sold groceries are long gone. Both are now established players in a broad range of consumer markets, with interests in liquor and hotels, fuel and convenience, general merchandise and mobile phones. With a network of over 1,600 supermarkets, 1,100 service stations, 2,200 liquor stores and nearly 400 hotels, the supermarket duo are now getting ready for a war with Australia’s big four banks.

What's in a name - Catherine or Kate?

This paper discusses the art practice of Australian artists Catherine Sagin and Kate Woodcroft, who have been working collaboratively under various monikers since 2008. The duo define their artworks in terms of winning and losing, and play out the division of labour in an artistic practice that employs video, performance, photography and sculpture. Catherine or Kate utilise combative and comparative processes, which challenge notions of artistic collaboration and highlight the inherent tensions and competitive nature of working together.