TRAVEL DIARY

A weblog regularly updated by Jodi Rose.

Monday, June 23, 2008

12:41 PM
Posted by jodi rose

Refreshed after a couple of days off-line. It's so rejuvenating to spend some time away from the screen. Not logged-in, un-networked, completely in the place where you are physically. Got into some deep local exploration of my neighbourhood, ventured down to the end of yuan ching rd, where the fake tang dynasty village is falling into disrepair, and tried the watermelon juice and supermarket fares at the shopping centre there. Nice local vibe, also quite run-down, enjoyed looking across the rd at the jungle enveloping the village fortifications. Plenty of entertainment options, should one be so inclined - go-karts, bowling alley, swimming pool a little way back, golf course (if you want to ruin a perfectly good walk), and further down the road, the jurong bird park.

Making plans with the art posse for trips to art deco bar with fairy-costumed bartender, who ascends a pulley thing to get your wine down, and Fullerton for the old-world glamour. Watched a very strange 1920's film, "Shadows", with everyone who came along to Georg's apt, after pot-luck salad buffet and a few beers. Nice to have these impromptu sunday gatherings, since we're all in the same place anyway. This morning explored the bus option to clementi - same time as MRT, even a few minutes quicker, minus the sardine can, routine drudgery vibe. Definite improvement. I never deal well with being in suburban context, from Helsinki to Sydney, Berlin to Singapore, there's a whole raft of cogent reasons to stick with the inner city. Anyway, it's fun here for a while, getting the hang of the cultural and geographic scenes a little now, and starting to really get my teeth into making work. You can only plan, and research, and take meetings for so long.

Today am going back to the drawing board - literally. Yes, it's time to sketch some of these ideas, make the visual scores I love playing with, go hang out and draw crooked bridges.

Had a great meeting on Friday at the National Museum, with Laura, our fabulous exhibition designer, Meng and Team 108, who are also pretty fantastic. Mark reached into his backpack, pulled out a video picture frame 7" LCD screen, and said 'Something like this?'. Aha, that's it exactly... perfect, I love the kitschy home-display feel, along with scale that has a more utilitarian purpose, not video for entertainment, but for monitoring and scientific research. The whole piece is developing a quasi-science vibe (although hopefully not bad-science-as-art!), having fun with the texts too.
oh and the radios, superb, need to leave them a surprise...

So, now, my interns are concentrating on building a mock-up of the system in our lab, and we're testing the various components in case we get to go live. In case not, I'm developing all the material for what has somehow become a 5-channel video and sound installation. Crazy-La!

OK, out to choose paint now, and visit the excellent Indian Roti-Prata stall around the corner. Intense week for network/socialising, hopefully offset by productive hermit time, drawing, making video of udo's maps walk-through on bridges, playing with screen capture..