Live Code- Reflections on Twelve Notational Practices

7/29/2019 Live Code- Reflections on Twelve Notational Practices

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Live Code: Reflections on Twelve Notational Practices

Twelve hours. Twelve scenes. (Scene I: 10:00) Open public space; a makeshift stage

for action. A lone woman reads philosophy, tapping notations along the limits of herown body with the tooth of a single piano key, cut off from the crowds that mill

behind her, immersed in her appointed task. (Scene II: 11:30) Somewhatembarrassed, the tutor apologizes for the missing model before returning naked toresume his class, simultaneously exposing and breaking the rules in this seemingly

innocuous move. The latent power relations of the life class are forced to the surface;observational drawing revealed as a never neutral act. (Scene III: 12:00 noon) Adancers body submits to the demands of a live score; her audience is invited tomodify and change the rules. Both parties test the body according to the logic ofinstructive code; scored operative and scoring operator implicated within the

performance, the line of separation between increasingly blurred. (Scene IV: 14:00)Speaking and coding unfurl within a shared time-space; theory performed as achoreography of consonants and vowels enunciated in the mouth, whilst codedphrases animate in the cursors flashing beat, the rhythm of one ever-interrupting thelogic of the other. (Scene V: 14:45) The artist speaks in tongues, which to the novice

might appear as impenetrable as encrypted code or lovers babble. To practicegarblingreturns archaic sense to the term less a form of confusion as one of sifting, theselection of choice fragments akin to the sieving of spice from refuse or from sand.(Scene VI: 15:30) Performance on paper: the pages surface like the bodys skin, thedrawn mark navigates the live(d) line between seeing and thinking, between exterior

and interior worlds. (Scene VII: 16:00) Intimacy is taken as substance for a soloperformance; the constructed nature of the encounter affords surprising depth ofconnection, the tense togetherness of shared time. (Scene VIII: 19:30) Code manifests

in dense veils of sound and colour; individual threads of data woven and collided toproduce deep vibrating drones, the dissonant pulse of improvised, overlapping

rhythm. (Scene IX: 20:00) One system is transformed into the language of another:code to sound; words to colour, image converted to a score. Layered sound waves arereplaced by thin, pigmented veils worn as a shroud, the performers palette of palepinks, oranges and indigo blue recombined over and over against the diagrammaticimperative of images scattered on the floor. (Scene X: 20.30) Combinational

procedures yield complex assemblages through the play of addition and subtraction,of backtracking and reactivation. (Scene XI: 21:00) Command keys operate asinvocations code, the converts spell or sermon, a means of summoning forms andforces from beyond the limits of the screen. (Scene XII: 21:30) Intervening into the

space of anothers practice, each performer strives for connection yet disrupts theunfolding of action into which they reach programming is relational, to affect isalso to be affected back.

Twelve fragments from twelve scenes. Fragments gleaned over twelve hours, partiallyrecollected. On the 27th July 2012, theLive Notation Unitstaged a symposium and seriesof performances at Arnolfini Gallery in Bristol, to test and question what the term livenotation might signify. TheLive Notation Unitis an emergent research collectiveestablished to examine the shared vocabularies that might unite two radicalperformance practices:Live ArtandLive Coding. The research project was initiated bylive artist Hester Reeve and live coder Alex McLean, working in dialogue with an

international network of artists, coders and theorists including Brigid Mcleer, DaveGriffiths, Kate Sicchio, Geoff Cox, Maria X, Sam Aaron, Andre Stitt, Thor


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Magnusson, Yuen Fong Ling and Wrongheaded. Twelve scenes. Twelve hours.Twelve practices. It would be foolhardy to imagine that consensus might be reachedin relation to the proposed term live notation. The attempt was not to homogenizeor flatten the concerns of such diverse practices into agreement, into accord. Both liveart and live coding speak in a language that is not easy to translate into other

vocabularies; moreover, the nurturing of bespoke language operates as a constitutiveact, cultivating nascent discourse specific to these still emergent practices. The intentthen is not simply to use the language of one for describing the other. Interdisciplinary

exchange does not just involve the trade of terms and phrases, a bartering acrossborders in which new vocabularies are begged, borrowed, thieved. Rather perhaps,the attempt is to speak in a more provisional voice, searching for a language provokedby the encounterof interdisciplinary exchange, not wholly belonging to either side.Rather than focusing on the specificity of individual practices, this text offers a more

propositional response, elaborating on some of the interweaving issues and ideasprovoked by theLive Notation Unitevent as a whole, identifying the possibility of sharedprinciples that might resonate with the concept of live notation.

Exposing the hidden workings / Capacity for transformationTo describe a practice as revelatory is not to offer judgment on the nature of insightafforded therein but rather signals towards the possibilities of revealing, exposing or of

bringing something hidden to the surface, operating at a more tactical level.Revelatory practices strive to shed light on the hidden workings of thinking andmaking, unveiling the decision-making processes, the unfolding of labour. To exposethe inner workings of a practice is to foreground process, emphasizing the methodsand mechanics of production, the durational taking place of something happening

(live). Live notation might refer to the methods used for externalizing and articulatingthis unfolding, a means of expression that remains faithful to the process rather thanperformed in search of finished form. The unseen thinking within the event of readingis materialized as a system of strokes and taps, thinkings invisible rhythms renderedpalpable as coded idiolect akin to the dots and dashes of Morse. Or else, the artists

actions might interrupt the habitual rhythms of a given scene, momentarilyilluminating the codes and rules operative therein, drawing attention to their scriptednature. Social situations are choreographed through complex scores of learntbehaviour, drummed into the body, practiced until naturalized. Class conventions aredisrupted by the presence of the master naked; the coded rules that tacitly underpin

the event of looking, of regarding the other,brought into sharp relief. The revelationof digital code through the performance of live programming involves showing and

sharing the unfolding logic of a language so instrumental to contemporary life, but inwhich so few are fluent. That which is unreadable can easily become hidden,concealed. Code is an operating language: learn the language of the operator

(programmer or code-writer) or be forever operative (subject to anothers code). Forevery operative there is someone pulling the strings; the rules by which the bodybends have been drawn by other bodies, we are each complicit in devising andperforming the laws that bind. To reveal the relation between operator and operativeproblematizes the nature of this bond, the play of power within. Yet, revelation

involves more than critique of hidden structure; it has a transformative potential. Nolonger working behind the scenes, the operator is witnessed in the process of devisingthe rules, whilst witness to the implications of their own actions. Action is shown as

never neutral, no action truly without consequence. Real time feedback creates theopportunity to amend ones action live, in order to change or modify the trajectory of


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an unfolding sequence of events. To witness the impact of ones actions renders visiblethe logic of cause and effect, at the same time as creating a momentary gap in whichto conceive things as otherwise.

Negotiable rules / Interpretative interference

It is tempting perhaps to view the role of operator (code writer) as one of power andthe operative (written respondent) as subordinate, where the former writes the ruleswhilst the latter must only follow and obey. However, whilst rules and codes canfunction as a means of limitation and constraint, they can also be productive,generative. Sticking to the rule can yield surprisingly creative results; coded logic can

be pushed beyond its limits, pressured to reveal unexpected possibilities therein.Moreover, rules and codes are not always passively endured. At times, submission tothe imperative of instruction operates as a willful tactic for evacuating personalexpression from a practice, a voluntary abdication of individual creativity within thecreative act. Surrendering to the logic of a rule can involve the loss of control, of ones

agency, authorship or authority. Rule-based practices can attempt to knock back or

dampen the habits and hang-ups of the structural self; artistic ego bypassed orsidestepped by giving oneself up or over to the unfolding conditions of a given code,script or score. The artist becomes a functionary charged with an operation tocomplete, a task to perform. In one sense, the artists body might be conceived as a

processing machine, acting out algorithms, performing code. Yet, human inflectionoccurs within even the most banal task, the most prescriptive operation. Even thesimplest sign is subject to interpretation, its meaning unstable, rarely fixed. There is nosingle system of code or notation to which the body responds; instructions are thusapprehended according to different, even contradictory, operational keys. Words can

be comprehended at a level of both linguistic signification and formal shape; the curveand line of letters readable in alphabetic terms or simply mimicked as directionalcontours. The same words can be processed as instructional code or as poeticprovocation, a diagram or map. Instructions can travel at different speeds dependingon whether they are seen or heard. While (exhausted! = true) if (landed) {jump}. The bodystammers, not fully knowing which system of translation to deploy. Even given thestrictest instructions, the body is often prone to embellish, unable to resist adding itsown mark. Live notation thus refers to the unfolding of a score, and the scored marksof the operative performed in response. Yet, for the human operative, codes and rulesfunction as points of leverage or pressure against which to work. They have the

capacity to be tested or negotiated rather than simply and obediently followed. Rulescan be reviewed or dismantled once they begin to stifle action or no longer offer

provocation, once they fail to create tension or have become dull. Live notationdocuments these moments of resistance, refusal and reworking of the rules, themoments of experimental interference, discrepancy and excess.

Intervention / InventionPerforming code might operate less in terms of an obedient following of a codes logic,with the attendant loss of agency often associated with operating according to pre-programmed rules. Rules can be accepted electively, approached in the spirit of agame or play. Rules can be changed even whilst working within their frame,instructions modified even as they are followed. Performing a score involves rewriting

the rules through the vocabulary of the body. The operative can also write their own

rules or code; at times, the roles of operator and operative become indistinguishable,practiced as one. The generation of code or rules can be taken as a creative starting


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point, comprehended as the ground upon which to work, the germinal conditions intowhich further action is subsequently written and performed. Writing the rules createsthe system within which to then work. One instruction sets up a rhythm, which then

might be intercepted or deviated in its course. The first line of code creates a loop-stitch; a further decision is needed to draw the next line through. The writing of code

never begins with a truly blank screen, much as the stage of performance is never trulyempty. Both are haunted by previous iterations, the trace of earlier actions. Everynewly conceived line is written upon the ground of preceding inscription, inserted into

an already existing system of notation. However, existing rules and codes are not to betaken as given (as fixed or unchangeable) but rather taken-as-given, appropriated as afound material with which to work, rework. Here, the writing of code (of rules, scriptor score) is not conceived as an algorithmic operation whose logic is simply set inmotion and allowed to run its course; code has the capacity to be unraveled and

rewritten as events unfold. Live notation reveals the rules or codes even as they arebeing amended, revealing the decision-making processes within even the most codedpractice. Analogous to the pulsing live body within performance, the flashing cursor

marks the point of decision-making of consciousness perhaps within the liveprogramming of code. The cursor is the threshold where human and machine touch,

entangle; it is the line separating what exists from what is still yet to come. The cursoris the location of action andretraction, of cut and paste, of deletion and erasure,insertion and manipulation. Live notation might unfold recursively through loopedrepeats and circuitous returns, at times un-writing the rules in order to move forwards.The performer navigates a course of action by intuiting when to yield to the rule or

code and when to reassert control, when to respond and when to interrupt. One forcemust give way to allow for the emergence of another; action can soon falter in theabsence of the decision taken to stop or switch tack. To improvise within a givenstructure requires skillfulness and attention, a capacity for biding ones time and

knowing when and how to act.

Simultaneity each producing the otherRules can be written as a test or challenge, as a frame or constraint within which towork. Repeatedly pushing at the limits of a rules logic can create moments ofelasticity within its law, revealing momentary openings or loopholes from withinwhich new lines of action might materialize. The rule can become a space of rehearsalfor exercising ones capacity to improvise within its seemingly closed terms, a limit

against which to practice the search for new openings, new ways of operating therein.Artists can work with the creative pressure of rules encountered within the public

realm or met upon the surface of a page or stage or screen. Live notation involves thecultivation of a vocabulary for describing the experience of working with something,of working something through. It is a form of notation intent on observing and

documenting the conditions of its own coming into being. Live notation seeminglyinvolves working with the terms of an existing language or notational system, in orderto move beyond it, in order to craft a new vocabulary, which alone is adequate to thetask of describing that endeavour. Live notation might be considered as the devising ofa system of notation through which to articulate the experience of such a quest. It

involves devising the rules or score through which to bring something about,something into being, at the same time as devising a new form of notation fordescribing the nature of the new being called forth. An attempt is made to bring about

something unexpected, something truly improvised or experimental, without thencapturing that thing too hastily, naming it through the language of what is already


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named and known. Within live notation, a language of description emergessimultaneously to the experience it tries to account for, where one produces theconditions for the other. In this sense perhaps, live notation cannot be located as

either prior to or after the event of a performance, but rather happens within andthrough it. Live notation describes a form of imminent (and immanent) invention

performed at the brink of experience, a means of articulation emerging simultaneousto (unique and in complete fidelity to) the emergent ontology that it attempts todescribe.1 As such, live notation cannot be crystallized as a fixed and repeatable

language, since the ontology it describes is ever restless, always disappearing even as itis coming into being, endlessly necessitating new live forms of notation.

Copyright Emma Cocker, 2013

Text commissioned by the Live Notation Unit in response to a symposium and series of performancesat the Arnolfini Gallery in Bristol on 27 th July 2012. No part of this text should be copied or reproduced

without the authors permission. See http://not-yet-there.blogspot.co.uk/

1 This conceptualization of live notation draws on Antonio Negris notion ofkairos, the restless

instant where naming and the thing named attain existence (in time). See Antonio Negri, Time for

Revolution, (New York and London, Continuum, 2003). The kairotic dimension of live notation will befurther developed as part of an extended article,Live Code: Notations on a Kairotic Practice, proposed for aforthcoming issue ofPerformance Research, Vol 18, No.5. On Writing and Digital Media.

Live Code- Reflections on Twelve Notational Practices

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