Programme

0900 – 0945    Guided view at the project exhibition: Tracing Rhythm, Rom61 KMD

1000 – 1030    Introduction: Geir Harald Samuelsen

1030 – 1115    Drawing the Line / On Signs and Signifiers in Art and Artefacts: Maarten Vanden Eynde 

1115 – 1200    The thin red line: ochre, humans, and deep time: Elizabeth Catherine Velliky

1200 – 1245    Music, Waves, Sound, Contact – human biological rhythm expressed in art: Viggo Kruger

1245 – 1330    LUNCH

1330 – 1415    Rhythm in Moving Image Media: Asbjørn Grønstad

1415 – 1500    In the shadow of materiality, memory, and soul: Theodor Barth

1500 – 1545    Rhythm in Mysteries – Mysteries of Rhythms: Torill-Christine Lindstrøm

1545 – 1600    End words

Biographies and abstracts:

Maarten Vanden Eynde (Belgium), visual artist and PhD candidate at the MGS project at the Art Academy – Department of Contemporary Art, Faculty of Fine Art, Music and Design, University of Bergen. 
Living in Belgium and Bergen

Drawing the Line / On Signs and Signifiers in Art and Artefacts
Line drawings are among the first manifestations of cognitive communication in early human behavior. These visible traces form the beginning of a mnemonic revolution, expanding human brain capacity enormously by externalizing memory. The specific signification of most drawings and petroglyphs got lost along the way, but their graphic endurance trough time, even into the present day (think #), invites us to recognize its importance for human evolution in general. After a brief introduction about some of the artistic translations of my research into deep time remnants of human presence on Earth, I will present my current PhD research project called Ars Memoriae, the Art to Remember. Starting with arguably the earliest example of an external memory device (the piece of ochre with crosshatched drawing from Blombos), my research follows the evolution and role of signs and symbols as communication technology to expand, transform and transmit knowledge and information.


Elizabeth Catherine Velliky (US), Postdoctoral Fellow, SFF Centre for Early Sapiens (SapienCE), Department of Archaeology, History, Cultural Studies and Religion, University of Bergen.
Living in Bergen

The thin red line: ochre, humans, and deep time
Ochre is an earth mineral that has been used by ancient humans and our hominin relatives across vast distances of time and space. It appears in almost every continent on the globe, both in the past and now. It can be used as a pigment for paint, as a medicine, as a topical solution, and as a medium for symbolic communication. Because of the prevalence of ochre materials in the past, it is often a topic of focus in archaeological conversations, but is also studied by geologists, chemists, anthropologists, and artists, to name a few. However, to say that ochre use is ubiquitous with the human experience is falling short of the total earth material heritage of this material. It is used by certain animal species, it is created by bacteria, it is found on other celestial bodies, and it has been part of geological earth processes long before humans ever started taking their first bipedal steps. Homo sapiens are perhaps the last in a long chain of actors to recognize the power of this unique earth mineral. Here, I will discuss the unique role that ochre has played in the history of our earth and species from the deep time until now, and what our role can be in understanding, preserving, and actively engaging with ochre now and in the future.


Viggo Krüger (Norway) is an Associate Professor at the Grieg Academy –Department of Music, University of Bergen

Music, Waves, Sound, Contact – human biological rhythm expressed in art In this paper I will use insights from a music therapy perspective to reflect on how early art works by man can be understood considering modern theory of communicative musicality. From an evolutionary perspective it has been suggested that our capacity to make music has evolved in the evolution of the human species. A well-established argument is that there is a link between the biological origins of music and the many social uses of music. This comes to the forefront as all newborns are brought into the world with rhythms, sounds, and movements. Small children use this innate musicality to communicate with their mother or father. In this way, vital needs are communicated that ensure the balance between food, sex, care, rest, and activity. By eye contact, body movements, and sounds, children communicate with parents or other important persons immediately after birth. The need for and effectiveness of this form of communication does not cease after birth but persists throughout life. 
 

Asbjørn Grønstad (Norway), is professor of Visual Culture (UiB) and has worked extensively on the relation between transgressive forms of visuality and ethics. Living in Bergen

Rhythm in Moving Image Media
The point of departure for this presentation is the impression that rhythm perhaps has been an underexplored aspect in reflections and research on screen media - cinema, video, and television. As Alma Mileto observes in an interview about Sergei Eisenstein, rhythm may be considered "an anthropological means of organizing experience," something that is "necessary to enact transformation" (quoted in Necsus, July 10, 2018). In film studies, the vast attention given to questions of narrative and visual style has rarely been lavished on the subject of rhythm, despite its inescapable presence across the syntax of cinema. Editing is essentially a rhythmic expression, dialogue is immersed in rhythm, as are gestures and body language, and of course music, whether diegetic or non-diegetic. In my presentation, I will address some of the theoretical work on filmic rhythm that does in fact exist, and I will also briefly consider some examples.


Theodor Barth (Norway) is a professor of theory and writing at KHIO in Oslo. He is an anthropologist [dr. philos., 2010] educated at the University of Oslo, with fellowships at the University of Bologna [Institute of Communication/Semiotics], La maison des sciences de l'homme in Paris [École des hautes études en sciences sociales/Semantics]. 

In the shadow of materiality, memory and soul
This seminar-intervention takes place on the backdrop of two investigations, both conveyed to the project by the intermedium of two texts and one lineup (the Kahina)1. The first investigation took place in the wake of a journey to PAF in Northern France and includes an adventure with mediaeval religious icons. The second investigation took place in the wake of a first attempt at photogravure in Prof. Jan Petterson’s workshop at KHiO, w/Enrique Guadarrama Solis.

In sum, the two investigations combine with an investigation of the Goethean topic of darkness—which indebted to the Darkness group at KHiO—and attempt at elaborating on C.G. Jung’s theory of the shadow. Rather than an exegesis on Goethe and Jung, the intervention will seek to follow an experimental track in exploring the shadow. And, in particular, the role of the shadow in our dealings with the past: the shadow as, first and foremost, a projective power (whether foe/friend).

It is argued—and hopefully demonstrated—that the shadow can help develop and further an understanding of why making (Ingold) is a precondition for a certain range of investigation. It has been discussed as investigative aesthetics (Fuller & Weizman 2021). Along the same lines, our adventures with the shadow can infuse projective powers gone “rogue” with criticality (Rogoff, 2003): that is, when crossed a threshold of critical mass can hatch new repertoires. 

The intervention will be developed on the backdrop of the two materials mentioned above, but also aims at finding out what bids the other participants may have on the subject and see if it is possible to define and determine a transversal connection within the seminar. The way of the shadow is like learning to move with a stone in one’s shoe (Yaniv Cohen) as a perpetual travelling companion. Yet (perhaps) a key to develop a cartography (Latour) of materiality, memory, and soul. 


Torill Christine Lindstrøm (Norway), professor of psychology and archaeologist, Department of Psychosocial Science, Faculty of Psychology; and SFF Centre for Early Sapiens Behaviour (SapienCE), Department of Archaeology, History, Cultural Studies and Religion, Faculty of Humanities, University of Bergen.
Living in Bergen

Rhythm in Mysteries – Mysteries of Rhythms
In the beginning, was rhythm….  
We find rhythms everywhere: in the body, in dance, in the day-and-night cycle, in music, in patterns, in seasons, in annual rings in trees and clams, and many, many more places. 
– But can pictures have rhythms? – I was surprised when I discovered a clear rhythm in the Dionysiac wall-painting in Villa dei Misteri (Villa of the Mysteries) close to Pompeii! 
– I will show you the wall-painting, and tell you about the mysteries in, and connected to, the more than 2000 years old, large Roman painting-cycle. 
– I will demonstrate the rhythm, and speculate on what they may mean.


Geir Harald Samuelsen (Norway), leader of the project: Matter, Gesture, and Soul. Visual artist, PhD, associate professor, and researcher at the Art Academy – Department of Contemporary Art, Faculty of Fine Art, Music and Design, University of Bergen. Living in Oslo

1 1) first text: Forensic fiction—post-liminaries, pre-liminaries, annex [travelogue from journey to PAF]; 2) second text: Performative next. Lineup: the Kahina.

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