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It has been suggested that walking is itself an aesthetic and creative practice. Discuss.

Passing Truth. The idea in motion.

In this paper I want to find a ratio for the inspiration derived from being on the move. A saying

from Bedouin times states ‘the soul travels at a walking pace’. Retracing this notion, we pass

alongside creative folks that share my fancy. They treat it in ways of giving context, adding details

of a more tangible matter. Further there are those who take the journey as its own reward. I will

approach some views in factual science to make my point. The relation of man and his habitat is

volatile. Reasons to turn oneself in to inner space can both emphasize and cancel out our urge to

explore. Yet one can’t get around making the paces, it is essential to our wellbeing. The movement

across outer and inner scenery correlates easily.

Walking is important to me. It helps to clear out the mind; it is good to find out what is around in

there at all. There are times where I just have to walk, lest the congestion curbs the more liberal

parts of my being. The appeal is acting the way dreaming is supposed to work. There is an intuition

of sorts how and when to start off, and which way to take. Like with music, it is best when the way

compliments the purpose, whether consciously or not.

Large parts of this our first modern metropolis do not treat a sense of exploration kindly. Whether

cooped up in a square mile office or a domicile around the town’s exurbs, walking can turn into

running the gauntlet – down identical high streets, made out to be functional, assaulted by the

debris of chain venues and visual pollution – and one can end up feeling inconvenienced and

displaced. How we can turn this around to our advantage is a concern of contemporary visual

information. The classical association of ‘a walk’ in the quaint, green countryside, with pretty

views is not mandatory. It only takes a context to come together.

2

Here again, the protagonists of ‘the journey as the destination’ can change the game, by unravelling

the history of a place, adding their own marks of involvement and attention. The urban non-entity

can become a canvas for how we decode and process these markers. There are layers of meaning

available from guided walks, literature, the cityscape itself. It is a challenge to each of us to find our

own vantage point, in terms of how we use the terrain. Ways can be taken that are made out not to

be. Places that are lost to our view beyond an overgrowth of the now hold their lasting charm in the

oblique. The transgressions to reach them can be a response to the lack of something, rather than a

laid out, intended focus on a certain outcome.

One set of factors that makes walking a rewarding experience is conveyed by the humanities as

neophilia. The ‘love for the new’ is a set of incentive and reward mechanisms that help make us as

successful and versatile as no other animal. Rather than considering factors out of our known range

as sinister, we consider them, carefully. A certain proportion (estimated at 15%) of mankind

actively seeks to be out there, seemingly just for kicks, regardless of the dangers this implies. The

same rate, on the other hand, prefers to keep it more safe.

The term neophilia itself was coined by R. A. Wilson, a neopagan author inspired by 70s

counterculture. Wilson described his work as an "attempt to break down conditioned associations,

to look at the world in a new way, with many models recognized as models or maps, and no one

model elevated to the truth."1 This spirit, as he detailed it, is stereotypically being upheld by

hipsters, hackers and sci-fi aficionados today. Their causes are more a travel of the mind.

But they do pick out white spots on corners of the map of curiosity. The outcome is made tangible

again, in the shape of technical innovations, political and social change. And it perpetually feeds

back into the cycle of our applied fantasy. On a more pedestrian level we can consider the walk as

allusion to the expedition, little discoveries on the way down the road as primers to perceive

anything out of the ordinary closer. “Neophilia can be a facilitator of serendipity, which can in turn

3

be the gateway to discovery and creativity. The three affective foundations underpinning neophilia

– surprise, curiosity, and interest – are referred to as ‘knowledge emotions’ because they resemble

thoughts in how they spur us to learn.”2

The effects of this chemical cycle saved our species from extinction 80 thousand years ago, when

conditions across the African plains changed in unforeseen ways. Retrieved climate data offers no

means to evade extinction but adapting nimbly to strange terrain and food sources on generation

long, erratic wanderings into the unknown. Many closely related species were marginalized and

eventually went extinct, Homo sapiens walked away from it. Animals tend to migrate across fixed

cycles of suitable terrain – man prepares for the unforeseen, pursues the lucky strike and perseveres

seemingly impossible stretches to break out of the loop.

This mode of contestation is more than an evolutional flight of fancy, rather an essential mode

of development. As such, it became deeply enmeshed in common lore and verbal history. All

cultures have their tales of the ‘whence and where to’ of their mythical ancestors. The griots,

bards in early Africa, were traversing the continent all their life, singing of current affairs, spinning

yarn of way more remote places than they ever could have seen. “Though [the griot] has to know

many traditional songs without error, he must also have the ability to extemporize on current

events, chance incidents and the passing scene. His wit can be devastating and his knowledge of

local history formidable”3

4

Aborigine spiritism lets certain people find ways across the plains by following animal spirits and

their features in the land, revealed in dreams. They transpose their findings into music and drawings

and restrict access through encoding these. Proofing the fate of their kin they set out for rambles

across these mirage bands, meeting narrators at the fringe of their tale to see the whole picture.4

Pre-dominion tribes had groups of their finest venture out on a whim, to become part of a story.

Caravans, seafarers and spacemen longed for what lies beyond the known realm. From the Greek

legends, to fairy tales and modern screenplays – if it grabs our attention, there is probably the

remote and unknown involved. And where the known story ends there will rarely be any sober,

humble admission of inadequate means. Here be lions, and he who dares wins. There was no way

to pull through but improvise, finding new rules as one went.

The ways that Francis Alÿs takes with his wandering performances is similarly playful in its

treatment of temporal reality. His paseo is a stroll through our neighbourhood, carrying a paint

bucket that leaks or ‘walking’ a magnetic dog, pushing a block of ice through the streets. What

more sense could that make than leaving breadcrumbs in the forest? And in the dis-located place

where he reveals the whole picture, and as it is made understood in context, the event has passed.

Vestiges he leaves behind to the spectator are deprecated until then, can’t be traced back to the

place they occurred in as the evidence suggests. But this paradox is part of the plot. It is only

through this being a rehash that the building of a myth stratifies. And only at the tertiary stage of

remoteness, the published work that makes it perennial, does his concept add up all the elements it

intends to. “.. a testament to, and document of, Alÿs’s use of fiction and story, it also utilizes a

fragmentary structure to model the ways in which pieces of an artistic project travel through time

(..) the artist himself makes stories and meaning out of a variety of fragmentary influences.”5

Thus it can only be ours what we go through with these pieces.

5

The choice of subject one makes is tangibly private and contextual. Even the optical mixing of

colours occurs in the eye of the viewer. At the end of the 18th century photography eroded the

rigidity this required in academical styles. When the Impressionists learned to come to terms with

their freedom, they took to the streets. Baudelaire, who enjoyed the company of Manet, Degas and

their circles, described the flâneur as a hedonist of fleeting passion. Not being compacted into the

commissioned formats of portrayal through the advent of photography, they found their colour and

shape back in walking. Electric light on the boulevards, cafes and bars that stayed open all night,

night people mingling by the river in balmy dawns. And venturing the countryside with field easels,

their work indulging in subjective ways of seeing, these passages are contained in the embodied

image. Kandinsky picked up on this movement and also used musical impressions in his pieces.

And went on to find a form of art that required no more reference. After all, any reality we can

express is natural in its source, as much as our treatment of it is unique.

A musical artist called Burial conveys this transience in electronic composition. And depending

on how one treats his works it furthers the notion that all arts exercise common structures and “..

despite the necessarily sequential nature of this discussion, singing was never distinct from poetry,

painting was never distinct from storytelling, poetry was never distinct from architecture.”6

Whistler used musical terms in his creative work, Burial has poetry structures and melodical

logic from performance art.

6

His tracks mix jungle, RnB and rave, thus illustrating the range of nightly venues of Zone 2. They

evoke a certain perception I can relate to. The same accounts for the video game and movie

samples, chosen carefully to a certain mind set. Like Whistler worked remotely from his subjects,

Burial uses the mere impression of these pieces and breaks them up for his purpose. Patterns

oscillate, linger, and speed up similar to a stroll in deep thought, leading us through the narration in

an ambience that suggests, but does not emphasize the urban frame. The story is told through song,

demodulated the same way as the beat, made into his own voice, with filters as Sigur Rós, Coco

Rosie or Fever Ray use – bands who talk of the landscape in an acutely dreamful manner.

In interviews, he nametags the ghost stories of M. R. James, and the fondness for a scene that

passed away before his days, but whose afterglow never ceased. As the Nocturnes of Whistler were

dismissed for a peculiar range and style, critics attribute him angst, aloofness, allusions that

separate him from his audience and neglect conventions the genres involved are reasoned upon. The

bringing together of futuristic and retro elements is regarded as an overused element in the scene.

To his defence – this is often just what a voyage manifests.

For my walks around Lun Din – the ‘moon town’ as some etymologies propose – in its best light,

I enjoy venturing out in the dead of night. The emptiness of places that are designed to be crowded,

with the mind tuned into dreamtime, work well to gather up the giddiness that one incurs from the

unreal, unseen. Superfluous light hatches dirty roads and eroding facades, flares up on the tower

block glazing, counterpoints the perpetual aspirations of the city in the river. The only things that

remain are those we take away from it.

7

A good walk should always be egoistic in some way, wilful even. This does not imply that it not

also works better for me to talk, read and do sketches. It would be idle to recount how many great

statesmen, authors, creators of music and city builders stress the relevance of ‘airing out’ their

work. In my own walks I use the tresholds of this state of mind, both more and less aware,

combining the outer and inner volumes, to get ahead of myself. As the streets pass by, the scenery

unravels, known issues blur with all the unfamiliar encountered. I remember what I am there for.

“We construct a narrative for ourselves, and that's the thread that we follow from one day to the

next. People who disintegrate as personalities are the ones who lose that thread.” – Paul Auster

fig. 1 – Photo taken during the British Graham Land Expedition, 1934–1937

fig. 2 – Illustration in ‘Hansel and Gretel’ by Carl Offterdinger, late 19th century

fig. 3 – Still from video taken during ‘Paradox of Praxis’ by Francis Alys, 1997

fig. 4 – Artwork from a sci-fi illustration collection by Moebius, 1980s

fig. 5 – ‘Blue Segment’ (Blaues Segment) by Wassily Kandinsky, 1921

fig. 6 – Aborigine cave painting, depicting a dream voyage, ca. 10K years BC

fig. 7 – Photo of London at sunrise, author’s own, 2006

fig. 8 – ‘Early Morning’ by James A. Whistler, 1878

fig. 9 – Cover art on self titled album by Burial, edited by himself, 2006

8

Reference:

1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Anton_Wilson

2 Winifred Gallagher – New: Understanding Our Need for Novelty and Change – 29. 12. 2011

Review by Maria Popova on brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/01/24/winifred-gallagher-new

3 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Griot

4 David Vann – The Aborigines who've walked for 40,000 years – The Observer – 7. 3. 2010

guardian.co.uk/travel/2010/mar/07/david-vann-aborigines-songs-legends-past-future

5 Chloe Johnston – Wandering Through Time: Francis Alÿs’s Paseos and the Circulation of

Performance – Liminalities: A Journal of Performance Studies – page 9 volume 6 issue 2 –

October 2010 – http://liminalities.net/6-2/paseos.pdf

6 Adam Harper – Rouge's Foam - The Premature Burial – 3. 12. 2009

http://rougesfoam.blogspot.co.uk/2009/12/premature-burial-burial-pallbearer-vs.html

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VCD1934,  Understanding  Communication  Arts   Georgij  Juri   26.  4.  2013      Self  Assessment  /  Submission  Sheet     Itin   Gr.Design    THIS  SHEET  MUST  BE  FILLED  IN  AND  ATTACHED  TO  YOUR  ESSAY,  AS  THE  FINAL  PAGE.    1.  How  has  doing  this  essay  contributed  to  your  understanding  of  your  field  of  study?    The  lateral  nature  of  looking  into  where  my  views  apply,  and  how  they  are  treated  by  other  people,    have  brought  me  into  fields  that  I  didn’t  know  much  about.  Having  had  too  little  time  to  contextualise,    there  will  be  a  second  round  on  my  own  terms.  There  was  some  material  treating  other  than  my    chosen  issue  that  we  mentioned  on  the  course.    2.  How  have  you  incorporated  feedback  given  on  the  Object/Text  assignment?    Formatting  issues  and  some  style  issues.  I  am  afraid  the  lack  of  cohesion  and  context  jumps  still  apply    (to  others  than  me.)    3.  What  has  most  supported  you  in  writing  this  essay?  How  did  the  lectures/readings/seminar  discussions  supported  your  understanding  of  the  topic?  Have  you  attended  any  workshops/meetings    with  the  AWL  team?  What  use  have  you  made  of  the  library  and  study  guides  in  the  module  area  on  unihub?  Some  connections  made  in  the  text,  and  many  terms  that  help  define  an  issue  come  from  the  lecture,  came  from  re-­‐reading  the  course  work.  The  afternoon  sessions  gave  me  an  overall  more  precise  feeling  what  it  entails  to  argue  a  point  clearly.  AWL  has  not  been  a  priority  because  I  can’t  help  my  style,  and  expect  my  treatment  of  the  technicalities  to  be  viable.  The  books  recommended  for  this  module  were  gone  by  the  end  of  the  first  week.  Other  works  in  the  field  are  a  commodity  throughout  the  year  anyways.  The  guide  write  essay  I  should  have  borrowed  earlier  to  conduct  reading  and  structure  with.        4.  What  research  have  you  done  for  this  essay?  How  widely  have  you  read  around  the  essay  topic?  Which  writers  have  helped  you  understand  the  topic  best?  What  have  you  mainly  used  the  internet  for?  What  uses  have  you  made  of  the  library,  including  its  databases?  What  understanding  have  you  developed  of  the  visual  work  that  you  have  included?  The topic is an issue I concern myself with anyways, it has also often enough appeared in unrelated material I enjoyed. Auster, Miller, Hesse, generic dubstep and triphop, art involving maps and land art have contributed. I have researched other publications by the authors recommended over library resources. The illustrations used were appropriated out of a similar synoptic view as the reading.  5.  How  well  have  you  referenced  the  sources  used  in  this  work?  Have  you  properly  referenced  your  sources,  using  the  MLA  system?     ✓  

Have  you  used  footnotes  and  included  all  sources  in  your  bibliography?     ✓  

Are  your  illustrations  clearly  captioned,  using  the  fig  1,  fig  2,  system?     ✓  6.  Have  you  met  the  submission  requirements?  What  is  the  word  count  for  your  essay?   2066  How  many  times  are  you  submitting  it  to  turnitin,  to  check  that  your  referencing  is  adequate?   1  Are  you  uploading  the  essay  as  a  PDF?   ✓  

Is  the  essay  well  presented  and  properly  formatted  (double  spaced,  12pt  font)?   ✓  7.  What  grade  would  you  give  yourself  for  this  work?    Be  honest!  And  don’t  worry  we  won’t  take  this  into  account  when  grading  your  essay!   9    8.  Any  other  comments  you  would  like  to  make  about  this  learning  process?  So  long,  and  thanks  for  all  the  fish.