Leonardo

Report on the 1975 Public-Celebration Workshop at the Center for Advanced Visual Studies,M.I.T.Author(s): Robert SteeleSource: Leonardo, Vol. 9, No. 1 (Winter, 1976), pp. 58-60Published by: The MIT PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1573305 .

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Leonardo, Vol. 9, pp. 58-60. Pergamon Press 1976. Printed in Great Britain

REPORT ON THE 1975 PUBLIC-

CELEBRATION WORKSHOP AT THE CENTER FOR ADVANCED VISUAL

STUDIES, M.I.T.

Robert Steele*

At the concluding meeting of the Workshop on the Theory, History and Practice of Public Celebration, held from 23 June to 4 July 1975, offered by the Center for Advanced Visual Studies (C.A.V.S.) at the Massachu- setts Institute of Technology (M.I.T.), Cambridge, Mass., U.S.A., Paul Earls, a fellow at C.A.V.S., said: 'It was an arrogant stance to announce a Workshop on Celebration.' He was not being derogatory, but was expressing the feelings of participants that celebration is a vast and amorphous concept and that it is hard, if not impossible, to pin down what is meant and not meant by celebration.

Probably no group anywhere has sought so intensely in over 23 four-hour sessions to explore the virtuosity, importance and necessity of celebrations. Among topics covered by the teaching staff were visual-form inventions; kinetic, sky and environmental art; tele- vision; national and religious holidays; funerals and memorial services; the history of celebrations from the earliest to present times; architecture; astrophysics; planning and designing costumes and sound events; light and reflections; and relationships of celebrations to audiences.

Co-directed by Otto Piene, Director of C.A.V.S. and teacher of environmental art in the Department of Architecture, M.I.T., and Robert 0. Preusser, Director of Education at the Center and teacher of visual design in the Department of Architecture, M.I.T., the special summer program attracted a diverse group: six de- signers; two photographers; four directors and adminis- trators; nine teachers; four students and two persons from theater. Some of the registrants showed slides and reported on their observations of or involvement with celebrations; i.e., The Royal Canadian Aerial Theater; Japanese, Mexican and Peruvian festivals; a Grand Rapids, Michigan, festival and Boston bi-centennial celebrations of the Declaration of Independence and American Revolution.

It was concluded that many unplanned events might and should have a celebratory spirit and that some planned celebrations might fail if a celebratory spirit is missing. Some celebrations succeed becuase of their tight controls, while others may succeed because of their slight planning and control. The affirming of life by way of art objects, happenings, events, holidays, etc. has a great deal to do with the rationale for a celebration.

* Film maker and teacher, School of Public Communica- tion, Boston University, 640 Commonwealth Ave., Boston, MA 02215, U.S.A.

Early in the Workshop, Piene said: 'People celebrate because they are striving for a higher sense of existence. The work of artists is to make private emotions public.' Karin Bacon, special-events consultant and producer, New York, N.Y., said: 'There are lots of things to celebrate which make public or people's art. Celebra- tion can be taken as a form to create communal relationships that meet a need. We need to experience in common and to give ideas power. We ought not to be afraid of transformations which may be altered states of consciousness. When people experience the ordinary in a nonordinary way, we have altered states of minding which can bring persons together. Celebra- tion is an emotional transformation that welds persons together around powerful ideas.'

Preusser dazzled Workshop members with the beauty of the slides that he presented surveying the history of light in past and present celebrations. He talked about the Sun and Moon as objects of celebrations, the use of light in the Middle Ages, Elizabethan theater, early theater in the U.S.A., and the transformation of events that took place with the advent of electric lighting. He showed and talked about developments from the Paris Exposition of 1889 to Expo '70, Osaka, Japan, the uses of light in world fairs and expositions. At a later session, he showed slides of light-and-reflection designs made by his students. They, too, were astonishingly beautiful. This led him to an analysis of light used in industries, cities, homes and the ways people are manipulated by light. Preusser believes that innovative uses of light can transform present architecture, celebrations and ways of life.

Four lectures with slides were given by Elizabeth Goldring, who is the exhibits director of Boston's Children's Museum. They had to do with the history and theory of public celebrations and the celebrant. She gave the group a new vision from the point of view of celebratory aspects of the history of art, religions and tribal rituals. She showed excerpts from the films 'Bitter Melons' and 'Dead Birds'.

To develop the topic 'Music in Public Places', Paul Earls, a composer and lecturer in media and performing arts at Massachusetts College of Art, Boston, Mass., as well as a fellow at C.A.V.S., demonstrated how environ- ments may be transformed with sound. He played recordings of music and sound of Asia and Africa, Charles Ives and bell-ringing in Europe and the U.S.A. He presented a church bell-ringing group to the work- shop. By way of printed scores, he taught members to understand and see as well as hear bell-ringing. Also he demonstrated uses of laser light.

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Report on the 1975 Public-Celebration Workshop at the Center for Advanced Visual Studies, M..T. 59

Fig. 1. View of the 'July 4th Salute' at Prudential Tower, Boston, Mass., U.S.A., which was conceived and realized under the direction of Otto Piene as the culminating event of the Public-Celebration Workshop, M.I.T. Center for Advanced Visual Studies (C.A.V.S.), Cambridge, Mass.,

1975. (Photo: N. Bichajian, M.I.T., C.A.V.S.)

A session led by Lowry Burgess, artist-fellow at C.A.V.S. and professor of visual fundamentals, media and performing arts at Massachusetts College of Art, concentrated on perception and imagination. System- atically, he introduced 12 kinds of memory and explained the kinds of imagination they can evoke and then he linked memory and imagination to celebrations.

Woodie Flowers, associate professor of mechanical engineering, M.I.T., talked about mechanized motion and illustrated his subject with a replica that he made of Laszlo Maholy-Nagy's 'Light Prop' for an electric stage, which the latter called 'Light-Display Machine'. At a later session he demonstrated aspects of the strength of materials and their weights and related them to the scales and environments of objects manufactured for celebrations.

Had it not been for the lucidity and enthusiasm of lecture-demonstrations given by the physicist Walter H. G. Lewin of the Department of Physics and the Center for Space Research, M.I.T., Workshop mem- bers might still not know why the sky is blue or what causes a rainbow. He hammered away on non- astrophysics-minded students to make answers clear to questions about rainbows, artificial and natural color, and light. Lewin was a consultant to Piene on his helium-inflated polyethylene tubes that were used to make an artificial rainbow at the conclusion of the Olympic Games at Munich. He has put up many balloons for scientific purposes in Australia and in the U.S.A.

Budgets, sponsorship, publicity, public relations and wrangling that can develop between city officials, artists and the directors of public celebrations (along with the debacles and blunders) were presented by professionals. Karin Bacon talked about her seven years' work for the City of New York. Elizabeth Cook, director of cultural affairs, mayor's office, Boston, and Sylvia A. Weisenfeld, parade coordinator for the city of Boston, talked about Bicentennial Events and problems. Susan Garber, of Boston's Institute of Contemporary Art spoke about outdoor and indoor urban art. Alan Bell of the Boston Museum of Afro-American History, showed slides to explain how merchants' cooperation was nurtured and won to have a street fair that was known as the Center Street Project. Harron Ellenson, festival administrator for the Boston bicentennial, divulged her being sued for using the ditty 'Happy Birthday', which is generally assumed to have been in the public domain for a long time but is not. 'When you try to do some- thing big and you do something big, the public wants still more', she said. As did other guests, she exposed limitations and difficulties when celebrations are attempted that depend on the cooperation of artists and city officials.

Albert Hurwitz, Coordinator of Arts for the public schools of Newton, Mass., has become known in the U.S.A. for leading art students and teachers away from making small traditional pictures and sculptures meant for contemplation by viewers to making group and environmental art. He feels that students and teachers have been prisoners of a backward view of art. He showed animated films made by children and slides of environmental and kinetic art. His goal is to destroy the prejudices that we have inherited from art schools.

Near the end of the Workshop, when members were satiated with new visual and sound experiences, Ron Hayes of WGBH television station, Boston, appeared and aroused the group with his computer-made film. He is the maker of what he describes as 'image music' and his 20-minute film attempts to visualize Wagner's prelude to 'Tristan and Isolde'. The colors, spheres, pinwheels and new forms that he designed made his nine-months' work come close to a cosmic celebration. The film is to be used during the celebrations of the 35th anniversary of the United Nations in the U.S.A.

Introductions to special workshops were presented during afternoons of the first week and during the afternoons of the second week at which members divided into groups to think and talk and to produce sound and costume events. These events were added to the big event, the 'July 4th Salute', which was the culmination of the Workshop.

This 'July 4th Salute', conceived by Piene and realized by him and his loyal, hard-working crew, exemplified environmental and sky art (Figs. 1 and 2). It was a spectacle that Boston will long remember. The 52-story Prudential Tower, which is 750 ft high, was used as a flag pole from which were hung the flag of the U.S.A., the Boston 200 Logo and a rainbow flag. The latter two flags, 30 x 20 ft and weighing about 28 lb, were made by M.I.T. students. The rainbow design symbolized hope, optimism and peace. The three flags were attached to joined red, white and blue air-inflated polyethylene tubes which were connected by webbing and reinforced by load tapes. The 10 ft- diameter tubes or 'ropes' reached from the ground of the Prudential Plaza to the 48th floor of the Tower.

Piene talks about the pyramids, moais of the Easter Islanders, Gothic cathedrals, African sculpture and

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Robert Steele

19th-century monuments of large size. He feels that contemporary artists have regrettably abandoned large- size works. He says it is easier to make small objects in studios where artists are not told what to do and where they can get along without cooperation from other artists and technicians.

The Prudential Tower is one of two tall buildings that dominate the city's skyline. Piene feels that it lacks interesting design. 'It is a landmark which fascinates the eye but is ugly.' Much study and planning was directed to solving anticipated problems (effects of weather, weight, etc.) that might cause failure of the project.

Piene predicted: 'If anything rips, it should be the balloon'. He was right. The inflation and rigging of the tubes was carried out smoothly, but when the balloon had been hoisted to the 47th floor of the Tower, Piene called a halt-saying 'mission accomplished'. Half an hour later, for reasons still unclear, one of the three tubes tore loose from the top bar and, for safety's sake, the balloon was deflated and taken down.

In his book More Sky (Cambridge, Mass.: M.I.T. Press, 1970) Piene writes about wanting to show people mirages. 'Mirages created by meteorologists (sic), geologists (sic) and artists can be a perfect form of immaterial art and theater in the sky' (p. 134). To persons whose attention was drawn to the 'July 4th Salute', some as far as 10 miles away, undoubtedly the event made them wonder if they had seen a mirage! Fig. 2. . gendor Fig. 1.

Fig. 2. Cf. legend for Fig. 1.

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