Petervan’s Music Ride October 2022 > almost 70 songs this time, most new releases, but also some classics > EOL, ENO, Charlotte de Witte, and even some country > play in shuffle mode to increase the surprise factor. Enjoy!
Cobra Manifesto – Image from Beinecke Digital Collections
As many of you know, I am a big fan of Cobra, the avant-garde art movement established in 1948. The movement only existed for three years, but forever changed the landscape of postwar European art.
What would an avant-garde business movement look like?
How could we scaffold that?
In my Sep 2022 update, I briefly introduced The Scaffold.
Today, I would like to share some more details about The Scaffold
The Scaffold is a brand-new transdisciplinary learning studio for the never-normal.
A Scaffold: a temporary structure to let emerge something new
Transdisciplinary: for each client project, we curate a transdisciplinary tribe of entrepreneurs, engineers, scientists, artists, and philosophers to reflect and speculate about your better futures
Learning: this is not learning by teaching, but learning through conversations, acting, and doing
Studio: the keyword here is critique: individual, group, and formal critique
The Never Normal: the ever faster changing environment we operate in. The best metaphor is that of the kayaker in wild water.
Older metaphors like the speedboat (brute force), tacking the sails to the wind (adapting with the destination in focus), and surfing the waves of change (staying before the tsunami of disruption) don’t serve us anymore.
Today you are in the water.
You have to sense faster and better what is, sense faster and better what can become, and take action – right there – in the middle of a system in full motion.
I often hear that we need more data, data is the new oil, and we need powerful AI and Machine Learning to discover patterns in the data, so we can make better and faster decisions.
But data will bring us only so far.
Data tell us something about correlation.
Correlation is not the same as causation.
And also rational cause-and-effect thinking and planning are only part of the story.
The Scaffold is imagination in full play: not knowing all the dots, and having to keep multiple lines of inquiry open at the same time, without coming to a conclusion, ànd feeling comfortable with that.
Orchestrating and activating collective intelligence (both human and non-human intelligence)
WHAT DO WE HAVE?
WHERE ARE WE GOING?
WHY ARE WE GOING THERE?
HOW DO WE GET THERE?
WHAT RULES DO WE FOLLOW?
WHAT IS FORBIDDEN?
HOW DO WE SPEAK TO EACH OTHER?
WHAT WORLD ARE WE PLAYING IN?
WHAT DO WE REALLY WANT?
The Scaffold asks questions related to the narratives that motivate individuals and organizations from the inside. These motivations have nothing to do with marketing from the outside. These motivations share the desire for societal, moral, and aesthetic advancement.
The experiences that we design can be in-person, and others are 100% online or virtual, or a combination thereof. Our experiences are high-touch and highly facilitated. We use world-class facilitators. We apply live scribing, live video editing, and live note-taking. We use technology in support of the content, not to impress nor to create a spectacle. We challenge each other through individual and group critique. We experiment, explore, tinker, and dare to change in flight. We use physical and virtual channels/containers of experimentation & distribution
We believe in the long format. Transdisciplinary impact groups learn by working, doing, and acting together during an extended period of time. This approach increases trust, bonding, candor, the release of real or perceived vulnerabilities, and the discovery of unintended opportunities.
The Scaffold is your PEPA
Play – Experimentation – Participation – Activation
The Scaffold is about dreaming & imagining big with your eyes wide open for reality.
More inspiring quotes are here.
More details at https://petervanstudios.com/the-scaffold/
The Scaffold is made possible through strategic partnerships with https://www.nexxworks.com/ and https://collectivenext.com/
Powered by a coalition of exceptional individuals as advisors for The Scaffold. A unique mix of strategists, futurists, engineers, entrepreneurs, experts in classic and contemporary arts, masters in narrative environments, philosophers, and a licensed architect and VR developer.
We are very curious about how this resonates with you.
Who could be interested in such an offering?
What is great, mediocre, or missing?
Let’s chat
Hope to welcome you soon!
Warmest,
From time to time, I discover an interview, an artist, a dreamer, or another non-conformist take on reality that I find worthwhile transcribing.
I prefer to make such transcripts manually, by listening, pausing, and reflecting. Like drawing by hand.
And also in the resulting text, it is possible to give some sense to that rhythm of reflection.
In this post, a transcript of the conversation with artist/architect Peter Cook on the benefits of drawing by hand, on buildable or non-buildable ideas, on utopia or reality. I started transcribing around 11:15 in this video which also contains beautiful artwork.
Somehow, I would like to grow old like Peter Cook…
In drawing
You can decide upon almost anything
How to make a building that can go from solid to transparent without a window?
From solid
to slightly permeable
and then translucent
More translucent
Completely transparent
And then back again
I don’t think any of the work is utopian
The notion of utopia, the notion of the ideal perfect objective is not in my mind
I think that a lot of these drawings are buildable
they may not be a hundred percent buildable
but they are more buildable
than they’re unbuildable
so what i’m saying is
to answer the question is it utopic
No, it’s not utopian
I even balk at the idea
if it’s huge you see
what happens is
the critical observer will say
Ah! that stuff is utopian
what we do down the road is real
and it delights me to say that
we did build The Kunsthaus in Graz
which could have been one of these drawings
but it’s there
you can go inside
it is still working 20 years down the line
and agreeably
The Kunsthaus in Graz, by Peter Cook
and so then I say
hey hold it
if you say that this stuff is utopian
what about Graz
it’s built
if you can
build Graz
aha you guys
you can build 80% of this stuff
it’s just that you obey by the critics and the
regular people saying it’s utopian
You put it aside
you put it into a kind of
you put it into a pigeon hole that says
oh those sort of architects are utopian
and we architects are normal
the delight I get out of doing some buildings
it’s to say
screw you
it can be built
so then i say
I do not want to be a utopian architect
i’m not interested in utopia
I’m interested in architecture
I’m interested in the drawings
contributing towards
the discussion and language
of architecture
and thank you very much
I wouldn’t mind building some of it
Below are some images of the hand-drawn city landscapes by Peter Cook. From the Louisiana Museum of Modern Art.
Obviously all images are courtesy of the artist.
A lot of Peter Cooke’s work and insights throw me back to my own architecture studies in the 70ies when we were allowed to design buildings that did not have to be buildable.
In the same way, his utopian/reality paradox is central to the ideas I developed as part of The Scaffold, a transdisciplinary learning studio for the Never Normal. The studio gives permission to play with ideas that are not necessarily buildable but that unlock some other kind of less cognitive insight.
Hope you stay on board
Warmest
As usual, an incoherent, irregular, unpredictable collection of interesting sparks. Handpicked, no robots. Minimalism in curation. Enjoy!
If you can’t get enough of these and want more, you can hang on to the firehose, the extended version of Petervan’s Delicacies in REVUE with loads of videos. Subscribe here: https://www.getrevue.co/profile/petervan
Petervan’s Music Ride September 2022 > almost 90 songs, most new releases, but also some classics > from Ozzy Osbourne to Tamino and everything in between > play in shuffle mode to increase the surprise factor. Enjoy!
© 2022 Petervan Artworks – Artist and Engineer – created with MidJourney
Here is the latest update on Petervan Studios. The previous update already goes back to February 2022
Professionalization of Petervan Studios Practice
Some days ago, I published a post about this and the launch of my new website and The Scaffold.
As I was very focused on professionalizing my art practice, I did not produce much artwork during that time. On the website, you can discover some of my existing work by selecting a method, dynamic, and outcome. You can of course also sort per container: canvas, video, audio, etc.
As part of the inventory work, I stumbled upon some older works and played around with DALL-E
© 2022 Petervan Artworks – made with DALL-E
© 2022 Petervan Artworks – Prison cell in ProCreate
Exhibitions
Since the last update, I visited the following art exhibitions:
Dhondt Dhaenens, Deurle, April 2022
Berlinde De Bruyckere, Studio visit, Ghent, April 2022
Castle of Laarne, Laarne, May 2022
Storycon, BOZAR Brussels, May 2022
Nick Ervinck, Skins, K.E.R.K., Middelkerke, July 2022
8th Biennial of Painting, Dhondt Dhaenens, Deurle, July 2022
8th Biennial of Painting, Mudel, Deinze, July 2022
8th Biennial of Painting, Raveem Museum, Zulte, July 2022
Jonas Gekhiere, MUSEE, Oostende, July 2022
Christian Dotremont, KMSKB, Brussels, August 2022
Tanya Goelen, KMSKB, Brussels, August 2022
(Un)Common Values, National Bank Belgium, Brussels, August 2022
Nick Ervinck, Studio Visit, Lichtervelde, August 2022
Wim Opbrouck Open Hart, Dr. Ghislain Museum, Ghent, August 2022
Splendid Isolation, S.M.A.K., Ghent, August 2022
Outdoors
We had a fantastic spring and summer. We basically had sunny weather from March till August. At least that is how I recall it.
Spent quite some time outdoors: some gardening, some walking, some bicycling, some doing nothing. Got a nice tan, and people asked me where I spent my holidays. At home, but many don’t seem to believe me 😉
I have not traveled abroad since October 2019. Cannot say I miss it.
Books
Check out my GoodReads: https://www.goodreads.com/user/show/3085594-peter-auwera
Some highlights:
Ways of Being: Beyond Human Intelligence by James Bridle
Reality+: Virtual Worlds and the Problems of Philosophy by David Chalmers
De Avond is Ongemak by Marieke Lucas Reineveld
And for the artists in this community:
On Being an Artist by Michal Craig-Martin
Art/Work by Heather Darcy Bhandari and Jonathan Melber
Making It in the Art World: Strategies for Exhibitions and Funding
Petervan Rides
Since July 2019, I have published every month a Spotify List with new releases combined with some oldies from the 60ies, 70ies, and beyond. Search for “Petervan Ride” and select “playlists”. Selection is driven only by my personal taste (or lack thereof).
In July 2022, we entered the fourth year of this experiment. Here is the latest Ride from September 2022
I suggest you play it in shuffle mode, it enhances the surprise experience.
Family
The most important news is that Astrid passed and is now starting her last year in high school! Where has the time gone?
What else?
Horses
Astrid is still enjoying horse riding very much. And so do I!
I have three roles in the horse riding adventure: being her All Bundy, her taxi driver, and her photographer
Astrid with Cienta
So, in summary, what’s next?
The plan for the next mile is to work/play on:
Support Astrid in her last year at high school
Professionalizing my art practice
Pitch and realize my project “The Scaffold”
So, that’s it for this edition.
If there is something worth reporting, the next update is for Feb 2023.
Warmest,
© 2022 Petervan Artworks – The Scaffold – created with Stable Diffusion
Since March 2022, I have focused on the professionalization of my art practice. As part of a grant for the innovation of cultural business models, I invited Kurt Vanbelleghem from Amy-Art and Present Future to be my coach in that endeavor.
Kurt is a curator, critic, and publisher specializing in the field of contemporary artistic practices. He received a MA in Psychological Sciences and a MA in Art History from the University of Ghent, Belgium, and a Master in Visual Arts Administration from The Royal College of Art, London, UK.
Whereas we initially started looking at my artwork only, Kurt was great at pointing out that the output of my artwork was less important than the methods and dynamics applied. And that these methods were also underpinning my other work in the area of interventions, provocations, and interruptions. In other words, all my work was about similar forms of artistic and aesthetic expression and experience. Kurt set me on a path of better articulation of my ambitions and offerings. It also led to a new vocabulary and a new set of aesthetics to describe and share what I do and why I do it.
I have now consolidated my creative undertakings into Petervan StudioS (plural).
Petervan Studios is the melting pot of three studios: The Art Studio, The Interventions Studio, and The Scaffold Studio. The Studios have the following methods, dynamics, and outcomes in common:
Methods: Collisions – Layering – Activations – Speculations
Dynamics: Translating – Unsnapping – Reframing
Outcomes: Provocations – Experimentations – Collaborations
The three studios share the motivation and desire for societal, moral, and aesthetic advancement.
I just launched a brand new website with all details about the three studios: www.petervanstudios.com .
The Website is designed by WebIt. Thanks, Ruben, Joke, and team for your patience. Thanks also to Peter, Kurt, Janne, and Tijana from Amy-Art for help with the archiving and API integration.
Below is a quick summary of the three studios
Studio-1 Artworks
This studio is the home of Petervan’s art experiments: a mix of analog and digital artwork and productions, writings, poems, installations, video scapes, soundscapes, recordings, documentaries, and time capsules.
Studio-2 Interventions
These interventions build upon my experience and capability as a translator/interpreter of your specific challenges and designer/architect of intellectual collisions. Most of the interventions involve private or semi-private tailor-made provocations and include: Conversations, keynotes, performances, and curations
Studio-3 The Scaffold
The Scaffold is a brand-new transdisciplinary learning studio for the never normal. This unusual learning studio invites participants into a fresh break from the day-to-day. It allows participants to think, sense, learn, ànd act together with a brilliant, curated non-conformist tribe about a specific collective challenge. Not to solve the challenge, but to identify pivotal insights and a new way to position it.
The Scaffold is made possible through strategic partnerships with nexxworks and Collective Next
We also brought together a coalition of exceptional individuals as advisors for The Scaffold. A unique mix of strategists, futurists, engineers, entrepreneurs, experts in classic and contemporary arts, masters in narrative environments, philosophers, licensed architects, and VR developers.
Please let me know what resonates.
Warmest,
Sneak preview of upcoming launch Petervan Studios website – Turn sound “on”
Petervan’s Music Ride August 2022 > abundance everywhere > almost 100 songs, most new releases, but also some classics > from ancient repetitive music to Barbara Streisand to contemporary rap > this month’s Ride has more slower and gentle rhythms than usual. Play in shuffle mode to increase the surprise factor. Enjoy!
This post is the last post of a series of essays bundled under “Traveling without moving”.
The intro of that series can be found here. In hindsight, this whole series was a slow reflection, maturation, and catalyst for something that will emerge in September as “The Scaffold”
The idea of a new “genre” has been hanging around since 2018, actually. But the COVID-related lockdowns have only amplified this dissatisfaction with replicating old analog formats into their digital copy-cats, without considering that the craving for something better has a deeper foundation.
In my Nov 2020 update, I already suggested:
“People are exhausted. Tired of online meetings. Tired of being locked up in their houses. Tired of all the negative news. People crave oxygen. People crave for small safe groups where they can share, critique, ideate, play.”
As John Hagel wrote some time ago: “We all are hungry for hope and excitement”
During and post-COVID, we have seen an acceleration in the use of online meetings and other forms of remote participation. We also witnessed the rise and hype of the metaverse, web3, AI-based image and text generators, and more.
But we have not catered to the craving for oxygen. On the contrary, we seem to flee and lose ourselves in virtual realities, suffocating ourselves in the coolness of the latest technological gadgets and hypes.
I feel we have hardly touched the surface of what is possible and more importantly what is desirable. What is our/my ambition in this space? I have written before about this in the “Ambition Cube”
I believe we need to start working on a new “genre” for collective learning and collaboration.
Photography in Scaffold by Milo-Profi, Begijnhof, Mechelen, BE
Over the last couple of months, I have watched, suggested, and experimented with a number of concepts that go beyond a pimped-up Zoom meeting. The spectrum included proposals like Pirate TV (gracefully hijacked – and well executed – by Mykel Dixon and Co after I mentioned it during a catalyst meeting with Josie Gibson), Beyond TV, or Beyond Netflix.
I started reflecting: is “pirate” or “rebel” really what I want to be? That may sound like heroic and sympathetic, but is that behavior leading to the desired outcome of imagining and orchestrating new narratives? And why would I even use the word “TV” in what I do? TV as a format that leaves little room for imagination?
Maybe it should be something more Newsroom style like Ian Bremmers’ GZERO channel, Ray Wang’s “DisruptTV”, or Gerd Leonhard’s KeynoteTV. Gerd probably nailed it when it comes to repurposing keynotes for the virtual world (and also very well executed).
Somewhere in 2020, I got the wonderful opportunity to collaborate on nexxworks’ “Missions”, and more specifically on the curation of Mission NXT, with Peter Hinssen as the host.
Mission NXT episode with Peter Hinssen and John Hagel
That worked quite well, and the concept was integrated into nexxworks’s Memberships Program.
In all formats above I have witnessed discussions live or pre-recorded, with or without Q&As, edited or unedited, etc.
But these are delivery-related questions only.
In the end, these formats are still about passive consumption of knowledge, not about working-out-loud together, or better “learning-out-loud together”, and at best they reach the level of high-quality “teaching” of simple topics.
What we seem to be craving for are formats that are mentoring and/or inquiry-based, tackling complicated and complex subjects and projects. These use in-person and virtual facilitation and immersion technologies, helping us discover new unintended opportunities and new unintended behaviors and skills.
Courtesy Ann Pendleton-Jullian from FOUR (+1) Studios
What does that genre-ambition look like? What do we really want?
We do NOT want yet another set of virtual equivalents of “meetings”, or “events”, “workshops”, TED Talks, TV shows, etc.
We want a genre with high participation and high connectedness; with a slow tempo, we take the time to digest existing knowledge and create new knowledge. Failing and learning together through “collisions”, provocations, and collaborative and highly participatory engagements.
This new genre adheres to a different style: away from the spectacle, and breathing a mood of silence and introspection. Not trying to impress but to take care. Away from the quick bites, quick-wins, and snackable fast-food content, but surfing on the slow waves of the long quality content format.
Witnessing, questioning, interrogating, inquiring, iterating, all beyond the cognitive knowledge consumption.
With tools like scaffolds, collages, visual and multi-sensory collisions, assemblages, narrative environments, multiple narratives, and plurality in points of view and participants.
It should feel like a cesarean, assisting birth to something completely new.
It is about scaffolding narrative immersive spaces for collective learning.
Detail “Mechanisms I” by © Tanya Goel – 2019 – Picture by Petervan
For a couple of months now, I have been working in stealth mode on a new project called “The Scaffold”, which is exactly doing that.
The Scaffold will come out of stealth next month, together with a brand new website and offering for Petervan Studios
Hope you stay on board
With warm regards,
Petervan Studios 