Word processing as an act of collaboration – description of a media artwork. Issue 3 (3rd July 2019)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Rutherford,
• Is Part Of: Media Practice and Education. Volume 20:Issue 3(2019)
• Page Start: 232
• Page End: 243
• Publication Date: 2019-07-03
• Subjects: Collaboration with the medium -- the agency of the medium -- deus ex machina; Journalism -- Study and teaching (Higher) -- Great Britain -- Periodicals; Mass media -- Study and teaching (Higher) -- Great Britain -- Periodicals; 302.23071141
• DOI: 10.1080/25741136.2018.1464739
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 2574-1136

Abstract

ABSTRACT: As described in an earlier contribution to the journal ( Photography as an Act of Collaboration – Vol. 15, Issue 3), my research explores the possibilities and implications of treating the camera and the photographic process as an active collaborator in the creation of scenes, events and 'moments' that did not exist until brought into being by the act of photographing them. The media artwork described here is the result of an experiment to explore the possibility of establishing the same co-operative relationship with word-processing software as a way to give voice to my unconscious that I had succeeded in establishing with the medium of photography. Despite comprehensively stripping the original text of both sense and sequence, the resulting text not only retains an uncanny degree of consistency with both the style and meaning of the original, but also reveals insights which had been only latent within the original. The result would appear to reinforce the findings of my previous research in photographic practice: that, by giving up conscious, rational control over the means of expression, we can (sometimes) create the conditions necessary for a constructive and often illuminating dialogue with the deus ex machina .