Friday, March 22, 2013

Ch3 sequence Where words fail

At long last, the next sequence to chapter three! Travel, teaching, and the complexity of elements I put into play for this short sequence - continued to take longer than expected, but I'm pleased to be able to share now and follow up on what was laid out in the opening to the chapter (all here).

This builds on and reworks a few elements that were seen in my journal article "The Shape of Our Thoughts,"specifically elements from that piece's second page, which has been split into two pages here. I'd used the flattened Mercator projection map previously and at the time, thought of incorporating Buckminster Fuller's alternative Dymaxion Map, but it didn't make the cut for space issues. Pleased to rectify that here. The Daily Planet-esque globe's "circumnavigable" text and other elements refer back to the navigation means discussed in the Odyssey sequence at the end of Chapter Two.

The upper half to the second page here is a direct reworking of that previous article - but with further levels of discussion happening through the incorporation of the dominoes sequence - which in turn hints at how i'll be discussing how comics work. I've long wanted to integrate sentence diagramming into a comic and this presented the opportunity. To get an assist on tackling this, i reached out to social networks, and the version i used is courtesy of professor Russell Willerton of Boise State University, who kindly responded to my twitter request. Everett Maroon sent a different version which is included below, and there may be a third one coming in - in which case I'll update this post. The fact that a sentence can be spatially rendered in such dramatically different fashion seems something worth exploring down the line (and if anyone else wants to tackle this...) I did create a system for diagramming my Kandinsky-riff, thinking on graph theory i studied as a mathematics undergrad, and as I was doing it I recognized a resemblance to the diagrams of Mark Lombardi - which I then played up further. (If you're not familiar with Lombardi's work - do check it out, fascinating stuff.)

The final page here, draws on philosopher Susanne K. Langer (who's mentioned on the previous page), who seems more than a bit under-recognized (and that fact too speaks to what's expressed on this page), but if you're interested in thinking on the role of the arts in thinking, she's terrific. The Cartesian coordinate planes or walls are made from poems of the following authors: Sappho, Dorothy Wordsworth, Emily Dickinson, Sylvia Plath, Maya Angelou, Adrienne Rich, Anais Nin, and Georgia Douglas Johnson. My original intent was that the figure showed up in the absence of the text - but the strikingness of the silhouette on black ultimately prompted a different direction. Keep in mind, as always, these are low-res versions of the pages, so it may be near-impossible to make out all the words... This sets the stage for a discussion of how comics work and how i'm using them on pages to come.

EVENT NOTE: If you're in NYC Thursday, March 28, I'll be giving a public talk at Adelphi University's Manhattan campus. Registration info and other details here http://comic-theory.eventbrite.com. More soon - Nick





Tuesday, March 19, 2013

Roundup: NYC Talk, GradHacker, ...

An invitation for those in NYC: on Thursday, March 28, I'm delighted to be presenting on my dissertation and comics as a new form of scholarship at Adelphi University's Manhattan campus. In addition to sharing work from the dissertation and exploring distinct ways that comics can present meaning - I also plan to engage attendees in a comics-making exercise or two. Come on out!

Thursday, March 28, 2013 from 6:30pm to 9:30pm At Adelphi Manhattan Center. 
75 Varick St (at Canal) NYC
 The event is free and all are welcome - registration details: http://comic-theory.eventbrite.com 

Can't make it - or want a teaser? I spoke at a conference at The Ohio State University last fall, and they've just posted the video of my talk intercut with the slides I shared, online here. It's rare to have these things documented, so grateful to the Art Education dept at OSU for hosting a great gathering and making this archive.

Last week, my dissertation received a kind mention in an article by Andrea Zellner on the GradHacker site, along with video dissertation abstracts and other alternative dissertation thoughts. It's online here:

http://www.insidehighered.com/blogs/gradhacker/dissertation-2-minutes-long

Also, just today, Professor Pelle Falk of Sweden integrated my rhizomatic page from Ch2 into a Prezi he created on rhizomatic learning. It's on Prezi here.

New pages are overdue - I've been plugging away on them, so hoping later this week. - Nick





Wednesday, March 6, 2013

Talking Comics and Education: Texas and NYC

This week (storm permitting), I'll be off to Fort Worth Texas to participate in the National Art Educators Association's (NAEA) national conference. On Thursday March 7, I'm part of a panel talking comics, education, and research that stemmed from the special issue of the Journal of Visual Arts Research devoted to comics. My piece "The Shape of Our Thoughts" (which along with a link to the others can be found here) has been an important component of my theorizing on how comics do what they do, and I'm in the midst of reworking it and expanding upon those thoughts for Chapter Three of the dissertation. The opening sequence on the confining nature of languages and comics amphibious nature is here. New pages are almost done - i'll post next week.

And coming up in a few weeks, I'm delighted to be presenting on my dissertation and comics as a new form of scholarship at Adelphi University's Manhattan campus. It's the kickoff talk for an ongoing lecture series in Social Theory at Adelphi. In addition to sharing work from the dissertation and exploring distinct ways that comics can present meaning - I also plan to engage attendees in a comics-making exercise or two.

The talk is Thursday, March 28, 2013 from 6:30pm to 9:30pm. (Talk, Conversation, and refreshments following)

@ Adelphi Manhattan Center
75 Varick Street New YorkNY 10013


The event is free and all are welcome - registration and other details here: http://comic-theory.eventbrite.com/

Looking forward to the chance to share and learn from those in attendance. Come on out! - Nick