The art surrounds you…
I just got off the phone (if that is not too archaic a term) with Bucharest, Romania.
I was the keynote speaker at the Romania Media Conference.
They originally offered to fly me to Bucharest, but I couldn’t work it into the schedule, so I tried Skyping myself into the conference instead.
It worked out pretty well. I was able to do the whole speech from my kitchen table.
Which got me to thinking, why couldn’t, in theory at least, they skype the conference back to me so I could watch and hear what was going on. The technology is available.
Which got me to thinking if I could skype myself into Bucharest, and I could skype Bucharest into my livingroom, could I not also Skype Iraq or Tehran into my living room as well?
In other words, would it be possible to skype another part of the world into your home or someplace nearby to transfer the moment in an all-encompassing way?
(For the geekier in the group, a kind of holodeck).
Preferring to to be tarrred with the ‘Trekkie’ brush, I find a better analog downstairs here at the Museum of Modern Art.
They recently had an overpowering exhibit in their main gallery by the artists Pipilotti Rist, entitled Pour Your Body Out.
It’s a kind of enveloping art, in which you are surrounded on 3 sides by 25 foot high video projections that dominate the walls and overpower the senses.
Interesting… but I think only a foretaste of what is possible for journalism.
We are always looking for what replaces newspapers, and I think, as I have said previously, that our metier is increasingly an art and decreasingly a craft. We should push Journalism as Art.
This is not so unusual. It was, after all, at the MoMA where photography, and in particular photojournalism crossed that line in 1957 with The Family of Man
So looking at the technology that makes it possible for Rist to express herself on massive walls as canvas, and allow people to be immersed into her vision of women’s lives.
Why don’t we do the same thing for Iraq or Gaza (my current point of focus).
Suppose we took the technology that allowed Rist to project her images in this immersive environment and instead placed live webcams on a street in Gaza and simply replicated the reality of one street back to New York, 24 hours a day, live.
If we could take the viewer and put them ‘in’ Gaza.
To see it. To hear it. To be there….
Now, that’s an impressive kind of journalism.
It is not a newspaper story; but even a good newspaper story will transport you in a sense to someplace else and give you the feeling of what it is like to be there.
Now, we can actually replicate the experience.
Is it art?
Is it journalism?
I think it is both and that is no crime.
If we are going to look for the next act in journalism, the last place we should be looking is at the past. That is, at the way that journalism was both created and delivered and then try and fine-tune the process for today’s technologies.
Instead, let’s rethink the whole thing.
How can we convey a sense of moment and place?
6 Comments
emmanuel December 12, 2011
i wan to know the exact defination of immersive journalism and what is its role in our media life?
Michael Rosenblum December 27, 2011
Ever read a great book and get ‘lost’ in it? Do you know what I mean? So captured by it that you lost track of where you were.
Sometimes a book can do that to you. Some books I have read completely changed the way I saw the world for the rest of my life.
I think that great journalism should be able to do the same – but it rarely does.
But that’s what I mean by immersive journalism
Andres Perez June 18, 2009
I like the idea of transporting myself to a multitude of international locations. I am infatuated with journalism and new-wave communication methods so of course this interests me.
My question though, is would it interest others?
It is certainly an interesting and original idea for reporting (and reporting in an artistic way). But for godsakes, we are in the midst of a generation where must people can’t stand watching YouTube videos longer than 30 seconds.
The idea that the masses would immediately be turned on by a new methods simply because it was a new method is a bit naive.
I am also intrigued by the search for a new method of journalism. But I believe the search doesn’t begin with new available technology, but rather the new attitudes of the people.
People currently are enamored with Twitter (short sentences) and YouTube (short vidoes). Maybe I am completely wrong, but I can’t imagine Average Joe wishing to spend enough time in an “emersed environment” and then take the time to investigate/deduce/conclude his thoughts on a certain region.
I like this idea a lot. But I think I like it and I think you like it because we like this stuff. Unfortunately, most people don’t. They just like what they can gain from it (And how quickly).
jonathan berman June 17, 2009
The technology is i in place for increased immersion, but I heard that the powers that be for example in Iran were slowing down the connection speed of internet coming out of Iran, by loading the “pipe” with garbage….
Violeta June 16, 2009
What was your speech about? And the conference in general? I am interested because I am originally from there. I was just thinking about pitching some ideas to the Romanian media outlets …
Thanks.
Adriana June 24, 2009
Hey Violeta,
I’ m from Romania. What’s your idea for Romanian outlets