The Thalassocentric Apparatus

230 Pages·2016·4.66 MB·English

by  John Harl

Title The Thalassocentric Apparatus: Connected art processes
from the sea showing multi-scale changes through their
own emergence and collapse
Type Thesis
URL https://ualresearchonline.arts.ac.uk/id/eprint/13332/
Date 2015
Citation Hartley, John (2015) The Thalassocentric Apparatus:
Connected art processes from the sea showing multi-scale
changes through their own emergence and collapse. PhD
thesis, University of the Arts London and Falmouth
University.
Creators Hartley, John
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The Thalassocentric Apparatus:
Connected art processes from the sea showing multi-scale
changes through their own emergence and collapse

John Hartley

October 2015

Submitted as practice based PhD awarded through University of the Arts London
Collaborating Establishment: Falmouth University

ESF funded research project, undertaken at Falmouth University with the support of
Exeter University and business partners Mojo Maritime and the National Maritime
Museum Cornwall
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Abstract

The sea changes in many ways and on many levels. These changes are complex
and highly connected and as a result are hard to predict
Connected, changing systems of different scale are found in many areas of life. As
well as physical systems such as the sea, they are apparent in emerging and
collapsing ecological systems (Gunderson, Holling 2002), in systems of human
ideas such as the philosophy of Deleuze and Guattari and, as I argue, in arts
practice.
Although attempts to know the sea are inherently difficult, they also offer
opportunities. For example, if we were better able to perceive the changes of the
sea, we might better approach other pressing problems that categorise our current
age, such as climate change and the threat of collapse within other socio-ecological
systems. A sea-centred form of ecological thinking could promote awareness of
change and connection on different scales in varied realms.
I demonstrate how forms of change, initially familiar through the movements of the
sea, can be understood through arts practice. I refer to this sea-centred, ecological
perception as ‘thalassocentric’i, (from the Greek thalassa, sea). This term denotes
an outlook that (in some way) originates within the sea, even if it then addresses
land, social arrangements or human imagination. Although thalassocentric
understanding is derived from the movement of waves, I show that the concept can
be developed as a useful tool for understanding changes beyond the oceans.
Having analysed a number of key creative practices that engage with the contexts
described, I develop an arts-centred use of the term 'apparatus'. I show that art
apparatuses can be considered to move and change in ways that are also
thalassocentric. This model is tested and applied through a series of creative
projects which suggest that changes within art apparatuses can help us understand
changes elsewhere. It therefore offers a valuable model that can contribute to our
knowledge and understanding of other complex systems.

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Dedicated to Sal, Ivy and Lola for their loving patience
and to my parents for their support and encouragement.
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Contents

Part 1 Developing the Requirements of the Thalassocentric Apparatus

Introduction 8
Chapter 1 Articulating the Problem of the Sea 10
Chapter 2 Sea Swimming Drawings 33
Chapter 3 Apparatuses 53
Chapter 4 Change in Complex Systems 68
Chapter 5 Making an Artistic Apparatus Visible 86
Chapter 6 Changing, Connected Philosophy of Multiple Scales 98

Part 2 Practice Review of Artworks

Chapter 7 Artworks of Emergence and Collapse 118

Part 3 Original Artworks that Result in a Thalassocentric Apparatus

Chapter 8 Hydrohacks and their Documentation 148
Chapter 9 Research Summary 185

Notes 193
Bibliography 200

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Part 1

Developing the Requirements of the Thalassocentric Apparatus

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Introduction
This research thesis is structured in three sections. The first, longest, written section
builds a context, methodology and set of evaluative tools that will be used in
sections two and three. The second section is a review of artworks by other artists.
The third addresses my own, original artworks that best respond to the issues
uncovered.

Adequately responding to the sea requires a range of types of knowledge. Which
types of knowledge and how they will help arts practice is an important question.
Using a method developed by Karen Barad I will borrow and test knowledge from
different perspectives against artworks to progress the research in stages. As this
research progresses, I will construct and justify a type of interdisciplinary research
that uses arts practice to connect complexity theory, philosophy, hacker culture and
socially distributed outdoor fieldwork and so respond to the challenges I set out. I
will approach the conditions of the sea (which I describe as change and connection
on different scales) as being about shape. This will allow different types of
visualisation of change to be attempted.

The thesis is concerned with the sea, its connections and the ways it changes. It is
also concerned with ecological changes of our time and will seek to show similarities
in these types of change in a way that includes people in different ways. So the
research is interested in shapes of change in non-human systems and also in
human systems. The tools and processes of art (which I will describe as art
apparatuses) are part of the human world (including our thoughts) and also the non-
human world (including the sea and wider processes of ecological change). A
discussion of how art functions as an apparatus is part of the discussion in the first
stage.

So in that first part of the research, I will produce and test initial artworks against a
number of critical contexts from various disciplines, to move the research forward in
steps. The 'shapes' of change that the works presented will also progress and
develop and become about representing change in different ways. The artworks I
develop and test through the initial section of this research will establish the
requirements for a thalassocentric apparatus.

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These artworks include a series of drawings undertaken following sea swimming; an
interactive installation looking at complex patterns of collapse in sand; and a
performance that produced changing sound waves at the same time as showing the
equipment it used in terms of changing waves. Each of these works will answer
some questions and leave others unanswered, in a way that helps determine the
next stage of enquiry. Through responding to the questions that arise in the artworks
I will select and use different additional references and types of knowledge. Only
after this first stage is completed, and the initial artworks are investigated and
evaluated against other disciplinary knowledge, will the research have produced
tools that will be used in its second and third stages.

Once this is completed, I will be in a suitable position to evaluate works of other
artists against the connected changes of different types and scale, seen in the sea.
The second stage does this, undertaking a review of existing relevant works using
the tools developed in stage one of the thesis.

Finally, I will be able to present a series of original artworks that draw together the
themes discussed. The final stage of the thesis does this by addressing the
production of original artworks that respond to the initial question in the terms and
context developed, to present original findings. It describes the resilience and
sustainability of artworks in terms of how they are produced and disseminated.
These works include devices made from discarded or cheap materials used in novel
and unlikely ways. In particular, the works include underwater cameras and
hydrophones and a sea kayak that can be used as a research platform. The
instructions documenting the processes for making these works are shown to be an
important part of the artworks too, and a final artwork documents the production of
the kayak using long-lasting ceramic tiles.

I will discuss these works to show how the movements of the sea and of ecology
can also be seen in the changes of thalassocentric art apparatuses. Using wave
terms I will describe the emergence and collapse of materials, artworks, the spread
of knowledge about how to make the artworks and the infrastructure that allows the
artwork to happen. I will show movements of emergence and collapse in the
thalassocentric apparatus as relevant to the movement of the sea and to the
changes in ecology. This is proposed as the contribution to knowledge of this thesis.
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