Then there will be errors. Lots of them. And cursing.

Editors for livecoding systems tend to look flashy, presenting both the code and its results in a stylised manner, attempting to turn the whole of the programming process into a sort of play. That is; until something goes wrong, then we might feel like some piece of décor came falling down and we are exposed to  the wood and cables behind it all. I don’t think this need be that way. Errors are great; errors allow for growth, for discovery and for learning about the system we use. Errors tell us about what we thought we knew yet don’t -yet- and help us learn. If livecoding is to expose the artistic process, as opposed to merely exposing the methods employed, errors and their cousin the debug-print should demand their centre-stage role. Similarly, programmers shouldn’t need to break the flow of their process for longer than is strictly necessary to notice something is wrong, diagnose the issue and remedy it.

Let’s focus on Fluxus. I’ve been writing quite a bit of Fluxus lately and recently discovered that Scheme (which Fluxus is based on) allows us to define how we’d like to deal with errors right in the language itself. Fluxus, on top of that, provides us with ways of turning text into 3d objects placed in the Open-GL scene the system creates. With some routing and hackery we can re-route the error messages into the main scene, instead of the somewhat out of the way repl, fully exposed to the audience and without a need for the programmer to switch screens and find them in a small font at the bottom of a likely dense page where the programmer instantly finds them, leaving the audience wondering.

Here’s a example;

Here my code is in white. First it asks Fluxus to build a cube, which works fine as Fluxus knows (build-cube). Then it requests a unicorn, which fails as Fluxus doesn’t know anything about that animal. If I wanted to build one I would have to define what they are like, hence Fluxus generates a error message. My code catches this message, scales it to be as large as possible and puts it on the screen, in the editor’s font, behind the code yet before stuff like the cube. It’s still a bit crude, but it works and it’s fun.

Here’s the code; dramatic_errors

Add that to your .fluxus.scm and from there on (display) and any errors will be printed right to the scene itself. (clear-print) will get rid of them again (hopefully we’ll think of a more clever way of removing them soon). Edit, remix, debate on the list. No warranties, no refunds.

To explain for international readers ; “bouwt” means “builds”, though in Dutch, at the end of a sentence it could also be read as a order; “build!”. I made this impulsively in the then freshly squatted Asta (a former cinema, now a unused dance club here in The Hague, lately squatted,in protest, by a group of local cultural organisations). I’d like to talk for a moment about the process of making it.

Last Tuesday morning I walked into The Asta, still a bit hungover from the BBQ the night before; a BBQ that had the dual purpose of  celebrating The Asta being back in use and cooking the food leftover from the IFM festival. I had followed a call to help clean the building, cleaning isn’t much fun, but this seemed like a good moment to roll up my sleeves. Tuesday was also the day the Dutch government was set to vote on the law against squatting and some groups had called -using rather aggressive imagery and phrasings- for protests. I was instead more interested in a demonstration, a demonstration of what can be done with a empty building and little to no budget. Much like the cultural organisations who took the initiative I feel there is a urgent need for space, in the centre of the city, where artists can perform/exhibit/experiment without economic factors or the (sometimes) restrictive atmosphere of regular clubs limiting them too much.

As I walked in I saw my friend (and occasional opponent in debate) Olof van Winden being interviewed by local television. I thought it best to stand back, but the interviewer (and camera-woman) invited me to help explain the link between the (in)famous local elektro scene and squatting, as well as share the idea that it seems profoundly counter-productive to put a stop to the one kind of self-sufficient cultural institute we have in a time of proposed budget cuts on culture. De Illusie was a rather convenient example.

I  took a broom to the alleyway-entrance and the hallway. A mess there would look unwelcoming to visitors and re-enforce stereotypes visiting journalists and their audience might have. More importantly it was a obvious first step towards making the place inhabitable and usable as a stage for whatever exhibitions, concerts and performances were to follow.

After a few hours I got bored of the broom and was wondering how I could do something more interesting with the (rather large amount of) local trash so I started exploring. In a dark and messy side-room, amongst debris, I found a few old banners that I unfolded, hoping they might hold something amusing. One had the name “The Hague” (as well as a company name), another had “bouwt!” (and more advertising) and a third was rather boring to me (later its reverse side was used as a canvas). I thought about joining the two words  but wasn’t so sure I should; was this meaningful? Was it worth the effort? Contemplating this I strolled around more. I grabbed a beer and didn’t feel like joining either the people talking on the stage or the others updating social media on their laptops. Funny how everyone gravitated towards sitting on the stage, even in front of a empty floor. I wanted more activity and so took the free floor space to join the two banners (combined they were several square meter so I needed a lot of space). Spread out like that I quite liked the word “bouwt”, it seemed like a nicely constructive counterpoint to the word “kraak” (the Dutch word for “squatting”, literally; “cracking”). It seemed to me to be a pleasant contrast against the destruction implied by the mess we were inhabiting at the moment, as well as the destructive spirit, commonly, but typically mistakenly, associated with the squatting movement.

No means of stitching these together were at hand, so the only option I saw was creating a wooden frame, and bolting everything to it with screws. As I started hauling around wood (more found material) something quite interesting happened; about half a dozen people spontaneously asked me whether I needed help. Perhaps they too were looking for something fun to do. Perhaps they too liked to build stuff together and see where you end up. With this small team of welcome volunteers, some of which I hadn’t seen before, others I already knew, some having professional experience in construction, others holding a electric screwdriver for the first time, the banner was completed.

Once it was finished the simplicity and the size seemed to appeal to all, reinforcing the idea that we were constructing something together, that you can create nice things from abandoned materials and spaces, especially if you join forces.

What started as a rather simple project became – to me – a micro-level analogy for the squatting of the Asta. Sadly this is now all the more so because it’s looking like the appropriation of the building has turned into more of a message than a solution in itself; the building will have to be cleared because, according to the fire-department, it is extremely dangerous. This leaves a few questions; how did it get to be in this state that is supposed to be in grave and immediate danger of collapse, fires breaking out and heaven knows what else? Wouldn’t such a building form a danger to the surrounding buildings and the local population as well?

From that perspective we could almost call covering up the holes in the floor in a communal attempt to make the room safe a political act. To be perfectly honest though; I suspect I mainly like to build stuff.

Details on the Steim site.

Close to home we encountered a group of young men standing on a street-corner. One (of -I imagined- half Moroccan decent, aged between 12 and 15) eyed me, so I expected trouble and looked back. Instead of “trouble” I read a mixture of trouble and befuddlement in his face. We walk on and after about three steps I hear him say something behind me. “Are you brown or white?”, in an uncertain voice.  Neon street lights are great at efficiency and visibility yet weak at colour. I didn’t say a thing, but the question stuck with me. Not so much because I’m insecure about what the answer might be (facial recognition experts tell me we are -mostly- all the same colour with different saturation values, mine is fairly unsaturated) but because apparently he needed the answer to this to determine how to respond to my presence on “his” street-corner.

I imagine this must get tricky around there, a lot of the time. I’m sure worse cases than Frisian sporting ‘fro’s cross his territory on a daily basis.  Poor thing.

I’ll be presenting the “Gate” installation that I made last summer as well as project a version of my Fluxus village that should react to the sound. This will hopefully turn the exhibition onto a sort of playground. If it all gets done in time….

herderinnestraat 16 – den haag

Stop by.

Rob&me have been playing sets each using our own homebrew sequencer and taking turns playing a song. We find that more interesting than playing a solo set each; at times we challenge each other, at other moment we can act as a safety net.

Stop by if you’re around.

> Sweet, you’re trying it with LuaJIT! In the README where I say “try
> LuaJIT for extra speed” I really mean it. If you TRY it, I’m very
> interested in how it works out.

Ok, so this is “bleeding edge” in the sense that actual cutting will
be done. Ok, got that. And I don’t know Lua. And I only understand the
bits of C++ that work like ChucK. Great, business as usual, then. I’ll
try this normally first and if that doesn’t work we’ll add fire to the
situation and see whether that improves anything.

Into the second hour, however, when looking for something new to make a sound with, my eye was struck by the turntables. I ended up putting some objects (a can and a empty beer bottle) on them and hanging others from wires attached to mic stands right above them. Then, instead of playing, I stood back to admire the resultant system. I now wonder whether I’m very consistent  or merely set in my ways.

The question would bother me more if we hadn’t had so much fun, I think.

More editing; corrected link