Sunday 20 August 2023

Story Village

All text & images ©2023 Ordo Octopia

All Rights Reserved





故事村

Village Story


Story Village is a place of mythology, existing wherever there are people. 
Its features are found throughout every culture and every era 
of our peoples long history and longer future. 

This particular insight into Story Village came from several sources;

- An exhibition outlining the concept,

- that the exhibition was banned 
from a 3D digital art space Virtual Reality platform 
because the owner is prejudice 
against use of AI art generators to augment storytelling;

- my reaction to that, 
which is to embellish on the themes 
indicated by that series of images 
and their arrangement in the exhibition. 

- The art utilises subject matter as symbolism familiar to the observer. 



Stories grow with the telling. 
They reinvent themselves as necessary. 
Their purpose is entertainment and education. 
Stories require Audience, lest they are forgotten. 

"A picture tells a thousand words." 






故事
兄弟

Story Brothers


The Brothers Grimm dedicated their lives
to collect, reinvent, invent, European folk tales.
They are Storytellers on par with Shaharazade 
in their cultural impact and significance. 





親日

Shinnichi


Falling in love with all things Oriental, 
as many Westerners do,
especially seen amongst subcultures 
of the petro-plastic & digital generation, 
comes discovery of the themes of 
Chinese and Japanese folk tales, 
fairytales and ghost stories
also historic, traditional and contemporary daily lives. 





森林村

Forest Village



The village is in a glade surrounded by a Great Woods. 

The way a forest grows.
A natural place for everything.

Connecting for integration.   
Reaching for diversity. 




A river runs through the village. 

The way a river flows.
Path of least resistance.
Always finding the lowest point.

If a way is blocked, 
grow in size and layers, 
find another route to flow. 




Lonely ruins of ancient buildings surround the village,
many are inhabited. 

The way a village grows.
Generations came before, generations yet to come. 
Our place in the world. 

To decide our role in todays community.
What do we bring? What do we need?
Ways of Trade. 




A Road runs Yonder 



A road runs 

North and South 

Through a village


Cold and Heat, 

Ice and Fire, 

Death and Life, 

Pole and Equator. 


Those are obvious roads 

Well traveled and known. 

Roads worn by many through ages. 

Roads of extreme. 



A road runs 

East and West 

Through a village 


These are the twin roads of 

Separation and Unification. 


These are roads of nuance. 

These are the roads of many paths,

Through worlds and throughout time,

Entwined. 


 

For many Travellers

the Road itself is home. 


The village is a crossroads, 

A melting pot for distillations. 

Temporal distractions for some, 

A place of its own. 





Strangers in the Woods

Guardian and Vigilante,
Bandit and Faye.

Do we trust them?
Do we trust ourselves?

Interchanges of communication
Compare against our Intuition.
Both are primal, lest we forget our survival.

For they are questing too,
All in the Forest are questing.
All here are a part of the Forest
Because they are not of the Village.






How do my own experiences relate directly to the Story Village? 



加美位置

Kami Place

When a river hits a rock,
it grows.
It brings silt to grow a strong tree there. 
It develops diversity,
going two ways around 
instead of ceasing,
instead of remaining,
a singularity of purpose. 
It evolves. 
This is how a river grows. 
It overcomes difficulty,
It continues to flow. 
If it is stilled it grows in depth, 
develops levels, retrospective, reflective. 
Becoming so big it overflows the obstruct.
What once was a trickling stream of optimism
becomes a wise river. 
Water knows;
there is always another way. 
To find the path of least resistance
Must first encounter resistance. 



童夢

A Dream of Childhood

Wild creatures spoke directly to our emotions, intuitions, translated by our minds,
Because our minds were working, then. 
We remembered they were spirits as our own, connected. 
A choice to love or hunt was made. 

As adults we too often forget
This simple awareness. 

The animal souls led us on adventures,
Through paths unknown to those
Who taught us Civilised Ways.

In the Art School I was told; 
"The creative adult is the child who survived." 

I ask; 
"Do you know any real artists?"

I ask again; 
"What is the purpose of Art?" 

It appears
Only the Shamen have the answers. 
The ones who live around the village are called Wizards and Witches.
Those who have cause to pursue their studies semi-civilised. 

I chose my path long ago
Even while others chose it for me.
Living in two worlds,
I became the Bridge.




[TBC]










Saturday 19 August 2023

UASL EXHIBITION

UNITED ARTISTS of SECOND LIFE 

EXHIBITION



Riannah Avora, the manager of UASL

explained about the group: 


“UASL is a relaxed group of artists of all kinds and others who support the arts in SL. 
Designed to be low pressure, easy-going and welcoming to everyone in the group. 
Its purpose is specifically to be pro-artist and support the artist in any way possible. 
We do have some land, not a lot, in which we build and exhibit art 
upon that has been donated to the group. 
UASL is for artists, by artists. 
We are a very pro-artist group.”



I was lucky;

there was a slot the verysameday I rediscovered this sim. 


Notecard > Riannah Avora > 
confirmation response > RA manually added rezzing privileges > 
I booked the slot > I uploaded some pictures



These pictures are some-not-all of a series 
I made recently 
which have now come into focus 
as being the purpose here. 



Creativity is something I am driven to do.
It is an innate need. 
If I cannot or do not do something creative, 
I feel like a bottle of pop which has been shaken,
too much pressure, explosive. 
It is internally painful, emotional and mental. 

Being like this, it means I can draw cause-and-effect
between the stuff I am compelled to make,
and the external world where it fits in.
Nature is holistic. 

Working with creativity this way,
gives a sense of purpose.
Fulfilling, because it is a relief. 
To finally find somewhere I am useful, where I fit in. 

For every one thing I make and share with others,
there are a thousand others unseen which remain in files lost to time. 

Even this space,
ability to communicate about this thing, 
words coming through at this time,
is a part of that process.
It is profoundly cathartic.







網絡:藝術
Cyber : Art




藝術:想像:圖像
Art : Imagine : Image




But then this happened: 






United Artists of SecondLife community boss does not like AI generated images. 

Riannah Avora pulled the exhibition. 




Well that cost me a day of my life.  






DISCLAIMER


I should explain, again, here, for posterity;

My AI generated images
are sourced from original art which I own the copyright of. 
As such the AI images are derivatives of my own legal property 
and are also therefore my own legal property. 
This is based on recommendations of the USA Copyright Office 
issued in 2023 with regard their opinion of how AI should be copyrightable. 

The AI generator is fed prompts,
which a human user decides and enters into the generator.
Prompts are a form of poem, slogan, 
as such they are also copyrightable should anybody declare to do so.
That certainly would somewhat stymie the system for AI art users.

The AI generator used for this series has a clause that 
'once a prompt has been published, it cannot be used again'.
 
There has been no theft nor moral crime committed here
by the creation of new artworks. 

Despite this, the prejudice against AI-augmented art is rife
Even within the cyber-art community.

I do not believe it is so much a case that History will decide.
I believe it is a case that individuals will answer the timeless questions,

What is Art?

What is the purpose of Art? 


My answer is simple: 

Storytelling;
to share experiences,
for expanding collective potential. 

vs 

Repressionism
dedicated to restriction
for fleeting sense of individual empowerment.