lookpullscatter:an interview with Barry Smylie and Alan Sondheim

"You will

look pull scatter"

This is how Alan Sondheim and Barry Smylie begin Broken ( http://www.studiocleo.com/cauldron/volume2/contents/index.html ), one of the many lit[art]ure features in Cauldron and Net's second issue (the third issue, which offers even more multimedia delights, has been out for a while now). And it's also an apt description of how the interface of a lit[art]ure piece can (and does, in the case of Broken) become a metaphor in itself--both for the body of the work, and for the human body itself.

Broken is singular among a wealth of lit[art]ure works for many reasons. It combines gorgeous graphics (the color and animation in Broken are breathtaking), an ingenious sound arrangement (the sound operates in many cases interactively--just push your mouse over certain sentences, and you'll hear, in addition to navigate) , and a remarkably apt and engaging textual presence. The themes that seem apparent in Broken are themes of sexuality, longing and domination--and these themes are wonderfully interwoven into both the sound, graphics and interface of the piece. In short, Broken is what every good piece of lit[art]ure is--a multimedia bit of literature.

Over the next few weeks I'll be interviewing both of these artists for insight into both the collaborative process that created Broken and the insistent personal themes of the piece. For anyone wanting more information about these two seminal artists, Barry's homepage is at http://barrysmylie.com/index.htm ; Alan, who has been quite active on the net as both an artist and theoretician, has written what is probably the most comprehensive and enthralling study of the medium itself, The Internet Text; its home is http://www.anu.edu.au/english/internet_txt/.

What follows is the beginning of my interview with these two artists, conducted via email the week of September 24:

Where did the elements come from? images/text/sound

Barry: All the media elements: images, sounds, and text originated in Alan.

Alan: Well, but they were completely transformed in the process; I'd take credit primarily for the text I think.

What was the process of collaboration like on Broken? What were the practicalities? Method?

Barry: It was like publishing a small book of poems on a hand press. Alan wrote it and created the audio visual elements. I did the online visual compositions, musical arangements, animation, and programming.

Alan: And we went back and forth in email; it was quite cogenial.

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