Document Actions
July 2002
Newsletter- July 2002
Contents:
I. New Initiatives @ Sarai:
i. OPUS
ii. Linux Access Project
iii. Workshop on New Delhi
II. New @ www.sarai.net
III. Book Launch @ Sarai: 'Galiyon Se / by lanes'
IV. Documenta Platform @ Kassel
V. Talk @ Sarai
VI. Film @ Sarai
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dear Friends,
Necessary renovation at the CSDS have forced us to cut down on some of
our public activities in the next couple of months. We have scheduled
a few events this month to keep the momentum going and hope to
continue as before in the coming months. Do bear with us for the time
being and drop in whenever you can.
And now on to the newsletter where among other things we proudly
announce the launch of OPUS and `Galiyon Se / by lanes', the first
book from the Compughar.
I New Initiatives @ Sarai:
i. Introducing OPUS
OPUS is an acronym for "Open Platform for Unlimited Signification!" It
is a unique online space and software for people, machines and codes
to share, create and transform images, sounds, videos and texts.
The basic idea of the OPUS project is to create an online community of
creative people from all over the world. OPUS allows anyone who logs
on to present their work to an international public and invite other
members to comment and reflect on that work through the attached
discussion boards. Other members are also free to take elements within
the original artwork and use them as the starting point for a new
artwork, without affecting the original. In this sense OPUS is a
platform for open publishing and follows the same rules as those that
operate in all free software communities. The source (code), in this
case the video, image, sound or text, is free to use, to edit and to
redistribute as is the code, i.e. the software itself that lies behind
OPUS. OPUS is inspired by the free software movement and is an attempt
to transpose the principles that govern the creation of free software
on to general cultural production.
Each media object archived, exhibited and made available for
transformation within OPUS carries with it data that can identify all
those who have worked on it. This means that while OPUS enables
collaboration, it also preserves the identity of Authors/Creators (no
matter how big or small their contribution may be) at each stage of a
work's evolution. In this way, OPUS can become a model for a practical
realization of the idea of a Digital Commons of creative work on the
Internet. OPUS users are governed by a license that protects them from
their work being taken out of the commons and into the regimen of
proprietary protocols.
OPUS, which has been written using PHP and MySQL is the first
comprehensive free software application and environment dedicated to
cultural production to come out of the free software movement in South
Asia. OPUS has been conceived and produced entirely at the Sarai Media
Lab.
Work on it began in September 2001 and the Beta version was uploaded
in April 2002. OPUS was launched as a publicly available free
software application, in June 2002 at Documenta 11. The coding of OPUS
was undertaken by Silvan Zurbruegg (from the Hochschule für Gestaltung
und Kunst, Zurich who was on a residency at Sarai), with Pankaj
Kaushal (the Garage Project at Sarai) . Joy Chatterjee (Sarai Media
Lab) worked on the design of the OPUS Interface. Bauke Freiburg (a
student at the New Media Department of the University of Amsterdam,
also on a residency in Sarai) assisted the Raqs Media Collective on
the documentation and worked alongside on the architecture of OPUS.
www.opuscommons.net
ii. Linux Access Project
Sarai, in association with Linux Users Group, Delhi, recently
initiated the Linux Access Project. This project attempts to generate
awareness and use of Free Software in schools in Delhi.
As a first step the Free Software team at Sarai is creating a Red
Hat-based distribution network that will be easily available on a CD.
A few schools willing to start using Linux-based systems have been
identified and a series of workshops are planned through the year to
introduce and familarise students to Free Software programs. The Free
Software Kit prepared by Supreet Sethi and Pankaj Kaushal at Sarai
will be distributed. Members of the project will also extend technical
support.
iii. Workshop on New Delhi
Sarai will be organising a workshop on August 23 and 24, 2002, to
explore new directions for research on "New Delhi". This will be a
preliminary gathering to examine the possibilities of developing a
collective that could engage with both new themes in Delhi's
historical and contemporary life - environment, consumption, leisure -
and also ways in which more traditional research subjects such as
planning, housing, markets, transport, labour, identity and community
relations etc. can be thought anew. We would welcome all those who are
interested in pursuing research in these areas to join us. Please
e-mail your interest to sharan at sarai.net.
II. New @ the Sarai Website
Time Travel to a Possible Self: Searching for the alternative
cosmopolitanism of Cochin
A cultural/psychological journey into Cochin by Ashis Nandy
http://www.sarai.net/compositions/texts/works/cochin.PDF
III. Book Launch @ Sarai:
Release of `Galiyon Se / by lanes'
'Galiyon Se / by lanes' is a bilingual (Hindi & English) compilation
of writings by a group of eleven 15 to 20 year-old young adults
(mostly school drop outs) from the Compughar (Cybermohalla Project) at
LNJP colony, Delhi.
Emerging from interaction that these young adults have had with some
people at Sarai, the book is in the form of diaries reflecting on
their lives in the basti (colony), sharing their lived realities,
through conversations and play with words, ideas, concepts and images,
to form a narration of the everyday.
The diary entries are about city spaces, and the basti in the city -
roads, lanes, water, elections, perceptions, celebrations, accidents,
dislocations, evictions, work situations, technology, selves,
construction, travelling, time, life stories. They include interviews,
stories, essays, write-ups and photographs of the basti. In this
sense, the diaries are layers of images, words and writings, with each
word and entry connected with a whole world of ideas, conversations
and narratives.
To us at Sarai and Ankur, this selection evokes a sense of the
everyday that gestures towards an intricate social ecology - a
specific mode of writing the city that has rarely before been
explored.
'Galiyon Se...' will be released on the 10th of July, 2002. It will
also be available as PDF files on our website.
http://www.sarai.net/community/cybermohalla/book01/bylanes.htm
IV. Documenta Platform @ Kassel
Sarai is one of the co-producers for Documenta11, an extensive
international exhibition of contemporary visual arts, currently being
held in Kassel, Germany. The Documenta exhibition (since its inception
in the 1950s) is widely regarded as being a benchmark for contemporary
aesthetic concerns and practices. This year, Documenta 11, curated by
Okwui Enwezor and his team of six co curators - Carlos Basualdo, Mark
Nash, Octavio Zaya, Sarat Maharaj, Susanne Ghez and Ute Meta Bauer,
brings together the work of 116 artists from all over the world. To
know more about Documenta11, log on to www.documenta.de
i. Installation
An inter media installation (28.28N/77.15E::2001/2002) on the mark of
law on the urban space by the Raqs Media Collective, as well as OPUS
in a media lab environment, are being shown at Documenta11 till
September 15, 2002.
ii. Mailing List
Sarai is also hosting a mailing list - <Discussion-d11 at sarai.net> - an
online discussion on artistic and cultural practices in relation to
Documenta11. This online discussion is being initiatied by the
scholarship holders of the education project team at Documenta 11. The
list is administered by Elisabeth Gerber and Olga Kopenkina. For more
information on this list, log on to
http://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/discussion-d11 or contact the
administrators at d11educationproject at yahoo.com
iii. Discussion Platform
"The Making of the Digital Commons in the Contemporary"
This is a three day forum of discussions scheduled to be held in
Kassel from the 18th to the 20th of July. The broad theme for
discussion is as follows -
"The imperative, challenges and possibilities of media practice in the
context of repression, legal violence and new enclosures in the
contemporary".
Themes & speakers include:
1. The Culture of the Copy
Ravi Sundaram, City/Media Scholar, Sarai, Delhi
2. The Cultural Politics of Shared Creativity in the Digital Public
Domain
Nancy Adajania, Art Critic & Editor 'Art India', Mumbai
3. Intellectual Property Rights, Law and Cultural Creativity
Lawrence Liang, Lawyer and Legal Scholar, Alternative Legal Forum,
Bangalore
4. The Digital Commons
Geert Lovink, New Media Theorist, Society for Old and New Media,
Amsterdam /Sydney
This event is co-ordinated by Raqs Media Collective & Sarai, Delhi,
with Roomade, Brussels and Documenta11, Kassel. For more details,
contact Luise Essen at Documenta11 le at documenta.de and Raqs Media
Collective, at Sarai raqs at sarai.net
V. Talk @ Sarai
The talk will take place at 3:30 pm in the Seminar Room, Centre for
the Study of Developing Societies, 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi - 110054
Urban Cultures and Politics Seminar
July 25, Thursday
Ecosocialist Manifesto
a talk by Joel Kovel
Department of Social Studies, Bard College, New York
Joel Kovel is the co-author, with Michael Lowy, of the `Ecosocialist
Manifesto', an attempt to build bridges worldwide between radicals who look
to an ecological society beyond capital. He has also authored nine books and
over a hundred essays spanning a wide range of issues. His books include
`White Racism' (1970); `The Age of Desire: Case Studies of a Radical
Psychoanalyst' (1981); `Against the State of Nuclear Terror' (1984); `Red
Hunting in the Promised Land: Anticommunism and the Making of America'
(1994); and most recently, `The Enemy of Nature: The End of Capitalism or the
End of the World' (Zed, 2002).
He is also an editor of the journal, `Capitalism, Nature, Socialism'. His
other interests include work with the anti-war movements, and soldarity with
the Nicaraguan and Cuban revolutions. In the US he has been active with the
Green Party. He ran for the United States Senate from New York in 1998 and
also challenged Ralph Nader for the Presidential nomination in 2000. His
recent essay, Passage to India, reflects on a visit to India earlier this
year.
VI. Film @ Sarai
The film screening will take place at 4:30 pm in the Seminar Room,
Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, 29 Rajpur Road,
Delhi - 110054.
Focus on the Documentary
July 26, Friday
The Men in the Tree, Colour, 98 minutes
directed by Lalit Vachani
in Hindi/English/Marathi/Sanskrit with English subtitles
In early 1993, Lalit Vachani and the Wide Eye Film team completed a
documentary film, The Boy in the Branch. Set at the headquarters of
the RSS in Nagpur, the film was about the indoctrination of young
Hindu boys by the RSS branch.
Eight years later, Vachani returned to Nagpur to meet the characters
from his earlier film. At one level, The Men in the Tree is a film
about memory. It is a documentary in the form of a personal revisit
where a filmmaker returns to the issues, the locations and the
subjects of an earlier film.
At another level, The Men in the Tree is a political documentary on
the RSS. It is about some of the individuals, the stories and the
myths, the buildings and the branches that enable the growth of Hindu
fundamentalism.
Cheers,
Ranita
The Sarai Programme
Centre for the Study of Developing Societies
29 Rajpur Road, Delhi - 110054.
www.sarai.net
Contents:
I. New Initiatives @ Sarai:
i. OPUS
ii. Linux Access Project
iii. Workshop on New Delhi
II. New @ www.sarai.net
III. Book Launch @ Sarai: 'Galiyon Se / by lanes'
IV. Documenta Platform @ Kassel
V. Talk @ Sarai
VI. Film @ Sarai
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dear Friends,
Necessary renovation at the CSDS have forced us to cut down on some of
our public activities in the next couple of months. We have scheduled
a few events this month to keep the momentum going and hope to
continue as before in the coming months. Do bear with us for the time
being and drop in whenever you can.
And now on to the newsletter where among other things we proudly
announce the launch of OPUS and `Galiyon Se / by lanes', the first
book from the Compughar.
I New Initiatives @ Sarai:
i. Introducing OPUS
OPUS is an acronym for "Open Platform for Unlimited Signification!" It
is a unique online space and software for people, machines and codes
to share, create and transform images, sounds, videos and texts.
The basic idea of the OPUS project is to create an online community of
creative people from all over the world. OPUS allows anyone who logs
on to present their work to an international public and invite other
members to comment and reflect on that work through the attached
discussion boards. Other members are also free to take elements within
the original artwork and use them as the starting point for a new
artwork, without affecting the original. In this sense OPUS is a
platform for open publishing and follows the same rules as those that
operate in all free software communities. The source (code), in this
case the video, image, sound or text, is free to use, to edit and to
redistribute as is the code, i.e. the software itself that lies behind
OPUS. OPUS is inspired by the free software movement and is an attempt
to transpose the principles that govern the creation of free software
on to general cultural production.
Each media object archived, exhibited and made available for
transformation within OPUS carries with it data that can identify all
those who have worked on it. This means that while OPUS enables
collaboration, it also preserves the identity of Authors/Creators (no
matter how big or small their contribution may be) at each stage of a
work's evolution. In this way, OPUS can become a model for a practical
realization of the idea of a Digital Commons of creative work on the
Internet. OPUS users are governed by a license that protects them from
their work being taken out of the commons and into the regimen of
proprietary protocols.
OPUS, which has been written using PHP and MySQL is the first
comprehensive free software application and environment dedicated to
cultural production to come out of the free software movement in South
Asia. OPUS has been conceived and produced entirely at the Sarai Media
Lab.
Work on it began in September 2001 and the Beta version was uploaded
in April 2002. OPUS was launched as a publicly available free
software application, in June 2002 at Documenta 11. The coding of OPUS
was undertaken by Silvan Zurbruegg (from the Hochschule für Gestaltung
und Kunst, Zurich who was on a residency at Sarai), with Pankaj
Kaushal (the Garage Project at Sarai) . Joy Chatterjee (Sarai Media
Lab) worked on the design of the OPUS Interface. Bauke Freiburg (a
student at the New Media Department of the University of Amsterdam,
also on a residency in Sarai) assisted the Raqs Media Collective on
the documentation and worked alongside on the architecture of OPUS.
www.opuscommons.net
ii. Linux Access Project
Sarai, in association with Linux Users Group, Delhi, recently
initiated the Linux Access Project. This project attempts to generate
awareness and use of Free Software in schools in Delhi.
As a first step the Free Software team at Sarai is creating a Red
Hat-based distribution network that will be easily available on a CD.
A few schools willing to start using Linux-based systems have been
identified and a series of workshops are planned through the year to
introduce and familarise students to Free Software programs. The Free
Software Kit prepared by Supreet Sethi and Pankaj Kaushal at Sarai
will be distributed. Members of the project will also extend technical
support.
iii. Workshop on New Delhi
Sarai will be organising a workshop on August 23 and 24, 2002, to
explore new directions for research on "New Delhi". This will be a
preliminary gathering to examine the possibilities of developing a
collective that could engage with both new themes in Delhi's
historical and contemporary life - environment, consumption, leisure -
and also ways in which more traditional research subjects such as
planning, housing, markets, transport, labour, identity and community
relations etc. can be thought anew. We would welcome all those who are
interested in pursuing research in these areas to join us. Please
e-mail your interest to sharan at sarai.net.
II. New @ the Sarai Website
Time Travel to a Possible Self: Searching for the alternative
cosmopolitanism of Cochin
A cultural/psychological journey into Cochin by Ashis Nandy
http://www.sarai.net/compositions/texts/works/cochin.PDF
III. Book Launch @ Sarai:
Release of `Galiyon Se / by lanes'
'Galiyon Se / by lanes' is a bilingual (Hindi & English) compilation
of writings by a group of eleven 15 to 20 year-old young adults
(mostly school drop outs) from the Compughar (Cybermohalla Project) at
LNJP colony, Delhi.
Emerging from interaction that these young adults have had with some
people at Sarai, the book is in the form of diaries reflecting on
their lives in the basti (colony), sharing their lived realities,
through conversations and play with words, ideas, concepts and images,
to form a narration of the everyday.
The diary entries are about city spaces, and the basti in the city -
roads, lanes, water, elections, perceptions, celebrations, accidents,
dislocations, evictions, work situations, technology, selves,
construction, travelling, time, life stories. They include interviews,
stories, essays, write-ups and photographs of the basti. In this
sense, the diaries are layers of images, words and writings, with each
word and entry connected with a whole world of ideas, conversations
and narratives.
To us at Sarai and Ankur, this selection evokes a sense of the
everyday that gestures towards an intricate social ecology - a
specific mode of writing the city that has rarely before been
explored.
'Galiyon Se...' will be released on the 10th of July, 2002. It will
also be available as PDF files on our website.
http://www.sarai.net/community/cybermohalla/book01/bylanes.htm
IV. Documenta Platform @ Kassel
Sarai is one of the co-producers for Documenta11, an extensive
international exhibition of contemporary visual arts, currently being
held in Kassel, Germany. The Documenta exhibition (since its inception
in the 1950s) is widely regarded as being a benchmark for contemporary
aesthetic concerns and practices. This year, Documenta 11, curated by
Okwui Enwezor and his team of six co curators - Carlos Basualdo, Mark
Nash, Octavio Zaya, Sarat Maharaj, Susanne Ghez and Ute Meta Bauer,
brings together the work of 116 artists from all over the world. To
know more about Documenta11, log on to www.documenta.de
i. Installation
An inter media installation (28.28N/77.15E::2001/2002) on the mark of
law on the urban space by the Raqs Media Collective, as well as OPUS
in a media lab environment, are being shown at Documenta11 till
September 15, 2002.
ii. Mailing List
Sarai is also hosting a mailing list - <Discussion-d11 at sarai.net> - an
online discussion on artistic and cultural practices in relation to
Documenta11. This online discussion is being initiatied by the
scholarship holders of the education project team at Documenta 11. The
list is administered by Elisabeth Gerber and Olga Kopenkina. For more
information on this list, log on to
http://mail.sarai.net/mailman/listinfo/discussion-d11 or contact the
administrators at d11educationproject at yahoo.com
iii. Discussion Platform
"The Making of the Digital Commons in the Contemporary"
This is a three day forum of discussions scheduled to be held in
Kassel from the 18th to the 20th of July. The broad theme for
discussion is as follows -
"The imperative, challenges and possibilities of media practice in the
context of repression, legal violence and new enclosures in the
contemporary".
Themes & speakers include:
1. The Culture of the Copy
Ravi Sundaram, City/Media Scholar, Sarai, Delhi
2. The Cultural Politics of Shared Creativity in the Digital Public
Domain
Nancy Adajania, Art Critic & Editor 'Art India', Mumbai
3. Intellectual Property Rights, Law and Cultural Creativity
Lawrence Liang, Lawyer and Legal Scholar, Alternative Legal Forum,
Bangalore
4. The Digital Commons
Geert Lovink, New Media Theorist, Society for Old and New Media,
Amsterdam /Sydney
This event is co-ordinated by Raqs Media Collective & Sarai, Delhi,
with Roomade, Brussels and Documenta11, Kassel. For more details,
contact Luise Essen at Documenta11 le at documenta.de and Raqs Media
Collective, at Sarai raqs at sarai.net
V. Talk @ Sarai
The talk will take place at 3:30 pm in the Seminar Room, Centre for
the Study of Developing Societies, 29 Rajpur Road, Delhi - 110054
Urban Cultures and Politics Seminar
July 25, Thursday
Ecosocialist Manifesto
a talk by Joel Kovel
Department of Social Studies, Bard College, New York
Joel Kovel is the co-author, with Michael Lowy, of the `Ecosocialist
Manifesto', an attempt to build bridges worldwide between radicals who look
to an ecological society beyond capital. He has also authored nine books and
over a hundred essays spanning a wide range of issues. His books include
`White Racism' (1970); `The Age of Desire: Case Studies of a Radical
Psychoanalyst' (1981); `Against the State of Nuclear Terror' (1984); `Red
Hunting in the Promised Land: Anticommunism and the Making of America'
(1994); and most recently, `The Enemy of Nature: The End of Capitalism or the
End of the World' (Zed, 2002).
He is also an editor of the journal, `Capitalism, Nature, Socialism'. His
other interests include work with the anti-war movements, and soldarity with
the Nicaraguan and Cuban revolutions. In the US he has been active with the
Green Party. He ran for the United States Senate from New York in 1998 and
also challenged Ralph Nader for the Presidential nomination in 2000. His
recent essay, Passage to India, reflects on a visit to India earlier this
year.
VI. Film @ Sarai
The film screening will take place at 4:30 pm in the Seminar Room,
Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, 29 Rajpur Road,
Delhi - 110054.
Focus on the Documentary
July 26, Friday
The Men in the Tree, Colour, 98 minutes
directed by Lalit Vachani
in Hindi/English/Marathi/Sanskrit with English subtitles
In early 1993, Lalit Vachani and the Wide Eye Film team completed a
documentary film, The Boy in the Branch. Set at the headquarters of
the RSS in Nagpur, the film was about the indoctrination of young
Hindu boys by the RSS branch.
Eight years later, Vachani returned to Nagpur to meet the characters
from his earlier film. At one level, The Men in the Tree is a film
about memory. It is a documentary in the form of a personal revisit
where a filmmaker returns to the issues, the locations and the
subjects of an earlier film.
At another level, The Men in the Tree is a political documentary on
the RSS. It is about some of the individuals, the stories and the
myths, the buildings and the branches that enable the growth of Hindu
fundamentalism.
Cheers,
Ranita
The Sarai Programme
Centre for the Study of Developing Societies
29 Rajpur Road, Delhi - 110054.
www.sarai.net