"Evasiveness should be classified as a Public Offence"
                                                                                                                     -TURE SJOLANDER

 


 
" I have no friends whatsoever,  and because of that no enemies either, as far as I know"
                                                                                                                                     
                                                                                                   -Ture Sjolander
 


Pioneer In Video-Art

Board Membership and Affiliations
Swedish Artists Society
Board Member (past)


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Ture Sjolander is eager to become a citizen of Australia - but he rejects anything to do with Britain or the Queen. "I love Australia, my greatest concern is that Australians don't love it enough. As soon it is possible to become a citizen of Australia without becoming a subject of the Queen then I will seize the opportunity" he said. In the meantime ex-artist Ture, 54, will keep his Swedish passport and keep hoping for the social changes he sees as vital for Australia in general and for Townsville i particular. "I am tired of art, painting has no relevance in this modern age" said Sjolander, whose work is exhibited in Sweden's National Gallery,
Museum of Modern Art and other international galleries. "All of society has embraced technology, to improve performance and to reach as many people as possible except for the artistic world. It is blinkered and tied to the principle of one-off paintings and limited edition prints. "Perhaps it is still relevant in the Third World countries which have no access to technology but in the Western World it is finished. It is like making only one hand-written copy of a book". Ture believes that the art establishment, the galleries and curators are perpetuating an anachronism and he wants no part of it. His plan is to change the world - well, Australia at any rate. He recently sponsored a public competition to find a new name for the combined city of Townsville/Thuringgova.
...
Although they have now separated, Ture continues to live in Townsville with his 20-month-old son, Matu because he thinks it is an ideal place. When he first arrived, he found that people were much friendlier if they thought he was a tourist. They would welcome him and offer help. If he said he lived here, their concern and interest shut of immediately. "S I started to pretend that I was a tourist and people in shops and buses and taxis were extremely friendly. When I saw the same person again I would tell them I was back again on holiday." Ture has abandoned this game now and hopes for a political future. His concerns are many and he is passionate about them all. Ture Sjolander not one to remain uncommitted even though some of his views may seem contradictory. On the one hand he is concerned about over-developement of Townsville. He feels that it is a good size now and double the population, as some developers have promised to do would destroy the lifestyle many find attractive.
...
Mr Sjolander, of Townsville, a Swedish expatriate, says he will expose the harsh realities of the social issues affecting the area i a series of two-minutes segments of "electronic art" to be aired weekly on television. he will buy the air-time with a State Government arts grant. "This is not a paint brush, it is a power tool," Mr Sjolander said. "I will criticise all the things that people ignore or don't want to think about to make them aware through art. "So much art doesn't touch people anymore, or has no relevance." Mr Sjolander, a passionate and outspoken man, has been involved in art from painting to videoproduction, since 1962. He has written several internationally published books, including Garbo, a pictorial biography of movie star Greta Garbo, and was commissioned by the 70s Swedish rock phenomenon Abba to create a tapestry. Mr Sjolander was also commissioned by silent screen star Charlie Chaplin to produce an art portfolio.
...
"These are all the things that happen in this area and they should be expressed in art to reflect the area," Mr Sjolander said. He believes art in the modern world should be expressed using technology and says that paintings are out-dated. He has even devised a plan to exhibit art on the walls of Townsville Airport terminal "for all the world to see". The large vacant walls in the terminal should be used to hanf paintings and tapestries, and sculptures could adorn the flight deck, the first-class lounge and the departure lounge, he said. His proposal suggest that the artworks be acquired on a six-montly basis and artists may have them on for sale. "Art can be anything at all," Mr Sjolander said.
...
A PILOT project to display art on the vacant wall spaces at the Townsville airport has been proposed by local artist Ture Sjolander.
...
Mr Sjolander believes that as the airport is the first point of contact for businessmen, domestic and overseas tourists and returning residents, there was no reason why the airport itself should not become an attraction. "I propose that the large vacant wall spaces be used for a semi-permanent art display which could include a number of large paintings and tapestries. " In addition to this, a small number of free standing sculptured piece could be easily be accomodated." Mr Sjolander believed the flight deck, the first class lounge and the departure lounge were other attractive areas where graphic and smaller size artworks could be displayed. "These could be accomplished with minimal installation of lighting and hanging equipment," he said. "The pilot project for Townsville airport can be realised with very little outlay, mutually benefiting the professional contemporary artists of North Queensland and the Federal Airports Corporation". From this experiment could evolve the creation of a unique airport environement which could become the blueprint for others, Mr Sjolander said. He also envisaged the formation of an art investment consultancy group under the airport corporation for future interstate exhibition exchange. Support for the venture has been pledged by Perc Tucker Gallery director Ross Searle and artist and James Cook University art teacher Anne Lord, both of whom have expressed wish to join Mr Sjolander on the selection committee for the first exhibition.
...
Mr Ture Sjolander's artistic work represents more than one technique, from traditional tapestry work to visualisation of electronic computing. He is a pioneer in video-art. His work contributed to the development of the video-synthesizer. Mr Sjolander has earned an international reputation for his multimedia art work since his debut in 1960. "Mr Sjolander has also served as a member of the board of the Swedish Artists Society," former Minister for Cultural Affairs in Sweden, Mr Bengt Goransson.
...
Mr Sjolander has produced television programs for Swedish Television including
The Role of Photography, Time, Monument, and Space in the Brain. He is skilled in all kinds of printing techniques and is also a professional photographer. Mr Sjolander has written several internationally published books.
...
Mr Sjolander has created monumental sized interior artwork for large industrial complexes in Sweden using various techniques. He has had a large number of seminars and exhibitions throughout Europe and he participated in the Fifth Biennale in Paris. He has given lectures throughout world on art and technology, includinga lecture last year at the Australian Film Institute in Sydney. One of the topics of his lectures is possible establishment of multicultural communication by satellite. This would include a three week international TV high tech and arts festival, the commersialisation of peace via satellite and the formation of an internatinal lobby group to connect all Television systems of the world. He is presently involved with negotiations with Uplinger Enterprises (USA), the organisation which organised Live Aid and Sport Aid, about establishing an annual three week satellite link up.
...
Mr Sjolander has conducted research into Townsville's history and the city council have received a proposal to revise the history of the city. His research has shown the first European to land in Townsville arrived 49 years earlier then previously believed. The discovery may be celebrated with a special Townsville Day and a 220 year celebration in 1990. He is also skilled in radio productions and TV production. Mr Sjolander is interested in establishing an international artist's centre in Townsville to display exhibitions from international artists. He was a member of the Perc Tucker Regional Art Gallery and believes i
Fusion Business. He is neither political nor religious but believes in authentic humanity.

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This letter is to introduce the Swedish artist, Mr. Ture Sjolander.

His artistic work represent more than one technique from traditional tapestry-work to the visualisation of electronic computing.

He is a pioneer in video-art. Already 1964-65 he created a video-art piece which was entitled :

" The Role of Photography ".

His work contributed to the development of the video-synthesizer.

Mr. Sjolander has won recognition outside Sweden for his multi-media art work.

In 1980 he was one of the founders of the Video Nu (Video Now VideoCenter), an independent laboratory for artistic terminal development.

Mr. Sjolander has also served as a member of the board of the Swedish Artist's Society (KRO). Sjolander is represented at The Museum of Modern Art in Stockholm, and the National Museum in Stockholm to mention a few.

He participated in the 5th Bienniale in Paris.

The Swedish Government, the City Council of Stockholm, and the Royal Fund for Swedish Culture have awarded him grants for his work.

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This is to introduce Mr. Ture Sjolander well-known Swedish artist/film producer, particulary in the experimental field.

Sveriges Radio, the Swedish Broadcasting Corporation, has transmitted several of Mr. Sjolander's interesting, advanced feature films.

The following titles: "The Role of Photography", " TIME ", " MONUMENT " and " SPACE IN THE BRAIN ", which include productions of an unusual technical character, have been subject to grants by the Swedish Government and the City of Stockholm.

...
This letter is to introduce the Swedish artist, Mr. Ture Sjolander.

His artistic work represent more than one technique from traditional tapestry-work to the visualisation of electronic computing.

He is a pioneer in video-art. Already 1964-65 he created a video-art piece which was entitled :

" The Role of Photography ".

His work contributed to the development of the video-synthesizer.

Mr. Sjolander has won recognition outside Sweden for his multi-media art work.

In 1980 he was one of the founders of the Video Nu (Video Now VideoCenter), an independent laboratory for artistic terminal development.

Mr. Sjolander has also served as a member of the board of the Swedish Artist's Society (KRO). Sjolander is represented at The Museum of Modern Art in Stockholm, and the National Museum in Stockholm to mention a few.

He participated in the 5th Bienniale in Paris.

The
Swedish Government, the City Council of Stockholm, and the Royal Fund for Swedish Culture have awarded him grants for his work.

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Ture Sjolander is eager to become a citizen of Australia - but he rejects anything to do with Britain or the Queen. "I love Australia, my greatest concern is that Australians don't love it enough. As soon it is possible to become a citizen of Australia without becoming a subject of the Queen then I will seize the opportunity" he said. In the meantime ex-artist Ture, 54, will keep his Swedish passport and keep hoping for the social changes he sees as vital for Australia in general and for Townsville i particular. "I am tired of art, painting has no relevance in this modern age" said Sjolander, whose work is exhibited in Sweden's National Gallery, Museum of Modern Art and other international galleries. "All of society has embraced technology, to improve performance and to reach as many people as possible except for the artistic world. It is blinkered and tied to the principle of one-off paintings and limited edition prints. "Perhaps it is still relevant in the Third World countries which have no access to technology but in the Western World it is finished. It is like making only one hand-written copy of a book".
Ture believes that the art establishment, the galleries and curators are perpetuating an anachronism and he wants no part of it. His plan is to change the world - well, Australia at any rate. He recently sponsored a public competition to find a new name for the combined city of Townsville/Thuringgova.
...
Although they have now separated, Ture continues to live in Townsville with his 20-month-old son, Matu because he thinks it is an ideal place. When he first arrived, he found that people were much friendlier if they thought he was a tourist. They would welcome him and offer help. If he said he lived here, their concern and interest shut of immediately. "S I started to pretend that I was a tourist and people in shops and buses and taxis were extremely friendly. When I saw the same person again I would tell them I was back again on holiday." Ture has abandoned this game now and hopes for a political future. His concerns are many and he is passionate about them all. Ture Sjolander not one to remain uncommitted even though some of his views may seem contradictory. On the one hand he is concerned about over-developement of Townsville. He feels that it is a good size now and double the population, as some developers have promised to do would destroy the lifestyle many find attractive.
...
Mr Sjolander, of Townsville, a Swedish expatriate, says he will expose the harsh realities of the social issues affecting the area i a series of two-minutes segments of "electronic art" to be aired weekly on television. he will buy the air-time with a State Government arts grant. "This is not a paint brush, it is a power tool," Mr Sjolander said. "I will criticise all the things that people ignore or don't want to think about to make them aware through art. "So much art doesn't touch people anymore, or has no relevance." Mr Sjolander, a passionate and outspoken man, has been involved in art from painting to videoproduction, since 1962. He has written several
internationally published books, including Garbo, a pictorial biography of movie star Greta Garbo, and was commissioned by the 70s Swedish rock phenomenon Abba to create a tapestry. Mr Sjolander was also commissioned by silent screen star Charlie Chaplin to produce an art portfolio.
...
"These are all the things that happen in this area and they should be expressed in art to reflect the area," Mr Sjolander said. He believes art in the modern world should be expressed using technology and says that paintings are out-dated. He has even devised a plan to exhibit art on the walls of Townsville Airport terminal "for all the world to see". The large vacant walls in the terminal should be used to hanf paintings and tapestries, and sculptures could adorn the flight deck, the first-class lounge and the departure lounge, he said. His proposal suggest that the artworks be acquired on a six-montly basis and artists may have them on for sale. "Art can be anything at all," Mr Sjolander said.
...
A PILOT project to display art on the vacant wall spaces at the Townsville airport has been proposed by local artist Ture Sjolander.
...
Mr Sjolander believes that as the airport is the first point of contact for businessmen, domestic and overseas tourists and returning residents, there was no reason why the airport itself should not become an attraction. "I propose that the large vacant wall spaces be used for a semi-permanent art display which could include a number of large paintings and tapestries. " In addition to this, a small number of free standing sculptured piece could be easily be accomodated." Mr Sjolander believed the flight deck, the first class lounge and the departure lounge were other attractive areas where graphic and smaller size artworks could be displayed. "These could be accomplished with minimal installation of lighting and hanging equipment," he said. "The pilot project for Townsville airport can be realised with very little outlay, mutually benefiting the professional contemporary artists of North Queensland and the Federal Airports Corporation". From this experiment could evolve the creation of a unique airport environement which could become the blueprint for others, Mr Sjolander said. He also envisaged the formation of an art investment consultancy group under the airport corporation for future interstate exhibition exchange. Support for the venture has been pledged by Perc Tucker Gallery director Ross Searle and artist and James Cook University art teacher Anne Lord, both of whom have expressed wish to join Mr Sjolander on the selection committee for the first exhibition.
...
Mr Ture Sjolander's artistic work represents more than one technique, from traditional tapestry work to visualisation of electronic computing. He is a pioneer in video-art. His work contributed to the development of the video-synthesizer. Mr Sjolander has earned an international reputation for his multimedia art work since his debut in 1960. "Mr Sjolander has also served as a member of the board of the Swedish Artists Society," former Minister for Cultural Affairs in Sweden, Mr Bengt Goransson.
...
Mr Sjolander has produced television programs for Swedish Television including The Role of Photography, Time, Monument, and Space in the Brain. He is skilled in all kinds of printing techniques and is also a professional photographer. Mr Sjolander has written several internationally published books.
...
Mr Sjolander has created monumental sized interior artwork for large industrial complexes in Sweden using various techniques. He has had a large number of seminars and exhibitions throughout Europe and he participated in the
Fifth Biennale in Paris. He has given lectures throughout world on art and technology, includinga lecture last year at the Australian Film Institute in Sydney. One of the topics of his lectures is possible establishment of multicultural communication by satellite. This would include a three week international TV high tech and arts festival, the commersialisation of peace via satellite and the formation of an internatinal lobby group to connect all Television systems of the world. He is presently involved with negotiations with Uplinger Enterprises (USA), the organisation which organised Live Aid and Sport Aid, about establishing an annual three week satellite link up.
...
Mr Sjolander has conducted research into Townsville's history and the city council have received a proposal to revise the history of the city. His research has shown the first European to land in Townsville arrived 49 years earlier then previously believed. The discovery may be celebrated with a special Townsville Day and a 220 year celebration in 1990. He is also skilled in radio productions and TV production. Mr Sjolander is interested in establishing an international artist's centre in Townsville to display exhibitions from international artists. He is a member of the Perc Tucker Regional Art Gallery and believes i Fusion Business. He is neither political nor religious but believes in authentic humanity.

 
   


"Jobs', accomplishents, at Pixar conveniently remain a mystery too, since we're just supposed to take it as read that he did great things, honest. Pixar itself broke ground, allegedly, but it may as well have broken wind instead, since it should be pointed out that it did not exactly invent computer animation. That honour goes to a man called Ture Sjolander, who in 1965 electronically manipulated images [that] were broadcasted by the Swedish Television. Oddly though, there's no Wikipedia page for Ture Sjolander, and no mention of him in the Timeline of computer animation in film and television. When Ture Sjolander dies, I doubt there will be any global headlines bearing his name, or flowers and fruity snacks left in shop doorways, and no fawning eulogies from presidents either. Obviously he's just not rich enough to qualify for hysterical adulation."

"So who exactly broke grounds here? Pixar, for merely creating something longer, or Information International, Inc., for being the first to use CGI animation in a major motion picture? And what about Ture Sjolander, who made the first electronic animation as far back as the early 1960s? Doesn't he deserve any credit at all?"

But no, Pixar takes the prize, because its production was longer, or in reality, because it's from Hollywood and made lots of money. As for real technical breakthroughs? Bleh, who needs that? Just show me the money, right?

And note that none of this had anything to do with Steve Jobs, at all, yet he's been lauded with the accolade of somehow being responsible for it all, in some mysterious way that (unsurprisingly) no one can quite put their finger on.


"Evasiveness should be classified as a Public Offence"
                                   -
TURE SJOLANDER
Democracy can't work without peoples trust
                                  Me -
My own Network

Published nov. 2006.

The Artist that invented Computer Animation

Aapo Saask on the artist
Ture Sjolander


On an island aptly named Magnetic Island off the coast of Australia, a Swedish artist lives in exile. Just like so many others in today's media-landscape, he was first praised and then brought to dust. However, he has left a lasting imprint on the world. As early as the 1960's, he made the first electronic animation. Had he been an inventor, he would have been celebrated as a genius today, but because he is a predecessor in the world of art, things are different. In that world, the great ones often have to die before they are recognized.

We all know how Disney's famous cartoons were made: thousands of drawings, filmed in sequence. Even today some films are made this way. However, electronic animation has opened up a new world within the film industry and it has also made computer games and countless graphic solutions possible in business and science.

Pixar, which used to be part of Lucasfilm and then sold to Steve Jobs in the lat 1980's, made the first completely computer animated film called "Andre and Wally B" in 1983. The first feature length fully animated movie was Toy Story from 1995. It was made by Pixar and distributed by Disney. Disney had already started to use computer animation in Little Mermaid from 1989, and then on through Aladdin, Lion King, Pocahontas, etc In those fantastic movies the pictures were however first drawn on paper and then scanned into computers for painting and cleanup and superimposition over painted backgrounds.

Decades earlier, in 1965, Ture Sjolander’s electronically manipulated images were broadcasted by the Swedish Television (SVT). Among other things, Ture Sjolander was experimenting with the question of how much the portrait of a person could be changed before it was unrecognizable, something which has pioneered the amazing morph-technique that is used today.

Gene Youngblood, who, alongside with Marshall McLuchan, is the most celebrated media-philosopher of today, devoted a whole chapter in his book Expanded Cinema, 1970, (Pre face by Buckminster-Fuller) to the experiments of the SVT. Expanded cinema means transgression of conventions as well as mind-expanding transgressions and new definitions. Sjolander’s broadcasts were not technically sophisticated, but they were ground-breaking.

The film mentioned by Youngblood  is "Monument" (1968) by Ture Sjolander and Lars Weck. The other earlier televised pioneering animation were "TIME" (1965/66) by Ture Sjolander and Bror Wikstrom, and later "Space in the Brain" (1969) by Ture Sjolander, Bror Wikstrom, Sven Hoglund and Lasse Svanberg. Whereas most of the modern-day artists fade into oblivion, Ture Sjolander has found his place in the art history by the making of those films.

Ture, a lad from the northern city of Sundsvall, had instant success with his opening exhibition at the Sundsvalls Museum 1961. He moved to Stockholm in the beginning of the 1960's. At an exhibition in 1964 at Karlsson Gallery his imagery upset the public so much that the gallery immediately became the trendiest place for young artists in Stockholm.

In 1968, he created another scandal, when the film "Monument" was televised in most European countries.
For a couple of years, Ture Sjolander was celebrated in France, Italy, Switzerland, Great Britain and the USA.

In Sweden there was a lot of jealousy. The Museum of Modern Art and the National Gallery of Sweden, to name a few, bought his works, but the techniques he worked with were expensive and after a few years, he found himself without resources. Instead he started to work with celebrities such as Charlie Chaplin and Greta Garbo. They taught him that exile – mental and physical - is the only way to escape destruction for a creative genius. He moved to Australia.

Ture Sjolander's works include photos, films, books, articles, textiles, tv-programs, video-installations, happenings, sculptures and paintings – all scattered around the Globe. Tracing will be a challenging and exciting task for a future detective/biographer and web-archaeologist's.

But mostly, his work consists of a life of questioning and creation. This is what sets him aside as one of the great artists of the 20th century.

Another forerunner in the art world, the internationally celebrated Swedish composer Ralph Lundsten, says in an interview in the magazine SEX, 5, 2004: "In those days (the 19th century), a painting could create a revolution. Today people look idly at all the thousands of exhibitions that there are.’ Hmm. Oh, really. How clever he is’, and they yawn… If I were a visual artist, and if my ambition was to create something new, I would devote myself to the possibilities of the computer."

In 1974, Sherman Price of Rutt Electrophysics, wrote to the Swedish Television Company (SVT): "Video Synthesis is becoming a prominent technique in TV production here in the United States, and I think it will be interesting to give credit to your broadcasting system and personnel for achieving this historic invention."

He was referring to Ture Sjolander's revolutionary work in the 1960's. No one at the SVT could at that time imagine the importance that this innovation would have for television, and hereby lost a lead position in the computer-development business.

Amongst the younger generation of computer animators, few know that they have a Swedish predecessor.
Many engineers were probably working away in their cellars in those days, trying to do the same thing, but Sjolander was the first person to show his results on the air. If any of you would like to have a look at the Godfather of animation, you can find a glimpse of him by googling.

He did not seek to patent his inventions and he has made no money from it. However, he has made it to the history books as one of the great precursors of art - and perhaps also of technology - of the 20th century.

For the past decades, Ture Sjolander has mostly lived in Australia, but he has also worked in other countries, such as Papua New Guinea and China.

After a couple of decades of silence, Sjolander's groundbreaking work was shown at Fylkingen, the avant guard media and music hide out in Stockholm in the spring of 2004.

In the autumn of 2004, some of his recent acrylic paintings on canvas were exhibited at the Gallery Svenshog outside of Lund, Sweden. This was to commemorate the forty years that have gone by since his last (scandalous) exhibition at Lunds Konsthall. Many artists take a pleasure in provoking the established art world. Ture Sjolander also provokes the rest of the world.




COPYRIGHT © BY AAPO SAASK
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
THIS TEXT MAY BE QUOTED
WITH PROPER ACKNOWLEDGMENT.





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Ture Sjölander



 
 
"the origins of video art"  pages: 116, 117, 118 and 181, 182  and 183.
 
 
 
A HISTORY of VIDEO ART
by Chris Meigh-Andrews
 
 
During the period between 1965 and 1975, which could be considered as the defining period of video art, there was significant research activity amongst artists working with video to develop, modify or invent video imaging instruments or synthesizers.
 
 
The first generation of video artist/engineers include Ture Sjolander, Bror Wikstrom, Lars Weck, Eric Seigel, Stephen Beck, Dan Sandin, Steve Rutt, and Bill and Louise Etra, in addition to the well-documented collaborative work of Nam June Paik and Shuya Abe.
 
 
The work of these pioneers is important because, in addition to exploring the potential of video as a means of creative expression, they developed a range of relatively accessible and inexpensive image manipulation devices specifically for 'alternative' video practice.
 
 
 
 
TURE SJOLANDER AND MONUMENT
 
In September  1966  Swedish artists Ture Sjolander ( 1937-, Sweden) and Bror Wikstrom broadcast Time, a 30-minute transmission of electronically manipulated paintings on National Swedish Television. Sjolander and Wikstrom had worked with TV broadcast engineer Bengt Modin to construct a temporary video image synthesizer which was used to distort and transform video line-scan rasters by applying tones from waveform generators. The basic process involved applying electronic distortions during the process of transfer of photographic transparencies and film clips. According to Modin they introduced the electronic transformations using two approaches. The geometric  distortion of the scanning raster of the video signal by feeding various waveforms to the scanning coil, and video distortion by the application of various electronic filters to the luminance signal.
 
Sjolander had begun working with broadcast television with the production of his first multimedia experiment The Role of Photography, commissioned by the National Swedish Television in 1964, which was broadcast the following year. With the broadcasting of Time, his second project for Swedish television, Sjolander was well aware of the significance of his work and importance of the artistic statement he was making:
Time is the very first video art work televised at that point in time for the reason to produce an historical record as well as an evidence of original visual free art, made with the electronic medium - manipulation of the electronic signal - and exhibited/installed through the television, televised.
 
In 1967, Sjolander teamed up with Lars Weck and, using a similar technological process, produced Monument, a programme of electronically manipulated monochrome images of famous people and cultural icons including the Mona Lisa, Charlie Chaplin, the Beatles, Adolf Hitler and Pablo Picasso. (Separate text of this work as below)
This programme was broadcast to a potential audience of over 150 million people in France, Italy Sweden, Germany and Switzerland in 1968, as well later in the USA. Subsequently, Sjolander produced a Space in the Brain (1969) based on images provided by NASA, extending his pioneering electronic imaging television work to include the manipulation and distortion of colour video imagery. A Space in the Brain was an attempt to deal with notions of space, both the inner worldof the brain and the new televisual space created by electronic imaging.
 
Sjolander, originally a painter and photographer, had become increasingly dissatisfied with conventional representation as a language of communication and began experimenting  with the manipulation of photographic images using graphic and chemical means. For Sjolander, broadcast television represented  truly contemporary communication medium that should be adopted as soon as possible by artists - a fluid transformation and constant stream of ideas within the reach of millions.
The televised electronic images Sjolander and his collaborators produced with Time, Monument and Space in the Brain were further extended via other means. The television system was exploited as a generator of imagery for further distribution processes including silkscreen printing, posters, record covers, books and paintings that were widely distributed and reproduced, although ironically signed and numbered as if in limited editions.
 
It seems likely that these pioneering broadcast experiments were  influential on the subsequent  work of Nam June Paik and others. According to Ture Sjolander, Paik visited Stockholm in the summer of 1966 and was shown still images from Time while on a visit to the Elektron Musik Studion (EMS). Additionally, Sjolander is in possession of a copy of a letter dated 12 March 1974 from Sherman Price of Rutt Electrophysics in New York, acknowledging the significance of Monument to the history of 'video animation', and requesting detailed information about the circuitry employed to obtain the manipulated imagery. In reply, Bengt Modin, the engineer who had worked with Sjolander, provided Price with a circuit diagram and an explanation of their technical approach to the project, claiming he 'no longer knew the whereabouts of the artists involved'.
 
THE PAIK-ABE SYNTHESIZER
 
The Paik-Abe Synthesizer, built in 1969 is one of the earliest examples of a self-contained video image-processing device. As we have seen, Ture Sjolander and his collaborators had brought together video processing technology in temporary configuration to produce their early broadcast experiments, Paik's synthesizer was a self-contained unit built expressly and exclusively for the purpose. The instrument, or video synthesizer, as it came to be known, enabled the artist to add colour to a monochrome video image, and to distort the conventional TV camera image.  -.......
Extending a dialogue that they had begun in Tokyo in 1964, electronic engineer Shuya Abe and Nam June Paik began building a video synthesizer in 1969 at WGBH-TV in Boston, possibly spurred on by the work of Sjolander in Sweden.
 
from Chris Meigh-Andrews book,
A HISTORY OF VIDEO ART, Publisher BERG, Oxford-New York. First Edition October 2006
 
 
representative video art works
pages 181, 182 and 183
 
MONUMENT, TURE SJOLANDER AND LARS WECK (WITH BENGT MODIN), 1967
( BLACK AND WHITE, SOUND, 10 MINUTES. COMMISSIONED AND BROADCAST BY NATIONAL SWEDISH TV, 1968)
 
Monument, characterized by Ture Sjolander as a series of  'electronic paintings' is a free flowing colage of electronically distorted and transformed icoic media images. Set to a similarly improvised jazz and sound effects track, images of pop stars, political and historical celebrities and media personalities, culled from archive film footage and photographic stills have been electronically manipulated - stretched, skewed, exploded, rippled and rotated. The relentless flow of semi-abstracted monochromatic faces and associated sounds seems to both celebrate and satirize the contemporary visual culture of the time. In its fluid mix of visual information it generalizes the television medium, draining it of its specific content and momentary significance. It creates a kind of 'monument' to the ephemeral - all this will pass, as it is passing before you now.
 
Archive film footage and photographic stills of familiar faces and people, such as Lennon and McCartney, Chaplin, Hitler, the Mona Lisa - the 'monument' of the world culture - flicker and flash, stretch and ooze across the television screen. In some moments the television medium is itself directly referenced, the familiar screen shape presented and rescanned, images of video feedback and, at one point, its vertical roll out of adjustment, anticipate Joan Jonas's seminal tape, although for very different purposes. The work anticipated a number of later videotapes, particularly the distorted iconic images of Nam June Paik.
Gene Youngblood described the psychological power and effect of these transformations i his influential and visionary book Expanded Cinema (Youngblood 1970):
 
Images undergo transformations at first subtle, like respiration, then increasingly violent until little remains of the original icon. In this process, the images pass through thousands of stages of semi-cohesion, making the viewer constantly aware of his orientation to the picture. The transformations accur slowly and with great speed, erasing perspectives, crossing psycological barriers. A figure might stretch like a silly putty or become rippled in liquid universe. Harsh basrelief effects accentuate physical dimensions with great subtlety, so that one eye or ear might appear slightly unnatural. And finally the image disintegrates into a constellation of shimmering video phosphores.
 
Sjolander and his collaborators at Sveriges Radio (the Swedish Broadcasting Company) in Stockholm had worked together on a number of related projects since the mid-1960s, beginning with The Role of Photography, Sjolander's first experiment with electronic manipulations of the broadcast image in 1965. This project was followed with the broadcast of Time (1966), a thirty-minute transmission of 'electronic paintings' produced using the same temporarily configured video image synthesizer that was later used to create Monument.
The system that Sjolander and his colleagues used involved the transfer of photographic images (film footage and transparencies) to videotape using a 'flying-spot' telecine machine. This process produced electronic images which they transformed and manipulated by applying square and sine signals with a waveform generator during the transfer stage, often using this process repeatedly to apply greater levels of transformation.
For Sjolander and his collaborator Lars Weck, the broadcasting of Monument was the epicentre of an extended communication experiment in electronic image-making reaching out to an audience of millions.
Kristian Romare, writing in a book published as part of an extended series of artworks which included publishing, posters, record covers and paintings after the broadcasting of Monument, describes the scope of Sjolander and Weck,s vision and aspirations for the new image-generating technique they had pioneered:
see separate article Sjolander,s CV on the Internet. www.monumentintime.homestead.com/
 
SCAN MODULATION/RESCAN
In this process images are produced using a television camera rescanning an oscilloscope or CRT screen. The display images are manipulated (squeezed, stretched, rotated, etc.) using magnetic or electronic modulation. The manipulated images, rescanned by a second camera are then fed through an image processor. This type of instrument was also used without an input camera feed, the resultant images produced by manipulation of  the raster. Examples of this type of instrument include Ture Sjolander,s ' Temporary " Video Synthesizer (1966-69), the Paik/Abe Synthesizer, and the Rutt/Etra Scan Processor (1973).
 
 

 
 

----Original Message Follows----
From: Christopher Meigh Andrews <
cmeigh-andrews@uclan.ac.uk>
To: turesjolander <
turesjolander@hotmail.com>
Subject: RE: Monument

Date: Wed, 01 Jun 2005 12:14:19 +0100
 


Ture,

As you rightly say, there is a sense in which the American artists have
written everybody else out of the history of video art. I would like to
put some people (such as yourself) back in! I would like to use an image
or two from the stills of Monument that I have found on the web, but
they are very low resolution. Would you be willing to e-mail an image of
greater resolution? (300dpi would be best- jpeg or tiff, if possible)
also, i attach a little form so that you grant me the rights to
reproduce the image in the book. Is this OK? if so, please fill it in
and send it back to me.

I would like to do more than simply paraphrase what Gene (Youngblood)
has written in Expanded Cinema, which as you say is what M. Rush has
done. Any chance that you can tell me a little bit more about your ideas
with Monument and how it began? I will of course piece togther what I
can from the web site, and from what Aapo Saask has written. I also will
talk to Brian Hoey and Peter Donebauer. i also have the Biddick Farm
catalogue from the exhibtion at Tyne & Wear, which has a little info.

All best wishes to you- and i will certainly send your regards to Brian
& Peter!!!

Chris




Dr. Chris Meigh-Andrews PhD (RCA) MA, HDCP
Electronic & Digital Art Unit
38 St. Peters Street
Preston PR1 7BS
www.uclan.ac.uk/edau

Tel: 01772-893204
Fax: 01772-892921
Mobile: 07855954298

http://www.meigh-andrews.com
 

"Evasiveness should be classified as a Public Offence"
                                   -TURE SJOLANDER
Democracy can't work without peoples trust
                                 
Me - My own Network