Drift Deck Proposal
"Drift Deck"(Submitted for consideration for Conflux Festival 2008.)
An edition of artist-designed decks-of-cards that can be used to enact urban walks in the spirit of the Situationists' "Dérive".
We are proposing to design and print a limited edition set of drift cards for use during the Conflux Festival. These cards will take the spirit of the drift as their motivation and use contemporary actions, objects and situations as the cues to interrupt movement and direction.
These cards will be thoughtfully designed and printed with a unique visual language and simple set of instructions for embarking on a dérive. The cards will consist of cues and possible actions. The cues are effectively things that are seen, heard or sensed. The actions are instructions on how to adjust one's perambulation. Each card will have one cue and one or more possible actions. A simple decision tree allows the perambulators to determine which action or actions to take, including how to pick the subsequent card.
Cues will include routine sitings or sensings. For example, a cue may be "Walk by a newsstand." When the ambulators walk by a newsstand, they refer to the action tree and pick one based on the card's instructions. For example, an action may be, "slow your pace by half for two blocks, then pick the third card down in the deck." Cues will be both "traditional" as well as more contemporary, such as "Receive an SMS", which may lead to an action such as "turn around and take a digital photography of the people behind you."
No comments yet.