For the next few months, Switchboard features an annotated bibliography in development, related to the center’s theme for 2009-1010, Speculating on Change. The project is initiated by 2009-2010 fellow Robert Sember, a member of the sound art collective Ultra-red, and is part of their multi-year initiative, School of Echoes, an examination of procedures of collective investigation and social change.

The bibliography assembles a selection of “classic” texts as well as lesser known works that address philosophical, theoretical and ideological conceptions of change, with particular emphasis given to political and social change and shifting approaches to art and cultural production. The bibliography aims to be generous and wide-ranging rather than comprehensive or canonical, and includes a series of brief annotations written by Sember.

Check back monthly for new annotations and other updates. Recommendations for additions are welcome and can be forwarded to the Vera List Center.

Launch School of Echoes.

This project is forthcoming.

More information on Jaume Ferrete.

The Shape of Change project is a navigable archive of American and Iraqi visions of change. Consisting of two projects, it investigates how U.S. and Iraqi citizens perceive and represent personal and political change. The first is an online archive that tracks citizens desire for political change as the two countries attempt to extricate from one another politically, to be used as the basis for art and discussion. The second project is a smaller more personal work, documenting an infant’s early development as it learns to walk and speak, and thus establish itself as an independent social subject.

The two projects serve as counterpoint to one another to create a portrait of the ephemeral nature of change, independence and identity formation.

View the project online at www.shapeofchange.com.

Melanie Crean is an Assistant Professor of Media Design at Parsons and teaches classes in experimental time-based work, mobile media and gaming. The former Director of Production at Eyebeam, she also designed special effects at MTV Digital Television Lab and produced documentaries in Nepal, on subjects that include women trafficking and the spread of HIV along trucking routes. Crean has received commissions from Art in General, Bronx Arts Council, Harvestworks, NYFA, NYSCA, Rhizome & Creative Time.

More information on Crean’s work can be found at www.melaniecrean.com.