The concept of GLIFIC is a reversal of contemporary trends in web-based media, whereby the concept of tagging media is transformed back onto itself. Rather
than tagging images, video, and content with words, GLIFIC uses media (primarily images) to tag words themselves. Narratives, news and current events are
translated back into a glyphic form that breaks language barriers through the re:symbolization of communication. Visitors can explore different texts and the
images that make them up.
The concept of GLIFIC is a reversal of contemporary trends in web-based media, whereby the concept of tagging media is transformed back onto itself. Rather than tagging images, video, and content with words like Flickr, Delicious, and other social bookmarking sites, we use media (primarily images) to tag words themselves. Instead of tagging one photos with a dozen words, we seek to tag one word with a dozen images. At any given point the word AUTOMOBILE could have tens of different visual representations. Using images as tags we then rebuild nar- ratives, news and events by replacing the words in their text.
Narratives, news and current events are translated back into a glyphic form that breaks language barriers through the re:symbolization of communication. Obama’s inauguration speech, C.S. Lewis’ Alice in Wonderland, or the continuous stream of news feeds from sources like Al Jazeera or The New York Times can be written backwords from their linguistic forms into pictographic re-interpretations.
This project has two main components: exhibition installation & web presence. The exhibition installation is the project that is being presented in this applica- tion. The web presence for Glific represents a second branch of the project that is intended to publicize the concept in a more available format, as well as to provide a community-based system for gathering more images and building a robust da- tabase of images, words and stories. These media are then available to be used in the exhibition setting where visitors can explore new themes, current events, and other glificized texts. The web portion of this project is ongoing.
Exhibitions
Ars Electronica Festival, Interface Cultures campus exhibition 3.9. - 8.9.2009, GlificSantralistanbul, Uncharted: User Frames in Media Art, 21.3. - 16.8.2009 Glific