VIA (Values, Identity, Art) 2010 a project that is part of Thinc, came together with Depart  to work with Sculpture students from HTL (High Tech Learning) in Hallein  for a workshop where the only requirement was to have no expectations.  The students not only developed sculptures out of string and plastic tubes left from Depart`s performance based on John Cages Four minutes, Thirty-Three Seconds. They also shot and edited these videos at the FH in Puch with Andreas Förster facilitating editing and myself facilitating shooting.

The episodes you see below, are three different interpretations of the same workshop!  What`s evident, is that we all experience the same thing in different ways, all we need to do, is open our learning environments to allow these different ways of seeing to come forward.  Unlocking creativity can allow this diversity, bringing richness of our lives.
        The Big Leap (Der Grosse Sprung) in this workshop; and performance art in general, involves risk and sometimes uncomfortable feelings as well as unexpected outcomes. These factors dynamically interplay between the students/artists/creators, the audience and within the creations themselves. This interplay that the students experienced has further empowered them to edit this montage, aptly named The Big Leap that further illustrates these aspects.  So sometimes practice first, theory last  has given the students an understanding about these components, in a similar way, the video Helicopter meets Thinker, also fully created by the students. Furthermore through practice they have explored Eisenstein's view that "Montage is an idea that arises from the collision of independent shots", without even knowing it previously.  This illustrates one of the variety of ways we need to approach contemporary education.  Thinc differently!
Klasse Bildhauerei HTL – Hallein
Martha Stützle
Astrid Neuner
Tobias Baumgartner
Florian Bogner
Christian Schmöller
Editing workshop facilitator: Andreas Förster
Video workshop facilitator: Jessica White
Performance Art Facilitators: Gregor Ladenhauf, Leonhard Lass, Daniela Schindler

In a further workshop facilitated by Andreas Förester HTL (High Tech Learning, Hallein) at the FH in Puch students were given After Effects and simple characters that had been pre-recorded with movement and costume in a green room as tools. The students decided to explore contemporary issues in a comedic fashion.

In the first of these videos by Martha and Tobias, I was told that here is a representation of the differing power structures of traditionally patriarchal society, represented through monumental symbols such as the Taj Mahal and a authoritarian official in a military style uniform.  His authority could arguably be seen as being represented by his ownership of space.  The students chose to emphasise this by using the special effect of repetition.  The students then suggested that the `made-up` woman in revealing clothes and  holding symbols of wealth and status such as the Louis Vuitton bag woman alludes to the western ideals of power that beauty and wealth will get you anywhere.  In the consumer fetishised west, everything can be bought.

In the second of the two videos HTL students Laura Nowery and Johanna Schwartz also explored symbols of power and authority through Environmental Activism.  Students highlighted aspects of attention and fame that are tied to activism, revealing the less righteous side, by positioning the photographer character as paparazzi.   Here the same character used in the above video as a symbol of control and authority is used here, however, the meaning has changed as to which kind of authority he represents with the context in which the students have put him in.  Here we see a symbol of particularly Austrian control with the police cars in the background, instead of the students alluding to fundamental Islamic authority in the previous video.  Furthermore, students were exploring, in a darkly humorous way, issues of atomic energy in Austria.  The students are perhaps also warning us of the future, that in fact, we may not need activists to prove that extreme damage is being caused.  The proof is evident in energy disasters happening globally, symbolised here through the explosion and barren land that lays before us.

For a longer version see: http://jtamsin.blogspot.com/