Bio

Daniel Kojta is a new media artist working in the arena of perception of phenomena. Informed by various expeditions thoughout remote Australia and the thoughts of Merleau Ponty, Paul Virilio, and McKenzie Wark, Daniel has presented interactive installations, which engage the audience in immersive environments and challenge their perception of sensual engagement.

Queen Victoria Unidentified Presence Expedition II

Exploration to the local Asylum Circa 20th C. Will be setting up Yowie sightings in area and exploring any remains of equipment for image library. Permission granted. Shoot starts Wed 13 July 2011. Experimenting with costumes of 70's doctors patients nurses.. TBC. Anyone with access to images please send on.

KAPOW II

ZOO

Animus 21st C

Circle Cage - small around 2mtrs in diameter - sign on the inside of the cage alerting to those on the outside - DO NOT FEED THE ANIMALS.

KAPOW I

'Kapow' as in the Batman and Robin bubble text reference, will be used here as a heading to describe a quick idea for a work or concept that I have to get down, in order to expand on and research later.

To begin, as the first 'Kapow' I have been considering the plight of Sisyphus and I am pondering on an object of which he would use to rest his heavy burden. A chair, I definitely like the title for a series of chairs. This may be a work I will use the left over timber from other works of a furniture nature, and create the ideal setting for Sisyphus to rest in. These installations or situations, sets, small environments will be made to be installed throughout locations in the city for those on the treadmill to escape momentarily, a room where time does not function, a broken clock.. And so it goes, Kapow.

[And again, fate has brought the granite boulder back into my visual language... A boulder on my back, made from foam]

Continued with the Guillotine.. Back to the quick short video piece (Disability employment competition).. Option II - the boy continues to make the object and finishes very contentedly with his fathers pride, his mother walks into the room, she sees the finished version, SHOT THROUGH SONS WHEELCHAIR and says something like, "I can see now why you want to become a carpenter son"... text on screen - 'if you can build a piece of furniture from impossible instructions theres nothing stopping you from becoming a carpenter'... (or some other reference) you can do anything - OR - why shouldn't a child dream - OR - if you can dream you can be anything you want for a career. .. the only 'dis' ability is the inability to see ability.."Employ a person with a disability today".

Argie Bargie I, II June 2011. Proposals

I. Chrome version of TRAP for production as model. Furbish in timber, angular.

II. Alien Perception - [line drawing machine K]

Laurice will shoot from ceiling cross beam in Barn studio, straight down to me on floor covered in wall paper - white with relief [flowery pattern relief]. I am drawing holds, any object which I may use as a hold to lift me higher in the scale of this building face. These will include metaphoric objects such as the 70's guide to sex. Some I will draw and use as is. I should also erase some, use several books, use a ladder and then knock it over - to increase the look and strength of the effect. I may fade to projection of me. Draw seat and rest for a break. How to end??

Argie Bargie concept I

TRAPPED

Man and son sit in lounge room assembling IKEA type parts. Various close ups of son and father moments. Close up of Dad proud and son looking through finished object as mum walks through the door, I'm home love - Dad says to son - Shh.. as she enters and trips the TRAP - go to black with the sound of a guillotine type blade sound sliding down with a thud and blood splattering... Open to back of mothers head - zoom out to mothers head rolling out of frame... Dad and son moment.. BLACK Dad and son laughter.

THE ABSENCE OF PRESENCE Reminders of nothing

'Metholated Spirit' 2007

Daniel Kojta

HD Still Image 29 x 42cm

Hill End Residency Series, Bathurst Regional Gallery.

'Clear Ideas' 1958

Magritte, Rene

Oil On Canvas 50 x 60cm

Belgium, Private Collection., Private Collection.

Having not seen this image for many years, I was surprised to see how similar in reference my media works are in both methodology and aesthetics (the floating boulder and obsession with boulders in general to Magrittes floating rock forms) and the methodology of 'nothing'.

Again I am slapped in the back of the head with a connection, the divine lottery, of connection across the ages.

I have been working with the notion of 'levitation', 'gravity', illusion and perception, and, the partner of time; scale:

With a tint of Stelarc, this is a passage I had to include for my own feeble bank retention;

Gould quotes in response to Magritte;

Gould resisted prophesying the future of human evolution, but it would seem that the neotenous trend will continue and accelerate in space—as bones soften, muscles thin out, and brains bulk up. For load-bearing tissue—bone and muscle—gravity is an enriching environment and weightlessness an impoverishing one. For mind-bearing tissue the opposite would seem to be true.

Above quote: Gould 1997.

I have interpreted my concepts of gravity and levitation through various series of works with 'Absence' and 'the perception of absence' or, 'nothing' as a state of presence. I have been working with this subjective perception of absence, supported both in my travels throughout Australia; in the landscapes from Werrington; the remote Iconic territory of the Bogan and, the western suburbs physical representation of this metaphor; the Yowie.. to the yet unfulfilled maiden proposal of the 'Alien Presence' series 1st version of an Alien crash landing in a remote area of the 'absence' filled lands; 'Absentia', on the Barkley Highway between 'Three Ways' and the Queensland Border. This comprehensively articulated production installation of a crash landed UFO was, back then, the first proposal to my Post Grad app. It was altered abruptly due to the inability to create an unidentified object, an 'Alien' aircraft. How do you create something which is by nature 'alien' and present most profoundly in its absence. This was my scrum with Sisyphus. If I build it as proposed, will it cease to be itself; an 'Alien' object. What would it then be; a 'Familiar'?

In the same respect, the 'Yowie' series relies on the beings Absence in order to maintain its' presence, and mythical quality. This project explored the Yowie as myth and, scientific subject. It is the absence of this creature that strengthens the reality of it’s presence. As referenced in the 'Alien Presence' series, Absence is again, presence.

This presents the question of myth to reality. Absence to presence. Can this be reversed with the same quality of authenticity. The seed of this entire inquiry was the theory of 'perception at a distance', and In a continuation of the Phenomena research, Both Robinson Crusoe and the Hunch Back of Notre Dame, the Yowie has been scientifically researched for decades. The hermit, the hobo, the swag-man; these identities represent the model of the introvert who exists outside the directions of society. One that exists in the present, without Ikea, I Pod or 'I need that shiny object'. They live within the simplicity of absence: the Yowie in the bush, the Hermit in a cave, the Hobo on the streets, and the Swag-man on the road with Kerouac.

I should return to the original schmack in the back of the head that started this rant. I will return to Virilio and Ponty in the ring. This time Magritte.

Magritte described his paintings by saying:

“My painting is visible images which conceal nothing; they evoke mystery and, indeed, when one sees one of my pictures, one asks oneself this simple question, 'What does that mean?'. It does not mean anything, because mystery means nothing either, it is unknowable.”

Again the 'Nothing'. Nothing is. And again the presence of this nothing defines its... and so on. It has only just occurred to me that his image, 'Clear Ideas' bears a schmack in the face resemblance to my 'hover' series. This included still images, a series of installs and video projection works. So, here I plant the seeds that will fertilise the next crop, with this shit, to watch the next flower open. For now I will continue to hover above nothing in my absence with an eye on the horizon and perception at a distance.