Beach Augury
(Playamancy)

Art Basel Miami Beach, 2003
Will Pappenheimer, Greg Ulmer and FRE (the Florida Research Ensemble)

"Beach Augury" refers to the ancient practice of setting out a rectangle, often in the sky, and scrutinizing it for a particular period of time to count the number of stars, birds, etc. that pass through. This information was then used to read and give advice for the future. In this case we draw a rectangle in a section of the Edison Hotel webcam in South Beach and watch for beach goers that pass through. We count and account for their attributes. We also call this "Playamancy" from the spanish"'Playa" for beach and the suffix "mancy" for "the art or practice of attempting to foretell events, or to discover the disposition of a person" (Webster's Dictionary). In the resulting series of works, these images are marked by poms, blown up into distant pixel poms, and disseminated throughout world in an attempt to become a source for our contemporary version of a "reading". Greg Ulmer observes that this practice calls attention to a new form of meaningful surveillance.

This project also has an important relationship to the previous work done by FRE in "Miami Miautre." The extended project by members of the FRE from 1998 to present explored(s) the history, geopolitics and inhabitants of the Miami River as it became the problem site of Haitian refugies, Carribean culture and shipping. The river was(is) thus the "other" water of Miami, challenging the glossy tousist image of South Beach. In this case, through the mechanisms of augury, the problem zone of the Miami River, is conjoined with the image of tourist beach culture as a site for asking questions about the situation, my situation and the situation of the place.