5. Research Project
A fifth repertory category may be evolved through the Research Project, an activity obligatory for all the members of the Scratch Orchestra, to ensure its cultural expansion.
The Research Project. The universe is regarded from the viewpoint of travel. This means that an infinite number of research vectors are regarded as hypothetically travellable. Travels may be undertaken in many dimensions, e.g. temporal, spatial, intellectual, spiritual, emotional. I imagine any vector will be found to impinge on all these dimensions at some point or other. For instance, if your research vector is the Tiger, you could be in volved in time (since the tiger represents an evolving species), space (a trip to the zoo), intellect (the tiger’s biology), spirit (the symbolic values acuired by the tiger) and emotion (your subjective relation to the animal).
The above is an intellectual structure, so for a start let’s make the research vector a a word or group of words rather than an object or an impression etc. A record of research is kept in the Scratchbook and this record may be made available to all.
…
Example:
Research vector: The Sun
Research record:
29.vi. Looked up astronomical data in EB & made notes to the accpt of dustmotes (symbol of EB) and sunbeams
1-28.vii. Holiday in the Bahamas to expose myself to the sun
29.vii. Saw ‘the Sun’ as a collection of 6 letters and wrote out the 720 combinations of them.
1.viii. Go interested in Sun’s m. or f. gender in different languages, and thence to historical personages regarded as the Sun (like Mao Tse-Tung). Sought an astrological link between them.
Cornelius Cardew in
Cox, Christoph and Daniel Warner, Audio Culture: Readings in Modern Music. New York: Continuum, 2004. 236-7.