Mircea Cantor "Deeparture"

This video, on display at the Hirshhorn, I found to be very difficult to access on any meaningful level. The movie takes a deer and a wolf, two animals that might normally represent hunter and prey, and places them in an empty gallery setting. The various camera angles are used to show the multiple different actions of the two animals, and at times the cameras are used to try to create a sort of tension between them that apparently isn't there. The animals seem to be aware of each other, but far more concerned with the outside unseen elements (IE, people, artist, film crew, possible exit, etc.) than anything else. Not that they seemed that interested in any of those things either. The wolf manages to catch a nap. This was the best part because I could relate to the wolf.
I was left with the feeling, after running my way through a series of possible but unlikely motives and intended metaphors that could'nt possibly be applied to this exhibit, that the artist's sole intent was to create a petting zoo, but because he is an artist, he could only afford two animals. That was a joke.
The piece feels incomplete. The symbolism of the animals is somewhat lost by their actions, but not lost enough so that it reads as the artist's intent that their symbolism is lost. The various camera shots, I found to be sort of annoying and unnecessary. In fact, I kind of felt that way about the piece itself.

Dick Higgins' "Intermedia"

Dick Higgins wrote "Intermedia" as a response to what he saw as a stagnate artworld that was confining and static at a time when it should have been elastic. His writing, while making some rather questionable assumptions about the future dissentegration of class among other predictions, is nonetheless noteworthy for its call for media blending and doing away with the object. The argument he makes is strong and passionate even as it relies heavily on his own made up caricatures of artworld stereotypes.
In a sense, the writing seems to have anticipated the contemporary art world as we know it, envisioning the way for limitless interdisciplinary exploration including performance art, studies of decay, conceptual art, sound and video art, installation, interactivity, etc.

"Art of Noises" Manifesto

This manifesto, a call to arms, written by a painter to other painters so they might throw away their paintbrushes and create the first "industrial techno" is pretty interesting.
Luigi Russolo actually says something like- paraphrasing here -the industrial revolution has created its own new unique sound and we should embrace the dissonance and cacophony of it by attempting to replicate its complicated structure.
He continues in the manifesto to define "pure" sound as predefined by four or five different types of instruments. He notes that musicians have struggled with these instruments for hundreds of years to find different ranges and tones but ultimately the answer is to create new intruments for a modern era so that the sounds and energy of the day are reflected in the music created.
In my own experience, sound is just another way to express something. Although I don't think I can compare it to another media form- because all media forms are at least slightly different, it is incredibly maleable.