The Rhizome Digest merged into the Rhizome News in November 2008. These pages serve as an archive for 6-years worth of discussions and happenings from when the Digest was simply a plain-text, weekly email.

Subject: RHIZOME DIGEST: 08.18.06
From: digest@rhizome.org (RHIZOME)
Date: Fri, 18 Aug 2006 12:08:33 -0700
Reply-to: digest@rhizome.org
Sender: owner-digest@rhizome.org
RHIZOME DIGEST: August 18, 2006

Content:

+opportunity+
1. gill AT watershed.co.uk: Clark Bursary - UK Digital Art Award
2. info: Art Blog links at Furtherfield.org
3. Jeff Ritchie: CFP: International Digital Media and Arts Association
Conference "Work in Progress/Rate of Change" (deadline:9/15/06; conference
dates: 11/9/06-11/11/06)

+announcement+
4. Ignacio Nieto: <Up Dating, Art and Technology>
5. Ryan Griffis: Parking Public Beta Database
6. Mel Alexenberg: new book: the Future of Art in a Digital Age

+thread+
7. T.Whid, marc, ARN, Ryan Griffis, Jim Andrews, Pall Thayer: New media
art shouldn't suck
8. marc, T.Whid, rob AT robmyers.org, Jim Andrews, ARN, Patrick Tresset,
bram, Lee Wells: Charlie puts NMA's down...

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Rhizome is now offering Organizational Subscriptions, group memberships
that can be purchased at the institutional level. These subscriptions
allow participants at institutions to access Rhizome's services without
having to purchase individual memberships. For a discounted rate, students
or faculty at universities or visitors to art centers can have access to
Rhizome?s archives of art and text as well as guides and educational tools
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subsidized Organizational Subscriptions to qualifying institutions in poor
or excluded communities. Please visit http://rhizome.org/info/org.php for
more information or contact Lauren Cornell at LaurenCornell AT Rhizome.org

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1.

From: gill AT watershed.co.uk <gill AT watershed.co.uk>
Date: Aug 15, 2006
Subject: Clark Bursary - UK Digital Art Award

Final call for proposals:

Mon 4 Sept 2006 is the forthcoming deadline for applications for the Clark
Bursary - 6th UK Digital Art Award. Initiated in 1998, the Bursary
provides opportunities for creative development in digital media through a
residency programme, and has built a reputation for innovation,
development and quality. Watershed Media Centre and partners including
Situations at the University of the West of England, are pleased to offer
the award of ?17,500 enabling an exceptional UK artist working primarily
in digital media, to develop their career and proposed idea/s through a
supported residency at Watershed, Bristol UK.

A new website is now online where you can find full guidelines and
download an application form, please visit
http://www.dshed.net/clarkbursary
The site features work by previous recipients and a studio space where
this year's artist will document there development process.

The Clark Bursary is funded by J A Clark Charitable Trust, Watershed, and
Arts Council England South West. In association with the University of the
West of England, Bristol.

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2.

From: info <info AT furtherfield.org>
Date: Aug 17, 2006
Subject: Art Blog links at Furtherfield.org

Art Blog links at Furtherfield.org

We have been receiving and collecting links for Art Blogs on furtherfield
for a little while now. And we thought that it might be a good idea to see
who else is out there currently creating 'Art Blogs'.

We are particularly interested in finding 'art blogs' that are created as
'art objects/pieces/works of art', and blogs observing, writing about net
art & meda arts culture.

Before sending, we advise you to check to see if you are not already on
there and to see that your blog might belong elsewhere in another links
section regarding its content and context.

If you wish to submit an Art Blog, please do it via email using this email
address - info AT furtherfield.org

Submission Format (example):

title - The creative Nipper.
info (about) - no more than 200 words.
URL - http://www.artblogger.it

Art blog links section:
http://www.furtherfield.org/displaylinks.php?link_set=11

Thank you - Marc.

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3.

From: Jeff Ritchie <ritchie AT lvc.edu>
Date: Aug 18, 2006
Subject: CFP: International Digital Media and Arts Association Conference
"Work in Progress/Rate of Change" (deadline:9/15/06; conference dates:
11/9/06-11/11/06)

November 2006 International Digital Media and Arts Association Conference
"Work in Progress/Rate of Change"
http://idmaa.org/idmaaNovember2006/

Call for Papers

The fourth annual International Digital Media and Arts Association
Conference seeks abstracts for papers that explore the reality of the
constantly changing digital universe in which we live. This brave new
world is a constant work in progress. Whereas the old reference point was
the finishing of "something" (be it media object, art form, or business
practice); now the issue is not completion, but rate of change. Nothing
stands still. While this was always true, the evolution of the digital
world we all live in has brought this into clear focus.

The conference welcomes academics, artists, and industry representatives
to participate in refereed paper presentations, panels, discussion
workshops, gallery talks, performances, and hands-on tutorials. The
conference will begin on November 9th and end on November 11th and will
also include a juried exhibition and a vendor fair. This conference is
hosted in San Diego, California by National University.

The four main conference categories for the November 2006 iDMAa Conference
are 1) Art/Design, 2) Business/Industry, 3) Education, and 4) Media/Games.

The Conference seeks submissions of abstracts (500 words maximum) for
presentation and discussion. All abstracts will be refereed for
acceptance. Those works selected for the conference will then be reviewed
for possible publication in _The International Digital Media and Arts
Association Journal_. Submissions will be for one of four main conference
categories.

Please send all submissions by September 15th, 2006 to:
Aleksandra Vinokurova at Avinokurova_at_nu.edu

Abstracts should be submitted for review as an attachment in either
Microsoft Word or PDF format (please include your last name in the
filename). Abstracts should include a cover letter indicating your
preferred conference category and should follow standard academic paper
formatting conventions. Participants are also encouraged to propose panels
on topics of specific interest. Panel submissions should include a brief
description of the panel topic and list of panelists (include a short vita
for each panelist). Authors will be notified via email of acceptance by
approximately September 30, 2006.

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Support Rhizome: buy a hosting plan from BroadSpire

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Purchasing hosting from BroadSpire contributes directly to Rhizome's
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4.

From: Ignacio Nieto <ignacio_nieto01 AT yahoo.es>
Date: Aug 12, 2006
Subject: <Up Dating, Art and Technology>

Dear friends and collaborators,

TROYANO
<Up Dating, Art and Technology >
...........................................................
A series of conferences that will aboard the limits between art and
technology from the last expiriencies made by artists. The event is
divided in two phases;

<---/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
-From 6 pm in the Centre Cultural of Spain of Santiago, Chile, during the
days 17, 18 and 19 of
August, will be boradcasted online to Espacio H
located in the city of Cordoba, Argentine. These
actvities will be part of the 8th Digital Days Works
from Cordoba, Argentine.
2006
/////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////--->
-Since the days 24th, 25th y 26th of August in the
School of Arts in the city of Valparaiso, will be
transimitted the 8th Digital Days Works from Cordoba,
Argentine.

PROGRAM..............................................................................................

Cultural
Centre of Spain of Santiago, Chile
_____________________________________________________________________
17 of August / 18 - 21 hrs.
-Igor Stromajer (sl) <Mobil Technology>: Wpack.
-Marina Zerbarini (ar) <Bio Arte>: Heat, Vapor
Humidity. Turner in the
XXI cent.
-Enrique Rivera (cl) <Technology and Politics:
Cybernetic Synergy,Basis
and Convergence betweenen Art + Science+ Technology
in Chile

_____________________________________________________________________
18 of August / 18 - 21 hrs.
-Dmitry Bulatov (ru) <Bio Art>: Third Modenization:
Works of Techno-
Biological Art Works -
-José Miguel Tagle (cl) <Bio Art>: The Brain of the
Chaman.
Neurobiological Rersearch and Bioelectronic
Instalations.
-Mirko Petrovich (cl) <Technology and Politics>:
Gesture Control in the
Audiovisual Interactive Systems.
_____________________________________________________________________
19 of August / 18 - 21 hrs.
-Angellique Waller (us) <Technology and Politics>:
Ebay Longing
-Eduardo Navas (sa-us) <Technology and Politics>: The
Culture of
Remix. The influence of the Break in DJ in the
Ideology of the
Repetition.
-Marc Tutters (ca) <Mobil Technology>: Beyond the
Locative Medias

l----------------------- >more information
www.t-r-o-y-a-n-o.cl


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5.

From: Ryan Griffis <ryan.griffis AT gmail.com>
Date: Aug 13, 2006
Subject: Parking Public Beta Database

The Temporary Travel Office is updating it's database of parking lots and
utopias in order to create more flexible visualizations and analyses.

We welcome new additions to our ongoing research archive from web- based
visitors, as well as mobile participants. Data can be submitted in the
form of voice recordings (via phone) and/or text and image uploads.

As our research is specifically focused on the development of parking
within the United States, we can only support US-based participation. To
participate or just to see currently available data, point your browser
to:

http://temporarytraveloffice.net/hollywood/parking.html

Mobile participants should go to
http://temporarytraveloffice.net/mobilecontent.html

More about Parking Public:
Parking Public is a research initiative documenting specific histories of
parking lot development as it relates to the more general ideology of
utopian capitalism. The initiative involves a three part process: 1) in
situ research of parking lots including participatory walking tours 2)
general public surveys of idiosyncratic notions of utopia in contrast to
the structured mundane reality of auto parking 3) a proposal for a
monument/memorial (nonument) to the 20th century parking lot in the United
States. The Travel Office is conducting research in various cities and
towns across the United States, as well as utilizing telecommunications
technologies to document the interactions between local and networked
spaces -- immediate and distant desires.


Visit the Temporary Travel Office online
http://www.temporarytraveloffice.net

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6.

From: Mel Alexenberg <melalexenberg AT yahoo.com>
Date: Aug 17, 2006
Subject: new book: the Future of Art in a Digital Age

Dear Rhizomers,
As fellow explorers at the intersections of art, science, technology, and
consciousness, I am sure you will enjoy my new book discused by our
colleagues below.

The Future of Art in a Digital Age: From Hellenistic to Hebraic Consciousness
By Mel Alexenberg
Published by Intellect Books, 2006
http://www.intellectbooks.co.uk/ppbooks.php?isbn=1841501360

In his book, Mel Alexenberg navigates his artistic insight amid the
labyrinthian complexities, explosions, and revolutions of the past forty
years of art, tracing his way amid questions of science and religion,
technology and environment, education, culture, and cosmos. Everyone will
find his book full of new vantage points and vistas, fresh insights that
give a uniquely personal history of artistic time that indeed points to
new and open futures.
- Lowry Burgess, Dean, Professor of Art, Distinguished Fellow of the
Studio for Creative Inquiry, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh.

Mel Alexenberg, a very sophisticated artist and scholar of much experience
in the complex playing field of art-science-technology, addresses the
rarely asked question: How does the "media magic" communicate content?
- Otto Piene, Professor Emeritus and Director, MIT Center for Advanced
Visual Studies, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge.

This is a wonderful and important book. The author links the history of
art to the important role played by various forms of thinking in the
Jewish tradition and connects that to the emerging culture of digital
expression. Brilliant insights and new ways of seeing make this a
must-read for anyone interested in the intellectual history of images in
the 21st Century.
- Ron Burnett, author of How Images Think (MIT Press, 2005), President of
Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design in Vancouver, Canada, and
Artist/Designer at the New Media Innovation Center.

The Future of Art in a Digital Age: From Hellenistic to Hebraic
Consciousness opens new vistas in the attempts to reconcile the newest
developments in digital art and postmodern critical perspectives with the
ancient concerns of the arts with the spiritual. It offers fresh
perspectives in how we can learn from Greek and Jewish thought to
understand the present era.
- Stephen Wilson, author of Information Arts: Intersections of Art,
Science, and Technology (MIT Press, 2002) and Professor of Conceptual and
Information Arts at San Francisco State University.

The author succeeds in opening a unique channel to the universe of present
and future art in a highly original and inspiring way. His connection
between ancient concepts (Judaism) and the present digital age will force
us to thoroughly rethink our ideas about art, society and technology. This
book is evidence that Golem is alive!
- Michael Bielicky, Professor of Media Arts at the Academy of Fine Arts in
Prague, Czech Republic, and at Hochschule fur Gestaltung, ZKM Center for
Art and Media, in Karlsruhe, Germany.

This book is simply a must read analysis for anyone interested in where we
and the visual arts are going in our future. Alexenberg has provided us
with powerful new lenses to allow us to "see" how postmodern art movements
and classical Judaic traditions compliment and fructify one another as the
visual arts are now enlarging and adding a spiritual dimension to our
lives in the digital era.
- Moshe Dror, co-author of Futurizing the Jews: Alternative Futures for
the 21st Century (Praeger, 2003), President of World Network of Religious
Futurists, and Israel Coordinator of World Future Society.

This Hebraic-postmodern quest is for a dialogue midway on Jacob's ladder
where man and God, artist and society, and artwork and viewer/participant
engage in ongoing commentary.
- Randall Rhodes, Professor and Chairman, Department of Visual Art,
Frostburg State University, Maryland.


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Rhizome.org 2005-2006 Net Art Commissions

The Rhizome Commissioning Program makes financial support available to
artists for the creation of innovative new media art work via
panel-awarded commissions.

For the 2005-2006 Rhizome Commissions, eleven artists/groups were selected
to create original works of net art.

http://rhizome.org/commissions/

The Rhizome Commissions Program is made possible by support from the
Jerome Foundation in celebration of the Jerome Hill Centennial, the
Greenwall Foundation, the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts, and
the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs. Additional support has
been provided by members of the Rhizome community.

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7.

From: T.Whid <twhid AT twhid.com>, marc <marc.garrett AT furtherfield.org>, ARN
<info AT x-arn.org>, Ryan Griffis <ryan.griffis AT gmail.com>, Jim Andrews
<jim AT vispo.com>, Pall Thayer <p_thay AT alcor.concordia.ca>
Date: Aug 15, 2006
Subject: New media art shouldn't suck


+T.Whid posted:+

<http://www.mtaa.net/mtaaRR/news/twhid/new_media_art_shouldn_t_suck.html>

AFC has a good post today
<http://artfagcity.blogspot.com/2006/08/new-media-why-it-doesnt-suck-part-two.html>
about the realities of new media artists crossing-over into the larger art
world. Here's the bit that should be common sense to new media artists
(but often isn't):

+++

AFC quote:

Unlike many professions, there are a great number of people within the art
world who could give a shit about the Internet. [?] This sort of thing can
create problems for artists who are making work in the medium because the
people who understand it best are often the sixteen year nerds [sic] who
spend 18 hours a day in front of a computer, as opposed to art world
professionals who are responsible for the evaluation of art.

+++

There are some new media artists who cross-over and make it look easy.
Cory Arcangel and the McCoys come to mind. Arcangel succeeds by acting a
bit like a ethnographer who travels into hacker culture and exports the
bits that make sense to the art world. The McCoys succeed by addressing
the older tradition of film and not letting themselves geek-out when
addressing the art world.

MTAA recently had our worst fears realized when speaking to some
traditional art world types about a new piece we're developing with RSG.
We were told bluntly that phrases like 'peer-to-peer' and 'file-sharing'
are jargon and the art world doesn't give a shit about them anyway. At
first, I was defiant. These file-sharing networks are part of the subject
of the piece, I told the art world pro. It's like saying you don't like
apples so you don't like paintings of apples. It's just not your subject.

But then we realized, with some help from the art world pro (who's
remaining nameless but was very sharp and helpful), that we were failing
to communicate what is interesting about our subject. (At least our 7
minute presentation about the project didn't communicate it.) What we find
interesting and exciting culturally about this technology needs to be
expressed to folks in the present that may be ignorant of it or fail to
understand it. We also need to communicate to people in the future that
may have no idea what happened in the late 90s / early 00s.

MTAA has been wanting to move into the gallery for quite some time now. In
order to do so, we'll need to start thinking that our audience is
completely ignorant of digital culture. We can't expect them to be geeks
that are excited about a good hack. We'll need to communicate our emotion,
interest and excitement. We can't expect them to share it until we
communicate every bit of it.

I can't believe it took me so long to realize this?


+marc replied:+

Yes - a problem.

We have recently been funding the making of some films about net
artists/media arts, with the aim of sending them to various education
organisations & to be part of some exhibitions - and also promoting them
to various television companies. Which seem to be quite popular - some of
the local audiences who have been coming to the space (HTTP) are finding
it a lot easier in viewing these films, about the artists and the work.
Usually before they view much of the work online itself.

We are also in the process of building an online facility where net
artists/media artists who wish to share their practise and want to explain
'one' project - they can do, by uploading a film about it and giving a
story about it.

It will be up in a couple of weeks hopefully.

What I find in respect of many artists is, that if they are given the
chance to speak for themselves about their work - usually people get it if
it is not too bound up in jargon. But of course, we have to be careful not
to lower the standards I suppose - the art still needs it raw dynamic and
intensity.


+ARN replied:+

> MTAA has been wanting to move into the gallery for quite some time
> now. In order to do so, we'll need to start thinking that our audience
> is completely ignorant of digital culture. We can't expect them to be
> geeks that are excited about a good hack. We'll need to communicate
> our emotion, interest and excitement. We can't expect them to share it
> until we communicate every bit of it.

Making art with the internet is just like making art with anything else.
It just says that you don't need the 'art world' to do it, unless you need
the money from this art world.

What you're telling about is not a lack of digital culture from the
audience, but a lack of audience's power on what you can do. It's the same
if you put a piece of plastic with a mirror on a beach, not many people
will see that as art, everyone can do it, and yes precisely, it's just a
human act which says that art is just a human thing.. and this act doesn't
need any 'art world' to mystify the act. The 'art world' of such an act is
simply the world itself, and so it is for a net.art piece.

try it: http://yann.x-arn.org/wiki/Arc


+Ryan Griffis replied:+

It's interesting to hear someone in the art world say that "peer-to-peer"
is jargon, while shows can be titled things like, say,
"Dereconstruction." Maybe if it was B2B, rather than P2P, it would
generate more interest :) Geez, it's not as if the art world is still
using the telegraph. Is it really possible that people buying thousands of
dollars + of art really don't know what "peer-to-peer" means? Seems
unlikely. Do they care or like it? i guess that's another issue. But i
honestly can't imagine it being any more difficult to explain what
"peer-to-peer" means than something like "cultural hybridity" or many of
the vaguely theoretical signifiers widely used in art. i think if the
significance of Dada (not to mention the non-concept of
"dereconstruction") can be explained to a general audience, "file sharing"
shouldn't be too difficult. Obviously, it's not a matter of simple
semantics and vocabulary at issue here, and museums have a somewhat
different mandate than galleries. i agree with the need to make clear the
significance/interest of work without relying on the capital of catch
phrases, but i'm also skeptical that the ideas MTAA is talking could be
read as exclusionary in the context of the art world. Then again, if it's
just a pragmatic issue of gaining acceptance in their terrain, i guess all
of this is really irrelevant -- it's just easier to do what is expected.

Aside from the obvious problem of value appreciation/depreciation (art
object vs. software), could it also be an issue of High Art's historic
problem with the kitsch factor of popular media and language (i.e.
commercially vulgar rather than transcendent)? just a thought, maybe not
on target.


+Jim Andrews replied:+

I suspect that actually is on target.

Also, just because an art pro couldn't care less about the Internet as an
art medium, it doesn't mean he or she doesn't have some ideas about what
is to be found on the Internet. Very likely he or she just has not found
much net art on it but is somewhat familiar with any number of other
dimensions of the Internet. Such as the pop net for teenagers (if he or
she has kids) which consists mainly of IM, youtube-like videos, viral
games, and other assorted yuks. And shopping sites. Etc.

To make an analogy with TV, it's as though there are interesting TV
stations that are in unusual channel locations that aren't covered in the
usual TV guides.


+Pall Thayer replied:+

> AFC quote:
>
> Unlike many professions, there are a great number of people within the
> art world who could give a shit about the Internet. [?] This sort of
> thing can create problems for artists who are making work in the
> medium because the people who understand it best are often the sixteen
> year nerds [sic] who spend 18 hours a day in front of a computer, as
> opposed to art world professionals who are responsible for the
> evaluation of art.
>
> +++

I don't agree that "the people who understand it best are often the
sixteen year nerds..." They usually don't understand it because they don't
understand the "art" within. The right people to understand are the
art-world people but they allow themselves to be scared off by the tech.
If they just take a little time to look beyond, they'll see that it's just
art.

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8.

From: marc <marc.garrett AT furtherfield.org>, T.Whid <twhid AT twhid.com>,
rob AT robmyers.org, Jim Andrews <jim AT vispo.com>, ARN <info AT x-arn.org>,
Patrick Tresset <autrechose AT btopenworld.com>, bram <bram.org AT gmail.com>,
Lee Wells <lee AT leewells.org>
Date: Aug 17-18, 2006
Subject: Charlie puts NMA's down...


+ marc posted:+

Wow - and now we have Charlie Gere putting us all down.

"So are artists at the cutting edge of new-media technology? No, says
Charlie. One of the problems is that other stuff on the net is so much
more mind-blowing. A site such as Google Earth is so much more awesome
and thought-provoking than something an arty hacktivist can knock up on
her PC."

I would love to have an open discussion with him about this stuff this
on-line.

http://feeds.feedburner.com/~r/mtaa/~3/13468813/the_times_uk_does_new_media.html

Also check rhizome front page...

Thanks Charlie, we love you two ;-)


+T.Whid replied:+

He's right about one thing. Artists aren't at the cutting-edge of
technology. The technocrats and scientists will always be ahead...
with the technology. (Though Golan Levin is working with one of the
top people in eye-tracking and face recognition at Carnegie-Mellon.)

Anyway, the 'thought-provoking" part of his statement is complete and
utter bullshit. Google Earth is cool and thought-provoking but you
don't need gee-whiz tech to be a thought-provoking artist. I think
that would be abundantly obvious to everyone.


+rob AT robmyers.org replied:+

Quoting "T.Whid" <twhid AT twhid.com>:

> He's right about one thing. Artists aren't at the cutting-edge of
> technology. The technocrats and scientists will always be ahead...
> with the technology. (Though Golan Levin is working with one of the
> top people in eye-tracking and face recognition at Carnegie-Mellon.)

This is a historically unprecedented situation. Early computer artists
begged,
borrowed, stole or remortgaged for access to computer technology at the same
time as the pioneers of AI research and mathematical simulation. If they'd
stuck with tabulators we wouldn't be here now. Painters have always availed
themselves of technological and theoretical developments. Even fire was new
once, and cave artists didn't stick with twigs and berries.

For "New Media" art to be a kind of aethetic and technological conservatism
breaks the irony tag. People are building careers cannibalising the gains of
the 60s and 70s into accessible work for the usual suspects. This is kitsch;
cheaply made and heavily marketed mass-produced versions of something
that once
meant something. It ignores the historical and cultural context of the
very work
it cannibalises.

> Anyway, the 'thought-provoking" part of his statement is complete and
> utter bullshit. Google Earth is cool and thought-provoking but you
> don't need gee-whiz tech to be a thought-provoking artist. I think
> that would be abundantly obvious to everyone.

Charlie has been in New Media longer than some of us. His criticism can be
answered, but let's not try to pretend it is unreasonable.

If Google Earth had been submitted to SIGGRAPH a decade ago it would
have been a
triumph. Its gee-whiz effect is an aesthetic and conceptual effect: it
shows you
a different worldview, it makes you look at the world differently. It changes
your perceptions and adds to your range of experience of regard. It is
not art,
but it is an effective analog to art and it is more effective than much New
Media art. We would do well to ask ourselves why this is and why
*precisely* it
is not art. That might help us get a GPS lock on some tasks that New
Media needs
to start working on rather urgently if it is not to become the new
water colors.

Possibly one doesn't need gee-whiz tech to be a thought-provoking
artist. But a
New Media artist is an artist working with new media, by *definition* they
are
working with gee-whiz technology. We cannot decide that time stopped in 1996
(or whenever we could first afford our own copy of Director and a QuickTime
codec). Nam June Paik's later work has a different meaning to earlier
work done
with the same technology. Charcoal does not mean the same thing now as it did
twenty thousand years ago.

IT has become pervasive. It is now landscape rather than still life, ground
rather than figure. We can work with this, turning from unpaid salespeople of
the gee-whiz to embedded reporters and critics of it in the wider world.

Or we can reaffirm the link between the new and new media (and the high
and high
art) amd pursue the new arenas for computation (wearable, mobile, massively
networked) and new levels of computing power (can I get a Beowulf cluster of
that?) that have emerged over the last decade.

Or we can regroup, take stock, look hard at where we've come from and
where we
are and try to maintain that trajectory or to generate a new one. This turns
the trend that Charlie criticises into a virtue.

The current state of New Media art is revealing about changing social
relations
in western culture. This in itself is interesting and might generate some
useful work for New Media artists to do.


+marc replied:+

HI T.Whid & all,

>He's right about one thing. Artists aren't at the cutting-edge of
technology. The technocrats and scientists will always be ahead...with
the technology. (Though Golan Levin is working with one of the top
people in eye-tracking and face recognition at Carnegie-Mellon.)

And my answer would be to him, well 'so what?'

We know we cannot build a spaceship to splurt out happy patterns around
the galaxy and all that nonsense.

If media art is only measured by its supposed 'cutting edge' of
technology I would personally find it all pretty boring.

for me, it's the context, the communities that use it, the networked
nature of it, the ideas that come out of it, the content created with
it, the fact that it is free (almost) from historical control and lame
canons and htere is more, so much more - he seemed to miss all these
vital ingredients...

>Anyway, the 'thought-provoking" part of his statement is complete and
utter bullshit. Google Earth is cool and thought-provoking but you
don't need gee-whiz tech to be a thought-provoking artist. I think
that would be abundantly obvious to everyone.

It's like measuring the size of a male protrudence next to another I
think, mine is bigger and better than yours kind of thing.

If I was one of those artists mentioned in the article I would feel
pretty embraressed to aquainted to such a negative and non-visionary
stance. Perhaps Charlie is aiming to fill the shoes to be the 'Brian
Sewell' of the media art world. http://linkme2.net/9h

He manages make everything sound so boring and tired - completely
opposite to those who are actually doing it, why the heck is he writing
about it and invited to conferences about it - if he hates it so much?

I actually respected Charlie Gere and thought that he had some important
things to say regarding media art and its culture but, this has forced
me to re-evaluate my original feelings about him. If he can just
irresponsibly blabber on in the mass media press (a murdoch paper at
that) and flippantly diss a whole generation, with such misinformation
then something might have to be done about it - in a productive way of
course ;-)


+Jim Andrews replied:+

new technology, in itself, is not interesting art. we can see that from
http://www.playdojam.com . there we have new technology used in an
entertaining way, but not interesting as art. the virtual basketball game
just doesn't interest as art, however entertaining it is. perhaps with a few
modifications you could significantly change the meaning of the activity and
turn it into art. for instance, consider the famous 'computer game' where
you try to shoot all the terrorists, but in doing so, you spawn more
terrorists. The technology is very similar to game technology but it is
altered so that the meaning of the activity is significantly different from
the usual computer game.

google earth is exceptional in that the new technology is used in a richly
meaningful way. but, usually, when new technology comes around, the uses to
which it's put, initially, are, at best, entertaining. artists excel in
discovering/creating deeper human meaning in the processes technology
supports. new language, in itself, is not poetry. it takes some time to
tease the poetry from new language, to be able to feel with the new
language, to turn the new extension of the body or mind from an inarticulate
claw into something capable of summoning poetry.

but artists should not be afraid of learning how to use technology. how to
program. how to use mathematics, physics, etc, because there lies the key,
often, to more subtle and meaningful articulation of the technology.


+ARN replied:+

another quote:
"The web, Charlie says, has the alarming potential of realising the idea of
the artist Joseph Beuys, that everyone is an artist. This could spell the
end of art as we know it, when everyone becomes a producer and we all drown
in a sea of mediocrity made up of billions of minutely-niched microchannels."

i think this is great, so will better write:

"when everyone becomes a producer and we all grow in a great sea of
experimentations made up of billions of creative microchannels."

why being so alarmed by JB (& others) idea , Charlie ?


+marc replied:+

Hi Arn,

I have heard this kind of argument many times, when meeting curators
mostly.

I would have to disagree with Charlie here, because for one - not
everyone wants to be an artist. Plus - art does not always come from
places that one would prefer it to arrive from, it is more than just a
studied and inhereted creativity...

I have always been excited that the web has been bringing about
independent creativity, outside of the usual places, such as art
institutions myself.

It also challenges the too readily accepted hierarchies to take a
lookoutisde of their assumed vistas...


+Jim Andrews replied:+

> another quote:
> "The web, Charlie says, has the alarming potential of realising
> the idea of
> the artist Joseph Beuys, that everyone is an artist. This could spell the
> end of art as we know it, when everyone becomes a producer and we
> all drown
> in a sea of mediocrity made up of billions of minutely-niched
> microchannels."
>
> i think this is great, so will better write:
>
> "when everyone becomes a producer and we all grow in a great sea of
> experimentations made up of billions of creative microchannels."
>
> why being so alarmed by JB (& others) idea , Charlie ?

Both of these have already happened, haven't they? It's like the wave and
particle theories of light. They are at odds with each other but both shed
some light on um light.

Not "billions" of channels--and more channels of dreck than creative
microchannels--but enough of both that it almost might as well be
"billions". Also, one person's creative microchannel is another's dreck.

What art is is continually under revision in a wacky wiki with no file
protection and thousands of copies of what once was only a few hundred
copies.

I recall McLuhan and Ong emphasizing that in some cultures, there is no
concept of art, although there are/were many artifacts that are now
interpreted as art. And in some of these cultures, they say 'no, we don't
make art; we just try to make everything we make with care and attention."

Art is continually torn apart, rent asunder, dying, dead, dismembered--and
continually subject to remembering, transformation, regeneration,
transmigration, resurrection. It's like Orpheus on a very bad hair day
where there's one limb here, one limb there, death and destruction of he
himself all around yet different versions of himself in various stages of
life--not even recognizable as being he himself--maybe not even he
himself, by now. And now we see even very little use in linking them all
to Orpheus, since the process by now involves so many hybrids, many of
which quite clearly do not involve Orpheus so much as non-Orphic figures
that we think it might not be like this at all.


+Patrick Tresset replied:+

I am not sure if everybody knows that Charlie is involved in a very
interesting
and well funded project initiated by Paul Brown called Drawbot.


+bram replied:+

Art is a closed system that only sees what it already knows. (And is
very badly equipped to access new information)

I think we have to defend new media art
we will have to be missionaries
we will have to educate

we will have to infiltrate
we will have to explain
we will have to promote early netart

And at the same time we should go on to intertwine different spheres,
to develop new ways of seeing the same, never seen before, to
experiment beyond techniques, to develop new ways of generating sense.
Don't forget we (at least some of us) are on the internet because we
don't want to have "art" as our only customer, consumer nor as the
most important vector by which we work.

Yet, we want recognition from the art world because that's the place
we feel at home (at least some of us)

Restart reading at the beginning.

Annie Abrahams

PS 1
What's wrong with watercolours? I would be delighted if as many people
wanted to learn coding as watercolours. One can make cutting edge art
in watercolours, but it's rare.

Art is rare. So the article does not disappoint me. It talks about new
media. We exist!

PS 2
Please ARN explain us a bit more about your poietic aggregator?
Indeed, how many persons are behind?
Tell me why this is more than just another way to produce beautiful
abstract images?
I would like to have them too :)


+ARN replied:+

> Art is rare. So the article does not disappoint me. It talks about new
> media. We exist!

Art is not rare, art is everywhere for whom can see it. Art is what we say
it is. I agree with Jim Andrews about the parallel with theory of light.

> PS 2
> Please ARN explain us a bit more about your poietic aggregator?
> Indeed, how many persons are behind?

I never tried to count. I thought about people behind works presented in
articles from sources used in this aggregator.

> Tell me why this is more than just another way to produce beautiful
> abstract images?

it's more and not more...it depends how you look at it. If you read french
(i know you do ;-), you can read:

http://yann.x-arn.org/wiki/PoieticAggregator

" Si les initiateurs de ce projet envisagent essentiellement des activités
de veille, je crois aussi qu'une interface de ce type pourrait être trés
utile pour la gestions des alertes, le suivi des activités multi-projets ou
encore la surveillance d'un parc de machines "

for me, it's just a way to produce abstract images, and not necessarily
beautiful. secondly i use it sometimes to jump in unknown online works.


+Lee Wells replied:+

Art is not rare. It is everywhere. Just sometimes is not well thought out.


+Patrick Tresset replied:+

I personally find those discussions to qualify one activity or another as Art
fairly sterile.
I was recently at a workshop where Charlie was and his comments were
certainly very intelligent but not very constructive. He seems to have a
very precise opinion of what art should be and is (well I suppose it is
more or less his job). I think his opinion has to be taken as what it is:
an opinion.


+marc replied:+

I agree, it is an opinion - and should be acknowledged as such.

But it is an opinion in a national news paper which does give it a
different emphasis.


+Patrick Tresset replied:+

Hi Marc,

Yes I know. And his opinion is very much respected certainly for some good
reasons
My opinion on classifying what we do as art. Is that it is not my problem,
or role as an artist. My role is to do my work as well a possible, and if
it is art I produce or my programs produce
it will be considered as such by some people (including some
critics/curators/historians) but not by all.

the above is only my opinion



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