nettime Media Art Histories review
[NMF] TEXT: Media Art - A Mixed History, book review by Horea AVRAM http://newmediafix.net/daily/?p=1371 Media Art Histories, Edited by Oliver Grau; Cambridge, Massachusetts, London, England: MIT Press, 2007. More information: mediaarthistory.org Media Art Histories, edited by Oliver Grau aims to occupy a central position among an increasing number of edited volumes of essays or overview histories dedicated to new media art. Like other such endeavours Media Art Histories proposes to fill the gap between a full-speed developing practice, and the crystallization of a systematic theoretical knowledge and the establishment of an organized historical basis (and in fact legitimacy) for the phenomenon of new media art. The principal merit of this book is synthesized in the title itself: it doesn¹t pretend to deliver a history, but histories, that is, a pluralist account of media art. Indeed, the volume is comprised of a mosaic of approaches and attitudes regarding new media art seen from a historical perspective. However, there is a declared common premise, which is, according to the editor, the need to put media art and its histories on a more stable basis, to bring them to a sort of mainstream institutional recognition, and introduce new media ³full time² in the academic curricula. And there is something more: the affirmed ambition of this book to understand media art not only as a technical/technological gadget but also as a complex theoretical issue situated in a historical context and seen in relationship with other akin disciplines: film, cultural and media studies, computer science, philosophy, and sciences dealing with images. In the very first sentence of the editor¹s introductory note, Oliver Grau makes a bold statement that ³the book will discuss for the first time the history of media art within the interdisciplinary and intercultural contexts of the histories of art². The book¹s aim is neither more nor less than to lay the first brick for the construction of an ³evolutionary history of audiovisual media². And how will this ambitious goal be achieved? As the editor states, by opening art history to media art, by putting media art against the background of art history while employing reflections from neighbouring disciplines. Now, of course, the tone of the first quoted sentence is a little bit bombastic. This volume is arguably not the first to deal historically with media art. Grau¹s own book, Virtual Art: From Illusion to Immersion contributed much to the development of this theme. But what is certain is that media art, as one of the major practices in contemporary art, deserves broader attention, and this book is intended to be a step towards a wider recognition and a deeper understanding of media art. Despite its increasingly wider use, ³media art² is still an ³unstable² term that varies according to the author¹s background, institutional engagement, or theoretical intent. In our case, Grau doesn¹t attempt to offer a tight definition of the notion, but the few denominations the editor puts forward in the introductory text are meant to establish the framework for discussion in the pages to follow: besides photography, film and video, a wide range of digital practices like Net art, interactive art, genetic and telematic art, or even robotics, a-life and nanotechnology are to be considered. Media artists? Grau brings in a few names at the beginning, but surely the list of active people in the domain isfortunatelymuch, much longer (Char Davies, Hiroo Iwata, Karl Sims, Daniela Plewe and David Rockeby). When examining media art, considers the editor, it is important for us to observe which aspects are new and which are old, and then to familiarize ourselves with media history, with its myths and utopias. We are living in a world of images, where open and/or mobile access becomes more and more the rule (think wearable devices, cell phones, Internet, TV, cinema)a visual sensory sphere that profoundly affects our perception of the surrounding world. Yet, our perception is not simply a physiological process but a cultural act, so, in order to decipher the what, how, who, when about new media (art), it is necessary to take a closer look at the legacy left by historical media in literature concerned with (artistic and scientific) visualization. Two possible models for constructing such a complex media art history, believes Grau, are the ³older and successful² tradition named ³image science² (a cultural history-oriented, inter- and trans-disciplinary approach in art history developed by Aby Warburg), and Panofsky¹s ³new iconology², both of which emerged at the beginning of twentieth century. This new interdisciplinary subject it is believed to be in good company with other contemporary disciplines that deal historically with scientific or artistic image. So, the building of a media art history should start from its origins, hence the title of the first part of the book: ³Origins: Evolution versus
nettime The Three Basic Forms of Remix, by Eduardo Navas
To read this text with all the proper links, visit: http://remixtheory.net/?p=174 The Three Basic Forms of Remix: a Point of Entry, by Eduardo Navas Image source: Turbulence.org Layout by Ludmil Trenkov Duchamp source: Art History Birmington Levine source: Artnet (This text has been recently added to the section titled Remix Defined to expand my general definition of Remix.) The following summary is a copy and paste collage (a type of literary remix) of my lectures and preliminary writings since 2005. My definition of Remix was first introduced in one of my most recent texts: Turbulence: Remixes + Bonus Beats, commissioned by Turbulence.org: http://transition.turbulence.org/texts/nmf/Navas_EN.html . Many of the ideas I entertain in the text for Turbulence were first discussed in various presentations during the Summer of 2006. (See the list of places here plus an earlier version of my definition of Remix http://navasse.net/remixCCEBA/). Below, the section titled ³remixes² takes parts from the section by the same name in the Turbulence text, and the section titled ³remix defined² consists of excerpts of my definitions which have been revised for an upcoming text soon to be released in English and Spanish by Telefonica in Buenos Aires, Argentina. The full text will be released online once it is officially published. REMIX DEFINED To understand Remix as a cultural phenomenon, we must first define it in music. A music remix, in general, is a reinterpretation of a pre-existing song, meaning that the ³aura² of the original will be dominant in the remixed version. Of course some of the most challenging remixes can question this generalization. But based on its history, it can be stated that there are three types of remixes. The first remix is extended, that is a longer version of the original song containing long instrumental sections making it more mixable for the club DJ. The first known disco song to be extended to ten minutes is ³Ten Percent,² by Double Exposure, remixed by Walter Gibbons in 1976.[1] Image source: Vinyl Masterpiece The second remix is selective; it consists of adding or subtracting material from the original song. This is the type of remix which made DJs popular producers in the music mainstream. One of the most successful selective remixes is Eric B. Rakim¹s ³Paid in Full,² remixed by Coldcut in 1987. [2] In this case Coldcut produced two remixes, the most popular version not only extended the original recording, following the tradition of the club mix (like Gibbons), but it also contained new sections as well as new sounds, while others were subtracted, always keeping the ³essence² of the song intact. Image source: Rate Your Music The third remix is reflexive; it allegorizes and extends the aesthetic of sampling, where the remixed version challenges the aura of the original and claims autonomy even when it carries the name of the original; material is added or deleted, but the original tracks are largely left intact to be recognizable. An example of this is Mad Professor¹s famous dub/trip hop album No Protection, which is a remix of Massive Attack¹s Protection. In this case both albums, the original and the remixed versions, are considered works on their own, yet the remixed version is completely dependent on Massive¹s original production for validation.[3] The fact that both albums were released at the same time in 1994 further complicates Mad Professor¹s allegory. This complexity lies in the fact that Mad Professor¹s production is part of the tradition of Jamaica¹s dub, where the term ³version² was often used to refer to ³remixes² which due to their extensive manipulation in the studio pushed for allegorical autonomy.[4] Image source: Last FM Allegory is often deconstructed in more advanced remixes following this third form, and quickly moves to be a reflexive exercise that at times leads to a ³remix² in which the only thing that is recognizable from the original is the title. But, to be clearno matter whatthe remix will always rely on the authority of the original song. When this activity is extended to culture at large, the remix is in the end a re-mixthat is a rearrangement of something already recognizable; it functions at a second level: a meta-level. This implies that the originality of the remix is non-existent, therefore it must acknowledge its source of validation self-reflexively. In brief, the remix when extended as a cultural practice is a second mix of something pre-existent; the material that is mixed at least for a second time must be recognized otherwise it could be misunderstood as something new, and it would become plagiarism. Without a history, the remix cannot be Remix.[5] The extended, selective and reflexive remixes can quickly crossover and blur their own definitions. Based on a materialist historical analysis, it can be noted that DJs became invested in remixes which inherited a rich practice of appropriation that had been at play in culture
nettime NMF: Review of 7th Biennale of Video and New Media of Santiago
REVIEW (Focus on Santiago, Chile): The Hacker Aesthetic infiltrates the 7th Biennale of video and New Media of Santiago by Eduardo Navas http://newmediafix.net/daily/?p=3D467 The 7th Video and New Media Biennale of Santiago in Chile took place at the Museum of Contemporary Art, in conjunction with ongoing events at Centro Cultural Espa=F1a, from the 18-27 of November, 2005. The exhibition's curatorial statement, by N=E9stor Olgaharay, reconsiders Roland Barthes' essay The Death of the Author as it relates to concepts of interactivity, and how these ideas have been elaborated on by burgeoning developments in computer interface design. The statement proposes the idea of interface as a metaphor that can be used to reevaluate cultural production in the rise of the network society. In his essay, Barthes questions the passivity of the reader and the privileged position of the author, explaining that the text can only be activated, or brought to life by the reader--a critical reader, to be precise. Olhagaray asserts that Duchamp previously proposed this type of reader when he presented his urinal for contemplation as a work of art at the beginning of the 20th Century. And, it is with this approach to the work of art, to abolish or at least diminish the distance between the reading and writing, that the 7th Video and New Media Biennale of Santiago was organized. The curator endorsed this reevaluation by arguing that developments in emerging technologies allow for new types of dynamic relationships to occur between the author and reader by supporting more open-ended discourses. This proposition was the central tenant for exploring the relationship between and crossover of video and new media. [image] (Biennale curator, N=E9stor Olgaharay) The Biennale was an attractive event that exhibited Chilean artists along with international artists from Europe as well as the United States. However, neither the idea of the interface as a discursive metaphor endorsing a critical position, nor its correlation to authorship, was immediately evident. This lapse may be due in large part to the pervasiveness of traditional video installations. This would not have seemed incongruous with the exhibition thesis if the installations had been pushed beyond traditional museum presentation, consisting of large projections in dark rooms furnished with seats. The theme might have been better served by strategically juxtaposing video works with more interactive installations to imply some sort of dynamic relationship. Unfortunately, only a couple of the ten or so galleries offered works with which the viewer could actually interact, compared to the anticipated challenges offered by contemporary interfaces. Considering the potential of new media as a platform inspired by collaborative activities, such as open source, it was ponderous why there were no works that explored the notions cited in the catalog's curatorial statement more explicitly, allowing users to become actual creative collaborators by modifying the work. At the most, the user could play, interacting in the most general way with some of the works, but no permanent modifications were ever possible. The role of the author and reader remained very well defined. However, to be fair, we could consider the questioning of authorship/readership as a rhetorical measure, where the exhibition exposes the ideological displacement of the work of art from its pivotal position, a unique object created to be looked at, to one where the viewer is expected to deconstruct and reflect upon his/her own role as an active participant. Yet, this position would still not be enough to sustain the exhibition statement, which claims that elements of new media, such as open source or hacking, necessarily imply joining a collective to develop works; and, that these works do not depend on the labor and/or concepts of a single person, but rather on the contributions of many whom are readers and producers simultaneously. [image] ( ASCII =AD Gioconda acci=F3n de arte digital by yto.cl , AKA Isabel Aranda. one of the welcomed performances throughout the Biennale. Here Da Vinci is digitized manually.) The Biennale successfully presented emerging contemporary practices in juxtaposition with video projects that may not necessarily be connected to the concept of interactivity by default. A shortcoming, however, was that a certain division happened between disciplines. That is, video was presented emphasizing a strong tradition while new media was presented as an up and coming discipline in the arts, which not always complemented the more established tradition. Upon realizing this, one could only wish that the biennale had pushed for a hybridized state. But, instead, =8Cpurity' was the implicit position taken to validate both camps. This is evident in the official name of the biennale -- Video and New Media -- which brings the two fields together, while also separating them
nettime NMF INTERVIEW: Jose Luis Brea.
INTERVIEW: Jose Luis Brea. The Critic Operator of the Web 2.0? by Ignacio Nieto http://newmediafix.net/daily/?p=405 http://newmediafix.net/ February 12, 2006 NMF's contributor, Ignacio Nieto interviews Jose Luis Brea who was formerly Dean of the Fine Arts Academy of Cuenca and Director of Exhibitions for the Ministry of Culture between 1985 1988. As a free lance art critic, he is a regular contributor to Spanish and international art magazines including Frieze, Flash Art and Parkett. He is Spanish correspondent for Arforum and regional editor for Rhizome. He has organized multiples exhibitions as independent curator and has published several books including Auras Frias and El Tercer Umbral. Currently, he is prefessor of Esthetics and Theory of Contemporany Art at Carlos III University in Madrid, editor of the magazine Estudios Visuales and he is director of two new online projects: salonKritik and ::agencia crítica:: Ignacio Nieto [IN]: With the popularization of blogs, a number of spaces have developed which had no place within the logic of political economy; contained and produced by media, creating a new front for ideas and critical thinking. For you, what would be the advantages and disadvantages that blog technology has over traditional media (newspapers, radio and television)? Jose Luis Brea [JLB]: I believe that there are two fundamental advantages: an extended possibility of access, and participation. The first is very important, of course, because it proposes access to critical thinking that is made available to a larger part of the population, something that was not possible in the past (this is without exaggeration, of course, one must never forget that the supposition of total access is an illusory fantasyan interest of Capitalist ideology). Considering television and the culture of diffusion, Bourdieu called this the lowering of the level (of access). Let's say that more people heard and sawmaybe even readfor example philosophers; Derrida, and now Zizek, whom they would never have had heard, seen or read before. This is much more evident with new media (especially since the development of the web 2.0) But for the same reason this amplification (possibility to access) would not have an excessive importance; it would be purely quantitative, it would not contribute without making more of the masses the culture of masses, and maybe to incorporate in it cultural objects, of the critical tradition which before belonged to areas in culture less popular, more elitist or more reserved for specialized communities, let's say (for example deconstruction, Theory of acts of speech, or antagonist thinking). This is why I think that the quality that is important is the latter, that which I have called participation. This is something that the web 2.0 has re-enforced a lot. Before, of course, it had already occurred that all new media, obviously from radio to video, from vietnamita[1] to photocopy or the fanzine, and of course, the website programmed in HTML, makes possible a certain extension of interactivity (in the construct of collective critical thinking), related to the conversion of the spectator/reader/ receiver into emitter. But with the emergence of the blog, forums postnuke, and phpBB, wikis, and podcasting in general all DIY media publication has grown exponentially, and it is there where a great leap has been produced; its impact on the discursive field we currently entertain, (critical thinking), necessarily is huge; and it will ultimately culminate in those diverse forms authors call collective intellectualization. Let's say that all the manifestations of technologies of treatment, gesture, diffusion, archiving, and organization of access to knowledge (not only the tools of e-science, but also those dialogical and interactive prototypes of the web 2.0), necessarily open and submit critical thinking to processes much more intense and, to put it this way, frantic public contrast. The challenge for critical thinking resides in confronting the consequences of its new logic and its social construct. And it is there where it should be pointed out, also, the disadvantage, the danger, which respectively corresponds to new media: that the elusive lowering of the level is not only produced in the terms mentioned above (of more open access), but also produced as a lowering of the level for content. Let's say that the public dialogue ends up converting critical thinking into chatter, vulgarity, in an ineventual series of commonalities badly developed and repeated from blog to blog, like echoes each time more hollow of ideas, which in those repostings lose more and more panache and sharpness. In my reflection on the transformation of the tools of cultural criticism with the apparition of these new media, I dedicate an ironic post to this question specifically titled Chatter (of unquestionable Benjamanian references, which surely some readers will
nettime Reflections on Conceptual Art and its relation to New Media
Online at http://www.netartreview.net/monthly/0705_3.html FEATURE.REVIEW: Reflections on Conceptual Art and its relation to New Media, a month long conversation at Empyre BY: Eduardo Navas I was a guest speaker on Empyre during the month of April 2005. The following text is a revision of two particular postings on Conceptual art, which I here use as launching platforms to reflect on the long debate that took place between Raul Ferrera Balanquet (CU/MX), Kate Southworth and Patrick Simons(UK), and myself. Other invited guests included Lucrezia Cippitelli (IT), Heidi Figueroa Sarriera (PR), Raquel Herrera Ferrer (ES), Lucas Bambozzi (BR), Andres Burbano (CO), and Joeser =C1lvarez. This text is also part of a larger essay which will be published at a later date in its entirety. The conversation was fruitful in various ways, ranging from abstract theoretical propositions to more personal statements. The online exchange proved to be one of the most important experiences for me until now, because I learned that colonial ideology is more powerful than I expected. It is thanks to Raul's intervention (this is how he considered his writing) that I realized this shortly after the discussion came to a close. Such realization will be the subject of reflection for the second part of this series. In this first part I will focus on the premise proposed by Christina McPhee for the month long conversation. The theme of the month at Empyre: Do conceptual art and curatorial practice merge in post digital cultural production? How are new media art, criticism and curatorial practice a 'transgressive' ecology? While it is true that artists part of the net.art group were influenced by a certain type of conceptualism, the premises behind conceptual art as it is understood from its origins in the New York scene is practically irrelevant in new media practice. When it is brought up it is often in allegorical form. In regards to this, we can consider a work that has been reviewed here. MTAA's One Year Performance,[1] which allegorizes Performance artist Sam Hsieh's One year performance where he stayed in a cell for a whole year. Conceptual art, mainly in the New York, developed in reaction to Greenbergian modernism; this is specific to Joseph Kosuth and his contemporaries. However conceptual practice became quite diverse and took on many approaches around the world.[2] Critical art practices since the turn of the twentieth century have relied on a materialist approach to art making.[3] To be specific, the artist looks at the subject and considers key material elements to then make them obvious to the viewer, who if the work is developed carefully, will come to question it according to the exposed contradictions, coherences, limitations, and excess, which can be read as open-ended questions, or at times as forms subject to the sublime (the latter may be problematic for some conceptualists who are critical of ideology). The artist can claim that what she has done is nothing but show what was already there, thus appearing critical and detached with proper distance, thus questioning not only what the role of the artist is, but also the idea of originality. This is what Duchamp did with his famous Urinal.[4] As it is commonly known, he did nothing but choose a work that exposed the artist's role in art practice and her/his relation to the growing industrial world. However, he was not directly questioning the material aspect of the work of art. Conceptualism did-New York conceptualism to be exact.[5] Whether moving towards or away from the object; the point is that, in conceptualism, the materiality of the object of art was in question, or at least it was the subject of reflection. Yet, if this is to be contested, what can be said about Conceptualism is that its subject was the idea as the object of art.[6] With new media we experience works that are not materialized in the conventional sense to which conceptualism reacted. This is in part because new media works are easily reproducible. What is unique about new media art is that it did not face what other mediums had faced in the past to be legitimated. Issues of originality and purposiveness were previously dealt with by other media such as photography and most importantly Film. In fact, new media was understood so quickly as a vehicle for efficient dissemination that it swiftly moved to affect previously existing media. New media is considered to have pronounced major reciprocal effects, especially in Cinema. As Lev Manovich explains: Computer media redefine the very identity of cinema. In a symposium that took place in Hollywood in the spring of 1996, one of the participants provocatively referred to movies as flatties and to human actors as organics and soft-fuzzies. As these terms accurately suggest, what used to be cinema's defining characteristics are now just default options, with many other available.[7] Here we notice how new media's language comes to redefine how
Re: nettime DNA and computers
- Original Message - From: Ognjen Strpic [EMAIL PROTECTED] bad thing, in my view, about current trends in nanoresearch is that they seem to be desperate to (finally) cash in some of their accomplishments. the recent popular literature is flooded with points about business opportunities of nanotech. By 2015, nanotechnology could be a $1 trillion industry (first sentence on the back cover of Ratner Ratner, Nanotechnology, Prentice Hall, 2003). last section of the same book is Venture capital interested in nano. This is very true. What I did not mention in my previous post about my visit to Cal Tech is that, yes, there was a very direct connection with major corporations (I visited around 1998, so the research now is even more mind-boggling). The director of the nanotechnology research lab kept talking about how the researchers were always splitting their time between research and the commercial application of such research. There was a certain implication in his voice to a compromise the research institution had made in order to acquire the necessary funding to develop projects. But as soon as we visited the actual research labs, we soon learned that most of the researchers were very eager to sell their developments to major corporations. One particular project that stands out to this day in my mind was a researcher talking about putting inmmense amount of information (gigabytes+++) if not more on what looked like a credit card (remember this is 1998). Banks were very interested in this particular project, and he was negotiating with one or two. He admitted that the banks would never be able to use the full potential of what the card could offer, but that was not his problem... later on he mentioned commodities that he could buy with his deal. This vibe was all over the labs, and I felt like the director was frustrated not just with the corporations but the incentives driving the minds of the young researchers. I do find it very problematic, as I did not learn about one project being developed without direct money rewards being involved. Sad but true. Eduardo Navas # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: nettime Nettime-bold is bleep
As an experiment, Nettime-bold was a failure, but a revealing one. First, there was very little interest in it. At its best, nettime-bold had about 130 subscribers, which, at the time, was 5% the subscribers nettime-l had. I think these figures serve no useful purpose. (you know the rest from the thread...) --snip-- - My response: The key to this dilemma is time. Nettime bold is not successful due to the amount of time it takes to filter all of the submitted material. In an ideal world, all nettimers would have the time to look over every e-mail sent to the bold list, but this is not possible as everyone is attached to some sort of obligation that takes time away from full immersion in possible meaninglessness... I think if the time were available bold would be very successful, but the truth is that most decent publications need editors -- I do not care how decentralized the net may become, this will always be true to some degree. Editors have been around for quite some time in order to subsume noise. Unfortunately, editors (by default) hold a certain priviledged position within the intellectual power structure -- Nettime volunteers are no different. Let us be honest about this and move on. Though I do think the bold list should be made available in some form -- even as messy garbage... who knows, maybe someone could appropriate it as a decadent state of overproductive awareness. Keep on editing, but find some way to leave some (that is where the real challenge is...) Peeezaaccdeee. Eduardo Navas http://navasse.net http://netartreview.net # distributed via nettime: no commercial use without permission # nettime is a moderated mailing list for net criticism, # collaborative text filtering and cultural politics of the nets # more info: [EMAIL PROTECTED] and info nettime-l in the msg body # archive: http://www.nettime.org contact: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
