Re: <nettime> Lev on the embarressment of digital art

On Mon, 21 Sep 2020 at 16:16, James Wallbank <james@lowtech.org> wrote:

Hello Nettime!

This conversation is simply *too* *interesting*!

I'm a bit busy right now, but just want to register that I have loads of responses.

What is "digital art"? Where is the boundary between digital art and art that engages with the digital?

The artworks that I and my friends made in the mid 90s, under the banner "Redudant Technology Initiative" were always embodied in physical computers - they were installations and objects. If you make objects (as I do), you know that they change over time.

Sometimes I think that the "prank", the "intervention" or the "interactive" that characterises much of how Lev describes digital art doesn't quite do this - it's more performative and of the moment. It isn't meant to have a presence over time.

I think that the theme of RTI artworks was redemption, the reclamation of objects from the universal process of decay. Philip K Dick called this "kipplization". The tendency of all things to degenerate into trash. We used then ancient computers to make installations, in the knowledge that we were already working with the semi-functional, the antiquated, the obsolete. We weren't just advocating recycling, and exploring our software skills, we were also raging against entropy - the "accelerated decrepitude" of the digital age.

That feeling of sadness, or tragedy that Lev identifies was ALWAYS AN INTENDED PART OF THE WORK.

Before making those artworks, one of my earliest "digital" installations was a complete list of identified computer viruses, painted in clear varnish onto 1m x 2m sheets of raw steel. (Eight of them, I think - maybe 10!). Visitors to the gallery were invited to spray the steel with corrosive liquid (water, salt and vinegar) which made the piece decay, and the image appear. (The varnish protected the virus names.) I knew that this process of decay was unstoppable. The piece would slowly rust into oblivion.

Similarly, each time we exhibited the "Lowtech Videowall", we resisted careful packing and cleaning, so the installation (comprising 36 25-33mHz computers, and a powerful 66mHz server!) accumulated dents, scratches and grime. We conceded that it was legitimate to clean the screens.

Now here's a thing. I have stored those artworks for the last 20 years. They have become even more antiquated. The 486s that were, at the time, obsolete, have now become antique. The '80s styling of the cases has become fascinating in a way that it wasn't at the time. At the time, the Lowtech Video Wall was something of a demonstration of technical prowess. Should I show it again, it will be so again. The effort and skill required to revive 30-year-old machines will be, if anything, greater than it was to repair and reuse them in the first place. Perhaps it's impossible, and entropy has already won.

The rusting artwork I mentioned of is still in storage. Whether the list of virus names that was first applied to it is still legible, I don't know. All was predicted, and all has come to pass.

If anyone ever wants to help me break open the digital pyramid, to exhume and reanimate the works for exhibition, I'd love to talk.

Best regards,

James
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On 17/09/2020 08:37, Geert Lovink wrote:
URL or not but this is too good, and too important for nettimers, not to read and discuss. These very personal and relevant observations come from a public Facebook page and have been written by Lev Manovich (who is “feeling thoughtful” as the page indicates).

—

https://m.facebook.com/668367315/posts/10159683846717316/?extid=fWYl63KjbcA3uqqm&d=n

My anti-digital art manifesto / What do we feel when we look at the previous generations of electronic and computer technologies? 1940s TV sets, 1960s mainframes, 1980s PCs, 1990s versions of Windows, or 2000s mobile phones? I feel "embarrassed. "Awkward." Almost "shameful." "Sad." And this is exactly the same feelings I have looking at 99% of digital art/computer art / new media art/media art created in previous decades. And I will feel the same when looking at the most cutting-edge art done today ("AI art," etc.) 5 years from now.

If consumer products have "planned obsolescence," digital art created with the "latest" technology has its own "built-in obsolescence." //

These feelings of sadness, disappointment, remorse, and embarrassment have been provoked especially this week as I am watching Ars Electronica programs every day. I start wondering - did I waste my whole life in the wrong field? It is very exciting to be at the "cutting edge", but the price you pay is heavy. After 30 years in this field, there are very few artworks I can show to my students without feeling embarrassed. While I remember why there were so important to us at the moment they were made, their low-resolution visuals and broken links can't inspire students. //

The same is often true for the "content" of digital art. It's about "issues," "impact of X on Y", "critique of A", "a parody of B", "community of C" and so on. //

It's almost never about our real everyday life and our humanity. Feelings. Passions. Looking at the world. Looking inside yourself. Falling in love. Breaking up. Questioning yourself. Searching for love, meaning, less alienated life.//

After I watch Ars Electronica streams, I go to Netflix or switch on the TV, and it feels like fresh air. I see very well made films and TV series. Perfectly lighted, color graded, art directed.

I see real people, not "ideas" and meaningless sounds of yet another "electronic music" performance, or yet another meaningless outputs of a neural network invented by brilliant scientists and badly misused by "artists."

New media art never deals with human life, and this is why it does not enter museums. It's our fault. Don't blame curators or the "art world." Digital art is "anti-human art," and this is why it does not stay in history. //

P.S. As always, I exaggerated a bit my point to provoke discussion - but not that much. This post does reflect my real feelings. Of course, some of these issues are complex - but after 30 years in the field, I really do wonder what it was all about)

P.P.S.

The mystery of why some technology (and art made with them) has obsolescence and others do not - thinking about this for 25 years. We are fascinated by 19th-century photographs or 1960s ones. They look beautiful, rich, full of emotions, and meanings. But video art from the 1980s-1990s looks simply terrible, you want to run away and forget that you ever saw this. Why first Apple computers look cool, cute, engaged? But art created on them does not? And so on. I still have not solved this question.

Perhaps part of this has to be with the message that goes along with lots of tech art from the 1960s to today - and especially today. 19th or 20th-century photographs done by professional photographs or good amateurs do not come with utopian, pretentious, exaggerated, unrealistic, and hypocritical statements, the way lots of "progressive art" does today. Nor do their titles announce all latest tech processes used to create these photographs.

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Ars Electronica 2020:
https://ars.electronica.art/keplersgardens/en/

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Video illustration: Japanese robot at Ars Electronica 2010 -
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmabKC1P51A
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