Works on Screen
Art created that can only be experienced in the digital realm.
With the rise of Web 2.0 we have seen something amazing happening in the world of art. In a realm that use to be dominated by so called professionals, the creative amatuer and her peers have been able to shift the understanding of art and what it can be. Creating art digitally has become a trend from younger artist as it allows them to create without the need to replenish equipment like paints or papers. Works on Screen takes a look at works that have eliminated the tangible elements altogether from the piece of work(outside of the tools used to create them). In truth the tools we use, such as our computer, mouse, bamboo bad, etc. are still only a means to the software tools that we use to create. Likewise the screens on our phones or computers are just a means to consume the art that has been create. Consequently, neither the tools nor the art are true tangibles.
Works on Screen are created on screens and experienced on screens but come with the added advantage of being able to be showing in multiple places at once without compromising any of the integrity of the artwork. Rainbow Narcosis by Jonathan Monaghan is a 9 minute video that is currently on display at Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art but is also on tour with the State of the Art exhibition that was curated by Crystal Bridges.
These GIFs were created by colormush as an experiment in creating algorithms. When colormush created these GIFs he wasn’t concerned with with colors but instead was concerned with creating an algorithm that would push out simple color gradients. The artist here got down to a more bareroots point of view of graphic/digital art and looked at the basis for it all, numbers. These colormushes become a visual representation of the work he put in to create the algorithm and the tweaks he made to it in order to adjust how the GIF generated color. Interestingly enough the artist himself did not identify as an artist and said that he only decided to create the ColorMush tumblr because he figured it would be popular because he’d never seen anything like it before.
Because a GIF can only exist on screen and was created using software it is the prime example of new media and how it is being created and consumed. They are used to appropriate history, joke about it and call it into question. The the way in which this art is being used and the sorts of messages the works are presenting are a testament to the times that we live in. With the phenomena of the meme anything has the potential to become a joke, even classical art. This culture also allows for use to take serious topics and present them in ways that cross barriers because they are works on screen.
Motion is not a requirement for works on screen
It doesn’t have to be a GIF though, some regular images are meant to be experienced on screen as well. If it was created on screen, printing it out to experience it compromises the integrity of the creation unless it was printed out in process by the artist. In some cases image (.jpg, .png, etc) files are better experienced and consumed as a work on screen. Memes are a pretty common work on screen that we see and while it might be easy to print a meme out, taking it from the screen could change the way it is viewed. Taking a meme from the screen and displaying it might remove some of the humor usually associated with memes. The pieces created over at /earthfolder as part of Somone’s Old Computer are image files that are screenshots from Google Earth view in the browser. While these images could be printed out and put on display they are initially meant to be viewed on screen as part of Google Earth and do not exist outside of that digital platform.
And of course we could always look at the ever faithful photograph which has crossed the bounds of art and not art since its inception. Although technologies have advanced in other art fields none look quite like the changes that photography has seen. Although it hasn’t changed at its core the technology and equipment for photography is almost entirely different. The replacing of Film SRLs with D-SRLs turned the medium of photography into a work on screen though it was conceived as a tangible form of work. The earliest photographs even required you to paint the emulsion on to the plate before the exposure. Aside from medium and large format cameras, still cherished and produced because of the amount of detail you can pull from a negative, there are only a few film cameras still available. But we have seen a resurgence in the polaroid which are ultimately the effects of a new media, like facebook and instagram, for you to share your photography. Platforms like these helped revitalize an interest in photography as a way of expressing yourself but also of documenting life’s moments. But because lives are more private than public having another medium like an instant camera is fast enough but also more rewarding because it’s something you can hold separate from your phone. This would suggest that there is a need to place things on screen as separate from things off the screen. If that is the case the what is to be said for the work on screen that is then printed and displayed away from the screen?
If this was an interesting post to you please feel free to comment and also be on the lookout for more on these sorts of topics and other things related to the web, art, network culture and whatever else really
