By Marie Chatel
Copy-Paste. Today we take for granted this functionality on our laptops as if it had always been there. But the fragmentation, dislocation and recombination of visual and textual content only have a short history that finds all its meaning in art. Flourishing in the early 20th century through the movements of Cubism, Dada and Surrealism, collage and montage still have a visible impact on digital art. Beyond its actual process, the practice brought distinct aesthetics and new ways to represent society and technology. Highlight on the legacy of this revolutionary art technique.
By Marie Chatel
With thirty years of exercise and more than a hundred solo shows to this day, Russian art collective AES+F has established itself as a key player in digital practices and the contemporary art scene. What’s most intriguing in their absurd parodies is how narratives look both shallow and buried at the same time. Driving viewers in a relentless quest for meaning is probably one of the group’s most successful and overriding strategy, and it all revolves around one term: allegory.
Allegory: Back to Basics
Before delving into AES+F’s approach to narration, let’s go back to the definition and traditional use of allegory. While you might think “Duh, I know this!”, the clarification provides critical elements to understand the Russian collective’s construct of satirical pieces. …
By Marie Chatel
“Are we just secretly yearning for an endless summer?” asks Pedro Gadanho, director of Lisbon’s MAAT Museu de Arte in Eco-visionaries (2019) and, frankly, who would say no to that. But while this question might have appeared innocent a few years back, the tide has turned. From Greta Thunberg’s 15-days sailboat journey across the Atlantic to the Amazonian forest burning down, at last, one stops to ignore, forget, overlook and dismiss. The idea of a technology ensured, corporately maintained future for the very few bothers. …
By Marie Chatel
Claudia Hart is a pioneer of media art, one of the very few that worked at the onset of merging art and simulation technologies in the 1990s. Starting with early 3D virtual imaging then-used in the military only, she subsequently experimented with upcoming techniques such as AR and VR in an all-embracing capacity. But is being technologically vanguard enough for artists to gain credibility? Is it just about mastering new tools? These questions ask to ponder the blurring of roles between a creative and an engineer or IT specialist. Conspicuously, while Hart’s embrace of technologies stands apart, it is also her capacity to generate discourses and claims around simulations that makes her art so meaningfully addictive. …
Interview by Marie Chatel
Café Le Brebant, Paris, a Monday morning. We meet with video artist Sabrina Ratté to talk about her creative approach, use of new media, and recent work, as she brings her solo show Cité-Jardin to Galerie Charlot in Paris.
Interview by Marie Chatel
Ahead of Art Basel week, we’ve met with Sabine Himmelsbach, director of the House of Electronic Arts (HeK) in Basel, to talk about artificial intelligence and art, as the institution dedicates its latest exhibition Entangled Realities: Living with Artificial Intelligence to artists engaging with the revolutionizing medium.
By Marie Chatel
New media art is a challenging field for non-specialists to apprehend, requiring an understanding of both art and digital technologies. How do the two areas interact? How do artists manage to work with both? And what does this merging offer in presenting new cultural and social meanings? Following up on one of our most popular articles — What is Digital Art? Definition and Scope of the New Media — we have gathered discussion panels in video and podcast formats for you to embrace better what digital art is about. Enjoy!
Introducing Digital Art
This podcast from State of the Art and Untitled gives an excellent overview of the scene for digital art. Media art pioneer Lynn Hershman Leeson, SFMoMA media specialist Erica Gangsei, and artist/curator Dorothy Santos share their vision on the evolution of contemporary art with digital technologies. The panelists notably analyze the speed of development of digital art, the short genealogy of the medium, and the challenges in establishing a critical vocabulary for artworks made with new technologies such as virtual reality, augmented reality, and mixed reality. Other questions include the integration of new technologies within the museum to attract broader audiences, as well as how art can play a social role in better understanding of current technological changes. …
By Marie Chatel
Traditionally speaking, the aura of an artifact grows with rarity, which may result from the provenance of the object, the medium used, craft, expertise, and level of recognition of the artist, as well as market trends, following the general law of supply and demand. Computer-produced artworks, however, inherently depart from this economic model, making it either painstakingly adjustable to the existing scheme or persuasively innovative in its consumption and usage.
By Marie Chatel
Representing our physical traits and those of others, realistically or not, is a constant subject of art history which continues to intrigue artists working with digital tools, network systems, and biotechnologies. From avatars to cyborgs and technologically-augmented humans, here is a highlight of several themes and approaches to body depiction in the age of new media.
By Marie Chatel
Last week on international women’s day opened in Geneva the international film festival for human rights FIFDH, a forum questioning injustice, armed conflicts, lack of civil rights, and other critical social frameworks, and which this year traces the specific impetus of women activists (through March 17). With movie On Her Shoulders documenting Nadia Murad’s fight for the recognition of Yazidis’ genocide, the opening ceremony set the tone in reminding of the courage, responsibilities, and risks that women take to defend their values. …
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