The following interview is carried out in connection with opening of
a show 'Art for Networks' starting now at Chapter Arts Centre,
Cardiff, Wales. (It tours afterwards.) The show includes work by:
Rachel Baker, Anna Best, Heath Bunting, Adam Chodzko, Ryosuke Cohen,
Jeremy Deller, Jodi, Nina Pope and Karen Guthrie, Radio Aqualia,
Stephen Willats, Talkeoke, Technologies to the People.
6 Questions in search of a network
1. Matthew Fuller: In the original Art for Networks project you state
that one of the motivations of the work was to discover another set
of relations for art on the internet. What was argued against was
the idea that network art could be categorised according to a certain
chronology. This chronology slotted certain works into a history
primarily on the basis of how closely they married themselves to
technological developments. What was suggested instead was that there
was a whole wider sense of networks that are being made and used by
artists. Do you think that this statement of an alternate set of
trajectories still holds true or polemically necessary?
Simon Pope: The Art for Networks project was initially devised as a
way of making sense of, and investigating how to move beyond,
so-called 'net.art'. This definition was, as Heath Bunting (1) has
said, 'a joke and a fake' anyway, but held sway in some circles.
'Net.Art' signified a technical art of the Internet or, more
specifically, the Web. It was defined as a progression through
clearly defined stylistic and technical phases: from an Avant Garde,
through 'high period' Web-based net.art and interminable Mannerist
replays, all the while waiting for the emergence of the new Avant
Garde…
This lame art historical approach denies wider or longer views of how
artists and their work operate.
The demand for a neat, linear art history becomes a real problem for
anyone it implicates. As Jodi are quoted as saying "We never choose
to be net.artists or not."(2) Pinned onto this restrictive and
arbitrary time-line, artists have their destinies plotted for them.
It was time to take Stewart Home's cue (3) and begin a process of
'self-historicising'. The exploration of more expansive definitions
of 'network' is part of this, at first through interviews and
presentations in 2000 and now through this exhibition.
2. MF: If the show works through various uses and creations of
networks as art, were there any ways in which this focus inflected
the way in which the show was curated? Can we imagine a curation for
networks?
SP: 'Network' isn't used here as an 'ideal concept' (4). It remains
open to interpretation and ongoing enquiry by the participating
artists. The network becomes a field, terrain or environment through
which to operate on, in or through.
Networks have been described in many ways, often at the moment where
some phenomenon eludes an accepted form of classification: Landow
reminds us that Foucault adopts the network when describing the means
"…to link together a wide range of often contradictory taxonomies,
observations, interpretations, categories, and rules of observation."
(5). Jeremy Deller's work often exemplifies this, for example.
Josephine Berry noted that "The term 'networks' has nearly become a
cipher for saying 'everything' with the proviso that 'everything' be
framed by technology" (6).
Jodi's 'Wrong Browser' project continues their scrutiny of the
conventions of the most popular of these technologies that link
'everything', the Web Browser. (7).
Others artists are not concerned with technology as such. They
investigate social networks, distributed knowledge or social
protocols, for example.
Together, all of the artists in this show help us speculate, with the
widest possible scope, on what an art for networks might be.
3. MF: Perhaps it is useful to think about two of the modes of
network that currently exist. There's the development of systems that
take heterogeneous material and connect it through a unifying,
reductive, measurable protocol. Another might be informatisation -
that everything can be transposed into a transmissable and calculable
numerical 'equivalent'. Perhaps these kinds of networking
technologies are linked to the idea of a discovery of an ur-language,
a code that precedes all codes.
A different kind of network might be that which is deliberately
non-compressible, that generates its own terms of composition as it's
enacted; rather than reducing one thing to its intermediary, it
focuses on inventing new connections, proximities, conjunctural
leaps.
SP: The unifying system forces homogeneity onto previously
heterogeneous material and has plenty of historical precedents such
as systematic classification in Zoology, the Dewey decimal system.
Objectified matter is ordered, processed - the system aims for
closure, completeness.
In your second example, the subject resists classification or
reduction to a cipher. For example, in organizations, there's always
tension between structure - invariably hierarchical - and those who
work within it. Despite the most ruthless line-management, the
subject - individual or group - will find ways of subverting the
structure. A common form of resistance is the 'gossip network'.
Rachel Baker's 'Art of Work', for example, has previously inserted
itself into this context. (8)
I think Manuel De Landa's model (9) of meshworks and hierarchies is
useful here and relates, (at least in my understanding of it), to the
relationship between networks, hierarchies, agency and structure.
Meshworks (networks) and hierarchies exist as a mixture. The meshwork
formed as an aggregate of dissimilar, heterogeneous material, the
hierarchy from similar, homogeneous material, forming strata. They
are interdependent and can change states, one into the other. They
stratify and destratify, depending on the flow of energy: meshworks
form from hierarchies and vice versa.
4. MF: Perhaps too, there is a range of disjunctive connections
between these two kinds of network. For example, one of the claims
often made for the architecture of the internet, and which is
currently under severe test, is that it's inherently decentralised,
that any time a hierarchy such as a national legislature attempts to
close a site down, can be worked around. It might be remarked of
course that if a technology is inherently liberatory, people acting
on the basis of this liberation are simply carrying out what is
programmed into the machine.
SP: The technologies of the Internet describe both networks and
hierarchies (or aggregates and strata): hierarchical systems such as
the DNS (10) that provide structure, and could be seen as a
constraining, strategizing desire. The DNS produces a homogenous
structure: it's a classification system that defines a number of
interrelated strata. HTTP, on the other hand, might be seen as the
confounding of that system through the construction of networks
within that structure: they form links between nodes to produce
aggregates, affinities of dissimilar material. So yes, 'liberation'
is built into the system, but it relies on agency to actualize it!
OWN (11) could be seen as an attempt to assert this through building
ad hoc, open, wireless networks.
Critical theories of Hypertext (12), have stressed that such
networked technologies produce a 'decentred' subject at the point of
reception; with no single centring device to provide surety,
Ideology, let alone shared values, appear impossible. In Stephen
Willats' work we see a struggle with this: participation's key in
many of his works and is often carefully constructed to explore or
develop a 'meta-language', a symbolic language shared by disparate
social groups. (13)
5. MF: It seems that quite a few of the projects circulating here
situate themselves right at a point where there are various kinds of
feedback, or bastard combination, generated between one kind of
network and another?
SP: Heath Bunting's 'Courier' (14) is a good example: although
efficiently coordinated online, exchange and distribution of items
'couriered' between destinations soon becomes problematized. As items
pass between social networks, via a technical network, they're
immediately invested with new value. Trust between networks is
negotiated 'on-the-fly', each exchange subject to very close
consideration.
6. MF: Some of the work here is represented by documentation of a
process that's already occurred. Other parts of the show invite
participation. I don't mean simply 'interaction', but an actual
challenge or invitation to take part in something going on. Natalie
Bookchin, in the original series of art for networks interviews
suggested that art galleries and museums were good storage places for
ideas and activities that had worked in the past, but that were now
done with.
What might be the implications or possibilities for producing a
show purely of the latter sort?
SP: Much of this work demands participation, often both over time and
across space. For example, Nina Pope & Karen Guthrie's 'An Artist's
Impression' (15) is constructed at live events at each venue
throughout the tour. We see the process of building on the 'island'
in response to continuing online activity by contributors.
In Anna Best's commission, work shown in the gallery changes over the
duration of the tour as interviews with local participants are
recorded and presented at each venue.
Ryosuke Cohen connects to a massive, distributed network of
contributors, each of whom sends stickers or stamps to add to each
iteration of 'Braincell'. We see this exhibit grow over the duration
of the tour as each version is posted back to us.
While most of the work is represented in the gallery in some form or
another, it's often not the primary venue:
Adam Chodzko's new work distributes an archive of planning
information into a travellers' encampment in Kent. Suddenly there's
connection and interaction between sedentary knowledge and a
potentially nomadic culture.
Also, Rachel Baker's commission, extending the prototype of
'Platfrom' (16) unfolds a narrative for passengers travelling on the
Eurostar.
Radioqualia reminds us of the networks of open collaboration that
contribute to the development of Free Software, with 'Free Radio
Linux' , an "audio distribution of the Linux Kernel" (17).
Beginning this tour from an independent venue has meant that there's
no compulsion to seek authority, fixity add or to the canon - this
can be erased and re-written if necessary.
For example. Technology To The People's website (18) is entirely
'open' to encourage participation in the development of this
exhibition, over time and across geographical location.
From a curator's point-of-view, this ability to describe a 'network'
to link across temporal and spatial divides (19) provides a way
around the restrictions of the 'net.art' taxonomy and linear art
historical view. Of course, this approach isn't restricted solely to
curating 'networked' art.
Notes:
1. Snap to Grid, Peter Lunenfeld, 2001. p
2. Interview with Jodi, Tilman Baumgaertel, 2001
(http://www.rhizome.org/object.rhiz?2550)
3. Five Thousand Years of Foreplay: Stewart Home interviewed by
Marko Pyhtil (http://www.stewarthomesociety.org/pyhtil.htm)
4. Southern Oscillation Index, McKenzie Wark. Online, 1998
(http://amsterdam.nettime.org/Lists-Archives/nettime-l-9810/msg00099.html)
5. The Nonlinear Model of the Network in Current Critical Theory.
George P. Landow, 1992
(http://65.107.211.206/cpace/ht/jhup/network.html)
6. The Unbearable Connectedness of Everything, Josephine Berry.
Online, 1999 (http://www.heise.de/tp/english/inhalt/sa/3433/1.html)
7. Baumgaertel,, Ibid.
8. Art of Work, Rachel Baker (http://www.art-of-work.com/guide.html )
9. A Thousand Years of Nonlinear History, Manuel de Landa. Zone Books, 1997.
10. The Domain Name System: A Non-Technical Explanation - Why
Universal Resolvability Is Important, InterNIC, 2002
(http://www.internic.net/faqs/authoritative-dns.html)
11. OWN, James Stevens & Julian Priest.
(http://www.informal.org.uk/inf/article.php?sid)
12. The Network in Marxist Theory, George P. Landow. Online 1992
(http://65.107.211.206/cpace/ht/jhup/marxnet.html)
13. Art and Social Function, Stephen Willats, Ellipsis (London), 2000
14. Irational Courier, Heath Bunting. Online, 2000
(http://www.irational.org/cgi-bin/courier/courier.pl)
15. An Artist's Impression, Nina Pope & Karen Guthrie. Online 1998
onwards (http://www.somewhere.org.uk/artists/impress/index.htm)
16. 'Platfrom' prototype supported by Proboscis. Online, 2002.
(http://www.platfrom.net/)
17. Free Radio Linux, Radioqualia. Online, 2002
(http://www.radioqualia.net/freeradiolinux)
18. Art for Networks website, Technologies to the People. Online,
2002- (http://www.artfornetworks.org)
19. Landow, Ibid.
A number of original interviews, conducted for BBC Arts Online in
2000, can be found at
http://www.bbc.co.uk/arts/digital/interviews/index.shtml
simon pope: art for networks
-
Type: discussion
Comments
Does anyone understand this?
michael
— matthew fuller <[email protected]> wrote:
>
>
>
> The following interview is carried out in connection
> with opening of
> a show 'Art for Networks' starting now at Chapter
> Arts Centre,
> Cardiff, Wales. (It tours afterwards.) The show
> includes work by:
> Rachel Baker, Anna Best, Heath Bunting, Adam
> Chodzko, Ryosuke Cohen,
> Jeremy Deller, Jodi, Nina Pope and Karen Guthrie,
> Radio Aqualia,
> Stephen Willats, Talkeoke, Technologies to the
> People.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> 6 Questions in search of a network
>
> 1. Matthew Fuller: In the original Art for Networks
> project you state
> that one of the motivations of the work was to
> discover another set
> of relations for art on the internet. What was
> argued against was
> the idea that network art could be categorised
> according to a certain
> chronology. This chronology slotted certain works
> into a history
> primarily on the basis of how closely they married
> themselves to
> technological developments. What was suggested
> instead was that there
> was a whole wider sense of networks that are being
> made and used by
> artists. Do you think that this statement of an
> alternate set of
> trajectories still holds true or polemically
> necessary?
>
> Simon Pope: The Art for Networks project was
> initially devised as a
> way of making sense of, and investigating how to
> move beyond,
> so-called 'net.art'. This definition was, as Heath
> Bunting (1) has
> said, 'a joke and a fake' anyway, but held sway in
> some circles.
>
> 'Net.Art' signified a technical art of the Internet
> or, more
> specifically, the Web. It was defined as a
> progression through
> clearly defined stylistic and technical phases: from
> an Avant Garde,
> through 'high period' Web-based net.art and
> interminable Mannerist
> replays, all the while waiting for the emergence of
> the new Avant
> Garde…
> This lame art historical approach denies wider or
> longer views of how
> artists and their work operate.
>
> The demand for a neat, linear art history becomes a
> real problem for
> anyone it implicates. As Jodi are quoted as saying
> "We never choose
> to be net.artists or not."(2) Pinned onto this
> restrictive and
> arbitrary time-line, artists have their destinies
> plotted for them.
> It was time to take Stewart Home's cue (3) and begin
> a process of
> 'self-historicising'. The exploration of more
> expansive definitions
> of 'network' is part of this, at first through
> interviews and
> presentations in 2000 and now through this
> exhibition.
>
> 2. MF: If the show works through various uses and
> creations of
> networks as art, were there any ways in which this
> focus inflected
> the way in which the show was curated? Can we
> imagine a curation for
> networks?
>
> SP: 'Network' isn't used here as an 'ideal concept'
> (4). It remains
> open to interpretation and ongoing enquiry by the
> participating
> artists. The network becomes a field, terrain or
> environment through
> which to operate on, in or through.
>
> Networks have been described in many ways, often at
> the moment where
> some phenomenon eludes an accepted form of
> classification: Landow
> reminds us that Foucault adopts the network when
> describing the means
> "…to link together a wide range of often
> contradictory taxonomies,
> observations, interpretations, categories, and rules
> of observation."
> (5). Jeremy Deller's work often exemplifies this,
> for example.
>
> Josephine Berry noted that "The term 'networks' has
> nearly become a
> cipher for saying 'everything' with the proviso that
> 'everything' be
> framed by technology" (6).
> Jodi's 'Wrong Browser' project continues their
> scrutiny of the
> conventions of the most popular of these
> technologies that link
> 'everything', the Web Browser. (7).
>
> Others artists are not concerned with technology as
> such. They
> investigate social networks, distributed knowledge
> or social
> protocols, for example.
>
> Together, all of the artists in this show help us
> speculate, with the
> widest possible scope, on what an art for networks
> might be.
>
> 3. MF: Perhaps it is useful to think about two of
> the modes of
> network that currently exist. There's the
> development of systems that
> take heterogeneous material and connect it through a
> unifying,
> reductive, measurable protocol. Another might be
> informatisation -
> that everything can be transposed into a
> transmissable and calculable
> numerical 'equivalent'. Perhaps these kinds of
> networking
> technologies are linked to the idea of a discovery
> of an ur-language,
> a code that precedes all codes.
> A different kind of network might be that which
> is deliberately
> non-compressible, that generates its own terms of
> composition as it's
> enacted; rather than reducing one thing to its
> intermediary, it
> focuses on inventing new connections, proximities,
> conjunctural
> leaps.
>
> SP: The unifying system forces homogeneity onto
> previously
> heterogeneous material and has plenty of historical
> precedents such
> as systematic classification in Zoology, the Dewey
> decimal system.
> Objectified matter is ordered, processed - the
> system aims for
> closure, completeness.
> In your second example, the subject resists
> classification or
> reduction to a cipher. For example, in
> organizations, there's always
> tension between structure - invariably hierarchical
> - and those who
> work within it. Despite the most ruthless
> line-management, the
> subject - individual or group - will find ways of
> subverting the
> structure. A common form of resistance is the
> 'gossip network'.
> Rachel Baker's 'Art of Work', for example, has
> previously inserted
> itself into this context. (8)
>
> I think Manuel De Landa's model (9) of meshworks and
> hierarchies is
> useful here and relates, (at least in my
> understanding of it), to the
> relationship between networks, hierarchies, agency
> and structure.
>
> Meshworks (networks) and hierarchies exist as a
> mixture. The meshwork
> formed as an aggregate of dissimilar, heterogeneous
> material, the
> hierarchy from similar, homogeneous material,
> forming strata. They
>
=== message truncated ===
=====
http://www.somedancersandmusicians.com/
__________________________________________________
Do you Yahoo!?
New DSL Internet Access from SBC & Yahoo!
http://sbc.yahoo.com
I understand it very clearly, it is merely a group of people closing a door
behind themselves - thats show biz!
marc
> Does anyone understand this?
> michael
> — matthew fuller <[email protected]> wrote:
> >
> >
> >
> > The following interview is carried out in connection
> > with opening of
> > a show 'Art for Networks' starting now at Chapter
> > Arts Centre,
> > Cardiff, Wales. (It tours afterwards.) The show
> > includes work by:
> > Rachel Baker, Anna Best, Heath Bunting, Adam
> > Chodzko, Ryosuke Cohen,
> > Jeremy Deller, Jodi, Nina Pope and Karen Guthrie,
> > Radio Aqualia,
> > Stephen Willats, Talkeoke, Technologies to the
> > People.
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
> > 6 Questions in search of a network
> >
> > 1. Matthew Fuller: In the original Art for Networks
> > project you state
> > that one of the motivations of the work was to
> > discover another set
> > of relations for art on the internet. What was
> > argued against was
> > the idea that network art could be categorised
> > according to a certain
> > chronology. This chronology slotted certain works
> > into a history
> > primarily on the basis of how closely they married
> > themselves to
> > technological developments. What was suggested
> > instead was that there
> > was a whole wider sense of networks that are being
> > made and used by
> > artists. Do you think that this statement of an
> > alternate set of
> > trajectories still holds true or polemically
> > necessary?
> >
> > Simon Pope: The Art for Networks project was
> > initially devised as a
> > way of making sense of, and investigating how to
> > move beyond,
> > so-called 'net.art'. This definition was, as Heath
> > Bunting (1) has
> > said, 'a joke and a fake' anyway, but held sway in
> > some circles.
> >
> > 'Net.Art' signified a technical art of the Internet
> > or, more
> > specifically, the Web. It was defined as a
> > progression through
> > clearly defined stylistic and technical phases: from
> > an Avant Garde,
> > through 'high period' Web-based net.art and
> > interminable Mannerist
> > replays, all the while waiting for the emergence of
> > the new Avant
> > Garde…
> > This lame art historical approach denies wider or
> > longer views of how
> > artists and their work operate.
> >
> > The demand for a neat, linear art history becomes a
> > real problem for
> > anyone it implicates. As Jodi are quoted as saying
> > "We never choose
> > to be net.artists or not."(2) Pinned onto this
> > restrictive and
> > arbitrary time-line, artists have their destinies
> > plotted for them.
> > It was time to take Stewart Home's cue (3) and begin
> > a process of
> > 'self-historicising'. The exploration of more
> > expansive definitions
> > of 'network' is part of this, at first through
> > interviews and
> > presentations in 2000 and now through this
> > exhibition.
> >
> > 2. MF: If the show works through various uses and
> > creations of
> > networks as art, were there any ways in which this
> > focus inflected
> > the way in which the show was curated? Can we
> > imagine a curation for
> > networks?
> >
> > SP: 'Network' isn't used here as an 'ideal concept'
> > (4). It remains
> > open to interpretation and ongoing enquiry by the
> > participating
> > artists. The network becomes a field, terrain or
> > environment through
> > which to operate on, in or through.
> >
> > Networks have been described in many ways, often at
> > the moment where
> > some phenomenon eludes an accepted form of
> > classification: Landow
> > reminds us that Foucault adopts the network when
> > describing the means
> > "…to link together a wide range of often
> > contradictory taxonomies,
> > observations, interpretations, categories, and rules
> > of observation."
> > (5). Jeremy Deller's work often exemplifies this,
> > for example.
> >
> > Josephine Berry noted that "The term 'networks' has
> > nearly become a
> > cipher for saying 'everything' with the proviso that
> > 'everything' be
> > framed by technology" (6).
> > Jodi's 'Wrong Browser' project continues their
> > scrutiny of the
> > conventions of the most popular of these
> > technologies that link
> > 'everything', the Web Browser. (7).
> >
> > Others artists are not concerned with technology as
> > such. They
> > investigate social networks, distributed knowledge
> > or social
> > protocols, for example.
> >
> > Together, all of the artists in this show help us
> > speculate, with the
> > widest possible scope, on what an art for networks
> > might be.
> >
> > 3. MF: Perhaps it is useful to think about two of
> > the modes of
> > network that currently exist. There's the
> > development of systems that
> > take heterogeneous material and connect it through a
> > unifying,
> > reductive, measurable protocol. Another might be
> > informatisation -
> > that everything can be transposed into a
> > transmissable and calculable
> > numerical 'equivalent'. Perhaps these kinds of
> > networking
> > technologies are linked to the idea of a discovery
> > of an ur-language,
> > a code that precedes all codes.
> > A different kind of network might be that which
> > is deliberately
> > non-compressible, that generates its own terms of
> > composition as it's
> > enacted; rather than reducing one thing to its
> > intermediary, it
> > focuses on inventing new connections, proximities,
> > conjunctural
> > leaps.
> >
> > SP: The unifying system forces homogeneity onto
> > previously
> > heterogeneous material and has plenty of historical
> > precedents such
> > as systematic classification in Zoology, the Dewey
> > decimal system.
> > Objectified matter is ordered, processed - the
> > system aims for
> > closure, completeness.
> > In your second example, the subject resists
> > classification or
> > reduction to a cipher. For example, in
> > organizations, there's always
> > tension between structure - invariably hierarchical
> > - and those who
> > work within it. Despite the most ruthless
> > line-management, the
> > subject - individual or group - will find ways of
> > subverting the
> > structure. A common form of resistance is the
> > 'gossip network'.
> > Rachel Baker's 'Art of Work', for example, has
> > previously inserted
> > itself into this context. (8)
> >
> > I think Manuel De Landa's model (9) of meshworks and
> > hierarchies is
> > useful here and relates, (at least in my
> > understanding of it), to the
> > relationship between networks, hierarchies, agency
> > and structure.
> >
> > Meshworks (networks) and hierarchies exist as a
> > mixture. The meshwork
> > formed as an aggregate of dissimilar, heterogeneous
> > material, the
> > hierarchy from similar, homogeneous material,
> > forming strata. They
> >
> === message truncated ===
>
>
> =====
> http://www.somedancersandmusicians.com/
>
> __________________________________________________
> Do you Yahoo!?
> New DSL Internet Access from SBC & Yahoo!
> http://sbc.yahoo.com
> + Well this is thoroughly depressing
> -> post: [email protected]
> -> questions: [email protected]
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> -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
> +
> Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
> Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php
>
>
> I understand it very clearly, it is merely a group of people closing a
door
> behind themselves - thats show biz!
>
Surely they are in:
> > a process of
> > 'self-historicising'.
:-)
Ivan
> > Does anyone understand this?
> > michael
> > — matthew fuller <[email protected]> wrote:
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > The following interview is carried out in connection
> > > with opening of
> > > a show 'Art for Networks' starting now at Chapter
> > > Arts Centre,
> > > Cardiff, Wales. (It tours afterwards.) The show
> > > includes work by:
> > > Rachel Baker, Anna Best, Heath Bunting, Adam
> > > Chodzko, Ryosuke Cohen,
> > > Jeremy Deller, Jodi, Nina Pope and Karen Guthrie,
> > > Radio Aqualia,
> > > Stephen Willats, Talkeoke, Technologies to the
> > > People.
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > > 6 Questions in search of a network
> > >
> > > 1. Matthew Fuller: In the original Art for Networks
> > > project you state
> > > that one of the motivations of the work was to
> > > discover another set
> > > of relations for art on the internet. What was
> > > argued against was
> > > the idea that network art could be categorised
> > > according to a certain
> > > chronology. This chronology slotted certain works
> > > into a history
> > > primarily on the basis of how closely they married
> > > themselves to
> > > technological developments. What was suggested
> > > instead was that there
> > > was a whole wider sense of networks that are being
> > > made and used by
> > > artists. Do you think that this statement of an
> > > alternate set of
> > > trajectories still holds true or polemically
> > > necessary?
> > >
> > > Simon Pope: The Art for Networks project was
> > > initially devised as a
> > > way of making sense of, and investigating how to
> > > move beyond,
> > > so-called 'net.art'. This definition was, as Heath
> > > Bunting (1) has
> > > said, 'a joke and a fake' anyway, but held sway in
> > > some circles.
> > >
> > > 'Net.Art' signified a technical art of the Internet
> > > or, more
> > > specifically, the Web. It was defined as a
> > > progression through
> > > clearly defined stylistic and technical phases: from
> > > an Avant Garde,
> > > through 'high period' Web-based net.art and
> > > interminable Mannerist
> > > replays, all the while waiting for the emergence of
> > > the new Avant
> > > Garde…
> > > This lame art historical approach denies wider or
> > > longer views of how
> > > artists and their work operate.
> > >
> > > The demand for a neat, linear art history becomes a
> > > real problem for
> > > anyone it implicates. As Jodi are quoted as saying
> > > "We never choose
> > > to be net.artists or not."(2) Pinned onto this
> > > restrictive and
> > > arbitrary time-line, artists have their destinies
> > > plotted for them.
> > > It was time to take Stewart Home's cue (3) and begin
> > > a process of
> > > 'self-historicising'. The exploration of more
> > > expansive definitions
> > > of 'network' is part of this, at first through
> > > interviews and
> > > presentations in 2000 and now through this
> > > exhibition.
> > >
> > > 2. MF: If the show works through various uses and
> > > creations of
> > > networks as art, were there any ways in which this
> > > focus inflected
> > > the way in which the show was curated? Can we
> > > imagine a curation for
> > > networks?
> > >
> > > SP: 'Network' isn't used here as an 'ideal concept'
> > > (4). It remains
> > > open to interpretation and ongoing enquiry by the
> > > participating
> > > artists. The network becomes a field, terrain or
> > > environment through
> > > which to operate on, in or through.
> > >
> > > Networks have been described in many ways, often at
> > > the moment where
> > > some phenomenon eludes an accepted form of
> > > classification: Landow
> > > reminds us that Foucault adopts the network when
> > > describing the means
> > > "…to link together a wide range of often
> > > contradictory taxonomies,
> > > observations, interpretations, categories, and rules
> > > of observation."
> > > (5). Jeremy Deller's work often exemplifies this,
> > > for example.
> > >
> > > Josephine Berry noted that "The term 'networks' has
> > > nearly become a
> > > cipher for saying 'everything' with the proviso that
> > > 'everything' be
> > > framed by technology" (6).
> > > Jodi's 'Wrong Browser' project continues their
> > > scrutiny of the
> > > conventions of the most popular of these
> > > technologies that link
> > > 'everything', the Web Browser. (7).
> > >
> > > Others artists are not concerned with technology as
> > > such. They
> > > investigate social networks, distributed knowledge
> > > or social
> > > protocols, for example.
> > >
> > > Together, all of the artists in this show help us
> > > speculate, with the
> > > widest possible scope, on what an art for networks
> > > might be.
> > >
> > > 3. MF: Perhaps it is useful to think about two of
> > > the modes of
> > > network that currently exist. There's the
> > > development of systems that
> > > take heterogeneous material and connect it through a
> > > unifying,
> > > reductive, measurable protocol. Another might be
> > > informatisation -
> > > that everything can be transposed into a
> > > transmissable and calculable
> > > numerical 'equivalent'. Perhaps these kinds of
> > > networking
> > > technologies are linked to the idea of a discovery
> > > of an ur-language,
> > > a code that precedes all codes.
> > > A different kind of network might be that which
> > > is deliberately
> > > non-compressible, that generates its own terms of
> > > composition as it's
> > > enacted; rather than reducing one thing to its
> > > intermediary, it
> > > focuses on inventing new connections, proximities,
> > > conjunctural
> > > leaps.
> > >
> > > SP: The unifying system forces homogeneity onto
> > > previously
> > > heterogeneous material and has plenty of historical
> > > precedents such
> > > as systematic classification in Zoology, the Dewey
> > > decimal system.
> > > Objectified matter is ordered, processed - the
> > > system aims for
> > > closure, completeness.
> > > In your second example, the subject resists
> > > classification or
> > > reduction to a cipher. For example, in
> > > organizations, there's always
> > > tension between structure - invariably hierarchical
> > > - and those who
> > > work within it. Despite the most ruthless
> > > line-management, the
> > > subject - individual or group - will find ways of
> > > subverting the
> > > structure. A common form of resistance is the
> > > 'gossip network'.
> > > Rachel Baker's 'Art of Work', for example, has
> > > previously inserted
> > > itself into this context. (8)
> > >
> > > I think Manuel De Landa's model (9) of meshworks and
> > > hierarchies is
> > > useful here and relates, (at least in my
> > > understanding of it), to the
> > > relationship between networks, hierarchies, agency
> > > and structure.
> > >
> > > Meshworks (networks) and hierarchies exist as a
> > > mixture. The meshwork
> > > formed as an aggregate of dissimilar, heterogeneous
> > > material, the
> > > hierarchy from similar, homogeneous material,
> > > forming strata. They
> > >
> > === message truncated ===
> >
> >
> > =====
> > http://www.somedancersandmusicians.com/
> >
> > __________________________________________________
> > Do you Yahoo!?
> > New DSL Internet Access from SBC & Yahoo!
> > http://sbc.yahoo.com
> > + Well this is thoroughly depressing
> > -> post: [email protected]
> > -> questions: [email protected]
> > -> subscribe/unsubscribe: http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
> > -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
> > +
> > Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
> > Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php
> >
> >
>
>
> + Well this is thoroughly depressing
> -> post: [email protected]
> -> questions: [email protected]
> -> subscribe/unsubscribe: http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
> -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
> +
> Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
> Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php
>
Exactly!
marc;-)
>
>
>
> > I understand it very clearly, it is merely a group of people closing a
> door
> > behind themselves - thats show biz!
> >
>
> Surely they are in:
>
> > > a process of
> > > 'self-historicising'.
>
> :-)
> Ivan
>
> > > Does anyone understand this?
> > > michael
> > > — matthew fuller <[email protected]> wrote:
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > The following interview is carried out in connection
> > > > with opening of
> > > > a show 'Art for Networks' starting now at Chapter
> > > > Arts Centre,
> > > > Cardiff, Wales. (It tours afterwards.) The show
> > > > includes work by:
> > > > Rachel Baker, Anna Best, Heath Bunting, Adam
> > > > Chodzko, Ryosuke Cohen,
> > > > Jeremy Deller, Jodi, Nina Pope and Karen Guthrie,
> > > > Radio Aqualia,
> > > > Stephen Willats, Talkeoke, Technologies to the
> > > > People.
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > >
> > > > 6 Questions in search of a network
> > > >
> > > > 1. Matthew Fuller: In the original Art for Networks
> > > > project you state
> > > > that one of the motivations of the work was to
> > > > discover another set
> > > > of relations for art on the internet. What was
> > > > argued against was
> > > > the idea that network art could be categorised
> > > > according to a certain
> > > > chronology. This chronology slotted certain works
> > > > into a history
> > > > primarily on the basis of how closely they married
> > > > themselves to
> > > > technological developments. What was suggested
> > > > instead was that there
> > > > was a whole wider sense of networks that are being
> > > > made and used by
> > > > artists. Do you think that this statement of an
> > > > alternate set of
> > > > trajectories still holds true or polemically
> > > > necessary?
> > > >
> > > > Simon Pope: The Art for Networks project was
> > > > initially devised as a
> > > > way of making sense of, and investigating how to
> > > > move beyond,
> > > > so-called 'net.art'. This definition was, as Heath
> > > > Bunting (1) has
> > > > said, 'a joke and a fake' anyway, but held sway in
> > > > some circles.
> > > >
> > > > 'Net.Art' signified a technical art of the Internet
> > > > or, more
> > > > specifically, the Web. It was defined as a
> > > > progression through
> > > > clearly defined stylistic and technical phases: from
> > > > an Avant Garde,
> > > > through 'high period' Web-based net.art and
> > > > interminable Mannerist
> > > > replays, all the while waiting for the emergence of
> > > > the new Avant
> > > > Garde…
> > > > This lame art historical approach denies wider or
> > > > longer views of how
> > > > artists and their work operate.
> > > >
> > > > The demand for a neat, linear art history becomes a
> > > > real problem for
> > > > anyone it implicates. As Jodi are quoted as saying
> > > > "We never choose
> > > > to be net.artists or not."(2) Pinned onto this
> > > > restrictive and
> > > > arbitrary time-line, artists have their destinies
> > > > plotted for them.
> > > > It was time to take Stewart Home's cue (3) and begin
> > > > a process of
> > > > 'self-historicising'. The exploration of more
> > > > expansive definitions
> > > > of 'network' is part of this, at first through
> > > > interviews and
> > > > presentations in 2000 and now through this
> > > > exhibition.
> > > >
> > > > 2. MF: If the show works through various uses and
> > > > creations of
> > > > networks as art, were there any ways in which this
> > > > focus inflected
> > > > the way in which the show was curated? Can we
> > > > imagine a curation for
> > > > networks?
> > > >
> > > > SP: 'Network' isn't used here as an 'ideal concept'
> > > > (4). It remains
> > > > open to interpretation and ongoing enquiry by the
> > > > participating
> > > > artists. The network becomes a field, terrain or
> > > > environment through
> > > > which to operate on, in or through.
> > > >
> > > > Networks have been described in many ways, often at
> > > > the moment where
> > > > some phenomenon eludes an accepted form of
> > > > classification: Landow
> > > > reminds us that Foucault adopts the network when
> > > > describing the means
> > > > "…to link together a wide range of often
> > > > contradictory taxonomies,
> > > > observations, interpretations, categories, and rules
> > > > of observation."
> > > > (5). Jeremy Deller's work often exemplifies this,
> > > > for example.
> > > >
> > > > Josephine Berry noted that "The term 'networks' has
> > > > nearly become a
> > > > cipher for saying 'everything' with the proviso that
> > > > 'everything' be
> > > > framed by technology" (6).
> > > > Jodi's 'Wrong Browser' project continues their
> > > > scrutiny of the
> > > > conventions of the most popular of these
> > > > technologies that link
> > > > 'everything', the Web Browser. (7).
> > > >
> > > > Others artists are not concerned with technology as
> > > > such. They
> > > > investigate social networks, distributed knowledge
> > > > or social
> > > > protocols, for example.
> > > >
> > > > Together, all of the artists in this show help us
> > > > speculate, with the
> > > > widest possible scope, on what an art for networks
> > > > might be.
> > > >
> > > > 3. MF: Perhaps it is useful to think about two of
> > > > the modes of
> > > > network that currently exist. There's the
> > > > development of systems that
> > > > take heterogeneous material and connect it through a
> > > > unifying,
> > > > reductive, measurable protocol. Another might be
> > > > informatisation -
> > > > that everything can be transposed into a
> > > > transmissable and calculable
> > > > numerical 'equivalent'. Perhaps these kinds of
> > > > networking
> > > > technologies are linked to the idea of a discovery
> > > > of an ur-language,
> > > > a code that precedes all codes.
> > > > A different kind of network might be that which
> > > > is deliberately
> > > > non-compressible, that generates its own terms of
> > > > composition as it's
> > > > enacted; rather than reducing one thing to its
> > > > intermediary, it
> > > > focuses on inventing new connections, proximities,
> > > > conjunctural
> > > > leaps.
> > > >
> > > > SP: The unifying system forces homogeneity onto
> > > > previously
> > > > heterogeneous material and has plenty of historical
> > > > precedents such
> > > > as systematic classification in Zoology, the Dewey
> > > > decimal system.
> > > > Objectified matter is ordered, processed - the
> > > > system aims for
> > > > closure, completeness.
> > > > In your second example, the subject resists
> > > > classification or
> > > > reduction to a cipher. For example, in
> > > > organizations, there's always
> > > > tension between structure - invariably hierarchical
> > > > - and those who
> > > > work within it. Despite the most ruthless
> > > > line-management, the
> > > > subject - individual or group - will find ways of
> > > > subverting the
> > > > structure. A common form of resistance is the
> > > > 'gossip network'.
> > > > Rachel Baker's 'Art of Work', for example, has
> > > > previously inserted
> > > > itself into this context. (8)
> > > >
> > > > I think Manuel De Landa's model (9) of meshworks and
> > > > hierarchies is
> > > > useful here and relates, (at least in my
> > > > understanding of it), to the
> > > > relationship between networks, hierarchies, agency
> > > > and structure.
> > > >
> > > > Meshworks (networks) and hierarchies exist as a
> > > > mixture. The meshwork
> > > > formed as an aggregate of dissimilar, heterogeneous
> > > > material, the
> > > > hierarchy from similar, homogeneous material,
> > > > forming strata. They
> > > >
> > > === message truncated ===
> > >
> > >
> > > =====
> > > http://www.somedancersandmusicians.com/
> > >
> > > __________________________________________________
> > > Do you Yahoo!?
> > > New DSL Internet Access from SBC & Yahoo!
> > > http://sbc.yahoo.com
> > > + Well this is thoroughly depressing
> > > -> post: [email protected]
> > > -> questions: [email protected]
> > > -> subscribe/unsubscribe:
http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
> > > -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
> > > +
> > > Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
> > > Membership Agreement available online at
http://rhizome.org/info/29.php
> > >
> > >
> >
> >
> > + Well this is thoroughly depressing
> > -> post: [email protected]
> > -> questions: [email protected]
> > -> subscribe/unsubscribe: http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
> > -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
> > +
> > Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
> > Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php
> >
>