net.art auction on eBay

hello Rhizomers,

For the first time, as part of it's annual fundraising art auction,
New Langton Arts - an experimental media artists space in San
Francisco, CA - is offering a symbolic portion of 3 net.art works for
sale on eBay.

On the one hand; this auction follows the tradition of art
organization fundriasing auctions by selling donated art works; but
we are also updating that tradition with regards to net.art and
commenting on present issues of how valuation happens with a
intangible art medium by not selling whole or discrete art works, but
by offering instead conceptual portions (points, pixels, chapters) of
art works. So, yes, we need to fundraise; but we're also using the
opportunity to play , just a little, with the idea of collecting
intangible art. I would like to thank all of the artists for
supporting New Langton Arts with this creative donation.

You can participate by going to the New Langton Arts website
(www.newlangtonarts.org), or by following the links below directly to
the 3 works on eBay:

Lisa Jevbratt
1:1, 1999
1:1 was a project created in 1999 which consisted of a database that
would eventually contain the addresses of every Web site in the world
and interfaces through which to view and use the database. Crawlers
were sent out on the Web to determine whether there was a Web site at
a specific numerical address. If a site existed, whether it was
accessible to the public or not, the address was stored in the
database. Because of the interlaced nature of the search, the
database could in itself at any given point be considered a snapshot
or portrait of the Web, revealing not a slice but an image of the
Web, with increasing resolution.
eBay URL: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item'8449839
Your bid is for one pixel which will be identified as your own within
the database.

Sonya Rapoport
Arbor Erecta: A Botanical Concept for Masculinity, 1998
Chapter 3: Pandanus Dioecious: Male/Female Separate is an
interrelated cross-cultural and scientific botanical concepts project
the work?s intent to promote tolerance of differences. Arbor Erecta
reflects on the intangible but real communication between tribal
initiation in New Guinea, its indigenous Pandanus tree and sexual
preference.
eBay URL: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item'8450829
Your bid is for a single web page/chapter 3 of the project.

Richard Rinehart and Shawn Brixey
Chimera Obscura, 2002
Crossing the boundary between gallery installation and Internet art,
Chimera Obscura is constructed around a telerobotic agent that
Internet visitors use to navigate and decode a highly complex maze
designed from a human thumbprint. The project employs a mutative game
structure, allowing visitors to leave a virtual trail of media memes
(video, audio, text, etc.) behind for others to read, duplicate, or
delete in the search for a unique sequence that will decode the maze.
The ghost of the minotaur roams the maze in the form of random
mathematical algorithms that yield mutative forces to the memes in
the database, frustrating attempts at an easy, linear solution.
Visitors over the Internet break through by assuming a newer hybrid
form: that of telematic cyborgs simultaneously operating a robot in
the gallery space attached to a continuously evolving database in
virtual space.
eBay URL: http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item'8452110
Your bid is for a single virtual point within the maze (point 2031).


Thanks very much,

Richard Rinehart
New Langton Arts, Board Member and net.art Curator