[-empyre-] rethinking art&science

[Felix Sattler <felix@querformarte.de>]

Dear -empyreans-


this was send to the list on behalf of Jill Scott:
> 1. Scientific Research in the book "Coded Characters" by Jill Scott,
> largely falls into three categories
>
> a. Mediated technology itself. The history of the implications of media
> including its analog, digital and computational evolution. In regards 
> to
> these evolution and particularly in relation to interaction and 
> interface.
> Do people feel that media art has a future-if so where could this 
> future be
> showcased? Could artistic research in these fields ever be taken 
> seriously
> as scientific research?


A couple of days ago I was very glad to be able to attend a panel 
discussion about Art&Science at the Art Gallery of New South Wales. The 
panel was chaired by Anna Munster who's contributed to the list very 
much this month - thanks Anna for also providing this insightful panel!

In my opinion the statements of the artists who participated in the 
panel (a visual artist, two "Neue Musik" composers and a musician from 
the Kronos Quartet) showed that they did not question whether their own 
practice should be regarded as scientific or not but put their emphasis 
on the possibilities to collaborate with science while remaining at an 
art perspective.
It has to be noted that these artists work in slightly different areas 
than most of the new media artists we have been talking about so far - 
anyway composition has been one of the first fields where technology 
and scientific methods have been introduced (still, many contemporary 
concerts bear witness to that with their introductory talks about 
technological aspects and scientific research that led to the creation 
of the sounds). Regardless, all of these artists had accomplished works 
that definitely can be labeled "media art".

I am not sure if the only future for media art has to be an inclusion 
into the sciences. Sure enough (mediated) technology plays a key role 
in today's perception of reality. Reality is in fact just a result of 
this mediated technology. Even if this sounds a bit old fashioned 
structuralist: But why seems media art being incapable of establishing 
its identity in being different from the sciences and their 
methodology? Though there is the one big argument which makes it indeed 
necessary to fight for media arts place amongst the sciences and that 
is money spend on scientific research.
In the past centuries art, science and philosophy have all had their 
very equal right to affect our lives by paradigm shifts within each 
discipline. None of these disciplines seemed to be superior nor 
included one of the others. Think of Galilei&Darwin for the sciences, 
Brunelleschi&Duchamps for the arts and Heidegger&Derrida for 
philosophy, as different as they may be from one another, they are all 
responsible for paradigm shifts that made their impact on our world.
Needless to say their has been influence and friendship between all 
three disciplines at all times (at least between the greatest geniuses) 
which didn't lead to the inclusion of one into another.

I would like to end with Paul Feyerabend who has already in 1984 
published "Science as Art". I do not recommend this book as a credo as 
it is not flawless.
However with this book Feyerabend proposes to treat the sciences as 
arts. Of course that is problematic, too, but at least enables us to 
imagine the reversal of what we encounter today. In the book Feyerabend 
opposes an idea of sciences being superior to the arts. He concludes 
that the sciences have only been assigned their role in creating truths 
by society while the arts could (luckily) remain in the realm of 
offering multiple truths and realities. While scientific progress 
replaces former truths as non-truths the arts only know of epochs 
without rendering the past non-true.
Now, if multiple realities seem to establish themselves as the "only 
truth" (paradox and even including non-truth in the form of an 
exception or including exclusion) does this still lead the arts into 
succumbing to the sciences?

If there is a parallel reality to that I'd be glad to discuss where 
else art could "showcase" itself in the future.

Felix

--
artist and querkopf

http:// www.querformarte.de