Re: Forward from Christiane Paul: RE: [-empyre-] reply to Ben Bogart

[Christina McPhee <christina112@earthlink.net>]

hi Pali and list,

This month limit focus to the provocative question posed by Documenta  
12 , "Is Modernity our Antiquity?", even though the debate about what  
is new media, what is painting, is always interesting, and probably  
is a modernist obsession (e. g. the focus on the meaning of materials).

There are some interesting months in the =empyre= archive that treat  
this kind of query into the nature or core values of a discipline  
with respect to materials.  For example,
January 2004, Nova Media Storia,with guests Nick Montfort and Noah  
Wardrip-Fruin
> https://mail.cofa.unsw.edu.au/pipermail/empyre/2004-January/ 
> subject.html
on what is new media relative to its history,
and the many months in which Jim Andrews has developed topics around  
the nature of digital writing.

cm


On Mar 8, 2006, at 2:52 PM, Pall Thayer wrote:

> On 7.3.2006, at 23:19, Robbins @ Jetztzeit wrote:
> > Quickly the point I'd like to suggest in response to Christiane's  
> > statement below is in regard to the often levied criticism that  
> > "New media art is all about technology."  Unfortunately,  I  
> > believe this is more often the case than not.  However, painting  
> > is not simply about painting as such ( materially and technically  
> > speaking.)
>
> I would say that this comment is well addressed by Christiane here:
>
> > If an art recipient / museum visitor is unfamiliar with a specific  
> > technology or interface, it will automatically move to the  
> > foreground and become the focus of attention -- which very often  
> > is completely unintended by the artist. For the expert audience,  
> > on the other hand, the technology tends to be transparent, it  
> > moves to the background and becomes mostly a vehicle for content.  
> > Unfortunately, this problem of focus and perception cannot easily  
> > be solved.
>
> This holds true for everything. Not just technology based art. If I  
> knew nothing about painting, I could easily assert the claim that  
> painting is about the technology behind painting. In the same way,  
> I would say that heavy-metal is about screaming guitar solos and  
> classical music is about the orchestra. But just to take things a  
> little further, I would argue that there's a lot of new media art  
> (generative and data visualization), that is in fact painting. I'd  
> be interested in hearing about some samples of well-recognized new  
> media work that is only about the technology.
>
> Pall
>
>
>
> --
> Pall Thayer
> palli@pallit.lhi.is
> http://www.this.is/pallit
>
>
>
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