[-empyre-] scalable relations-- how does this matter? (or de-materialize?)

[Christina McPhee]

dear -empyreans-

Please welcome Christiane Paul back to the list. Christiane has just opened three intertwined new shows on 'Scalable Relations'  in California.  She is bringing  to us new media productions that, in her words, "illustrate the relational qualities of the digital medium."  

http://www.ucdarnet.org/scalablerelations/scalablerelations.php

To quote her exhibition notes--   "One of the distinctive features of the digital medium is its capacity to establish relations between large quantities of data through filtering and processing according to different criteria. These constantly evolving, scalable relations affect both the production of meaning and a traditional understanding of aesthetics, which become subject to computational logic?the instructions given by algorithms?and a constant reconfiguration of contexts. The format of the exhibition itself, in its distribution across multiple venues, mirrors the relational theme of the exhibition and the inherent connectivity of the digital medium."

Hopefully this month some of the artists in "Scalable Relations" will engage with us. Meantime I want to start by asking Christiane
about how she may place the 'scalable' morphology as a significant discovery?  Is 'scalable' like 'granularity' or is it something more 
like a series of cascading iterations? Are these qualities valuable for us as a use factor-- or as something intrinsically beautiful, or both? 

-cm