Dear list.
First of all, apologies for the delay caused by national holidays, the
World Cup, computer crashes, house moves and the like! Welcome to the
summer season and the belated launch of our discussion theme:
permanence and public art.
In his article "Public Art and Interactive Publics" (2003,
http://www.yproductions.com/writing/archives/000730.html), Steve Dietz
writes:
"The content of interactive work may be ever-new, but inevitably its
form will be obsolescent almost from the day it is installed."
Which leads us to ask, just how permanent is permanent when it comes to
public art installations which use new media technologies?
This summer's ISEA festival (less than a month away!) has a strand of
exhibitions concerning the Interactive City as well as an Interactive
Cafe, which suggests that "we are on the cusp of a world where
information processing and biotechnology has changed many, if not all,
objects around us. How does this change our everyday spaces and
everyday experiences?" While the works on view at ISEA will only be up
temporarily, one can assume that curators will be visiting and thinking
about commissioning similarly interactive projects for their cities and
public spaces, potentially on a permanent basis. Steve's questions of
three years ago are still of going concern:
"How can host organizations be made to understand and accept
maintenance as normal? Light bulbs? Of course they need to be replaced
on a regular cycle. Computers? Why aren't they "permanent"? ...
Eventually we will know that a computer in a reasonably protected
environment can last x years, an LCD screen needs to be replaced every
y months., and we'll plan accordingly. It's programming that is a
particularly gnarly issue. Leaving aside the problem of buggy code,
what happens when the information architecture changes? Who is
responsible for making the necessary adaptations?"
So this month we're looking for your thoughts on making public art
experiences lasting, and your experience in being commissioned or
commissioning work, and how it has affected your practice, your sense
of public spaces and your idea of permanence in art.
This month's respondents include:
Sheldon Brown is Director of the Center for Research in Computing and
the Arts (CRCA) at the University of California at San Diego (UCSD)
where he is a Professor of Visual Arts and the head of New Media Arts
for the California Institute of Telecommunications and Information
Technologies (Cal-(IT)2). His work examines the relationships between
mediated and physical experiences. This work often exists across a
range of public realms. As an artist, he is concerned about overlapping
and reconfiguring private and public spaces; how new forms of mediation
are proliferating co-existing public realms whose geographies and
social organizations become ever more diverse.
Matt, Susan and Rob Gorbet enhance people's experience of public spaces
through the creative application of technology. With innovative
physical interactions, their design practice and public artworks add
surprise and delight to spaces like retail stores, hotels, airports and
museums. Their interactive marquee 'P2P: Power to the People' will be
shown at ZeroOne San Jose in August. Rob is an artist and professor of
electrical engineering at the University of Waterloo, and a Director of
the Contemporary Art Forum, Kitchener and Area (CAFKA). Matt and Susan
are cofounders of Gorbet Design, Inc. and are also currently working
with the City of San Jose and SJC as the 'Airport Art Activation Team'
(along with partner Banny Banerjee) for the new San Jose airport
buildings. They are creating an infrastructure to support a rotating
program of Art & Technology in the airport. More at
http://www.gorbetdesign.com and
http://www.gorbetbanerjee.com/artactivation.
Jon Thomson & Alison Craighead are artists based in London who have
recently completed a permanent commission for a Sainsbury's grocery
store window in South East London (Decorative Newsfeeds /
http://www.thomson-craighead.net/docs/decnewsffh.html). They will also
be showing two installations at ISEA 2006; Unprepared Piano
(http://www.thomson-craighead.net/docs/pianof.html) and a new work
called, 'Light from Tomorrow' (http://www.lightfromtomorrow.com). Jon
is a lecturer at the Slade School of Fine Art and Alison is a senior
researcher at University of Westminster.
Ben Rubin (who will join the discussion in August) is a media artist
based in New York City, and his permanent project for the ADOBE
building in San Jose will be on view at ISEA. Ben's exhibitions include
shows at the Whitney Museum of American Art, the MIT List Visual Arts
Center, and the Skirball Center in Los Angeles (in a show organized by
the Getty Museum). He has been a frequent collaborator with artists and
perfomers including Laurie Anderson, Diller+Scofidio (on Jump Cuts,
which also took place in San Jose), Ann Hamilton, Arto Lindsay, Steve
Reich, and Beryl Korot. Rubin's Listening Post (2002, with statistician
Mark Hansen) won the 2004 Golden Nica Prize from Ars Electronica. Ben
received a B.A. from Brown University in 1987 and an M.S. in visual
studies from the MIT Media Lab in 1989. He teaches at the Yale School
of Art, where he was appointed critic in graphic design in 2004.
Barbara Goldstein is the director of public art in San Jose and also
was the public art director in Seattle for the Library and many other
projects.
and hopefully others still to be confirmed!
Please chime in with your experiences and your thoughts.
Sarah
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Sarah Cook
School of Arts, Design, Media and Culture, University of Sunderland
CRUMB web resource for new media art curators
http://www.crumbweb.org
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