As somebody who has been a creative practitioner with and has curated the
moving image across both "old video" and "new media/video" I would question
whether the phenomena of YouTube and similar online video sharing
sites/communities is comparable with "old video" and thus whether there is
any (shared) territory to reclaim.
Video art (as it was once called) had its own concerns and formulations and
the theory that was built around it and to which it responded was very
specific. Many of us will be able to remember the debates - the distinction
between video and television and cinema, the aesthetics of the electronic
image, the status of the assembly edit, the role of special FX, etc. I get
all misty eyes just remembering those debates (usually in cold artist run
galleries).
On the other hand, video practice was not singular back then - there were
many different modalities, many of them exclusive to one another. Community
video, video activism, video art, video sculpture, video documentation of
time based and ephemeral artworks that then became artworks themselves, etc,
etc. In the 1990's video made a come back not as video art but as part of
neo-conceptualism, as practiced by the Wilson twins or Douglas Gordon.
I haven't looked much at YouTube but from what I have seen this pluralistic
character is evident there as well and it would therefore be likely that
just as video as a coherent genre escaped definition back in the 70's and
80's so it will now in online contexts. However, the multiple genres that
seem apparent with online video seem very distinct to earlier video
practices. If there is a precursor it might be found in the Sadie Benning
school of lo-tech and personal practice.
Perhaps we can at least reclaim the evident plurality, for what it is
worth...
Regards
Simon
On 23/1/08 16:35, "Sarah Cook" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Not meaning to be glib on this dull grey day, but I wonder if there
> is now scope for us to put the generation gap often evident in new
> media curating to good use -- those curators who worked so hard in
> the early days to get video accepted as a new art form, can now
> reclaim that territory and move forward with all this online video
> work, helped by the knowledge they've gained inbetween by continually
> tracking the new (god knows the state of online video projects could
> use your critical help!). and those curators who came to new media
> art after video was already established, can continue to push for
> alternative ideas of culture online (for instance).
Simon Biggs
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http://www.littlepig.org.uk/
AIM/Skype: simonbiggsuk
Research Professor in Art, Edinburgh College of Art
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http://www.eca.ac.uk/
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