I know what the authors means when she writes "to avoid lapsing into a retrograde medium specificity, on the one hand, or technological determinism, on the other" but this is a well worn post-modern mantra that might not be that useful anymore.
It is arguable whether the media specificity of a work is any longer irrelevant. Many vital works are being produced that consider their mediality as essential to appreciating the work. This is especially the case for works that seek to use media characteristics to shift the way the work is made, disseminated and engaged. Media art, by definition, does just this. So, to follow the author's logic, media art is irrelevant as it considers media specificity to be important.
The issue of technological determinism is a more complex one. It was probably necessary, in the early days of PM, to fight the dominant view of how history was made; by great people, their wars and inventions. PM sought to establish a more nuanced and broader apprehension of who and how the (human) world was made. However, that doesn't mean technology is therefore not part of the debate. In a broader context is remains a key consideration - perhaps more so as we begin to see, post ANT, how it operates virally in liaison with other factors. Foucault's concept of the dispositif relies on this expanded approach to power relations and remains a powerful framework for understanding them. I have a feeling this author is, in repeating this antique mantra, glossing over something very important and highlighting what is so wrong not only with the logic that underpins the art world (and magazines like Artforum) but also much of the pop-theory it depends on.
best
Simon
On 4 Sep 2012, at 12:28, Sarah Cook wrote:
> I also think I should mention that we should be not taking Bishop's article entirely out of context of the very welcome September issue of ArtForum, which has a spot-on introduction from its editor Michelle Kuo which actually begins with the letter which Paul Brown posted the link to! Michelle Kuo has a PhD which looked at Experiments in Art and Technology, and who was very keen to talk at Rewire but due to scheduling concerns couldn't make it.
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=31950
>
> To that end, to add to ArtForum’s own archival response, here is a curated selection of readings about new media art published in ArtForum as sourced from the online archive, in no particular order:
>
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=10623 - Nam June Paik
>
> http://artforum.com/archive/id=20619 - Trevor Paglen
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=30804 - review of Younger Than Jesus
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=5670 - Rafael Lozano Hemmer
>
> http://artforum.com/archive/id=21993 - review of Predrive: After Technology
>
> http://artforum.com/archive/id=29975 - review of New Document
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=6580 - Ant Farm
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=1672 - Christiane Paul’s Hotlist
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=2888 - Jon Ippolito’s hotlist
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=22120 - Barbara London
>
> http://artforum.com/news/week=200116#news84 - Variable Media Initiative
>
> http://artforum.com/archive/id=20592 - review of Superlight
>
> http://artforum.com/archive/id=21297 - review of Untethered
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=4509 - Sylvere Lotringer
>
> http://artforum.com/archive/id=19211 - Claude Closky
>
> http://artforum.com/archive/id=465 - Rachel Greene on web art
>
> http://artforum.com/archive/id=278 - etoy
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=8261 - The Yes Men
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=20915 - on service aesthetics in art
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=22117 - Dara Birnbaum and Cory Arcangel
>
> http://artforum.com/diary/id=25360 - review of Seven on Seven
>
> http://artforum.com/inprint/id=2704 - Maciej Wisniewski / Open_Source_Art_Hack
>
Simon Biggs
[log in to unmask] http://www.littlepig.org.uk/ @SimonBiggsUK skype: simonbiggsuk
[log in to unmask] Edinburgh College of Art, University of Edinburgh
http://www.eca.ac.uk/circle/ http://www.elmcip.net/ http://www.movingtargets.co.uk/
MSc by Research in Interdisciplinary Creative Practices
http://www.ed.ac.uk/studying/postgraduate/degrees?id=656&cw_xml=details.php
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