hi,
Pre-web text based art is definitely undervalued and underrepresented in histories. Some quick thoughts.
For information about art in MUDs and MOOs (pre-web, chatroom art basically) check
-the interview Julia Scher in [net.art 2.0] by Tilman Baumgärtel.
- http://www.hz-journal.org/n17/jansson.htm
Focussing mostly on newer spaces, but still something there.
quote:
"One of the first attempts to explore performance on-line was made by Antoinette LaFarge, an American new media artist and professor of Digital Media at University of California Irvine. In 1994 she founded the "Plaintext Players", an online performance group inspired by MOO. MOO (a cousin to MUD-Multi-User Dungeon) was a system used to create online text-based adventure games in the beginning of the nineties."
Do a search for an online document called 'Moo was there', about MOO poetry.
If we take for our basic unit of poetry the word- then the basic unit of MOO poetry is the object- and a room in a moo could be conceived in Gombringer's terms- "a constellation, an arrangement, a play-area of fixed dimensions... ordered by the poet, (who) determines the play-area, the field or force and suggests its possibilities. the reader, the new reader, grasps the idea of play, and joins in."
A nice insight of life and play in MUDs and MOOs is given by Erik Davis, author of Techgnosis:
http://www.techgnosis.com/index_muds.html
About 'codes for lists', these are not very different from codes of conduct in other social gatherings. It is quite normal to wait and see what a particular online 'group' is like, since all you have to go on is letters on a screen.
In my opinion the dynamic of online art discourse should be thoroughly researched. The online environment should not be seen as one space with one social dynamic, one set of rules, and equal levels of entry for everyone. The growth of people that have started communicating online should also be taken into account.
I am not crazy about an anecdotal approach of history. The story about the origin of the term net.art for example is not funny to me. Critics preferred the anecdotal history of the real history, even when informed otherwise, because 'it is such a good story'. To write a history based on 'good stories' seems far from what it is meant to do. Anyhow, one problem with preferring anecdotes is that they block a further search for origins, and a deeper view of history. In this case it blocked the view of Pit Schultz organizing an exhibition in Berlin of what he called 'net.art' in 1995. Vuk Cosic was one of the artists in this exhibition. I wouldn't call Shulgin's prank a work of art, unless every twist of communication by artists would be a work of art. That seems a bit of a stretch, but I am sure someone will try to correct me on this. :-)
For me it is important to move beyond simple preconceptions about art and the Internet. I am not entirely sure whether the subject 'art history online' covers this topic. It could also refer to how the canon of art history has moved and developed online.
best,
J
*
On 3 okt. 2013, at 08:25, Charlotte Frost wrote:
> Thanks Rob.
>
> I'm unaware of any art-talking/making MUDs or MOOs - anyone? This is a
> definite gap in my knowledge!
>
> I *think* I first posted to Rhizome and lurked on Nettime. My first F2F
> with any of these online art types was with Marc Garrett and Ruth Catlow
> at Furtherfield. I wrote and asked them what Furtherfield was all about
> and whether I could get involved - it seemed the best way to learn. And I
> also started writing Net Art News for Rachel Greene around that time -
> again because I wanted to learn. I felt like there were pre-arranged codes
> of conduct for lists and that I hadn't got the memo. In a way, I suppose
> there were. Pit Shultz explained this situation in an interview in Mute in
> 1997 - that things kind of just worked themselves out:
>
> 'The phenomenon is, and I think this is not such a rare thing, that a
> group of people, in a repetitive, communicative environment, begin to
> filter a field of possible 'communication acts' in a certain way, quasi
> machinic. You don't have to be professional or especially skilled in the
> beginning. The production of 'information' along the borderline of
> noise means to constantly refine a social context, maybe an artificial
> one, what some call immanent, I mean with rules which are self-evident,
> and are interdependent in a dynamic way.'
>
> http://www.metamute.org/editorial/articles/mute-conversation-nettime-pit-sc
> hultz-digital-publishing-feature
>
> Before we even get into any discussion of lurking and flaming, I wonder if
> you or anyone else has any thoughts on how prohibitive online spaces can
> be to newcomers. I'm about to run the 3rd Academic Writing Month, which
> uses a lot of Twitter, and someone just said to me they were scared to
> death of taking part the first time round.
>
> And also I like your point - if I'm understanding correctly - about
> different spaces giving rise to different types of interaction/discussion.
> Today it's easy to compare the 'brands' of different social media
> platforms but it's difficult to get a sense now of how one list would have
> differed from another - except by asking people to comment. So I'd love to
> know which lists people used and why? Why the Syndicate rather than
> Rhizome? Was it just geographical allegiance or was there a different type
> of discussion or a different value in being involved?
>
> All anecdotes and examples welcome. By the end of this month I'd love to
> have collaborated on a vast archive on the history of online art
> discussion - feel free to respond on list or elsewhere and post us a link!
>
>
>
>
> On 03/10/2013 10:16, "Rob Myers" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
>> On 01/10/13 03:53 AM, Charlotte Frost wrote:
>>>
>>> So, first up, what was YOUR first experience of online art discussion?
>>
>> It was 1996 and I had signed up to an art mailing list (I cannot now
>> remember its name or where the archive of my old [log in to unmask] college
>> account is).
>>
>> But I didn't have a handle on the shared academic or specific mailing
>> list culture that would have allowed me to participate constructively.
>>
>> This meant that I made a lot of elementary mistakes. For example I
>> replied to a cross-posted essay as if it was a comment by someone on the
>> list. This annoyed people and left me feeling alienated.
>>
>> So my first experience of online art discussion was of its social and
>> technological form rather than any specific art historical content.
>>
>> Perhaps I would have done better if I'd tried IRC or the MOOs instead (I
>> knew about MediaMOO), something more realtime and social. Maybe that's
>> just technological determinism.
>>
>> But surely part of the reason for this discussion is the idea that new
>> tools and new media create new possibilities for discussion. And if this
>> is the case, the technological and emergent social differences between
>> the various means of discussing art online will affect the discussions
>> that take place using them.
>>
>> - Rob.
|