Re: <nettime> Lev on the embarrassment of digital art

Hi all. Longtime lurker, first-time poster.

I’ve been thinking about Manovich’s facebook post since I glibly sent screenshots to a few friends who make pretty compelling digital art. While I assumed I’d soon forget about it, nettime kept bringing it up, so here I am.

Part of what stuck in my craw is a faulty comparison. Manovich switches from Ars Electronica to Netflix and is relieved to find there well-made films, “perfectly lighted, color graded, arts directed.” Well, of course. Netflix is in the business of making consumer products, things that, above all else, you will want to look at. Art Festivals have a different purpose. If we want the digital art equivalent of Netflix or big consumer movies, we’d do better to think about big consumer video games. I’ve been playing Death Stranding for a few weeks, and it’s been a good while since I’ve felt as compelled or moved or conceptually challenged by a film. Nor could anyone reasonably say the game, which takes on life and death and societal trauma and family dynamics in the post-apocalypse all through a central plot very much about network connectivity, is anti-human, devoid of feelings or passions. And let’s talk about technical accomplishments! Let’s talk about color grading! It lacks none of the slickness or polish Manovich sees as so tragically lacking from digital art.

Now, don’t get me wrong. As someone interested in media and media art, I’ve sat through my fair share of deeply embarrassing electronic noise shows. But I’ve also sat through my fair share of deeply embarrassing punk shows. That doesn’t mean punk is bad. While big consumer media (good or bad) is principled on being magnetic, there’s also always been an avant-garde sensibility that, good or bad, is premised on being repellant. No wonder that when it gets it wrong, it’s embarrassing. And it may take some time to discover what’s merely repellant for the sake of it and what uses repellency to crack holes in stultified thought, but we do end up figuring it out because we keep coming upon these holes in our thought.

Especially when they emerged, we could have spoken of the profound embarrassment of cubism, brutalism, expressionism, abstract painting, minimalist sculpture. I mean, Performance art, for god’s sake! But what cubism or brutalism (etc.) that has endured has done so, at least in part, because it’s pretty good.

But forgetting the avant-garde and just thinking of the the rarefied world of the highbrow gallery or the arts festival (some of the problems of which Francis Hunger pointed out in this thread)… I’m a big believer that for as long as these spaces have existed, they’ve mostly been full of preening crap, and unscrupulous or just plain doltish art dealers have promoted ranks swollen with meritless art. But out of this haze critics and curators and even good collectors have plucked things that deserve to endure. Manovich says he feels embarrassed when looking at 99% of digital art/new media art/media art — that seems about right to me.

So could we do with less uncritical exuberance for any art that tacks “digital” onto its identifier? Sure. But we don’t get much further toward finding the good stuff with such broad-brush disdain, however intentionally provocative. If we’re staying within the “art world” (and a couple people in the thread have pointed out that this might not be the most important place for this art to live), what we need is what we’ve always needed: critical taste. What we need, besides an updated library sciences that makes sure these things even can endure, are updated tastes and sensibilities amongst those tasked with helping us sort the wheat from the chaff. We’re finding new ways of doing this without the usual gatekeepers online, but thinking narrowly of the institutional art world, we need this to be the remit not only at digital-focused cliques like Ars Electronica, but all of the places that have conscientiously developed their ability to think and talk critically about art and its merits. I’m talking everywhere from critique groups to popular reviews to academic journals and even auction houses, from small galleries to behemoth museums to the National Endowment for the Arts. Not only so we can get rid of all that chaff, but also so we don’t lose too much wheat.

Geert Lovink pointed out that a lot of this is already happening as “new media art” gets folded into less specialist arts institutions, and the bevy of good new media art brought up in this thread seems pretty convincing to me. And of course, despite Manovich’s despair—a familiar despair—in the face of bad art, Manovich himself has been an important figure developing this taste, in bringing to light the excellent and, as I suppose he’s trying to do here, burying some of the dross. Did he “waste [his] whole life in the wrong field?” Not if you ask me! I’m nothing but grateful, and look forward to the day—rapidly approaching—when we can happily look back on the rise of new media art with hindsight bias.

-Jordan

Jordan Sjol

PhD Candidate

Duke University | Program in Literature

jordan.sjol@duke.edu

jordandsjol@gmail.com

On Mon, Sep 21, 2020 at 1:25 PM <nettime-l-request@mail.kein.org> wrote:

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Today's Topics:

1. Re: Lev on the embarressment of digital art (James Wallbank)

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Message: 1
Date: Mon, 21 Sep 2020 17:16:39 +0100
From: James Wallbank <james@lowtech.org>
To: bronac ferran <bronacf@gmail.com>, a moderated mailing list for
net criticism <nettime-l@mail.kein.org>
Subject: Re: <nettime> Lev on the embarressment of digital art
Message-ID: <c7cc9c4f-aa51-d1ce-146d-9a7a21337d89@lowtech.org" target="_blank">c7cc9c4f-aa51-d1ce-146d-9a7a21337d89@lowtech.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="utf-8"; Format="flowed"

Hi Bronac,

I've always believed in the truism "ars longa, vita brevis". You only
really see what an artwork is in time.

Lev is right that some artworks become hopelessly outdated, or just of
interest as an experiment - a record of a moment. But some are still
highly relevant.

Now, in 2020, I'm seeing, thanks, in part, to COVID19, propositions like
"TTTP (Technology To the People)" and "Teledildonics" become not simply
provocations, but actual products. The idea that the homeless should
accept payment by contactless credit card machine is "Big Issue" policy.
The idea that you might use devices to have remote sex over the network
has become standard operating procedure for sex workers in lockdown!

The digital artworks of the '90s were often forward-looking. But, for
me, the ones that still resonate were consciously backward-looking as
well, and often had a kind of wistful, critical quality. At the time I
railed against works that I saw as little more than "product
demonstrations". Some of them (I'll name nobody!) were very high
profile, and had spectacular sponsorship and hype. Those works do now
seem laughably dated and irrelevant - but even so, they may have been
interesting experiments at the time.

All the best,

James
=====

On 21/09/2020 16:43, bronac ferran wrote:
> Dear James
>
> Fascinating, but inevitably some thoughts arise
>
> I'd already been viewing Lev's cri de coeur as his Hamlet moment, or
> better still, his anthropophagic minute: Tupi or not Tupi, as our
> Brazilian forefathers warned us. How to breathe life into old stuff?
> To regurgitate the swallowed? To unearth the only recently?buried? To
> undigest the consumed? To tikkik the contemporary back into the retro?
>
> And why?
>
> Oh why. The glamour of the nineties. A fin de millennial revival to
> distract us from wherever we are now: a reaping of those whirlwinds
> now that they have ceased to be gyres.
>
> Ah-but.? Might we then tilt at digital windmills even further? Might
> certain long winded ramblings practiced so long on nettime channels
> find a place of solace in extensive articles in print about why the
> nineties mattered?
> But that is only half the question.
> The other bit missing is why Lev told us the truth about the matter?
> Was Hamlet mad, or simply?grieving?
>
> B
>
> --
> Brona?
>
>
> On Mon, 21 Sep 2020 at 16:16, James Wallbank <james@lowtech.org
> <mailto:james@lowtech.org>> wrote:
>
> Hello Nettime!
>
> This conversation is simply *too* *interesting*!
>
> I'm a bit busy right now, but just want to register that I have
> loads of responses.
>
> What is "digital art"? Where is the boundary between digital art
> and art that engages with the digital?
>
> The artworks that I and my friends made in the mid 90s, under the
> banner "Redudant Technology Initiative" were always embodied in
> physical computers - they were installations and objects. If you
> make objects (as I do), you know that they change over time.
>
> Sometimes I think that the "prank", the "intervention" or the
> "interactive" that characterises much of how Lev describes digital
> art doesn't quite do this - it's more performative and of the
> moment. It isn't meant to have a presence over time.
>
> I think that the theme of RTI artworks was redemption, the
> reclamation of objects from the universal process of decay. Philip
> K Dick called this "kipplization". The tendency of all things to
> degenerate into trash. We used then ancient computers to make
> installations, in the knowledge that we were already working with
> the semi-functional, the antiquated, the obsolete. We weren't just
> advocating recycling, and exploring our software skills, we were
> also raging against entropy - the "accelerated decrepitude" of the
> digital age.
>
> That feeling of sadness, or tragedy? that Lev identifies was
> ALWAYS AN INTENDED PART OF THE WORK.
>
> Before making those artworks, one of my earliest "digital"
> installations was a complete list of identified computer viruses,
> painted in clear varnish onto 1m x 2m sheets of raw steel. (Eight
> of them, I think - maybe 10!). Visitors to the gallery were
> invited to spray the steel with corrosive liquid (water, salt and
> vinegar) which made the piece decay, and the image appear. (The
> varnish protected the virus names.) I knew that this process of
> decay was unstoppable. The piece would slowly rust into oblivion.
>
> Similarly, each time we exhibited the "Lowtech Videowall", we
> resisted careful packing and cleaning, so the installation
> (comprising 36 25-33mHz computers, and a powerful 66mHz server!)
> accumulated dents, scratches and grime. We conceded that it was
> legitimate to clean the screens.
>
> Now here's a thing. I have stored those artworks for the last 20
> years. They have become even more antiquated. The 486s that were,
> at the time, obsolete, have now become antique. The '80s styling
> of the cases has become fascinating in a way that it wasn't at the
> time. At the time, the Lowtech Video Wall was something of a
> demonstration of technical prowess. Should I show it again, it
> will be so again. The effort and skill required to revive
> 30-year-old machines will be, if anything, greater than it was to
> repair and reuse them in the first place. Perhaps it's impossible,
> and entropy has already won.
>
> The rusting artwork I mentioned of is still in storage. Whether
> the list of virus names that was first applied to it is still
> legible, I don't know. All was predicted, and all has come to pass.
>
> If anyone ever wants to help me break open the digital pyramid, to
> exhume and reanimate the works for exhibition, I'd love to talk.
>
> Best regards,
>
> James
> =====
>
> On 17/09/2020 08:37, Geert Lovink wrote:
>> URL or not but this is too good, and too important for nettimers,
>> not to read and discuss. These very personal and relevant
>> observations come from a public Facebook page and have been
>> written by Lev Manovich (who is ?feeling thoughtful? as the page
>> indicates).
>>
>> ?
>>
>> https://m.facebook.com/668367315/posts/10159683846717316/?extid=fWYl63KjbcA3uqqm&d=n
>>
>> My anti-digital art manifesto / What do we feel when we look at
>> the previous generations of electronic and computer technologies?
>> 1940s TV sets, 1960s mainframes, 1980s PCs, 1990s versions of
>> Windows, or 2000s mobile phones? I feel "embarrassed. "Awkward."
>> Almost "shameful." "Sad." And this is exactly the same feelings I
>> have looking at 99% of digital art/computer art / new media
>> art/media art created in previous decades. And I will feel the
>> same when looking at the most cutting-edge art done today ("AI
>> art," etc.) 5 years from now.
>>
>> If consumer products have "planned obsolescence," digital art
>> created with the "latest" technology has its own "built-in
>> obsolescence." //
>>
>> These feelings of sadness, disappointment,remorse, and
>> embarrassment have been provoked especially this week as I am
>> watching Ars Electronica programs every day. I start wondering -
>> did I waste my whole life in the wrong field? It is very exciting
>> to be at the "cutting edge", but the price you pay is heavy.
>> After 30 years in this field, there are very few artworks I can
>> show to my students without feeling embarrassed. While I remember
>> why there were so important to us at the moment they were made,
>> their low-resolution visuals and broken links can't inspire
>> students. //
>>
>> The same is often true for the "content" of digital art. It's
>> about "issues," "impact of X on Y", "critique of A", "a parody of
>> B", "community of C" and so on. //
>>
>> It's almost never about our real everyday life and our humanity.
>> Feelings. Passions. Looking at the world. Looking inside
>> yourself. Falling in love. Breaking up. Questioning yourself.
>> Searching for love, meaning, less alienated life.//
>>
>> After I watch Ars Electronica streams, I go to Netflix or switch
>> on the TV, and it feels like fresh air. I see very well made
>> films and TV series. Perfectly lighted, color graded, art directed.
>>
>> I see real people, not "ideas" and meaningless sounds of yet
>> another "electronic music" performance, or yet another
>> meaningless outputs of a neural network invented by brilliant
>> scientists and badly misused by "artists."
>>
>> New media art never deals with human life, and this is why it
>> does not enter museums. It's our fault. Don't blame curators or
>> the "art world." Digital art is "anti-human art," and this is why
>> it does not stay in history. //
>>
>> P.S. As always, I exaggerated a bit my point to provoke
>> discussion - but not that much. This post does reflect my real
>> feelings. Of course, some of these issues are complex - but after
>> 30 years in the field, I really do wonder what it was all about)
>>
>> P.P.S.
>>
>> The mystery of why some technology (and art made with them) has
>> obsolescence and others do not - thinking about this for 25
>> years. We are fascinated by 19th-century photographs or 1960s
>> ones. They look beautiful, rich, full of emotions, and meanings.
>> But video art from the 1980s-1990s looks simply terrible, you
>> want to run away and forget that you ever saw this. Why first
>> Apple computers look cool, cute, engaged? But art created on them
>> does not? And so on. I still have not solved this question.
>>
>> Perhaps part of this has to be with the message that goes along
>> with lots of tech art from the 1960s to today - and especially
>> today. 19th or 20th-century photographs done by professional
>> photographs or good amateurs do not come with utopian,
>> pretentious, exaggerated, unrealistic, and hypocritical
>> statements, the way lots of "progressive art" does today. Nor do
>> their titles announce all latest tech processes used to create
>> these photographs.
>>
>> --------------------
>> Ars Electronica 2020:
>> https://ars.electronica.art/keplersgardens/en/
>> <https://lm.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fars.electronica.art%2Fkeplersgardens%2Fen%2F&h=AT2w4OEuuoeVihKs5LjapuFkzEqtX9kuEBqihrvRbLxcuGHrMqRyRMepEAj7BPSSlqJg9BXKo7LkCG_hIaW69JvA5Kxej9OYXAGjkGNmEm3brgToON6XJYp7Et8r5tsIzkFwbrHkPa3zDVfvnsoo2zo5TMf5GxGjT83hCGKqrSbm>
>>
>> --------------------
>> Video illustration: Japanese robot at Ars Electronica 2010 -
>> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmabKC1P51A
>> <https://lm.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DmmabKC1P51A&h=AT0ZZLvc7X9Tf8ucLLR-DUPF7ioMwdtdLBafjgz2Y_Fq9EBhcL-jiyga7ljPRHx0Quc6zpegRFbBFcgLw7VFffy0xT4s9Y_QZ1lFGsTgU2dNuph12NAxFyRRUwNZ0uai5yQJ3nDDib4h4xcmlL6vHlPXM27bHgOHtAZB67GwKbei>
>>
>>
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>
> --
> Brona?
>
>
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