In a follow up to Paul Warren's comments on web-based art ["<a
href="/cgi-local/query.cgi?action=grab_object&kt=kt0426">How do you define
online arts?</a>" RHIZOME CONTENTBASE, 1.22.97], Markus Kruse wrote:
these are interesting questions but i do not necessarily agree with your
statements about museums or institutions making serious investments in
exploring the web as a medium in and artists and museums scope.
I think that no museum has even yet understood the web in its entirety
as a new medium for communication. Most museums present their sites as
if they were extensions of the pr and marketing departments. Many of
them try to make another nice little promotional catalog out of it… If
you take a look at most museum sites you will agree that they are a
curatorial disaster.
[…]
There has yet to be a museum that makes an entire exhibition available
via the WWW. They are scared to death of this medium and maybe they
fear the loss of the real visitor to the actual institution.
Furthermore, noone counts the WWW visitor like a real visitor….
How about involving the populace from all across the globe when curating
exhibitions??? but maybe too many curators are afraid of losing their
position of power. Well, i guess the western mistake of cultures
curating other cultures is still an accepted practice….
Paul Warren responded:
I think you are mostly correct in this. The offline art world doesn't
seem to have very many ideas on how to deal with virtual experience.
But mainly, I think it still comes down to money. There isn't any way
for museums to pay for high quality virtual sites, and even more
important, to make money from sophisticated web exhibitions like they do
with blockbusters.
Unless that happens somehow, I think all we'll see is re-purposed
exhibition brochures and so forth. Otherwise, the art institutions may
eventually be forced to re-define their missions, which I'd guess they
are not too keen on doing soon.
Ironically, this might mean Bill Gates could have increasing power in
the art world (e.g., the digital rights to significant works etc.
through Corbis). Power tends to abhor a vacuum.
Tamas Banovich also commented on Warren's "How do you define online
arts?":
I read your posting on RHIZOME. I basically agree, I am struggling with
all the questions and problems you describe. My answer will be our
digital realm I am trying to put up for a while. It will focus on
individual projects, one at the time which hopefully can be called web
art. The page is at about the same stage as yours, i still have the "Can
You Digit ?" page up until than. I am looking for work for the site,
when it starts it will feature a project every three four weeks.
At this point it is anti commercial activity, I agree, but there is some
interest already and when there will be some significant work,
significant artists with some track record, I think the support will
materialize as well…
[…]
At this point, i think the most important thing is to develop a critical
base, so there is a qualified dialog.
To which Warren responded:
[…]
While I agree with your post completely, I tend to become concerned when
"critical base" thinking becomes too central. IMO, one of the main
trends which has flattened art is that late-modernist critics have
shifted from seeking out artists who have something to say into making
their own "critical statements" which use certain artists as a way to
illustrate this point of view.
I think we have to somehow begin to find significant art of our own time
period (which by definition is not an illustration of a pre-existing
critical point of view).
Perhaps making web art projects "non-commercial" is the only way to
remove the tendency to link art with pre-existing critical limits to
experience.
However, I do think that commodity reality has forever shattered the
idealized landscapes of illusion, but I'm not certain whether synthetic
landscapes offer the mystery necessary to sustain art.
Regardless, I think the time may soon be right for art to push forward
on the web.
