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Interview with Constant Dullaart Reading Response

According to Cecilia Guida, Constant Dullaart is an artist who uses the internet as a platform to investigate different components and functions of the web.

In the interview, Constant Dullaart explains his concepts and processes in exploring the internet as a medium. For example, he states that the research involves exploring the technical functions of the internet and presenting its capabilities to attract attention. In addition, the artist attempts to experiment with the boundaries of the mediums’ capability and analyze the medium on a. metaphysical level. In relation to his own piece, YouTube as a Subject (2008), he explains his interest in the YouTube play button and its connection to conceptual art and society.

I found Dullaart’s process in exploring the medium interesting, specifically, for its systematic qualities. For example, he researches the medium with specific steps and order to thoroughly understand the medium that will help inform his decisions.

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Alexandra Rowe Peer Blog Review

Alexandra Rowe does a great job analyzing the readings and providing great detail on how the art piece functions and ideas that encompass them. In all the reading responses, she sufficiently provides quotations from the readings that is followed by an analysis and also provides her own opinion. Furthermore, she provides interesting questions in all the readings, for instance, “how can we analyze the dark net in terms of morality?”.

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Black Vernacular: Reading New Media by Martine Syms. Reading Response

In this excerpt, Martine Syms attempts to ignite conversations regarding new languages and their potential to improve communication between different cultures. For instance, in his piece, “Everything I’ve Ever Wanted to Know”, he creates a web page that displays three years of his Google searches in a drop-down list format. In addition, he removes the ability to investigate the searches any further by redirecting users who click on a search, back to the first search. This function was intentional in hope to emphasize the “language of search”, rather than the content of the search. Furthermore, he states that his works are often assumed to have some relations to race; however, Syms clarifies his works are influenced by race but not essential in understanding his work. His inspirations come from the vernacular of different communities and the new vernacular that was created with the invention of the internet. Syms provides examples of black internet artists such as Kevin Young, Jayson Musson, and Keith Obadike and their method in using the internet to invoke an experience through the internet and language. Lastly, Syms hopes to create a discourse around his work by allowing readers to “gather ideas, feelings, and factions”.

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Wikipedia’s Sexism by Amanda Flipacchi. Reading Response

In the New York Times, Amanda Flipachhi addresses the recent change in Wikipedia. The change involved volunteer editors moving women in the “American Novelists” category to the “American Women Novelists” subcategory. Furthermore, the article addresses the disproportionate numbers of men to women authors from this change in which they later reverted. Significantly, after Op-Ed articles surfaced, Wikipedia attempted to delete the Wikipedia page that addressed this issue.

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Hans Ulrich Obrist In Conversation with Julian Assange, Part 1

In this beginning of this interview, Julian Assange starts by stating the places he previously resided and his childhood interests. His interests include breaking encryption systems that were used to stop people from sharing software and systems that were used to hide information in government computers. Furthermore, Assange uses this interest to protect peoples’ rights by creating systems that give individuals more freedom from the state. For instance, WikiLeaks was a system that provided the people records that were being suppressed from publication and after publication. Assange states that his goal for WikiLeaks is that it will be incorruptible and provide accurate information to the public. However, accuracy in the information cannot be completely guaranteed. Nevertheless, Assange is attempting to find methods to protect intellectual records by implementing mathematical functions that links content to the material.

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Trevor Paglen in Conversation with Lauren Cornell, Reading Response

In this interview, Paglen explains his inspirations and ideas that influences his work and his process. For instance, he explains his goal to create tension between different elements within different movements and historical genres such as Abstract Expressionism and Minimalism. Furthermore, Paglen explains how his work’s ambiguous and abstract nature is significance in his process of creating tension. He is also interested in exploring ideological terms created from technology such as “the Cloud” and “Internet Freedom” and further investigates the physical components that allow them to function and its infrastructures.

Another idea that Paglen mentions in his interview involves the anonymity of the internet and how it allows users to feel free when in fact these platforms are surveilled or has the potential of being surveilled. His minimalist sculptures, Autonomy Cube (2014), combines elements from Minimalism and modern technology to create a space that addresses issues regarding surveillance and anonymity. Paglen utilizes Tor and its ability to route all traffic to the Tor network in order to anonymize the users that connect to the cubes WiFi.

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If You're Not Paranoid, You’re Crazy, Reading Response

In this reading, Walter Kirn addresses questions and conspiracies regarding government surveillance. Kirn writes about the problems related to the technology used by the government to gather information, such as phone logs, e-mails, and browsing histories, while also addressing the needs for it. He states, “lose your privacy, lose your free will”, regarding companies’ capability in manipulating behavior through data mining. Consequently, he begins to understand how it might be necessary after his introduction to a heavily armed group who opposes the data center. He suggests a possible solution to the issues regarding data mining and surveillance, stating that people should give out their information freely, in order to prevent it from being stolen.

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The Dark Net pages 193-243 Reading Response: 2 questions

Can technology make us physically, intellectually, and morally better?

 Within the dark net, all types of content is accessible. Does this promote creativity or does it hinder it?

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The Dark Net pages 110-192 Reading Response

In this segment of the book, Bartlett examines common issues regarding distribution of illegal pornographic content and illegal substances that are often associated with the Dark net. Furthermore, he explores the underlying structures in these spaces that allow it to function and addresses the new problems that were created with the creation of the internet, specifically, problems regarding the availability of illegal pornographic content. On topics regarding the Silk Road, a digital space in which people can anonymously purchase and sell goods, Bartlett participates in a transaction of illegal content and shares his experience. According to Bartlett, individuals who want drugs will eventually acquire it if they are motivated enough, stating “there is violence and corruption at every point in the supply chain as drugs move from producers to street dealers. The longer the chain, the more violence and suffering; the more profits for dealers; and the more substances are cut and mixed. Dark net markets won’t fix all of this–but they will reduce the length of the supply chain”. Through his experiment and research, he discovered the fundamental component that allowed this dark market to grow, function, and live; the interactions between seller and consumer, and the empowerment in the consumer. Another topic he addressed in this section of the book was a brief history of the web-cam and the creation of new methods of interaction.

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Reading Response for The Dark Net pages 90-109

In this reading, Jamie Bartlett gives a general background on cryptocurrency’s importance, the creators, and the reasons for its creation. Bitcoin, a type of digital crypto-currency was created as a means to gain more freedom and privacy. The idea of Bitcoin is to take control of the money supply away from the government and banks, therefore, these entities will lose power to manipulate the people. The Bitcoin is therefore a political project that attempts to gain back freedom. Similarly, the Dark Wallet, also attempts to address a political message by solving issues related to surveillance, corrupt governments, and greedy corporations. According to Amir, “ Technology–empowers individuals”, therefore providing the people more freedom. Other projects with similar goals have created applications that provide the people a new form of communication that cannot be censored or monitored. For instance, social media platforms such as Twister and email platforms that add additional security for information. These programmers and activists view these forms of technology more beneficial stating that crypto-currencies “reduce the state’s ability to control us”, and sees it as necessary even when criminals use it for criminal activity.

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Interview with Brenna Murphy

In Brenna Murphy’s interview, she states that she projects herself into the forms of poetry to create a visual self portrait using computer programs. The computer programs create the texture and shapes that reveal unusual imagery in her Flickr self portraits. Her approach on medium selection is an important aspect of her works. She combines different mediums to open up different thinking processes that influence her critical process.

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Interview with Jeremy Bailey Reading Response

Jeremy Bailey utilizes his performative pieces and the web to critique technology and its relationship with the body. According to Bailey, his net art is influenced by the history of performance video art and is exploring reflective circuits that society is often interacting with, such as the cameras within computers and phones. Furthermore, Bailey states that his net art investigates the connection between technology and the body and how it changes ones’ perception of themselves. In his art piece, Video Terraform Dance Party and WarMail (2008), Bailey appears to be playing a video game that offers him the ability to transform and design a terrain. Additionally, he records himself playing the game while also vocalizing his decisions. According to Bailey, In VideoPaint 2.0 (2005), Bailey combines the performance of his body and the bodies in the videos and describes the act as “collaboration”. In this performance piece, we can see his interest in experimenting with the relationship between the body and the camera, while integrating his idea with new technology.

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Character Development by Jennifer Krasinski

Krasinski believes that many people in her generation felt that their lives were ‘inauthentic or unreal’ possibly because of the rise in advertising and corporate culture. Brody Condon explores the minds of the participants through live action role playing performances. This idea stems from his personal life starting in his childhood where he would escape the stress from the world by mentally entering into video games. As a teen, he was introduced to live action role play through the Society for Creative Anachronism, a group that reenacted the lives of those living in medieval times. According to Krasinski, live action role play gave individuals the opportunity to “explore alternative cultural situations and/ or political structures”. Condon used this experience and knowledge of LARP and incorporated into his experiment, where he invited people to create a character and allow the characters to become self-actualized. Condon named this performance piece Level5, in which people obeyed the rules of the game, played their characters as closely as possible, and collaborating with other players to make the game better for the participants. Importantly, the game became a space for social experiments and investigation in human behavior.

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A Brief History of and/or Gallery by Paul Slocum

In this reading, Paul Slocum examines art within the digital space and how it is collected by art collectors. Slocum archived different works of net art by artists and displayed it into the physical world such as a gallery. His work is important in attempting to represent artists that have not been represented. He attempts to combine the digital art world and the physical art world into one and expand the surrounding boundaries.

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Doing Assembly: The Art of Cory Archangel

Cory Arcangel realized the potential of the web and its ability to quickly communicate, promote, and share information with others. Arcangel did not have formal training as an artist; therefore, he was at a disadvantage in exposing his works of art in traditional galleries. He utilized the internet’s ability to attract attention to his net art. His net art attracted audiences from the art, music, and tech worlds. For instance, Super Mario Clouds (2002), Arcangel’s solo project attracted the public interest of all the individuals previously exposed to the game and transformed into a work of art that is comparable to the ready-made. A common theme found in Arcangel’s work was the use of obsolete technology, for instance, the use of 8-bit computer games. In addition, Cory Arcangel, utilized the web as a space for virtual engagement with the audience. For instance, Masters (2011), Cory Arcangel programmed a golf video game to always miss the hole after swinging the golf ball. This piece of work could also be questioning the new generation of instant gratification. Another question he attempts to address in his work is media presence and how it grows and changes over time. He attempts to answer these questions through the process of creation, repetition, depreciation, and archiving (Cornell 36). For example, Continuous Partial Awareness (2008-ongoing), is an ongoing project that attempts to archive artistic ideas that slowly grows over time. For this particular project, he himself is included into the work, similar to a performance piece. He reads the list of archived notes that relate to the internet and repeats it. His works of art is influenced by the Fluxus movement such as John Cage and La Monte Young. Additionally, he is also influenced by other avant-garde musicians such as Pauline Oliveros. Arcangel’s method of distributing his net art is also interesting, in which he transfers digital work into the physical world via DVDs. According to Kukielski, “Arcangel’s computer readymades embody none of the indifference of Duchamp. They seek to reveal and challenge the technological systems employed in their making” (Cornell 42). When Arcangel creates art that is connected to the web, he utilizes the web as a medium in which to activate his work.

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Internet Art Reading Response

“Internet art is intertwined with issues of access to technology and decentralization, production, and consumption, and demonstrates how media spheres increasingly function as public space” (8). According to Lawrence Alloway, new connections are formed through the web and are often more marginal and oppositional. Additionally, the internet opens up a space where an individual can express their ideology; technology; desire; experimentation; and their experiences. However, one opposing view of this form of art is internet arts’ tendency to be more aesthetically comparable to graphic designs rather than works of art commonly seen within galleries. Net artists are strongly influenced by art works created by Marcel Duchamp, for his exploration in overcoming the barriers of art. Similarly, net artists attempt to explore the definition of art in the digital space of the internet.

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Kaprow Reading Response

Allan Kaprow, Untitled Guidelines for Happenings, states that Happenings should be indistinct to prevent from being compared to other works of art. In order to accomplish that requirement, Happenings should be derived anywhere except from the arts and exist outside of ‘culture’. Additionally, Kaprow states that Happenings should take a decent amount of space with mobile capabilities to better find participants that are not normally engaged in art or performance.

Carolee Schneemann’s guide for Happenings consist of detailed instructions or actions. She states that artists must be present by directing and participating throughout the performance piece. Additionally, Schneemann believes that the audience should be completely eliminated in order to emphasize different elements such as “people, space, the particular materials and character of the environment, [and] time” (713). In addition, she states that happenings should be performed once only to prevent repetition and allow the audience to make up their own experience and connections to the work of art. Lastly, Happenings should be discontinuous to prevent predetermined conclusions of the piece.