Media Artist HW

Find five (5) media artists who provoke, inspire and wow you, using the massive list of doom:

Perry Hoberman has done a number of interesting projects involving technology. The one that strikes me the most, however, is one entitled "Zombiac" (though "The Bar Code Hotel" is also incredibly fascinating as a concept to me). This is an installation piece which incorperates a number of old computers, whose insides have been torn out, leaving zombie-like electronic shells. Inside the monitors have been placed green fluorescent lights, which turn on and off at varied intervals, which accompanies sounds (each computer having a unique type of sound) - simulating conversation. When one "speaks", the other monitors will turn toward it, and flash back in response. When a human viewer draws near and speaks to a computer, the monitor will stay dark and the computer silent, simulating listening, until the person stops speaking, when it will appear to answer. I really love the way in which he humanizes the interactions between computers, allowing them to visibly share in exchanges amongst themselves. I can only imagine how eerie it would be to walk amongst them - I know I would have a very strong sense that they were speaking, communicating, if only I could understand the words.

At first glance, visitors might simply perceive an arrangement of generic workstations. Then, as the monitors spin to face and flash at each other, a perception of a strange kind of community emerges. Finally, wandering through the installation, visitors may have the sensation of a man-made (but nonetheless alien) intelligence listening and addressing them, attempting to communicate, to establish contact.

While poking at various links to works involving barcodes, I stumbled across this project by Peter Coffin. Barcodes are such a impersonal concept, purely electronic in nature and decipherable only by machines, a means of language we could not hope to understand, entirely commercial. In this project, the artist provides barcodes which can be saved and printed out as stickers, which anyone can place overtop of the original barcode on a product in a store. When scanned in at the register, rather than a price, a four-letter word will appear on the screen, and in effect poetically disrupt the purchase. Taking something of cold electronic numbers and finances and yanking it back into the realm of humanity, provoking thought rather than computation, really makes me smile. The interchange between technology and reality is something that intrigues me endlessly to begin with...


Another site I found with interesting projects is 0100101110101101.org, concerning media, technology, and manipulations thereof. They have accomplished several large-scale hoaxes, involving the existence of an artist (with a full body of work) and a large-budget film, as well as hijacking the Vatican's website for a period of time. These projects impress me greatly, and the idea of tricking people into believing they are truly receiving emails from the Pope's staff, and twisting around articles from the Vatican's website just enough to still look credible but have the wrong message, is really fascinating to me. Twisted, but interesting. I think the one that really struck me though, was a computer virus they created and spread as a work of art. Biennale.py is apparently still on the loose - so far as I can see it presents no real harm, but is a love poem which spreads itself wherever it may, doing nothing more than inserting its words into any files you may have which are written in the Python language. It'll spread out of control, it'll make a round-the-world trip over two minutes, it'll go where you'll never go over your entire life, chased by anti-virus cops trying to regain control over it. In this very moment it's wandering around at the speed of byte. It's an art form that finds you, you don't have to go to museums to see it, the work itself will reach you inside your house.

The virus stresses its "aesthetic qualities" through the beauty of its own source code, a "love poem" being an integral part of its executing code. «We've chosen Python - says Massimo, Epidemic spokesman - exactly for the possibility to give any name to the variables, in practice you can write software with your own words».

The Thought Shop has a number of works related to text, and many of the projects are attempts to make manipulating and integrating digital text easier and more immediate. While the work combining changing text, and combinations of text and images, was what initially caught my eye, going through the projects, I Know What You're Thinking really grabbed me. It's a downloadable program, which, when run, will skim through all the text files (and any eudora email files) on your computer, and show snippets of them at random, piecing together a real-time collage of every bit of your typewritten history. The result is a disconcertingly intimate and schizophrenically lyrical look into your activities on that machine. I love the connections that we form between words and phrases that are juxtaposed at random - even if there was no meaning in their being together, we'll begin to create connections and a deeper meaning between them.


Along the lines of an interest in the relation between reality and virtual existance, the work Rebecca Allen has done really intrigues me. Some of her work dates back into the '80s, one even in the late '70s, and continues through the present, working with connections between computers and humans, attempting to make computers relatable on a human level. Her "Bush Soul" works were what first caught my eye, tying together virtual avatars with the West African idea of a bush soul, where a human's soul exists both within their own body, as well as in part in an animal. Our soul, our consciousness, will somehow be embodied in an avatar. The avatar becomes our other body, another container for our spirit. Seeing how immersive the current state of gaming culture can be.. it's interesting to see these ideas explored in an artistic manner. Though the project began in 1997, and thus is far outdated now in some ways, the ideas which came through in it are pretty close to the mark in the present. (And I like that she makes a point about creating a virtual environment meant for exploring and relating, not shooting things.)