:: Saturday, May 24, 2003 ::

Here are the recent additions to the New Media Fix:

Low-fi.org, an online artist-run organization featuring net-art. It not only features links to important projects but also offers commisions. The upcoming deadline is June 15, 2003. Suggested by Ivan Pope.

Virtual Migrants is a new media organization based in the UK. It largely deals with offline New Media projects. It is here added as suggested by the organizers. As some readers may be aware, net-art is a new media sub-category; because of this, some links in the New Media Fix jump outside the expected net-art field.

The fix of this week is: aleph-arts.org
:: Eduardo Navas [+] ::
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79 days is a political piece showing the role of abstraction as an aesthetic device, which can easily become politicized within the right framework. Press Release:

"79 days, a networked hypermedia project is shown here in its English version. Activated by the viewer the narrative thread links an extensive image database of media coverage of the 79 days of the Kosovo war, a live image search for reporting about the recent war in Iraq, everyday photographs and streamed video of Kosovars and Serbs.
Visitors to the site add terms used in current war reporting to a glossary of war(s) on the front page. created 2003, 3000 files, 40 minutes of streamed video, sound. Optimized for DSL"

When entering the site, one can select and mouseover various images; when this is done, a close-up of the particular area is shown on the right hand side of the window. This activity is reminiscent of computer defragmentation programs, which use the close-up feature to help the user understand the type of information being represented. 79 days uses the defragmentation idea to question media manipulation of political events.
Artist: Trebor Scholz
:: Eduardo Navas [+] ::
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Crankbunny reevaluates the concept of infrasound in their Future Installment Three new media project, currently featured at Boring Art. This project asks the participation of the net community, and because it is still work in process, it would be great if readers participate.

A piece to keep an eye out for in the future. But for now, let the current movie download and enjoy the repetitive animations.
:: Eduardo Navas [+] ::
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Salty (Debbie Salemink) is a Dutch net artist who's been making works for the internet for over 5 years now. Recent additions to her site are the nationpark research series, which are java based works that put you in the role of a hunter who has to hunt down abstracts images. An overview of her work can be found at salty.org/desktop.
:: Peter Luining [+] ::
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This is an open and free invitation to attend the opening of the uberground salon in Roterdam this Saturday 24/05/03 starting 18:30 at UBERGROUND, gedempte zalmhaven 923, rotterdam downtown rotterdam, near by the erasmus bridge, north side.

"Uberground is a new art space and transcultural playground in rotterdam, open for the public on a regular base for shows and salon events." The theme of the salon is "computerfinearts.com, a netart collection, 1999-2003" with guest Mr. Doron Golan, art collector and artist from new york city, usa.

"Uberground events deal with new media, architecture and design, experimental art, theory, performance, music, social issues, things on, or over the edge" and the organisers would like to extend a further invitation to all curators and artists interested in organizing future events in the uberground.
:: Garrett Lynch [+] ::
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"404 object not found" is a congress that will be held in june in Dortmund (Germany). The subject is preservation of new media art, and as the name suggests it has a special focus on the net. On the links page of the site there's a huge list of urls pointing to online digital (art) archives. The list exist though of rather instituational art archives. And here's a point of critique, because when we talk about new media or net art now, it is hard to say which work will be important or influential in the future. For that reason I missed probably the most import archive on the 404 links list: the way back machine. This project tries to archive the whole internet, has a very huge database, and has a searchengine where a lot of lost urls can be found, like for example old rhizome and nettime pages. But unfortunately this works not for all urls. An example: talking recently with somebody about one of the pieces that inspired me to do interactive soundengines I discovered that I wasn't able to find the particular work (made by fsol) through google though I could find dead links on some old sites that were pointing to the specific url (http://raft.vmg.co.uk/fsol/) were the work once had been. So I went to to waybackmachine.org and typed that url. But although I discovered some remnants of the site, the piece that I looked for wasn't available. So you can conclude that the largest netarchive is well worth a look when you are searching for something that seems to be lost, but also that especially when you go for older (1994/1995) works it is far perfect (yet).
:: Peter Luining [+] ::
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Entropy8Zuper! has created a set of abstract filmic narratives called Wirefire, which are currently being featured at Computer Fine Arts. The first project was launched in September of 2000, and since then every few months a new installment is added to the ongoing series. When one enters the website, a random narrative is presented; all installments start with the same introduction of a pixelated hand squeezing a nipple. When moving the mouse around, one can find two clickable buttons. One button offers a new piece at random, while the other offers the list of all movies according to the dates when they were made.

Wirefire is yet another net project relying directly on cinematic language. One might even ask why should these short movies be considered net art at all, when they are clearly in line with experimental film language? Would they not function much better in a film setting? The answers to these questions lie in the presentation itself. When one enters the project, a random narrative is offered, and once inside, one can choose directly or at random from the database. The openendedness of the presentation itself makes the project inherently net art, and because of their specific dependency on database logic,* the animations become further problematized. I suggest visiting the website several times. I usually analyze websites very quickly, but Wirefire challenged me over and over again. The net project is painfully exquisite.

*See Lev Manovich. "The Database Logic," The Language of New Media, (New York: MIT, 2000) pp.218-243
:: Eduardo Navas [+] ::
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As some netizens may already know, Steven Dietz was recently dismissed from his curatorial position at The Walker Art Center. Sarah Cook, New Media Curator and Coordinator of Crumb, has written an open letter addressed to the Walker's director Kathy Halbreich, and invites everyone to sign it as a way of expressing disappointment for the dismissal of Steven Dietz, an innovative and important new media curator.
:: Eduardo Navas [+] ::
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"Lab 3d" an exhibition of six 3d based installations is currently happening at the "Cornerhouse" in Manchester, England, and runs until the 20/06/03. The exhibition shows some cutting edge 3d based art works and gives visitors / users the chance to "immerse themselves in the world of the dimensionalised Internet and the landscape of the computer game."

As part of the exhibition "Web3D Art 2003" "an international, juried show of 25 online projects from artists, researchers, and students from more than 10 countries" is accessible to those who can't make it to the show to see the installation work. Here there is'nt the usual techie created VRML worlds, all savvy and no-style, that one would usually expect to find but a few very interesting pieces. Still I'm as little convinced that this is the way the internet will go in the future as much as the whole 'internet becoming interactive tv thing'!

:: Garrett Lynch [+] ::
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Mauro Ceolin develops projects inspired by computer games. Though his RGB website features interactive pages, his most interesting works consist of simple flat drawings.

I particularly recommend his resource page called Game Musicians.03, in which various micro-music developers are featured. Another project worth visiting is Game People.02, which also presents flat vector drawings of important people in the development of computer games.

Both projects are great resources for anyone who is interested in the history of computer game culture. The projects are even more appealing because the vector drawings are simple, yet intriguing. The flat minimal compositions, and the strategic use of browser-safe colors connect the portraits not only to computer game history, but also to the inherent aspects of the webpage. The result is pieces that slip between being straight resources and conceptual art works.
:: Eduardo Navas [+] ::
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