Date: Sun, 1 Nov 1998 21:57:03 +0000
From: "Gerald O'Connell" <goc-AT-gacoc.demon.co.uk>
Subject: WebArt Manifesto: more bananas


In message <004601be0532$36167e20$040013ac-AT-bestpuus1.kaapeli.fi>, Andy
Best <best-AT-meetfactory.com> writes
>I first want to say that everyone is entitled to their own opinions 100% -
>what I object to in the "WebArt Manifesto" is someone coming along trying to
>define a medium or approach to art making and basically saying "this is what
>WebArt is ......" - especially when we live in a time when definitions and
>barriers should be and are being broken down between what were previously
>totally different areas of cultural activity.

OK Andy, I get your point, but there is a distinction between 'barriers'
and 'definitions'. I am all for breaking down barriers, but without
workable definitions and descriptions, communication breaks down and we
are all impoverished. The WebArt Manifesto is an attempt to nail down
some key terms and help to build an understanding of why WebArt
represents a big step forward as the advent of an important new artform.
Non-artists within the art world need that kind of stuff in order to
have recognisable logical landmarks in a new territory that is subject
to unprecedentedly rapid change. That will help all artists working in
this and related fields, because it is part of the process of
recognition that provides the orientation their audiences ultimately
require.

Perhaps one barrier that really needs breaking down is the one that has
artists 'doing it' and others 'talking about it'. Historically, this has
done both art and artists a disservice. Thanks to the Internet, artists
now have much more ability to engage in critical discussion and to
determine the ground rules for the discussion and description of their
activity. The WebArt Manifesto is an instance of exactly that process in
action. These kind of follow-up disputes are a valuable contribution to
the discussion and further refinement that is always required in a
period of rapid change.

>There are many examples of art works made using the Internet that simply
>cannot exist in their original form without that interaction, whether that
>be real time interaction, or the capability for the artist to update a work
>over days, weeks, or months. Once you remove the Net the work still exists -
>in certain cases - but it will be a different work, or a documentation, or
>simulation, of the original NET work.

Think about that carefully. Do you really believe it ? 
Interactivity such as that you are describing can exist (and in some
museum examples already does exist) by virtue of a LAN. The Internet (ie
the public Internet) is merely a geographical expansion/extension of the
effect via the PSTN and those physical parts of the PSTN where the flow
of traffic is determined, in part, by public Internet routers. Are you
really sure that there are, or can be, works of art that require a
different definition or classification (and that is all that is at stake
here, because that is all you are objecting to - a definition and
classification) when the extent (not the inherent nature in terms of
quality or type of communication available - just the quantitative
reach) of their connectivity changes ?

My contention is this: if you can do it on a LAN or even a WAN, and it
does not require the public Internet in order to exist and work in the
same way, then your argument breaks down. 
This is a point of really fundamental importance, because current
networking arrangements and connectivity parameters will change quite
dramatically over the coming years. The major Telcos, especially the
international carriers, are building their new networks on the basis of
IP (Internet Protocol) as the common standard. 'The Internet' is likely
to fragment into an extended hierarchy of 'Internets' and VPNs (Virtual
Private Networks), while the distinctions between 'Internet', 'Extranet'
and 'Intranet' become increasingly unclear. In such an environment,
defining an artform in terms of its connectivity parameters (as
determined out there in the PSTN by a shifting quicksand of access
permissions) is likely to throw up definitions and descriptions that
make sense for about ten minutes at a time ! (OK, it's boringly
inevitable, but I'll say it before somebody else does: 'In the future
every digital artform will be infamous for fifteen minutes')

> Any work on the web can be called web
>art, and you can use html (for instance) to make works that are completely
>stand alone or for the web, this is not an argument. But to say that web art
>by definition is work made using html is just bananas!

But what is even more bananas is to say that 'work X stops being a work
of type Y and becomes something else (not sure what) when you take it
off one system for connecting computers with each other and put it on
another identical system that just happens to have less computers
connected to it' - and that is what your contention amounts to,
logically and in the light of the facts.

Now, it may be that, for some people (even for artists and their
audiences) things become much less 'fantastic, exciting, stimulating...
positive, intellectual, enlightening' when fewer people from a smaller
geographical area are involved. But that does not mean that they have
become different things.

The WebArt Manifesto actually says that WebArt is: "That artform which
depends upon HTML code, including HTML's derivatives and successors, as
the medium for its creation, presentation, communication and
expression." That means, of course, that there may be some things that
do not require HTML in this way, but do require the Internet. So be it.
For those things, a different term is needed.  Maybe 'NetArt' or
'net.art' would be right. And WebArt would be a subset of those things.
At the same time, there is a range of different ways of using HTML to
package different types of artistic activity. It may be, therefore, that
WebArt itself would, over time, turn out to have a number of subsets of
its own. Absolutely nobody ought to feel threatened, diminished or
confined by the natural development of such a set of identities and
accompanying definitions.
The key element in the definition is the term 'depends upon' - the
effect of this is to exclude instances where the WWW's HTML envelope is
used merely to deliver work (usually a single image, perhaps accompanied
by text) in exactly the same way as a the print medium would reproduce
it. So it may well be, as you say Andy, that 'Any work on the web can be
called web art,' - but it is equally the case not any work conveyed via
the WWW can be called WebArt. The WebArt Manifesto is worded quite
precisely in order to make that crucial distinction. Which is why this
statement:
>
>McLuhan stated that the content of the new medium is the old medium - so you
>putting your drawings on the web pretty much follows along with that.

is patently absurd, given what I said ('The HTML is essential to the
actual visual appearance of the work, and also the overall compositional
effects derived from its sequentiality.') and you have chosen to ignore.
Unless, of course you would care to admit that your "Conversations with
Angels" is equally an instance of McLuhan's dictum, in that it is
basically an interactive online arcade game for art students and VRML
nerds ?  ... but I don't think that is really a productive road for the
discussion to go down...

> But
>going back to the old story, none of "your" (that I saw) works does anything
>that couldn't be done using a CD rom - therefore why is it web art? >

Because it was done in HTML which means that it has the inherent
potential to be networked. And HTML is a whole lot easier to use and
more flexible than the languages otherwise available for packaging my
(and your) type of work, which means that HTML has the important benefit
of making  certain types of art much easier for artists to execute and
distribute than they would be if they still required more advanced
programming skills.

> Yes, gaming has a culture, but
>there's a huge wealth of creative talent out there that we hope to see
>involved in creating fantastic, exciting, stimulating virtual worlds that
>serve to build communities and positive, intellectual, enlightening
>experiences for users.
>

Andy, I am sure you are right about this. I also hope that there is
going to be much fruitful cross-fertilisation between such
'interactivists' and others who are concerned with developing ideas that
revolve around a more traditionally asymmetric flow of information
between the artist and the audience. One way or another, I suspect there
will be more than enough bananas for us all to digest...

good luck,

Gerald O'Connell

http://www.gacoc.demon.co.uk/


     --- from list avant-garde-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---