Is New Media Accepted in the Art World? Domenico Quaranta’s Media, New Media, PostMedia

hello everyone,
really interesting (and infinite) discussion here.
I’d really would like to add a point to the discussion: PhDs
getting a PhD and entering (continuing) life/profession in the university is a typical scenario for people working with technologies: small grants, small research projects, small relationships with companies and institutions deriving from academic work, add up to the few hundreds of euros which are the typical fee an artist gets when he/she gets invited to even the largest festivals, unless you are the superstar of the festival.
And I don’t want to stress the *few hundred euros* part of this as a critique to festival organizers: i had the chance to closely follow a couple of them and they are constantly in difficulty with their available budgets, and I am actually quite amazed that they manage to find those few euros for everyone involved after all!
What i’d like to stress are two things: the first is that the fact that most of the work which was once called “new media art” is designed and developed inside of universitites, in one form or the other, is really significative. As it is the fact that  the interdisciplinary character of many – many of these works – crossing boundaries in sciences, humanities, journalism, performance, arts, architecture, technology, robotics etc, multiple times – is possibly one of these works’ most significant traits. And the one which more explicitly creates a definite gap between what is called “art” and what is not called “art” (let me oversimplify.. i hope it is clear. I’ll be happy to clarify, if it’s not).
The second element which i’d like to highlight has to do with the fact that it sounds always “bureaucratic” to group things together. I know it is useful and convenient, and it allows to investigate and present things at institutional level, but we have been really out of the “era of classification” for a few years now. Even marketing people understand it, and contemporary marketing is perfectly aware that there aren’t 3 ot 4 or 10 “classes” anymore, but 20thousaand, 100thousand, 100million different classes of anything you might like to research.
This is a nightmare, of course, for institutions and large operators, who really like large numbers. But as of now large numbers are made from little tiny groups, each in their little niche: fluid, mutating, changing, evolving and moving around like crazy.
This is one thing which I feel as particularly stimulating in these last few years: the feeling and awareness that there are no “movements” anymore. There are instances, breakthroughs, common interests, common tendencies, but it is really like each one is on its own.
Why am I bringing this up? Because I’d like to connect the art discourse to a wider understanding of the current mutation scenario that has already affected education, economy and event the idea of conflict and revolt.
I don’t mean to attach any moral interpretation to it, obviously. I just want to highlight how the enormous possibilities which we have today, to interconnect emotions, desires, visions, skills and practices across theories, disciplines, sciences, humanities, ethics, technologies etc, really calls for new ways of imagining and doing things.
Open Source and peer to peer teach enormous lessons: of ethics, responsibilities and incredibly wide possibilities for creativity and reinvention of the world around you.
I don’t mean to declare the death of anything (and not of Art and History in the first place): I want to suggest how there are incredible possibilities which are available and accessible now. But they require new forms of schools, new forms of markets, new ideas for what “conflict” can be. 
On this last term “conflict”, I’d like to propose a vision which I find particularly stimulating and meaningful for the contemporary era. Since the TAZ, the idea of conflict has radically changed. After Open Source and p2p it has changed even more. Revolt is individual. When you get a piece of open source software you don’t only get “a piece of software”, you get something that, in a way, is left “incomplete” on purpose, and it includes a responsibility: to use it and fix anything which you don’t like, and to share your efforts with the rest of the planet. This simple act is revolutionary, as it includes a vision on the world. Your revolution is personal, it is an attitude, and it is not complete unless you become a node of a network, and the part “share your revolution” just cannot be left out.
So, while i truly enjoy and adore the works which are starting to find their economic sustainability in the Art Market, I cannot help thinking that we could (and probably already did) define “other” areas, other domains, for that which was once called art and now it’s different, as it covers and interconnects many more things. And, of course, we need to find a sustainability scheme for that, too. I just feel that “making a lot of things be called art” is not a “big” objective. Not big enough, at least.
cheers and thanks for the wonderful debate. 

As historian of photography John Tagg (1993) has noted of the reception of an earlier “new media,” the more experimental aspects of photography were not well-assimilated and the impact of the discourses of photography and contemporary art on each other was highly asymmetrical: the latter changed very little, while the former lost its edge in the process of fitting in.   Ji-hoon Kim (2009) has further observed that despite the extraordinary assimilation of video by MCA, much experimental film and video, particularly the sort of material championed by Gene Youngblood in Expanded Cinema (1970), and its progeny, has been excluded from mainstream museum shows, while being celebrated in exhibitions held in new media contexts.   Inevitably, new media and the longer history of electronic art will be recognized by MCA as well, once a potential market for it is developed and promoted.   Proactively theorizing the issues and stakes involved may play an important role in informing the ways in which that merger unfolds. Needless to say, many in the NMA community are wary of losing this critical edge in the process of assimilation…

At a panel I convened at Art Basel in June 2010 with Bourriaud, Peter Weibel, and Michael Joaquin Grey, the gap between NMA and MCA became increasingly clear.   One obvious indication of this gap was demonstrated by the simple fact that Weibel, arguably the most powerful individual in the NMA world, and Bourriaud, arguably the most influential MCA curator and theorist, had never met before.  Citing the example of photography and Impressionism, Bourriaud argued that the influences of technological media on art are most insightfully and effectively presented indirectly, eg. in non-technological works.  As he wrote in Relational Aesthetics, “The most fruitful thinking … [explored] … the possibilities offered by new tools, but without representing them as techniques.  Degas and Monet thus produced a photographic way of thinking that went well beyond the shots of their contemporaries.”  (p. 67).  On this basis, he states that, “the main effects of the computer revolution are visible today among artists who do not use computers” (p. 67).  On one hand, I agree that the metaphorical implications of technologies have important effects on perception, consciousness, and the construction of knowledge.  But on the other hand, this position exemplifies the historical, ongoing resistance of mainstream contemporary art to recognize and accept emerging media.

Peter Weibel astutely picked up on Bourriaud’s distinction between direct/indirect influences and pointed out the hypocrisy of valuing the indirect influence of technology while ignoring the direct use of technology as an artistic medium in its own right. Weibel accurately and provocatively labels this “media injustice.”  Indeed, the implicit/explicit dichotomy that Bourriaud constructs serves only as a rhetorical device to elevate the former member of the pair – the lofty, theoretical ideal – at the expense of the latter – the quotidian, practical tool.  That epistemological logic of binary oppositions must be challenged and its artifice and ideological aims deconstructed, in order to recognize the inseparability of artists, artworks, tools, techniques, concepts and concretions as actors in a network of signification.

If indeed there is a growing exhibitions that include work by artists who employ new media tools in one way or another, very little has changed.  There remains a more or less autonomous new media artworld (what I call NMA) that has its own institutions, galleries critics and historians, journals and university departments.  The NMA is rarely invited to the mainstream contemporary artworld (MCA) and when it is, it is generally those works that already obey its rules that get tapped.

MCA does not need new media art NMA; or at least it does not need NMA in order to justify its authority. Indeed, the domination of MCA is so absolute that the term “artworld” is synonomous with it. Despite the distinguished outcomes generated by the entwinement of art, science, and technology for hundreds of years, MCA collectors, curators, and institutions have difficulty in recognizing NMA as a valid, much less valuable, contribution to the history of art.  As Magdalena Sawon, co-founder/co-director of Postmaster Gallery notes, NMA does not meet familiar expectations of what art should look like, feel like, and consist of based on “hundreds of years of painting and sculpture.”   It is deemed uncollectible because, as Amy Cappellazzo, a contemporary art expert at Christie’s observes, “collectors get confused and concerned about things that plug in.” (quoted in Sarah Thornton, Six Days in the Artworld)

Citing Inke Arnes, Domenico Quaranta asks, How can we “underline New Media Art’s ‘specific form of contemporaneity’” in a way that does not “violate th[e] taboos” of MCA?  I’m compelled to take issue with the tone of this query.  Violating taboos has played an important role in the history of art.  One of the key contributions NMA can make to art in general is in drawing attention to and contesting the status quo.  This has a lot to do not just with the explicit use of technological media but with challenging the museum and gallery – or any specific locale – as the privileged site of exhibition and reception.  If NMA lies down and accepts assimilation on the terms of MCA, then much of its critical value will have been usurped. But this strident resistance, which is NMA’s strength, is also what makes it reprehensible (if not uncollectible) by MCA.

The operational logic of the MCA – its job, so to speak – demands that it continually absorb and be energized by artistic innovation, while maintaining and expanding its own firmly entrenched structures of power in museums, fairs and biennials, art stars, collectors, galleries, auction houses, journals, canonical literature, and university departments.  This is by no means a simple balancing act and each of these actors has a vested interest in minimizing volatility and reinforcing the status quo, while maximizing their own rewards in a highly competitive environment.  Their power lies in their authoritative command of the history and current practices of MCA and in promoting consensus and confidence in the market that animates it.  As such, their power, authority, financial investment, and influence are imperiled by perceived interlopers, such as NMA, which lie outside their expertise and which, in form and content, challenge many of MCA’s foundations, including the structure of its commercial market.  Witness, for example, the distress of the “big four” labels of the music recording industry over the incursion of new media into established channels of distribution.  From this perspective, there are substantial reasons for the old guard to prevent the storming of the gates, or at least to bar the gates for as long as possible. Typical strategies include ignoring interlopers altogether or dismissing them on superficial grounds.

We live in a global digital culture in which the materials and techniques of new media are widely available and accessible to a growing proportion of the population.  Millions and millions of people around the world participate in social media, and have the ability to produce and share with millions and millions of other people their own texts, images, sound recordings, videos, GPS traces.  In many ways early NMA works that enabled remote collaboration and interaction, such as Ascott’s La Plissure du Texte (1983), can be seen as modeling social values and practices that have emerged in tandem with the advent of Web 2.0 and participatory culture.  Now a YouTube video, like Daft Hands, can delight and amaze 50 million viewers, spawning its own subculture of celebrities, masterpieces, and remixers.  In this context what are the roles of the artist, the curator, the theorist, and critic?  As Brad Troemel provocatively asked in an Artfag City essay, What can relational aesthetics learn from 4Chan?  What do professional artists, theorists and curators associated with NMA or MCA have to offer that is special, that adds value and insight to this dynamic, collective, creative culture?  Why care anymore about MCA or NMA, per se?  What is at stake preserving these distinctions and in distinguishing such artistic practices from broader forms of popular cultural production and reception?  Do such distinctions merely serve to protect MCA and NMA from interlopers by preserving a mythical status to their exclusive, lucrative and/or prestigious practices?

Ed Shanken, 5 Sep 2011

I have elaborated these arguments further in my essay, “Contemporary Art and New Media: Toward a Hybrid Discourse?

Thank you for the long and insightful response! I’m very happy this thread has led to some real discussion.

I think the question “Why care anymore about MCA or NMA, per se?” is the perfect summary of the debate, and how anyone answers it probably depends heavily on their investment in it. If you’re a theorist I doubt it matters very much, MCA has enough prestige as a theoretical field to make it worthwhile. In fact, the “ghetto” effect likely suits academics well since it frames the discourse and narrows down the competition.

But as a professional artist I care because I want to keep creating my work (which necessarily involves paying the bills – a constant even for artists w/o object-based practices), as well as show it in its best possible way without having to groom it to fit one presentation context or the other. And let’s not beat around the bush, the media art world rarely focuses on the artwork to the extent that contemporary art does.

To be blunt: In most contemporary contexts lectures and panels are a legitimizing afterthought to the art and the glamour of the show. That’s a well known if not so pleasant fact, but at least discursive events provide artists and hangers-on a chance to sidle up to their favorite curators and academics . Meanwhile, at media art events the art regularly takes second place to the discourse, unsurprising given that such events are often short-lived and convened for an international audience that vanishes without a trace within a few days. Thus, the discourse is the primary product, and local audiences aren’t a target. One need only witness the peculiar economics of Transmediale or Ars Electronica to get a good idea of the mechanics.

Of course, events like Ars etc. need the exhibitions and performances to establish their merits. Even in a scene jacked into disembodied experiences and global tele-interaction, seeing a thing in the flesh establishes a gold standard that cannot be done away with (regardless of what the net art 2.0 kids say.) And of course there is the matter of justifying to politcal and industrial sponsors what their money has bought, and a riveting series of lectures just won’t do the job.

Anyone who has attended a few art fairs or half-dozen major electronic art event must acknowledge that these mechanisms obviously factor in how these events are organized and prioritized, even if we can disagree on whether they compromise the event itself. I’ve always enjoyed going to Linz even if I sometimes winced at the last-minute, helter-skelter presentation of artworks, I miss Transmediale even though the exhibition part was generally dry and less than amazing. Similarly, I’ll always find something worth looking at in a major contemporary art fair or in a night of roaming around openings in Chelsea even if many shows can be dismissed within 5 seconds of entering the gallery.

Again, I sound cynical. It’s very hard not to be in a world caught
between utopian idealism, capitalist reality and pragmatic realpolitik.
Most people quit art, remember? But often, whenever you’re ready to quit
you’ll see something amazing that reminds you why you’re invested in
art in the first place. And that can’t be erased even though you might
glimpse the not-so-subtle price tag or the twisted economy of the
spectacle not-quite-invisibly attached to the work.

Both MCA and NMA have their version of the art world rat race: NMA = play the gallery / curator / biennial game and maybe nod to the trend du jour. MCA = play the festival circuit, court the right potential co-funders for your next insane un-commodifiable megaproject and maybe nod to the trend du jour. It’s tedious at best and bone-crushingly depressing at worst, but hey, that’s what you sign up for as an artist, right?

Again I would go back to Quaranta’s argument, or at least my reading of it. It’s not about media art vs. contemporary art as absolute choices. It’s not about turning media art into an art market commodity simply to create a (much needed) revenue stream. It’s about nurturing artists and the artworks they create, enabling sustainable practices and maybe saving media artists from making asses of themselves by being ignorant of the last 50 years of contemporary art. (I know I was for a long time.)

Quaranta is correctly pointing out media art’s self-imposed inferiority complex as a potential embarrasment and blockeage of artists’ access to a larger field. But he also puts a clear spotlight on the blinkered prejudice of contemporary art curators and institutions in refusing to engage with media art practices as part of the “expanded field”. (In particular, their mortal fear of ideas that seem worldly, and – more importantly – whose “hot or not” potential is as yet undetermined.) I agree with him that media artists (probably even more so than media art theorists or curators) need to be aware of their relationship to contemporary art. Not as a simple choice between one or the other but as a parameter that will impacts the artists’ practices, their access to certain venues and perhaps markets, and finally the larger context that their work will be shown in and understood as part of.

MCA will never offer the deep discourse for practices intersecting the strange world between engineering, social theory and art that NMA does. But similarly NMA events have so far proven themselves ill capable of showing work with precision and elegance, or even give artists the chance to create the larger narrative that is a solo show or a retrospective. This compromise in the NMA world does become a burden at some point in an artist’s career, a burden that explains why mid-career media artists who made their bones in the early 2000′s now are losing their enthusiasm for festivals and 3-day events and looking to other formats and venues for their work.

Having said all that (against better judgment since comments on art world mechanics are rarely good thing for a practicing artist), I do agree with the central argument you make about the integrity of the work. That integrity is far more important than pragmatism or simple convenience, and if a move towards the MCA world requires dumbing down or self-censorship it shouldn’t be an option. The rumored story of a MoMA acquisition of a classic net art work falling apart because MoMA demanded the work be taken offline is an apt example.

Still, any NMA artist faced with that conclusion will need to be exceedingly clever to keep their practice alive over a 20-year time horizon, never mind ensuring that their work is conserved as more than faded images in books. How many names of 1990′s media /artists readily spring to the lips of post-2000 audiences? The 1960′s pioneers like Mohr and Nake may be having a second spring, but their work were object-based and so can easily be dusted down and recovered. Knowbotic Research, Ulrike Gabriel, Char Davies? Less so.