Twenty years ago the internet was all about sharing information, mainly scientifical information. The internet enabled geeks over at CERN to contact nerds at MIT. Today it’s function has changed. It isn’t a doubt that there’s still scientific data travelling through our glass-fibre networks but since a few years art is also a big deal on the web.
With the arrival of websites such as flickr (for your photo’s, 2004) and last.fm (to discover some new music, 2005) the exchange of amateuristic artistic merit has become much easier. But how are the creative professionals doing? Untill a year or two ago, not so good. Small artists were able to create websites, but the mainstream wasn’t very easily reachable. Good for the small artists social bookmarking sites like del.icio.us went viral two years ago. When one person added a new fabulous art site he just discovered to his bookmarks, someone on the other side of the globe could notice that, visit the site, like it and also bookmark it. Obviously the reach of the arists got much bigger.
So over the past, lets say five years, the internet has grown into an interesting platform for big and small artists to exploit their productions. “What is the essence of modern art in the constantly changing environment that is called the internet?” is the question I’m going to explore and answer using examples that generally fall into the catogery of visual arts.
Imagine we are able to travel through time. We are going on a trip to Paris in the troubled 1930s. In the year 1937 Picasso exhibited his famous piece Guernica there. Probably everyone agrees with me that this is a famous piece of art and most will also reckon it’s brilliance. But what matters most for the moment is that it is a unique piece of art, there’s only one of it. However, today this uniqueness in art is slowly dissapearning. When a professional photographer uploads his best shots to flickr, everyone with an internet connection can download a copy of it (the photographer can indeed prohibit downloading through flickr but there’s still a print-screen function on every computer). This isn’t neccisarily a bad thing, because when the photographer uploads his brilliant picuture he gets fame, comments, tips, and maybe even traffic to his own site in return.
At this point it can be concluded that if artists want to engage in online sharing of their merit they may have to give in something, but they absolutely get something in return.
An example to make this statement clear. Some time ago online (American) clothing store the Quiet Life held a t-shirt design contest. Everyone could give it a shot and the assignment was to design a t-shirt for a good cause. About a month ago the winner was announced. Neil Doshi. The creater of the Right On Fight On shirt. Without a doubt it can be said that the design on the t-shirt contains (some) artistic value. So the Quiet Life enabled Doshi to share his work with the world. I know for sure this is effective, because as I’m writing this I’m wearing the exact shirt. Consider the fact that I’m living in the Netherlands and it can be concluded that Doshi got a chance to use the web for spreading his designs.
So what is the relation between art and the internet? What is the essence of modern art placed in the internet? How do the commercial art industries react on the abilities given by the internet? How does the art itself react to the internet? These are picks of some questions which will shape the themes of my future posts here.