Is My Computer Supposed to Do That?
Posted by ben on 15 Jan 2007 at 10:56 am | Tagged as: net.art
Since not too many people seem to be familiar with the net.art genre, I thought I’d link y’all up to one of the classics, Jodi.org. Jodi is a two-person artist collective that plays with perceptions of personal computers, often by either mimicking glitches or exploiting pre-existing bugs. Their web sites and programs are sometimes impossible to control, making a force-quit necessary (I lost an earlier version of this post when I had to shut down Firefox due to one of their web-shenanigans – turn of pop-up blocking if you want to check it out). They tend to use an aesthetic derived from the early days of personal computing, with lots of text-based layouts, and green-on-black or white-on-black color schemes. In recent years, they have done a lot with video games, either modifying popular games or posting glitchy screen grabs from actual game play. They also created a number of pieces using Google’s Blogger service. That should get you started, but if you want more Jodi, check their Wikipedia page for links to other pieces.
If you have a favorite net.art site, let us know in comments.
In a world of reality television and ”realness” in the commercial media, what’s the unique and powerful role of live cultural experience? Thankfully, he answered his own question:
[It is theater's singular power] to contemplate our collective reality; as audience, actor and story engage in an unspoken discussion of what reality is, how definitions of reality can be broadened. Theater affords this opportunity like no other medium, as actors and audiences breathe side by side, together engendering the spiritual and meditative power that that shared experience implies.
In the end, we’re all weilding the same tools to construct the experiences and events we offer to the world. The difference is in the intent and purpose with which we weild them.
Methinks thou doth protest too much, actually.
before Detective Comics #822