[Nettime-bold] New Media(tors): The Social Life of Digital Art

[Richard Rinehart <rinehart@uclink.berkeley.edu>]

You are all invited to participate: remotely if you are remote in relation
to Berkeley, California, and in person if you are nearby.
Richard Rinehart

-----------------------------------------------

New Media(tors): The Social Life of Digital Art

Co-organized by the Berkeley Art Museum / Pacific Film Archive and
GenArtSF, a discussion among new media artists and audiences about their
role in society and the new economy and the effects of network culture on
the creation, interpretation, collection, and preservation of contemporary
visual art. New Media(tors): The Social Life of Digital Art includes three
interactive components, an email discussion list, a panel event, and a
video conversations kiosk.

Panel Date: Sun, Sept 23, 2001
Panel: 12:30-2pm: Pacific Film Archive Theater, 2575 Bancroft @ Bowditch
Reception: 2:00-3:00pm: Berkeley Art Museum, 2626 Bancroft Admission: free
Space: Limited seating. First come, first seated
URL: http://www.bampfa.berkeley.edu/events/mediators/
Organizers: Marisa Olsen, GenArtSF; Richard Rinehart, BAM/PFA

Participants: Shawn Brixey, artist & professor digital media, art
department, UC Berkeley; Alex Galloway, artist & editor/ director of
technology @ Rhizome.org; Lynn Hershman, artist & professor/director, media
arts program, UC Davis; Jason Lewis, artist & founder, Arts Alliance
Laboratory; Moderated by Richard Rinehart, artist, director of digital
media, Berkeley Art Museum, & faculty, art department, UC Berkeley.

The explosion of digital art has created a new social and economic
environment within the arts community and culture at large. Increasing
numbers of artists as well as presenters, collectors, media and tech
industry partners, and audiences are the active agents finding their way
through this new digital sub-culture. This event will track the new modes
of operation being used to adapt in this new environment. How are digital
artists surviving in a medium that is difficult to sell? Are presenters
changing their own economic models? How are the larger artistic and
curatorial professions measuring achievement? How are collectors responding
to intangible and ephemeral art works? How does the unique relationship to
the technology industry affect digital art? Are the audiences for digital
art the same or different from traditional art audiences?

At this event, artists, collectors, and presenters will demonstrate their
own ways of adapting to the shifting social and economic implications of
digital art - the audience will be the final panelist, representing itself
in the discussion. The conversation will start online, where attendees are
encouraged to fill out a short audience survey on the website. The results
of this snapshot of digital art audiences will be shared at the event.
Panelists will kick off discussion topics on the email list before the
event to get wider geographic input and focus ideas for the event. This
event is free of charge in order to encourage broad attendance, and will be
followed by a reception.

New Media(tors): The Social Life of Digital Art includes three interactive
components:

1. An open email discussion list which takes place for a few weeks in
September 2001 and leads into the panel/event. This discussion list will
include all of the event panelists/artists and organizers as well as anyone
on the internet who would like to join this discussion, ask questions, or
share their experiences. The discussion list will provide a public forum
which expands the geographic reach of the event, and invites people to
investigate the social life surrounding digital art, including these
questions...

How are new media artists interacting with art institutions or each other
in ways which are different/same from traditional media artists? How is the
education of artists adapting, if at all? How are artists making a living
working in media which are hard to sell? How does valuation happens with
perfectly reproducible works, and what is the impact on collecting as a
social and economic function? How is such work being preserved (which has
direct implications for collecting, buying, and selling)? How are new media
artists engaged or part of an external industry in a way that filmmakers
might be, but painters are not?

How to subscribe to the Mediators email discussion list.

Send an email addressed to:
majordomo@listlink.berkeley.edu
that contains this single line in the body of the mail message:
subscribe mediators

Notice that this does not include your actual e-mail address. Majordomo
will determine that information based on your email so long as you are
mailing to majordomo@listlink from your own account.

2. A public panel presentation and community discussion event

Described above.

3. A public reception following the panel at which attendees are invited to
interact with each other, and to contribute their thoughts and reactions to
the issues on the museum's video conversations kiosk.

There is a multimedia kiosk in the lobby where the reception will be held .
Here you can record a short digital video clip of yourself speaking about
your thoughts after the event, your experiences, and your own answers to
any of the questions above or anything you want to ponder on the issues.
Some of these video comments, along with video clips from the panel, will
be posted on the Mediators web page as the third part of the conversation,
completing the triangular communication flow between
artist-institution-audience. These will also comprise the lasting record of
New Media(tors): The Social Life of Digital Art.

GenArtSF <www.genartsf.org>

GenArts mission is to strengthen and empower the community of young
artists, to cultivate a new generation of arts audiences, and to connect
the arts community to the community at larage. GenArt pursues these goals
through a wide range of programs with innovative approaches to education,
community outreach, and exhibitions. GenArtSF is a project of the San
Francisco Foundation Community Initiatives Fund.

Berkeley Art Museum / Pacific Film Archive <www.bampfa.berkeley.edu>

The University of California Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive
serves the University by making aesthetic experiences a vital part of the
life of its community. BAM/PFA inspires, educates, and brings together the
various audiences of the Berkeley campus and Bay Area and engages national
and international audiences through access to its collections and
educational resources, and through the presentation of adventurous,
scholarly, and culturally diverse exhibitions of art and cinema.

-------------------------------------
Richard Rinehart
---------------
Digital Media Director, Berkeley Art Museum/Pacific Film Archive
www.bampfa.berkeley.edu
---------------
Instructor, Department of Art Practice
art.berkeley.edu
---------------
University of California, Berkeley


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