de Balie V2_ Arjen Mulder and Maaike Post Arjen Mulder and Maaike Post Book for the Electronic Arts de Balie V2_ Arjen Mulder and Maaike Post Photography: Jan Sprij Photo editor: Joke Brouwer de Balie V2_ text © Arjen Mulder en Maaike Post 2000 photography © Jan Sprij 2000 Photography: Jan Sprij Book design and (Photo) editor: Joke Brouwer, Rotterdam Translations Dutch-English by Leo Reijnen, with thanks to Pat Raff and Laura Marz. ISBN 90-6617-255-X No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system of any nature, or transmitted in any form or by any means with- out the prior written permission of the publishers. De Balie Kleine-Gartmanplantsoen 10 1017 RR Amsterdam V2_Organisatie Eendrachtsstraat 10 3012 XL Rotterdam www.v2.nl Contents Essays Introduction 4 Non-producing machines 9 Unstable Media 49 Imageless Art 81 Counterintuitive Interfaces 101 Incommunicative Networks 123 Interviews Literature 177 Dick Raaijmakers 8 Index 180 Stelarc 24 Steina en Woody Vasulka 49 Peter Weibel 56 V2_Organisation 81 Roy Ascott 88 Adilkno 96 Erik Hobijn 102 Felix Hess 113 Lars Spuybroek 120 Kodwo Eshun 129 Geert Lovink 137 Seiji Shimoda 143 Image: Artists and/or Projects (in alphabetic order) 220V park 80; 4Hero 176; 80LX 176; Alex Adriaansens/Joke Brouwer – Movement-Time-Space, Dynamic Dialog and Installation for the Unstable Media 38; Roy Ascott – Telenoia 47; Nicolas Baginsky – Überleben: Survive in Bosnia 76; Bourbonese Qualk 34; Ad van Buuren – Panoramafoon 39; Club Moral – Here Lives My House 36; Collectif & Cie 41; Cortex – Sense:less 161; Luc Courchesne – Salon des Ombres 153; Christina Cubisch 71; Cãlin Dan – Happy Doomsday! 162; Demers & Vorn – La Cour des Miracles 154; Diller & Scofidio – Indigestion 157 and Soft Sell 73; Toni Dove – Artificial Changelings 156; Ray Edgar – Flexonica II 145; Einstürzende Neubauten 33; Arthur Elsenaar – Ontvanger 80; Factory Toys 33; Monika Fleischmann – Marsbag 157; Masaki Fujihata – Global Interior Project 160 and Nuzzle Afar 162; Ulrike Gabriel – Memory Space 165, Perceptual Arena 164 and Terrain 0.1 72; Granular Synthesis – Model V 150; The Haters – Trigonometry 47; Barney Haynes – The Shopping Cart 65; Matt Heckert – Automated Sound Orchestra 69; Agnes Hegedüs – Handsight 70; Felix Hess – Moving Sound Creatures 44 and Papegaaien 44; Joyce Hinterding – Aeriology 155; Perry Hoberman – Barcode Hotel 158 and System Maintenance 159; Erik Hobijn – Delusions of Self-Immolation 67; Charley Hooker – The Chase 70; Human Beings 176; JODI – 404 Not Found %Unread %Reply %Unsent and OSS/**** 174; Jaap de Jonge – Kristallen bol 153; Gerald Van Der Kaap – Chill Caves 74; Kapotte Muziek 33; AnneMie van Kerckhoven – Mental Rotation – l'age d'or 2 44; Knowbotic Research – Anonymous Muttering 170; Laibach 34; Logos Foundation – Holosound 45; Hermen Maat – 't Trefpunt 146; Chico MacMurtrie/Amorphic Robot Works – The Ancestral Path: The Dog Monkeys Yourney through the Amorphic Society 172; Von Magnet 48; Marc Marc – S.I.N. 155; Bastiaan Maris – Insecten en spinnen 48; Paul McCarthy – Pinocchio Pipenose Household Dilemma 79; Just Merit – Gyroscope 68; Merzbow 40; Gustav Metzger – Auto Destructive Art 37; Seiko Mikami – Molecular Informatics version 2.0: Morphogenetic substance via eye tracking 168 and World, Membrane & the Dismembered Body 163; Mit Mitropoulos – Face to Face 4 45; Christian Möller – 220V Electro Clips 151; Gordon Monahan – Speaker Swinging 46; Muslimgauze 34; µ-ziq 176; Non 33; NOX/Lars Spuybroek – Armed Response 74 and SoftSite 157; Orlan – My Flesh, the Texts and the Languages 76; Paul Panhuysen – Canary Grandband 39; Paul Panhuysen/Johan Goedhart 34; Keith Piper – Interventions: A Nigger in Cyberspace 73; Daniela Alina Plewe – Muser's Service 152; Dick Raaijmakers – Beeld Streepje Geluid 43, Ideofoon 44 and Intona 42; Horst Rickels/Joop van Brakel – Simulated Woods 35; Horst Rickels/Elvira Wersche – Dodekafonie 39; Ken Rinaldo – Delicate Balance and The Flock 146; Miroslaw Rogala – Lovers Leap 148; Michael Saup – Binary Ballistic Ballet/Pulse[8]9 77; Scanner 176; Barry Schwartz – Optic Nerve 66; Jill Scott – Frontiers of Utopia 153; Bill Seaman – Passage Sets/one pulls pivots at the tip of the tongue 156; Sensorband – Soundnet 147 and 176; Paul Sermon – Telematic Dreaming 75; Jeffrey Shaw – Legible City and Selfportrait with Eiffel Tower 71; Seiji Shimoda – On the Table 77; SLP 35; Sonic Youth 33; Martin Spanjaard – Adelbrecht 37; Stacey Spiegel – Crossings 152; Stelarc – Amplified Body and Images without Organs: Absent Body/Involuntary Actions 78; Test Department 33; Thu20 with Gregory Whitehead 40; Time's Up – Hypercompetition for Beginners 149; Naoko Tosa – Neuro Kid Mic 153; Tötliche Doris 34; Steina Vasulka/Michael Saup – Hyena Days 46; Woody Vasulka – The Brotherhood – Table III and The Theatre of Hybrid Automata 150; Voice Crack 41; Michel Waisvisz – De Handen 166; Marschal Weber – Tumor TV 48; Brad Whang 48; Stephen Wilson – Street-Voice-Space 47; Zanzibars Twist 33. 4 Introduction The technological look The first two words that come to mind to describe the theme of the Book for the Electronic Arts are ‘transformation’ and ‘tech- nology’, whereas the book is about art. With paintings it is not unusual to speak admiringly of the artist’s technique. However, when an artist exhibits only the technology and the audience has to operate machines to call the art into existence the concept of ‘technology’ suddenly becomes an issue. Why would a technological installation be art? This technological art is not about beautifully designed devices; it is the tech- nological functioning of the machinery itself that moves us esthetically. You literally see only technology – until you overcome your diffidence and you step in, join in, play along: then another realm of experience opens up to you. But even there the technological aspect of this art is not disguised: in electronic art you are always aware that it is technology that gives you the experience, just like you know it is you who makes art out of technology. Art historically speaking, this takes a little getting used to. No one will deny that in the 20th century technology has improved the world beyond repair. The landscape has been rearranged to accom- modate highways, city districts and national parks. Our daily life is electrically lighted and rearranged around washing machines, televisions, personal computers and cars. Our bodies have been invaded by surgery and drugs. All living creatures have been reduced to an idiosyncratic genetic code that determines their physical shape as well as a good part of their social behavior. Nothing needs to be accepted as a natural given anymore, as everything can be adapted and surpassed. Nature itself has been placed under technological guardianship, either as nature reserve or tourist attraction. Wonder and concern about all these technological transformations of the world we inherited have always been short-lived. The power of technology is this: while it is highly visible and openly turns the world upside-down, it disappears from sight as soon as users have learned to manage their machines. Or as soon as the machines have changed their users in such a way that they can handle the new techno- logy. People can adapt to anything, or in other words: people change in order to remain the same. True, this book is about technology, but there is a hard and a soft side to technology, a compliant and a resistant side, a comfortable and an awkward side, an ergonomical and a social side. One can no longer speak of technology without mentioning beliefs. Tech- nology is as much a mentality as it is machinery. Every technology creates its own social and mental ‘environment’, in which it is seen as a normal thing. This reassuring normality numbs the awkward realization of how much the users have let themselves be transformed by the technology. According to Marshall McLuhan, art is one of the few means humanity possesses to understand the kind of blow dealt to the human psyche when our sensory capabilities are enhanced by technological media. Art creates a ‘counter-environment’ that puts tech- nological normality in disorder, enabling you as it were to look at it from a distance or to foresee what it will do: only then can you ask yourself if this is really how you want to be or become. The other way around, new technologies question the normality of art created in older media. A book about electronic art should not just investigate the technological view and turn it insideout but should also reinterpret, rearrange and broaden the traditional concept of art. As soon as you know a thing to be art, no matter which technology was used, you can use it as a means to grasp the blows to the human psyche we have already had to deal with and the blows that still lie ahead. Not just to avoid falling victim to technologies we no longer can do without, but also to be able to enjoy those technologies without becoming 5 twisted. Nowadays it is no longer obvious what art is; it is produced with all kinds of materials and all sorts of processes and can be found anywhere, not just in museums and homes but in the streets and on ontroduction I the World Wide Web as well. Transformation by frustration The Book for the Electronic Arts is about an approach rather than about a social movement or a trend in art, about a sphere of interest rather than about a trade you can learn, about a cloud rather than about a box. As the computer becomes more widely accepted in all art forms and disciplines these will tend to blend together more and more. The traditional distinctions between music, dance, animation, film, video, architecture and robotics have all but vanished already. Similar mergings can be seen at what were once rigid borderlines like those between nature and technology, body and machine, history and database, matter and information, proximity and distance, location and thought, planning and accident.