Leonardo_36-4_255_344 7/17/03 12:07 PM Page 335 Artmedia is among the first confer- communication technologies” were time for questions, too short lunch ence series posing theoretical questions very illustrative and interesting, but in breaks. Nonetheless the program and as well as looking at experimentations some respects also a bit superficial. conference format allowed networking regarding art and communication Nevertheless, I enjoyed the professional and discussions in many of the restau- technologies. It was founded in 1985 by presentation of Beusch and Cassani, rants of Paris—especially after walking the philosopher Mario Costa at the who gave an overview of mobile gam- through streets illuminated by most Department of Philosophy of the Uni- ing, and also the enlightening speeches wonderful Christmas decorations. versity of Salerno and was held there about curating net art by the curators seven times in a roughly bi-annual Dietz (Walker Art Center) and Jemima rhythm. There seem to be different Rellie (Tate Gallery). reasons why Artmedia VIII was held in The third day, Sunday, was the most AUDIO COMPACT DISC Paris in 2002: one is the possibility of exciting day of Artmedia VIII, because broadening its circle of influence; finally some rather provocative another is the fact that Paris is cur- thoughts were expressed. It started with rently a place of many interesting new Lévy’s presentation of a taxonomy for NORTH AMERICA electronic art activities. cultural design. This talk was not en- by Curlew. Cuneiform Records, Silver Artmedia VIII was co-organized by tirely appreciated because of the lack of Springs, MD, U.S.A., 2002. Audio CD, French artist Fred Forest, Costa and chaos and dynamism in his new ap- with booklet, rune167. French writer and theoretician Annick proach. Broeckmann criticized Lévy’s Bureaud. They first defined the theme simplification or idealization of cyber- Reviewed by Stefaan Van Ryssen, Jan and the rough sequence and special space and the idea that, though there is Delvinlaan 115, 9000 Gent, Belgium. focus of the sessions and then looked not necessarily a collective intelligence, E-mail: Ͻ[email protected]Ͼ. for the appropriate speakers to invite. there could well be a collective stupid- The idealistic goal was to have a 50:50 ity. In later sessions Vesna expanded the Curlew is a New York “downtown” for- ratio between theoreticians/philoso- discourse about networks to include mation around George Cartwright and phers and artists, older generations and nanotechnology, and Ascott added the Tom Cora, and includes Mark Howell, younger generations, and foreigners aspect of shamanic practices. François Fred Frith, Rick Brown and J. Pippin from many different parts of the world Soulages’s contribution on the subcon- Barnett. North America is Curlew’s sec- and French people, women and men. scious was, it seems (I was unable to ond album, originally released only in In some aspects intention and reality attend), another highlight of the day. Germany in 1986. This CD has addi- did not quite match. The number of There were also a few small exhibi- tional material from a live performance female presenters was low. There were tions in front of the lecture hall. The at Mort’s Place in New York, when the no representatives from Eastern Eu- exhibition on the history of artmedia group was composed of Cartwright, rope, partially due to a rather tight and aesthetics of communication Cora, Otto Williams, Micky Skopelitis budget that allowed only a small num- showed numerous interesting historical and Anton Fier. ber of foreigners to be invited. This documents and, to an artmedia- The CD has 17 tracks, most of them then led to an obvious French domina- newcomer like me, communicated a composed by Cartwright and Cora. Six tion. The conference was attractive sense for the continuity in the ongoing of them are available in two versions, because it brought together established discourse since 1985. There was also one recorded in the studio and the key personalities in the field, such as access to an on-line exhibition with other live. Recordings are by Martin Costa, Forest, Roy Ascott and Pierre works selected by invited curators and Bisi, who also assisted Frith in mixing. Lévy, and artists and theoreticians from symposium participants, but it was Perhaps this is an important historical a younger generation such as Oliver basically impossible to find time to look document. It illustrates what happened Auber, Andreas Broeckmann, Maurice at it. (It is to be hoped that this exhibi- in the early 1980s, when the borders Benayoun, Tina Cassani and Bruno tion will be made accessible on-line.) between free jazz, rock and experimen- Beusch, Steven Dietz, Eduardo Kac, The conference was free and tal music were starting to break down. Wolfgang Strauss, Victoria Vesna and attracted a loyal, mostly French, audi- Basically it is a collection of very self- many others. ence over the 3-day “marathon.” Even similar exercises—one of the tracks is During the first 3 days, 45 presenta- on the fourth morning, Monday, a appropriately called “The Ole Miss tions, most of them in French with reasonable crowd showed up for the Exercise Song”—in overlaying a beat simultaneous translation, were given. final discussion. This was held in (drums, sometimes two, bass and occa- The conference concluded on the French and no translation into English sionally cello) with a simply repeated fourth day with a panel discussion. The was provided; therefore, I attended it tune in one group of melodic instru- topics of the sessions progressed in a only for an hour and then left, ments and a free improvisational layer succinct way from history to body, exhausted from the French philosophi- in another group. The use of accor- cortex and networks. Personally, I cal lingo and without knowing if any dion, cello and violin results in a dis- found the first sessions very hard to concluding statements or important tinct musical timbre or “sound,” which follow, perhaps because philosophical questions for the ongoing discourse is the hallmark of the group and proba- issues were presented in a rather com- were elaborated. bly its raison d’être as well. plicated manner, with too few refer- All in all there were only a few sur- The booklet has a transcript of a con- ences to actual artworks or other prises at the conference. One reason versation between Cartwright and familiar examples. In contrast, the could be that there was no call for Michael DeCapite and tells us nothing sessions on “video games and hybrid contribution; the organizers chose the about the music. It only serves to illus- arts,” “net art in the museum context” speakers directly. The schedule was very trate the lighthearted cynicism of the and “architecture, urban design and tight—too many speakers, too little interviewee, who knows that certain days Leonardo Reviews 335 Downloaded from http://direct.mit.edu/leon/article-pdf/36/4/335/1571862/leon.2003.36.4.335.pdf by guest on 02 October 2021 Leonardo_36-4_255_344 7/17/03 12:07 PM Page 336 are over and unrecoverable, and allows Prefiguring Cyberculture: An Intellectual Other American Voices the interviewer to show off. History Corinna Belz and Neil Hollander. First Darren Tofts, et al., eds. MIT Press, Run/Icarus Films, Brooklyn, NY, Cambridge, MA, U.S.A., 2002. 322 pp., U.S.A., 2002. 52 min. illus. Trade. ISBN: 1-262-20145-3. MATERIALS RECEIVED Seeing Is Believing: Handicams, Human Reading Psychoanalysis: Freud, Rank, Rights and the News Ferenczi, Groddeck Katerina Cizek and Peter Wintonick. Audio Compact Discs Peter L. Rudnytsky. Cornell Univ. Press, First Run/Icarus Films, Brooklyn, NY, Ithaca, NY, U.S.A., 2002. 312 pp. Paper. U.S.A., 2002. 58 min. Guitar Solos ISBN: 0-8014-8825-7. Fred Frith. ReR Megacorp, Surrey, U.K., 2002. Russia at Play: Leisure Activities at the INTRODUCING THE End of the Tsarist Era Prints LDR PANELISTS Louise McReynolds. Cornell Univ. Fred Frith. ReR Megacorp, Surrey, Press, Ithaca, NY, U.S.A., 2003. 309 pp., U.K., 2002. Christa Sommerer is a media artist illus. Trade. ISBN: 0-8014-4027-0. working in the field of interactive com- Step across the Border puter installation. She currently holds a The Seduction of the Occult and the Rise Fred Frith. ReR Megacorp, Surrey, position as Artistic Director and Re- of the Fantastic Tale U.K., 2003. searcher at the ATR Media Integration Dorothea E. von Mücke. Stanford Univ. and Communications Research Lab in Press, Stanford, CA, U.S.A., 2003. Kyoto, Japan, where she leads a re- 289 pp. Paper. ISBN: 0-8047-3860-2. Books search team to design interactive envi- The Audible Past: Cultural Origins ronments that combine novel A Sum of Destructions: Picasso’s Cultures of Sound Reproduction human-machine interaction experi- & the Creation of Cubism Jonathan Sterne. Duke Univ. Press, ences, artificial life and evolutionary Natasha Staller. Yale Univ. Press, New Durham, NC, U.S.A., 2003. 472 pp., image design. She is also Associate Haven, CT, U.S.A., 2002. 328 pp., illus. illus. Paper. ISBN: 0-8223-3013-X. Professor at the IAMAS International Trade. ISBN: 0-300-07242-2. Academy of Media Arts and Sciences in Buddhism and Science: Breaking New Gifu, Japan, Guest Professor at the Telematic Embrace: Visionary Theories Ground University of Art and Design in Linz, of Art, Technology, and Consciousness Allan Wallace, ed. Columbia Univ. Austria, and a Visiting Research Fellow Roy Ascott. University of California Press, New York, NY, U.S.A., 2003. at the MIT Center for Advanced Visual Press, Berkeley, CA, U.S.A., 2003. 427 pp., 446 pp. Paper. ISBN: 0-231-12335-3. Studies in Cambridge, Massachusetts.