Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 Notes and Comments

I. Post Internet

Just as modernism concerned itself with the relationship between craft and the emergent technologies of its era, the most pressing condition underlying contemporary culture may be the omnipresence of the internet [...] this exhibition presents a broad survey of art created with a consciousness of the technological and human networks within which it exists, from conception and production to dissemination and reception. Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 This work, primarily produced by artists living in New York, London, and Berlin, has been controversially defined as “post-internet.” [1]

This quote from the press release of the exhibition “Art Post- Internet”, curated by Karen Archey and Robin Peckham for the 8 Ullens Center for Contemporary Art (UCCA) in Beijing, says a lot about what internet related art has become in 2014, and how the discussion about it has developed during the last twenty years. The text might best be read by an early enthusiast for net art who perhaps retired to a Tibetan monastery or fell into a cryogenic sleep at the end of the twentieth century and would now like to catch up with the current conversation. The first thing that such a reader would notice is the authorita- tive nature of the first sentence. Even the most conservative art critic is unlikely to question this stance today: in 2014, the internet is everywhere, can be accessed by massive numbers of people all over the world, and is affecting everything, from glo- bal economics to politics, from cultural production and dissemi-

Domenico Quaranta nation to our private and public life. About 3 billion people have saturation indeveloped countries.Baidu,aChinesesearch en fast in developing economies, and internet penetration nears yet to usetheinternet, buttheinternet populationisgrowing the internet isnot over, of course, [4]but itisnow agiven for controversial that this definitions term of most with agree can The term “post-internet” needssomeexplanation, though.We as amedium. main focus of thediscourse, instead of theuseof theinternet of theinternet seemsto besoimportantthatitbecomesthe though the internet was not there. Period. Today, an awareness porary art:there was net art,andthere was artthatexisted as ler left, there was littleorno“internet awareness” incontem The secondsentence isquite telling, too. When ourtimetravel curators have beenreplaced by contemporary artglobetrotters. two years heran a galleryinHongKong. Nerdy new mediaart and Tate Britain;Peckam hasalsowritten for even writes for Internet” exhibition underlinesthis change. Archey regularly curating exhibitions. [3]Thecuratorial team for the“ArtPost- Gioni andCarolyn Christov-Bakargiev have considered itwhile Ulrich Obristhasorganised panels to discussit,Massimiliano Jennifer Allen, BorisGroys have written pagesaboutit,Hans tion to thisshift: Nicolas Bourriaud, Claire Bishop, DavidJoselit, Berlin”, where theworld of contemporary arthaspaidatten “primarily produced by artistslivinginNew York, London, and rank. [2]Thismayalsoexplain whyChinaisinterested inanart visitedgine,today most is fifth site, the according Alexa the to Modern Painters Spike , Art-Agenda , and organised panels at the ICA,London , Frieze , Art Review Arforum , Kaleidoscope , andfor - - - - ,

Domenico Quaranta 9 Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 Domenico Quaranta 10 Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 Hijack art collective etoy, when they decided to present the net the by 1997, in done was exhibition internet” “post first to the logics of physical space. We should not forget that the sult of anattempt to adapt internet content andprocesses This was not primarilyamarket driven process, butthere print andinstallationasmediato operate inphysical space. the defaults of desktop-based tools, naturally looked atvideo, appropriating andreframing internet content andplaying with “post-internet” label, [7] whosepractice mainlyconsisted in themselves inphysical space;andtheearlyadopters of the by theways inwhichconceptual andperformance artmanifest dia hackswere documented andpresented inset-ups inspired converted into prints,videos,installations;performative me at home when they were invited to exhibitions. practices decided, where possible, to leave thetechnologies creasing numberof artistswithafocus ondesktop-based This isarelatively recent move: sincetheearly2000s,anin materialised from thedigital. [6] more successfulinnew mediacircuits, “post-digital”,i.e. re- lations, sculptures, even )and, to useanother label on show: most of the works areinstal physical (objects, prints, there are nowebsites –and, more importantly, notechnologies tists maintainanonlinepresence, anddointernet basedworks, scourse backto thegallery. Althoughmostof thefeatured ar as atheme”,[5]butcandophysical work andbringthisdi “functions only on the net and picks out the net or the ‘netmyth’ many, andartistsinterested initare not forced to doartthat at ArsElectronica asahugeinstallation of orange tubes Software was Digital ------relationship between internet basedartand itsmainenvi world evolved alongthelasttwenty years, whataboutthe relationship between internet basedpractices andtheart If thepost-internet debate helps usto understand how the horse. contemporary arthasnow reached thestageof thetrojan by artfair directors. [11]Thewar between digitalculture and nal network of commercial galleries,[10]andto bediscussed supported by (andsometimes identifiedwith)aninternatio identified asatrend by the contemporary artworld, to be that Post-Internet isthefirstinternet related practice to be Hito Steyerl) never were; andwe should not ignore thefact some (Bernadette Corporation, Dara Birnbaum,Seth Price, Internet” have beenpreviously discussedasinternet artists, rary art.Althoughmostof theartistsfeatured in“ArtPost- shift putinternet-based artincloseproximity to contempo It would not behard for ourtimetraveller to seethatthis cube. [9] to adapt hisstorytelling to thepeculiarlanguageof thewhite projected infographics, hedoesitnot to suitthemarket, but video documentation,printed ephemera andwall printed or “Interactive Art”category, presents hisnet-based works as winner of theGolden Nika in2014ArsElectronica Prixfor the traces. [8]Whennet artist and hacktivist Paolo Cirio, the formance was orchestrated, instead of presenting itsonline and a performance whichrestaged theway theonlineper der afew stories thatmayhelp usto delineate thischange. ronment, theinternet? Inwhatfollows, we willbriefly consi - - - - -

Domenico Quaranta 11 Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 Domenico Quaranta 12 Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 enough to persuadetheUS political authorities, mediaoutlets ple html website, some tactical skills andtwo brave guys were Alessandro Ludovico andPaolo Cirio),istelling. In2000, asim Itself A comparisonbetween the Vatican ortheWTO, andforce theCIA to investigate them. make believe people users, thousands of they sites,werehijack enjoyed itwhenthey were able to bringdown government web didn’t need to be effective, apparently forgetting how much they Artists started claimingthathacktivismwas aperformance and ce accounts,theweb becameanincreasingly regulated space. we were mass-distracted by YouTube videos andfancy MySpa web giantslike Googledevised away to not look evil, andwhile used inmediacircles. Thensocialnetworking cameabout,rising tivism), artivism(art+activism)andmediahackingwere widely make somenoise. Keywords suchashacktivism(hacking+ac spread viruses,violate copyright andprivacy laws orsimply perform fake identities, make onlineprotests, squatwebsites, and communicationskills to attackcompaniesand institutions, mailing listssuchas artists withgoodtechnical skills, whohadgrown uponactivist sation of onlinepublic spacewere miningthissenseof freedom, garde. Whilethedotcom bubble andtheincreasing institutionali online inthelate nineties rather thananartworld for anew avant experienced first they autonomy levelof the keep to struggling fighters of army an for battlefield a as perceived was internet At theturnof themillennium,whenourtimetraveller left, the II. (2005),by (the latter in collaboration with Nettime Vote-Auction , [12]usedtheirhacking,networking (2000)and WillEat - - - - - face, years later, inthesubtitle of thedocumentary itself became unfashionable in art circuits, only to resur as atool to subvert existing structures was over. Theterm individual orasmallgroup of people couldusetheinternet an impactonthecollective imagination.Thetimewhenan a test ground for imaginarysolutions, rarely able to have Hacktivism in art didn’t cease to exist, but mostly became blocked andrendered ineffective. [14] soon asGoogleandtheaudiencebecameaware ifit,itwas narrative viapress releases andinstallations,becauseas only be delivered after the fact and with a well constructed effective hackinto theGoogleadvertising system could the USpresidential elections, for months.[13]In2005,an votes of American citizens, withtherisk of compromising nion thatanimmoral European companywas selling the as large asCNN, investigation agenciesandthepublic opi now. and massive propaganda. Butto dothis,you needlegions such asDDOSattacks, cybersquatting,information leaks refreshes strategies firsttested in artistic hacktivism, of Wikileaks and theArab Spring, its fightagainstthechurch of Scientology anditssupport nymity andfreedom of speechontheinternet. Famousfor litical consciousnessin order to preserve spacesfor ano platforms suchas4chan[16] and gradually developed apo ve movement of hackers whichemerged onimagesharing ger. [15]Themovie tells thestory of Anonymous,amassi Legion: TheStory of theHacktivists , by BrianKnappenber Anonymous effectively We Are ------

Domenico Quaranta 13 Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 Domenico Quaranta 14 Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 because itwas delivering dangerous content, butyou can’t shut people that you had to shut down a particular Indymedia node censor thanactivistmedia platforms: you caneasilypersuade ory” talkin2008,[18] general content platforms are harder to and, asEthanZuckerman explained inhisfamous “cute catthe Indymedia for thedelivery of content to abroader audience; Even for anactivist,YouTube isclearlyamore powerful tool than cline of independentmediachannels, mailinglistsand forums. The riseof YouTube andsocial networking sawthegradual de globalisation movements. anti- the effectiveto during street put activists by use media, newway to establishment’s the against fight control over mass gital camera andaninternet connectionto handwas seenasa tional network Indymedia [17] asoneof itsslogans. Havingadi hate themedia,becomemedia”,adopted by theinterna punk rock musicianandactivistJello Biafra’s sentence “Don’t between media and power. This optimism is well summarised in by activists, capable of restructuring the former relationship bile phones, was perceived as a game-changing development availability of personalmediasuchasdigitalcameras andmo up, many-to-many structure of theinternet, andtheincreasing controlled onlinemediaspace. Inthelate nineties, thebottom- online sharing platforms, andthedevelopment of anincreasingly potential –of therhetorics of independenttacticalmediainto the subsumption –andconsequentweakening of thepolitical lel processes thatunrolled withtheriseof socialnetworking: The crisisof artistichacktivismwas related to two paral III. BroadcastYourself ------aware of producing – shopping records, surfing traces, etc. – etc. traces, surfing records, shopping – producing of aware tently sharing ahugeamount of datathatwe are not even fully ds –more orlessaware of ourprivacy settings –andinadver web, willinglysharing ourpersonalcontent withsupposedfrien Most of usalready went undertheCaudinforks of thesocial But places like thisare now theexception rather thantherule. IV. LifeSharing of anonymityandfreedom of expression, suchas4chan. pendent channels orusingthefew thatstillallow somedegree trope of thecamwhore; oroutsideof it,creating your own inde Hirsch andAmaliaUlmandointheirsocialmedia work withthe nels force onto you –asfemale artistslike Petra Cortright,Ann preting andsubtly subverting the stereotypes thatthe chan Autonomy hasto bepursuedwithinthisframework, by inter agency that will place its ad over your successful political video. a record of attention to besold for peanutsto anadvertising services to whichthey have subscribed:abunchof dataand camwhores prevail, andeverybody becomestheproduct of the and cats cute entertainment; and selfishness ofwaves behind yourself”,politicalgets agency watered down,finally and fades of moving from “becomethemedia”to YouTube’s “broadcast ckerman was right;butthere isapriceto pay. Inthe process cat videos.WhathappenedwithWikileaks [19] proves thatZu people realise thatthey cannolongerpublish andview cute down YouTube, becauseyou willcauseawideruprisingwhen with awide range of advertising companies. Recently, theDigi with thecompanies thatprovide theserviceand, through them, ------

Domenico Quaranta 15 Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 Domenico Quaranta 16 Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 exposed was mainlydata.Fourteen years later, we alllive inthe time digital cameras were stillnot widely used, andwhat was [22] and“abstract pornography” (Hito Steyerl) becauseatthe The project was discussedas“data nudism”(Matthew Fuller) The statement currently available ontheirwebsite reads: their coordinates to amaponthewebsite through aGPSdevice. 2002, they addedanew layer to theproject by manuallyposting – included their email traffic – through their website. Later on,in allowed web visitors fullaccessto thecontent of theircomputer they stupid”, is “privacy – that subversiveaffirmation of piece project called 0100101110101101.org -started athree year longperformance Eva andFranco Mattes -atthetimestillmostly known as Back in2000, duringthegolden ageof net art,theItalianduo destined to lose. privacy ismostly perceived asamove inachessgameoneis Sharing isnolongeranoption, andtheattempt to protect one’s participate intheprogram customise theiradsfor mybrowser. sing. Testing it,Irealised that76amongthe116companies to opt outfrom onlinebehavioural orinterest-based adverti gram for OnlineBehavioral Advertising, [20]thatallows people tal Advertising Alliance’s (DAA)launchedaSelf-Regulatory Pro something we calledLife Sharing.”[21] was more thansharing adesktop or abook, more thanFileSharing, resembling itsowner’s brain. Sowe felt that sharing ourcomputer ideas andfuture projects. Withthepassingof timeacomputer starts most of your time,your culture, your relationships, your memories, “Working withacomputerondailybasis, over theyearsyou willshare Life Sharing . Claiming–inwhatbecameamaster - - - history. pany, facilitating some important innovations in internet tial newcomers”, [24] market dominanceandthwart competition from poten harm and“break” theInternet, inorder to maintaintheir vel domain nameswere eitherunfeasible orcould cause spreading misinformation that large numbers of top-le 1996. Founded by Paul Garrin at a time when “many were new top level domains –started asanartisticproject in to participate in the evolution of the web by proposing Space from thedomainname. Itwas onthisbasisthat you, andwas theresult of aconsciousdecision,starting from scratch; whatever you made intheendbelonged to to choosetheland, buyit,designitcarefully orbuildit mepage hadbeenlike setting upahomeplace: you had or avirgin landto colonise, faded out.Setting upaho the utopian idealof theweb asafrontier to conquer, With themassive move to socialnetworking services, V. TheDeathoftheURL cking ouremails.[23] Meanwhile, maybenot everybody, butatleastObama,ische GPS locationsbeingattachedto every picture we postonline. sed to prevent content beingshared onsomecloudservice, or same glasscage. Mobile devices have to becarefully customi Websites, of course, still exist, butfor new netizens, –to date, oneof thefew communityattempts Name.Space evolved into acom Name. ------

Domenico Quaranta 17 Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 Domenico Quaranta 18 Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 habits.” [26] companies were less involved in mediating oursearch gesting afreer Internet from thepast,where software URL ispowerfully presented asasentimentalcipher, sug crash. AsLouisa Elderton wrote in truly dynamic part of the work – to the point of a browser refresh itself, filling up the browser cache – which is the racters. [25]An algorithm makes thewebsite constantly sented ina38characters domainmadeonlyof “x”cha Dutch artist Constant Dullaart is a static webpage pre vironment of theinternet. to raise ourawareness aboutthisshift inthepublic en cent net-based artoften commentsonit,inanattempt Unable to interfere with this new ecology of the web, re viour to them. service “terms andconditions”you alignyour beha it; you subscribe–often withoutreading them–to the the furniture andfew ornorightsto changeorcustomise by somebody else, withlittlecontrol over thechoiceof any more – you accept that you live ina place designed apartment inagated community. Nothing belongs to you account canbecompared to an hotel room, or to an services marked the“ikea-isation” of homepages,an content managementsystems popularisedby blogging a website (and an email) when I have ? If the registering a social networking account. Why do I need setting upyour own website ismuchlesscommonthan The Death of theURL Frieze magazine, “the (2013)by ------VI. AFK doesn’t mean, of course, thatnet basedartisover, quite 2014, and all artispost-internet to somedegree. Which Internet This quote, from the introduction to McHugh’s book Or, inthewords of GeneMcHugh: time onkeyboards (ortouch screens) thanaway from them. became rapidly obsolete aswe realised thatwe spendmore opposed to online),whichemerged oninternet chatrooms, The Pirate Bay, noticed, theexpression IRL(“inreal life”, as Universe Folklore na andDragan Espenschiedpointed outintheirbook add starry backgrounds to their homepages, as Olia Liali new frontier thatledsomanypeople, intheearlydays, to the cyberspaceimaginedineightiesandnineties asthe place. Theinternet isnolongerperceived asanouter space, reality, andbetween mediated and actualreality, hastaken the perception of therelationship between theinternet and Against thebackdrop of thisevolution, abroader shift in say AFK-Away From Keyboard. We thinkthattheinternet isfor real.” [27] “We don’tusetheexpression IRL[...] We don’tlike thatexpression. We became theplace where people tracked you down.” became theplace where businesswas conducted, andbillswere paid. It to escapeinto, butrather theworld onesought escapefrom... sigh...It “What we mean whenwe say‘Internet’ becamenot athingintheworld [28] andbeautifully portrayed in works such as , [30]bringusback to ourpointof departure. It’s (2002).[29]AsPeter Sunde, oneof thefundersof Digital Some Post Post -

Domenico Quaranta 19 Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 Domenico Quaranta 20 Art and the Internet 1994 - 2014 pp. 37-46. tarave textThis forcommissioned been has publishedfirst and in institutions. is amissionthatcannot beoutsourced to companiesand public place fullof conflicts,andisstillto beshaped. This the contrary –becausetheinternet hasnot ceasedto bea , exhibition catalogue, Kunsthaus Langenthal/WallRiss Friburg 2014,

Megarave -Me - [1] The press release is available on E-flux: Agatha Wara I’m sure I’ll hate it. If it’s on a cool www.e-flux.com/announcements/art-post- Tumblr I can’t be bothered.” internet/. Notes [11] Cf. Andrew M. Goldstein, “Frieze London [2] For some detailed statistics, check out this Co-Director Matthew Slotover on the Rise of presentation, made by the British consulting the Art Fair”, in Artspace, October 15, 2013, firm yiibu in April 2014: www.slideshare.net/ online at www.artspace.com/magazine/ yiibu/the-emerging-global-web. interviews_features/frieze_art_fair_mat- thew_slotover_interview. [3] A comprehensive list of references would be impossible here; cf. at least: Nicolas Bou- [12] Founded in 1995 by Geert Lovink and Pit rriaud, The Radicant, Lukas and Sternberg, New Schultz as a space for a new form of critical York 2009; David Joselit, After Art, Princeton discourse on and with the net. Nettime is still University Press 2012; Boris Groys, Art Power, an active mailing list, and its archives are The MIT Press, London - Cambridge 2008; Claire available online at www.nettime.org. Bishop, “Digital Divide. Contemporary Art and New Media”, in Artforum, September 2012; and [13] Vote Auction is still documented online at Massimiliano Gioni, “The Encyclopedic Palace”, http://vote-auction.net/. in VVAA, The Encyclopedic Palace. 55th Inter- national Art Exhibition: La Biennale di Venezia, Marsilio, Venice 2013. [14] GWEI (Google Will Eat Itself) is still docu- mented online at www.gwei.org. [4] Cf. at least Gene McHugh, Post Internet, Link Editions, Brescia 2011, p. 5. [15] We Are Legion: The Story of the Hacktivists. Documentary, director: Brian Knappenberger; [5] Joachim Blank, “What is netart ;-)?”, 1996, US/UK 2012. online at www.irational.org/cern/netart.txt. [16] 4chan is an online imageboard founded [6] Cf. “A Peer-Reviewed Journal About Post- in 2003, originally used for the posting of

Digital Research”, online at www.aprja.net. pictures and discussion of manga and anime; 21 users don’t need to register and mostly post [7] The term post-internet was used by Marisa anonymously, and contents are not archived. Olson around 2006 in reference to her work and For more info, visit www.4chan.org and http:// that of her peers. Cf. Michael Connor, “What’s en.wikipedia.org/wiki/4chan. Postinternet Got to do with Net Art?”, in Rhizo- me, November 1, 2013, online at http://rhizome. [17] Founded in 1999, the Independent Media org/editorial/2013/nov/1/postinternet/ for an Center (also known as Indymedia) is a global extensive bibliography. participatory network of journalists repor- ting on political and social issues. Cf. www. [8] The Digital Hijack was a massive online indymedia.org. performance in which web users where hijacked from search engines to the etoy website by [18] Cf. Ethan Zuckerman, “The Cute Cat manipulating search results for specific popular Theory Talk at ETech”, in My Heart’s In Accra, keywords. For more information and references, March 8, 2008, www.ethanzuckerman.com/ cf. www.medienkunstnetz.de/works/the- blog/2008/03/08/the-cute-cat-theory-talk- digital-hijack/. at-etech/. [9] Cf. http://paolocirio.net. [19] Wikileaks’ website was closed in 2008 af- ter a Californian judge’s injunction, and in 2010 [10] Cf. Brian Droitcour, “Why I Hate Post-Inter- Mastercard and Paypal froze the organisation’s net Art”, in Culture Two, March 31, 2014, online at account to boycott donations. For more info, http://culturetwo.wordpress.com/2014/03/31/ why-i-hate-post-internet-art/: “The scenes cf. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/WikiLeaks. that have been cultivated around Berlin galleries Kraupa-Tuskany and Societe are bad, too. If it’s [20] Cf. www.aboutads.info/choices/. at Higher Pictures gallery in New York I probably [21] Cf. http://0100101110101101.org/life-sharing/. won’t like it. If it’s in a group show curated by Domenico Quaranta Domenico Quaranta 22 Notes constant-dullaart/. 2013, onlineatwww.frieze.com/issue/review/ in [26] Cf. Louisa Elderton, xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx-xxxxxxx/. xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.xxx/xxxxx_xxxxx-xx/ [25] Cf. [24] Cf. http://obamaischeckingyouremail.tumblr.com/. memes/people/barack-obama orcheckout information, visithttp://knowyourmeme.com/ tion’s involvement intheNSAscandal. For more on June2013to mocktheObamaadministra Tumblr blog andaninternet memelaunched [23] “Obama walkerart.org/gallery9/lifesharing/. life_sharing”, 2000, available onlineatwww. interview with0100101110101101.org about [22] Cf. MatthewFuller, Frieze http://namespace.us/about.php.

http://xxxxxxxxxx.xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx , Issue159,November -December isCheckingYour Email”isapopular “Data-Nudism. An “ConstantDullaart”, - 2009 andMay2010ontheblog lection of postspublished between December Editions, Brescia 2011, p. 5.Thebook isase [30] InGeneMcHugh tion/stellastar/. [29] Cf. vation/vernacular/). online athttp://art.teleportacia.org/obser as anonlineessayin2005(andavailable nacular Web”, pp. 19-33,originallypublished 2009. Onthissubject,cf. thechapter “A Ver Digital Folklore [28] OliaLialina Simon Klose, Sweden 2013. Away from Keyboard [27] Peter Sunde around thelabel. which contributed al http://art.teleportacia.org/exhibi , Merz&Solitude, Stuttgart &Dragan Espenschied(Eds.), in TPB AFK:ThePirate Bay . Documentary, director: , ot to initialdebates Post Internet Post Internet , Link - - - , -