` Copyright by Edward A. Shanken 2001 ART IN THE INFORMATION AGE: CYBERNETICS, SOFTWARE, TELEMATICS AND THE CONCEPTUAL CONTRIBUTIONS OF ART AND TECHNOLOGY TO ART HISTORY AND AESTHETIC THEORY by Edward A. Shanken Department of Art History Duke University Date:__________________ Approved: ______________________ Hans Van Miegroet, Co-Chair ______________________ W.J.T. Mitchell, Co-Chair ______________________ ______________________ ______________________ Dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Art History in the Graduate School of Duke University 2001 ABSTRACT (Art History) ART IN THE INFORMATION AGE: CYBERNETICS, SOFTWARE, TELEMATICS AND THE CONCEPTUAL CONTRIBUTIONS OF ART AND TECHNOLOGY TO ART HISTORY AND AESTHETIC THEORY by Edward A. Shanken Department of Art History Duke University Date:__________________ Approved: ______________________ Hans Van Miegroet, Co-Chair ______________________ W.J.T. Mitchell, Co-Chair ______________________ ______________________ ______________________ An abstract of a dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Department of Art History in the Graduate School of Duke University 2001 ABSTRACT This dissertation argues that the artistic use of technology demands greater recognition. Scholarship on twentieth century art generally has ignored or disparaged the artistic current otherwise known as Art and Technology. Art History has failed to recognize and incorporate into its canons the rich historical and theoretical underpinnings of this tendency. This oversight is especially conspicuous in the literature's inability to grasp how the sciences and technologies particular to the Information Age have shaped the formal and conceptual development of art since 1945. The research presented here employs a synthetic method drawing on diverse disciplines, archival research, correspondence, and personal interviews. The work of British artist Roy Ascott and American art critic Jack Burnham furnish central practical and theoretical frameworks and are discussed in detail. Their contributions support the dissertation's thesis that the cultural manifestations of the late twentieth century can be better understood by closely analyzing the scientific and technological developments that have played a central role in shaping society. This study does not privilege science and technology as the engines of discovery that drive subsequent cultural developments, but demonstrates how artists have integrated art with science and technology in a praxis that interrogates key aspects of western epistemology and aesthetics. The dissertation examines how this praxis seeks to challenge conventional models of communication, such as aesthetic exchanges in which an authorial message is embedded in an object by an artist and decoded by an audience. By contrast, many works iv of Art and Technology (and artists' theories about them) explicitly propose that richer forms of meaning can arise from a multi-directional flow of information in discursive networks. Such works stress the processes of artistic creation and audience participation. They emphasize the dematerialized forms of ideation and collaboration rather than the materiality of concrete art objects. The dissertation problematizes these aesthetic theories, but maintains that artistic meaning in the Information Age is not embedded in objects or individuals so much as it is abstracted in the collective production, manipulation, and distribution of information. v ACKNOWLEDGMENTS My large and extended family cultivated an environment in which learning was highly valued, and in which no accomplishment was unattainable. They encouraged my childhood fascinations with both art and technology, and have continued to support my efforts to forge a uniquely branching professional and personal path. My wife, Dr. Kristine Stiles, has been not only a constant source of inspiration and emotional sustenance, but has been my most important mentor and advisor. I am blessed and humbled by her love and brilliance. I am grateful to my committee for standing by me and seeing my work through. Drs. W.J.T. Mitchell and Hans Van Miegroet, in particular, shouldered the responsibility of co-chairing my committee, exhibiting an exceedingly rare degree of commitment and generosity, offering invaluable insight and counsel, and helping to shape my ideas and thinking. Drs. Patricia Leighten, Mark Antliff, and Barbara Herrnstein Smith made themselves available to discuss my work as it developed, resulting in significant contributions to my thinking. Acknowledgement is also due to Drs. Annabel Wharton, who helped guide my research at a critical moment, and Kevin Parker. Dr. Richard Powell has served as an important model as a scholar and leader, and his mentorship and support of my work are deeply appreciated. Many artists and friends of the arts have generously granted interviews, access to their archives, and hospitality, but no one more than Roy Ascott and Jack Burnham. A partial list includes: Eduardo Kac, Joseph Kosuth, Sonia Sheridan, Robert Adrian, Liza vi Bear, Billy Klüver and Julie Martin, Hank Bull, Les Levine, Carolee Schneemann, Hans Haacke, Tjebba van Tijen, Willoughby Sharp, Josephine Coy, Karl Katz, David Antin, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Alan Kaprow, Peter D'Agostino, Ted Victoria, Victoria Vesna, Woody Vasulka, Norman White, Stan Casselman, Stephan Delacher, Arnaud Enné, Daniel Gorn, and the Skwersky, Ziv, Beesch, and Kopelowicz families. A Henry Luce/ACLS dissertation fellowship helped immensely to provide uninterrupted time to study and write. Grants from Duke University's Graduate School, Department of Art History, and the Center for International Studies all contributed greatly to my scholarship. Jeffrey Shaw and Katherina Gsöllpointner provided residencies at the ZKM in Karlsruhe, and at Ars Electronica in Linz respectively, which offered unparalleled learning experiences. Finally, the librarians and archivists at the Jewish Museum, the Corcoran Gallery, the Getty Research Institute, the Los Angeles County Musem of Art, the Museum of Modern Art, the Stedelijk, the Moderna Museet , and Duke University all facilitated my research. vii CONTENTS Abstract iv Acknowledgments vi List of Illustrations viii Introduction: A Brief History of Art, Technology, and Art and Technology 1 Chapter 1. Cybernetics and Cybernetic Art Chapter 2. Informing Software: Art and Technology in the US, 1966-71 Chapter 3. Telematics and Telematic Art Chapter 4. Conclusion: Towards a Critique of Telematic Art Appendix: Illustrations Bibliography Biography viii Introduction: A Brief History of Art, Technology, and Art and Technology Art and technology have been paired together throughout western intellectual history. The concepts signified by these terms have varied widely, and the relationship between them has been subject to much debate. Contemporary notions of art or technology are markedly different from those shared by Plato and Aristotle, who made no distinction between what are now considered the fine arts and the applied arts. The ancient Greeks did differentiate between the liberal arts and the servile arts, though both were subsumed under the rubric of τεχνε (techne). The division between these arts was based on class distinctions and related attitudes towards different types of skills: the liberal arts (such as logic and rhetoric) required intellectual reasoning and were deemed suitable for free citizens, whereas the servile arts demanded manual skills, such as metalworking and painting, that were performed by slaves or members of the lower classes. According to Aristotle, techne enables what is to be produced to come into being in the absence of reason or judgement. He argued that the virtue of praxis, which is the special work of humankind, cannot be reduced to techne.1 Plato condemned art for its exclusive concern with appearances (or rather, the appearance of appearances). However, the mimetic standards by which painting and sculpture were judged by the ancients included not only their ability to imitate the appearance of things, but to evoke 1 John Phillips, "τεχνε's Other Eye: Concerning an Art with No Effects," in John Gange, ed., Art, Technology, Technique. (London: Pluto Press, 1998): 51-2. 1 states of mind and dispositions of character through psychological association.2 Roman accounts went further, attributing to Greek art wisdom, intuition, and imagination. Descriptions of Pheidias' sculpture by Cicero and Philostratos, for example, recognized not only the skillful, mimetic reproduction of appearances that can be seen, but the representation of the nature of beauty itself, a quality that they could be envisioned only through the imagination. Thus the Roman understanding of art further elevated its status above that of mere craft. The source of contemporary distinctions between science, technology, and art has been credited to Artistotle's parsing of theoretical, practical, and creative goals: truth, praxis, and making, though the origin of these contemporary distinctions is not nearly so neat.3 For example, art and technology were closely aligned in the creation of religious architecture in the Middle Ages, and mathematics, architecture, and art were inseparable in the formulation of the rules of one-point perspective in the Renaissance. The Renaissance also brought a significant reappraisal of the status of art in the hierarchy of human endeavors.