Pixels and Passion
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PIXELS AND PASSION New media art and e-culture in The Hague JUNE 2018 MA CULTURAL ANTHROPOLOGY Tanah Meijers Pixels and Passion 27/06/2018 Master Thesis 1 Tanah Meijers Pixels and Passion 27/06/2018 Master Thesis TABLE OF CONTENT Acknowledgements 5 1. Introduction 6 1.1 Some important notifications 6 1.2 New media art as a topic 6 1.3 Academic and social relevance 9 1.4 The research questions 11 2. Theoretical framework 12 2.1 Introduction 12 2.2 ‘New’ media 13 2.3 New media art 15 2.4 Active audiences and produsage 17 3. Methodological reflections 19 3.1 Introduction 19 3.2 The Hague and its art scene at first glance 20 3.3 Research Population 23 3.4 Methods of research 24 3.4.1 Participant observation 24 3.4.2 Semi-structured interviews 26 3.4.3 Online research 28 3.5 Data analysis 29 3.6 Ethical reflections 31 2 Tanah Meijers Pixels and Passion 27/06/2018 Master Thesis 4.‘There are no amateurs in here!’ 33 WHO ARE THOSE INVOLVED IN NEW MEDIA ART? 4.1 Introduction 33 4.2 Mapping new media art in The Hague 35 4.2.1 Problematizing the field 35 4.2.2 Amateurs and Gatekeepers 38 4.2.3 Other interesting players 43 4.3 Involvement of active audiences 47 4.5 Conclusion 51 5. ‘I am allergic to this label’ 52 WHAT IS NEW MEDIA ART ACCORDING TO THOSE INVOLVED? 5.1 Introduction 52 5.2 How do people involved define new media art? 53 5.3 What is the importance of a label anyway? 57 5.4 Online videos as a form of new media art? 60 5.4.1 YouTubing and vlogging 60 5.4.2 YouTubing and online video art 64 5.5 Conclusion 66 6. ‘Amsterdam offers quantity, we offer quality’ 67 WHERE IN THE HAGUE ARE EXPRESSIONS OF NEW MEDIA ART MADE VISIBLE AND IN WHAT WAYS CAN THESE EXPRESSIONS PRESUMABLY BE (BETTER) FACILITATED? 6.1 Introduction 67 6.2 Where in The Hague are expressions of new media art made visible? 68 6.3 Policy on e-culture 71 6.4 CultuurSchakel and e-culture 77 6.5 Conclusion 78 3 Tanah Meijers Pixels and Passion 27/06/2018 Master Thesis 7. Passionate people in a ‘pixelated’ framework 79 7.1 Introduction 79 7.2 Who are those involved in new media art? 79 7.3 What is new media art? 82 7.4 Where in The Hague are expressions of new media art made visible and in what ways can these expressions presumably be (better) facilitated? 83 7.5 Conclusion 85 7.5.1 Concluding : How are expressions of new media art within The Hague perceived and presumably (better) facilitated by those involved? 85 7.5.2 Suggestions for CultuurSchakel 86 8. Bibliography 88 9. Appendix 94 9.1 Original quotes 94 9.2 Images 95 4 Tanah Meijers Pixels and Passion 27/06/2018 Master Thesis ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis has come about within the master’s program Cultural Anthropology and Sociology – Policy in Practice, at Leiden university. It seems fit to first address my teacher Janneke Verheije and supervisor Bart Barendrecht for inspiring and critiquing me with their knowledge, adding to the content of this thesis. Second, I owe my thanks to CultuurSchakel, in particular the Cultural Participation department for letting me roam around in their organization as well a giving me the freedom to conduct my research substantively. Stephanie Hermes, Hans van der Maas, Joan Biekman, Hélène Esenwein, Poernima Gobardhan, Katja Groenendijk, Tania Monteiro, Talitha van Ooyen, Magreet Schuemie and Arie Spaans were all part of the team that made me feel welcome each week, in their meetings and during lunch. Third, of course, there are my informants and their organizations, who I will name in the order I had the pleasure of meeting them. Impakt, Oneseconds, SETUP, Roland Smeenk, Bradley Groffen, Stef Katwijk (The Hague municipality), Brechtje Burger (Nest), Michel Behre (BorderSessions), Sanne van der Velde and David Middendorp (Another Kind of Blue), different employees from Stroom and West, Matteo Marangoni (iii), Sytze Schalk (Werelden van Schalk), Farouk, Minerva, Damani (CLOUD/DanceLab), Olof van Winden (TodaysArt), Cees van de Burg (Parts Project), Sarah-Jane Earle (COMM), Casper van Beusekom, Ingeborg Dennesen (Cultuur Coach at CultuurSchakel) and audience members and gallery owners I met at museums and gatherings throughout my research. I want to thank all of you for your time, insights, material and hospitality. Without you this thesis would never have come together! Not all your names have made it to the final thesis, but you nevertheless gave me knowledge I had in the back of my mind throughout my research and its analysis. Lastly, I need to thank people close to home who had to cope with me being away often and stressed out at times while working on this thesis: thanks for all the cups of tea and encouraging words! 5 Tanah Meijers Pixels and Passion 27/06/2018 Master Thesis 1. INTRODUCTION 1.1 Some important notifications Before reading this thesis, it is important to take note of some general decisions I have made regarding the transcription of my field data. First, whenever I mention CultuurSchakel, I specifically mean the Cultural Participation department of CultuurSchakel. This is the division of CultuurSchakel that I worked with and that submitted their policy question towards Leiden University and, by doing so, to me. Within the master’s programme of Leiden University, CultuurSchakel is cited to be my societal partner, so I will also make use of this terminology within my thesis. Second, I conducted most of my field data using the Dutch language. However, considering new media art forms often have an international (online) character, which I will explain in this thesis, and my intended audience therefore likely will be an international one, I decided to write this thesis in English. I also deem it important that an English thesis will reach more academics who can benefit from this research as well. This topic has not extensively been researched within the field of anthropology and I consider it a relevant contribution to social scientists who are interested in studying new media art (see below). This language preference also needs to be addressed here, since it means I had to often translate quotes from my research participants from Dutch into English. The original quotes are all added in the appendix to minimize the risk of their words getting ‘lost in translation’. I addition, my collaboration with CultuurSchakel has led me to create a Dutch policy brief as well. This policy brief is not included in this thesis, since it is only meant for CultuurSchakel and The Hague municipality. Of course, the recommendations within this policy brief are based on the conclusions of this fieldwork, which are transcribed in the last chapter of this thesis. 1.2 New media art as a topic “Fieldwork is […] a trial trough battle in a war for which the novice has little preparation” (Freilich 1970:16 in Robben and Sluka 2012:1) I felt this quote to be very true, already before the official start of my fieldwork, when I had my first meeting with Stephanie, the leader of the team I was going to conduct my research for. She is a staff member of CultuurSchakel, an organization that defines itself as ‘the link between 6 Tanah Meijers Pixels and Passion 27/06/2018 Master Thesis education and the cultural sector of The Hague by means of combining supply and demand’.1 I met her at Het Koorenhuis, a place I had never seen, in a city I barely knew and got introduced to a topic I was not familiar with. I suddenly realized that, within the course of only a couple of months, I had to become acquainted with, or even ‘at home’ in this building and this city and, therewithal, become an expert on this topic she introduced to my only minutes ago: new media art. CultuurSchakel wanted to know where in The Hague they could find new media art expressions, performed by non-professional artists, and how they could assist these practitioners in a manner these artists themselves deemed appropriate. This focus on amateur practitioners was important for CultuurSchakel, since it is an organization concerned with non- professionals within the art world. CultuurSchakel reckoned an anthropologist would be suitable to conduct this information because of their “bottom-up way of working, in which they first collect data from the field in order to create a defection, instead of approaching their field using a top-down method in which they have their definitions ready and search for people who fit these definitions” (personal communication Stephanie Hermes, staff member CultuurSchakel). Indeed, I agreed this policy question could be approached by ethnographic research, but – as an academic – I did start with theoretical research on the topic before entering the field and gather the ‘bottom-up’ information CultuurSchakel was interested in. Within anthropology, there is an interest in new media and Internet phenomena and emerging anthropological literature on these topics (Wilson and Peterson 2002:450). This does not surprise, since new media and technologies are undeniably ubiquitous within almost every – social, cultural, economic and linguistic – aspect in the everyday lives of many people in many parts of the world (Coleman 2010). It might – therefore – be almost inevitable that modern technologies have gained influence in the art world as well. As one of my informants put it: “New media art is just art. Art in a context of digital creativity and digital culture, because the world we live in is digital.