Oliver Grau (ed.): MediaArtHistories (2007)

Digital art has become a major contemporary art form, but it has yet to achieve acceptance from mainstream cultural institutions; it is rarely collected, and seldom included in the study of art history or other academic disciplines. In MediaArtHistories, leading scholars seek to change this. They take a wider view of media art, placing it against the backdrop of art history. Their essays demonstrate that today’s media art cannot be understood by technological details alone; it cannot be understood without its history, and it must be understood in proximity to other disciplines—film, cultural and media studies, computer science, philosophy, and sciences dealing with images.

Contributors trace the evolution of digital art, from thirteenth-century Islamic mechanical devices and eighteenth-century phantasmagoria, magic lanterns, and other multimedia illusions, to Marcel Duchamp’s inventions and 1960s kinetic and op art. They reexamine and redefine key media art theory terms—machine, media, exhibition—and consider the blurred dividing lines between art products and consumer products and between art images and science images. Finally, MediaArtHistories offers an approach for an interdisciplinary, expanded image science, which needs the “trained eye” of art history.

Contributors:
Rudlof Arnheim, Andreas Broeckmann, Ron Burnett, Edmond Couchot, Sean Cubitt, Dieter Daniels, Felice Frankel, Oliver Grau, Erkki Huhtamo, Douglas Kahn, Ryszard W. Kluszczynski, Machiko Kusahara, Timothy Lenoir, Lev Manovich, W.J.T. Mitchell, Gunalan Nadarajan, Christiane Paul, Louise Poissant, Edward A. Shanken, Barbara Maria Stafford, and Peter Weibel.

Publisher MIT Press, 2007
Leonardo (Series) (Cambridge, Mass.)
ISBN 0262072793, 9780262072793
Length 475 pages

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Read Me! ASCII Culture & The Revenge of Knowledge. Filtered by Nettime (1999)

A compilation of writings and debates from the Nettime newsgroup and internet mailing list. This book documents the debates over emerging media technologies that are currently reshaping society. What are the liberatory potentials? Where are the points of political conflict and class struggle in this new culture? What are the pitfalls of new technology? Read Me! provides the beginnings of this discussion and an outline for what has become a continuing forum on the Net.

Edited by Josephine Bosma, Pauline van Mourik Broekman, Ted Byfield, Matthew Fuller, Geert Lovink, Diana McCarty, Pit Schultz Felix Stalder, McKenzie Wark, and Faith Wilding
Publisher: Autonomedia (February, 1999)
ISBN: 1570270899, 978-1570270895
556 pages

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Agnieszka Pokrywka: New Media Art in Central and Eastern Europe in the 2000s (2009) [Polish]

The thesis is a presentation and analysis of contemporary new media art in Central and Eastern Europe in the context of history (soviet times) and current situation (network society). First chapter of this work is focused on the issues mentioned above, simultaneously being kind of theoretical introduction to the concepts of Central and Eastern Europe, network society or new media art which are closely related to the technological revolution. Second chapter is kind of fusion between mentioned above subjects which apparently seem to be very different and discordant but in fact they’re deeply connected and dependent. Analysis of them allow us to understand correctly and truly realities of new media art origins in Central Eastern Europe. Comprehending of these terms became to be a necessary base for analysis technologically based art in the context of European (Chapter Three) and global (Chapter Four) networks of media creativity. Speaking generally, what has been discussed theoretically in the first part of this work is supplemented by specific examples in the second half which is showing different networks focused on organization, theory, practice of technological art. Complex and variable networks of new media art centers were visualized as a CEEMAC2000+ map (Appendix 3). The main aim of this thesis is to underline historical, political and economical influence on new media art development in Central Eastern Europe.

Master of Arts thesis
Dept of Art Criticism and Promotion, Poznan Academy of Fine Arts, 2009
Supervisor: Professor Grzegorz Dziamski
Length: 111 pages
Published under Creative Commons BY-NC-ND 3.0 Poland

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Stuart Mealing (ed.): Computers and Art, 2nd ed (2002)

Computers & Art gathers together contributions from a broad, international spectrum of experts concerned with the computer as a tool for artists.

The approaches vary, with contributors looking at the historical, philosophical and practical implications of the use of computer technology in art practice. The variety of their approaches is matched by the diversity of backgrounds of the contributors who are artists, critics, educators, philosophers and researchers. Following the success of the first edition, this revised version includes three new chapters.

Publisher Intellect Books, 2002
ISBN 1841500623, 9781841500621
Pages 159

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Robert Adrian X exhibition catalogue (2001) [German, English]

Robert Adrian X is an artist making installations, music and radio projects as well as works in public space since 1950s; since early 1980s he is the pioneer in the field of telecommunication.

A fragile sculpture made of cigar packages, painted in the style of De Stijl, a canvas that radiates in the subdued hues of Yves Klein’s “patented” blue, and a faded Amiga monitor with colourfully gleaming computer graphics, all lined up on a red shelf. Modern Art IV (1990), thus runs the title of this work, finds a common denominator for the art of the 20th Century, including that of the sampling brand.

152 pages, german/english, illustrated, with essays by Timothy Druckrey, Georg Schöllhammer and Reinhard Braun, ISBN 3-85247-028-5
Editor: Kunsthalle Wien, Lucas Gehrmann, Gerald Matt
Publisher: Kunsthalle Wien
Year: 2001
Exhibition/Project: Exhibition Robert Adrian X (07.12.2001 – 10.02.2002)

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Fibreculture Journal 1-15 (2003-2009)

Fibreculture Journal is a peer reviewed international journal that explores the issues and ideas of concern and interest to both the Fibreculture network and wider social formations. The journal encourages critical and speculative interventions in the debate and discussions concerning information and communication technologies and their policy frameworks, network cultures and their informational logic, new media forms and their deployment, and the possibilities of socio-technical invention and sustainability. Other broad topics of interest include the cultural contexts, philosophy and politics of information and creative industries; national and international strategies for innovation, research and development; education; media and culture, and new media arts.

What Now? : The Imprecise and Disagreeable Aesthetics of Remix
Fibreculture 15, 2009
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Web 2.0: Before, During and After the Event
Fibreculture 14, 2009
Edited by Darren Tofts and Christian McCrea
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After Convergence: What Connects?
Fibreculture 13, 2008
Edited by Caroline Bassett, Maren Hartmann, Kate O’Riordan
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Models, Metamodels and Contemporary Media
Fibreculture 12, 2008
Edited by Gary Genosko and Andrew Murphie
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The Futures of Digital Media Arts and Culture
Fibreculture 11, 2008
Edited by Andrew Hutchison and Ingrid Richardson
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New Media, Networks and New Pedagogies
Fibreculture 10, 2007
Edited by Adrian Miles
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General Issue
Fibreculture 9, 2006
Edited by Andrew Murphie
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Gaming Networks
Fibreculture 8, 2006
Edited by Chris Chesher, Alice Crawford and Julian Kücklich
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Distributed Aesthetics
Fibreculture 7, 2005
Edited by Lisa Gye, Anna Munster and Ingrid Richardson
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Mobility, New Social Intensities, and the Coordinates of Digital Networks
Fibreculture 6, 2005
Edited by Andrew Murphie, Larissa Hjorth, Gillian Fuller and Sandra Buckley
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Multitudes, Creative Organisation and the Precarious Condition of New Media Labour
Fibreculture 5, 2005
Edited by Brett Neilson and Ned Rossiter
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Contagion and the Diseases of Information
Fibreculture 4, 2005
Edited by Andrew Goffey
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General Issue
Fibreculture 3, 2004
Edited by Andrew Murphie
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New Media, New Worlds?
Fibreculture 2, 2003
Edited by Andrew Murphie
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The Politics of Networks
Fibreculture 1, 2003
Edited by Andrew Murphie
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Fibreculture Journal: Internet theory + criticism + research
Publisher: Fibreculture Publications/Open Humanities Press, Australia
ISSN: 1449 – 1443

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Christa Sommerer & Laurent Mignonneau. Interactive Art Research (2009)

Christa Sommerer and Laurent Mignonneau are two of the most innovative and internationally renowned media artists and researchers. Their work has been called “epoch-making” (Toshiharu Itoh, NTT-ICC Museum, Tokyo) for developing natural and intuitive interfaces and for applying scientific principles such as artificial life, complexity, generative systems and nanotechnologies to their innovative interface design.

This monograph represents a comprehensive overview of Sommerer and Mignonneau’s art and research. In addition to providing detailed project descriptions of each interactive artwork, it includes essays and articles by highly recognized media scholars and theoreticians who bring the interactive artworks of Sommerer and Mignonneau in an art and media art history perspective.

Contributions from Roy Ascott, Anne Marie Duguet, Oliver Grau, Erkki Huhtamo, Machiko Kusahara, Hannes Leopoldseder, Christine Schopf and Peter Wiebel, among others

Editors: Gerfried Stocker, Christa Sommerer, Laurent Mignonneau
Publisher Springer, 2009
ISBN 3211990151, 9783211990155
Length 200 pages

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Sean Cubitt, Paul Thomas (eds.): Re:live. Media Art Histories 2009. Conference Proceedings (2010)

Proceedings from the Third International Conference on the Histories of Media Art, Science and Technology held in December 2009 in Melbourne, Australia. The event followed the success of the two previous Media Art History conferences, re:fresh (Banff 2005) and re:place (Berlin 2007).

Published by The University of Melbourne & Victorian College of the Arts and Music 2009
ISBN: 978-0-9807186-3-8
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial 2.5 Australia License.

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Mukul Patel (ed.): Ambient Information Systems (2009)

The publication (London: AIS, 2009) elucidates the work of Manu Luksch, Mukul Patel and collaborators as part of the wave of critical art that has emerged alongside the rise of digital networks. Interrogating the social and political transformations of the late 20th/early 21st centuries, their practice bridges art and activism, and recalls aspects of the 1910s-20s avant-garde and 1960s-70s conceptual and systems art.

A major essay by media theorist Armin Medosch situates the work of the London-based artists amidst the rise of the ‘creative industries’ idea, inner-city regeneration, and the dot-com boom. Medosch also discusses critical art in the light of ‘open source culture’ and offers an analysis that draws on systems theory. Other contributors to the book include independent media activist Keiko Sei on the ‘camcorder revolution’ in Burma; policy consultant and writer Naseem Khan on grass-roots regeneration in East London; activist/artist Siraj Izhar on praxis as process; and philosopher/dramaturge Fahim Amir on techno-democracy.

commissioned texts by Fahim Amir, Siraj Izhar, Naseem Khan, Armin Medosch, Keiko Sei, Shane Solanki
book design: Marion Mayr, Julia Juriga-Lamut
design concept: Manu Luksch, Marion Mayr, Mukul Patel
editor: Mukul Patel

English, some texts in German. Translator: Nicholas Grindell
400 pages, 6-colour hardbound, 17.5 x 23 cm
edition of 1,500 unique & numbered.

ISBN-13: 978-0-9556245-0-6

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Kevin F. McCarthy, Elizabeth H. Ondaatje: From Celluloid to Cyberspace: The Media Arts and the Changing Arts World (2002)

The arts in America are entering a new era that will pose many challenges for the arts community. However, our current knowledge of the operation of the arts world and its underlying dynamics is limited. These limits are particularly pronounced with regard to the newest and most dynamic component of the arts world: the media arts. Defined as art that is produced using or combining film, video, and computers, the media arts encompass a diverse array of artistic work that includes narrative, documentary, and experimental films; videos and digital products; and installation art using media. This report examines the organizational features of the media arts, placing them in the context of the broader arts environment and identifying the major challenges they face. Rather than discussing aesthetics or individual artists or works, the authors take a structural point of view, discussing audiences, media artists as a group, arts organizations, and funding for the media arts. They conclude that the media arts need both greater public visibility and a clearer sense of their own identity. They should become more attuned and responsive to the policy context in which they operate and should address the lack of systematic, quantitative information about the field. Finally, the media arts need to become actively involved in building greater public involvement in their work.

Publisher Rand Corporation, 2002
ISBN 0833030760, 9780833030764
Length 79 pages

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Alessandro Ludovico (ed.): Ubermorgen.com. Media Hacking vs. Conceptual Art (2009)

This is the first time for the complete works of the artist-duo UBERMORGEN.COM – lizvlx and Hans Bernhard – to be presented in printed form and subjected to critical scrutiny.

To mark the tenth anniversary of UBERMORGEN.COM, a number of internationally respected critics, curators and artists focus on these border-liners in the global mass media and their radical actions on the precipice of the international art world. The interplay of concept art, software art, fine art, media hacking, net art and media activism makes UBERMORGEN-COM a hybrid gesamtkunstwerk within the contemporary European media-art avant-garde.

With texts and interviews by and with Inke Arns, Florian Cramer, Raffael Dörig, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Peter Weibel and others.

March 2009
208 pages, 20,5 x 22,5 cm, 200 colour illustrations
ISBN: 978-3-85616-460-7

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Third Text. Special Issue: Media Arts: Practice, Institutions and Histories (2009)

Special issue of Third Text journal is an update on the development and current state of new media arts in some “under-represented” regions and contexts of the world, from New Zealand to India and from South Africa to the former East of Europe.

Guest Editors: Sean Cubitt, Jose-Carlos Mariategui and Gunalan Nadarajan.
Contributions by (among others) Nina Czegledy and Andrea Szekeres, Olga Goriunova, Pi Li, Marcus Neustetter and Ravi Sundaram.

Third Text Vol 23 Issue 3 2009
Publisher: Routledge
ISSN: 1475-5297 (electronic) 0952-8822 (paper)
Publication Frequency: 6 issues per year

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Rita Raley: Tactical Media (2009)

Tactical media describes interventionist media art practices that engage and critique the dominant political and economic order. Rather than taking to the streets and staging spectacular protests, the practitioners of tactical media engage in an aesthetic politics of disruption, intervention, and education. From They Rule, an interactive map of the myriad connections between the world’s corporate and political elite created by Josh On and Futurefarmers, to Black Shoals, a financial market visualization that is intended to be both aesthetically and politically disruptive, they embrace a broad range of oppositional practices.

In Tactical Media, Rita Raley provides a critical exploration of the new media art activism that has emerged out of, and in direct response to, postindustrialism and neoliberal globalization. Through close readings of projects by the DoEAT group, the Critical Art Ensemble, Electronic Civil Disobedience, and other tactical media groups, she articulates their divergent methods and goals and locates a virtuosity that is also boldly political. Contemporary models of resistance and dissent, she finds, mimic the decentralized and virtual operations of global capital and the post-9/11 security state to exploit and undermine the system from within.

Emphasizing the profound shift from strategy to tactics that informs new media art-activism, Raley assesses the efficacy of its symbolic performances, gamings, visualizations, and hacks. With its cogent analyses of new media art and their social impact, Tactical Media makes a timely and much needed contribution to wider debates about political activism, contemporary art, and digital technology.

Publisher    U of Minnesota Press, 2009
ISBN    0816651515, 9780816651511
Length    208 pages

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Domenico Quaranta (ed.): Ubermorgen.com (2009)

UBERMORGEN.COM is an artist duo created in Vienna, Austria, in 1999 by lizvlx and Hans Bernhard, a founder of etoy. Behind UBERMORGEN.COM we can find one of the most unmatchable identities – controversial and iconoclast – of what they call “the contemporary European techno-fine-art avant-garde”. Their open circuit of conceptual art, drawing, software art, pixelpainting, computer installations, net.art, sculpture and digital activism (media hacking) transforms their brand into a hybrid Gesamtkunstwerk.

This monograph is a first attempt to provide an overview of their hybrid body of work, that moves constantly between art and entertainment, mass communication and one-to-one experience, digital and physical; and to introduce their corporate identity, that is itself a work of art. Through projects such as [V]ote Auction, Psych|OS, Art Fid, Superenhanced and the recent monument to the e-commerce age known as The EKMRZ Trilogy, and trough contributions by the art critics Inke Arns and Domenico Quaranta and the legendary net.art duo Jodi.org, this book is also a veritable portrait of a future that is already here.

Edited by Domenico Quaranta
Texts by Domenico Quaranta, Inke Arns, Jodi.org
Published by FPEditions, February 2009
160 x 225 mm / 6.3 x 8.9 in – 96 pages
ISBN: 978-88-903308-5-8

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Mark Tribe and Reena Jana: New Media Art (2006-)

Artists have always been early adopters of emerging media technologies, from Albrecht Dürer and the printing press in the 16th century to Nam June Paik’s video experiments in the 1960s. In 1994, the advent of the internet as a popular medium catalyzed a global art movement that began to explore the cultural, social, and aesthetic possibilities of new communication technologies–the web, webcams and video surveillance cameras, wireless phones, hand-held computers, and GPS devices. This book addresses New Media art as a specific art historical movement, focusing on technologies, forms, thematic content and conceptual strategies. Often involving appropriation, collaboration, and shared ideas and expressions, New Media art frequently addresses issues of identity, commercialization, privacy, and public domain. Many New Media artists are profoundly aware of their historical antecedents, making reference to Dada, Pop Art, Conceptual art, Performance art, and Fluxus.

Artists featured: Cory Arcangel, Jonah Brucker-Cohen and Katherine Moriwaki, Young-Hae Chang Heavy Industries, Vuk Cosic, Mary Flanagan, Ken Goldberg, Paul Kaiser and Shelly Eshkar, Jennifer and Kevin McCoy, Mouchette, MTAA, Keith and Mendi Obadike, Radical Software Group, Raqs Media Collective, RTMark, and John F. Simon Jr.

This open-source wiki book is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 2.5 License. It is based on the manuscript of New Media Art, a book written by Mark Tribe and Reena Jana and published by Taschen in 2006. The Taschen book is available in French, German, Italian and Spanish in addition to English. This wiki book is not intended as a substitute or replacement for the Taschen book, but rather as an expandable educational resource to which artists, curators, students and others may contribute.

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