Harvard referencing plan!!!!!!!!!

I think in my Context of Practice essays (woo) I will attempt to argue that digital art has the potential to be as emotive and legitimate as art created with traditional methods, such as pen and paper. To drive this argument I will look at various sources and collect differing opinions to drive my point of view.

Source uno:
Greene, R. (2004) Internet Art, London: Thames and Hudson

Greene talks about how "a related criticism is sometimes aimed at the works' creators: that internet and softwarre artists, often self-identified as programmers, are not 'real' artists. This critique can be taken as a symptom of the changing modes of art and the evolving expectations of what artists should be, what skills or trades they should possess, and what their critical concerns should be." [page 13]

"For those who do not support it, net art is often thought to lack the craft and direct impact of work in painting and sculpture by privileging commercial tools, veering too close to graphic design, or exploiting cheap, "whizz bang" programming tricks (to which authentic, meaningful art should naturally be opposed). Furthermore, net practices such as software art do not align with existing gallery, museum and discursive systems, and these institutions often want to differentiate themselves from commercial fields."

It seems obvious that more high-brow art critics, then, seem to agree that digital art does not have a place amongst the more traditional crafts, despite the fact that art is in a constant state of evolution. It is interesting to note Greene's commentary on "what artists should be", as there is so often a classism within finer arts that create a set of rules and regulations for something that is often emotive and almost primal.

Additionally, digital art harks back to more traditional Dada art, which was intentionally strange, silly and nonsensical. "Many net artists feel a strong connection to the work of French artist Marcel Duchamp [who created the moustachified Mona Lisa below] and to the participants of Dada (the international arts movement that began in Zurich in 1916 as a reaction to World War I and to a traditional art public), all of whom helped to shift art practices away from traditonal forms of pictorial representation. Dada firmly embraced the random as a means of expression."

Lecture Notes - Digital Production and Distribution

I found this lecture very relevant to my COP, as I am looking at the digital aesthetic and the way that digital and technological influence can manifest within art and animation. The development of language and recording has been highly significant, not only within art but in all leases of culture and society. The technology of print and development isn't all physical anymore - it can be done through computing and via the internet, versus the traditional methods of print-press.

Marshall McLuhan (1911-1980) said "we shape our tools, and then they shape us." He was forward-thinking, and predicted a "global village" before the creation of the internet.

We become dependant on the tech we develop. One must examine figure (medium) and ground (context) together.

Where we are today is not the end point. As technology develops, there is an impact on the society that uses it.

Ultimately, when considering technology:

• What does it enhance/improve?
• What happens when you break it?
• What does it make obsolete?
• What does it allow us to do?

The first Mac retailed for $1000, in 1990. It allowed a range of type, more public. It enhanced productivity. It retrieved individual creativity and allowed the democratization of technology. Got rid of traditional, handmade methods, though it had problems with speed, capacity, access, and price. 

The New Aesthetic/Digital Aesthetic

This term was coined by James Bridle

It refers to the blending of the virtual and the physical

Internet within the physical world.

NOSTALGIA VS INNOVATION 

The way we imagine the future is influenced by what we have today.

A virtual clock tells the time, whereas analogue shows us.

The Mechanical Aesthetic

Robots now synonymous with technological advancement 

Cyberman - enemy

C3PO - friend, service robot, "alternative" human

The Technological Aesthetic 

iCulture - "white and blue with chromey bits"

Like Apple - smooth, very clean. Everything is deliberate - no clutter.

Utopian Aesthetic

Utopian ideal of the future

An imagine community or society that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities

"Superhumans" - created for a purpose, everything is highly efficient.

Also a dystopian view of technology - an undesirable future

Appears in subgenres of fiction (Hunger Games, for example), draws attention to currently existing real-world issues.

"WWIII is a guerrilla information war with no division between military and civilian participation."

MUTATED . . . FRAGMENTED . . . DIVERSIFIED 

Spectrum of media experiences

Wanting to return to analogue - people trust and believe in it. 

The Information Age

Computer age / digital age / new media age

Mobilisation of digital communication

New tech eliminated physical costs of communications.

Digital culture - emerging value system. 

Participation community values.

Print Culture and Distribution - Part 1

Currently, we are living in the "Late Age of Print". Subjects taught now, such as Illustration and Graphic Design, were not taught in the art schools of the 1800s. Instead, they taught the "fine arts", of painting, sculpture, architecture, music, and painting. The men only aspect of this was also stifling - only history paintings, classist.

As production became mechanised, the industry of art rapidly expanded to the lower classes, the working class. Instead of owning a singular piece of art, it became a case of experiencing it, being able to see it and get a cheap reproduction. The higher class hated this - reproduction was seen as less valuable, cheaper.

This one dude Matthew Arnold (who had some banging sideburns) called for culture to be "in the minority keeping" - to belong to only an elite few, not the general masses.

damn those sideburns could put guy martin to shame

Popular culture offers addictive forms of distraction and compensation - with culture being cheaply produced by and for the working class. Schools of design began to crop up, creating workers for industrial capitalism. Even LCA began as a school of design.

One argument is that technological reproduction removes the aura of a piece of work - the creativity, genius, and mystery of it. However, I believe that reproduction only increases this. By being so famous and well recognised, certain pieces of art become more mystified by seeing the original - almost like a celebrity.

History of Type Part Two: This Time it's Personal

 I found this week's lecture much more riveting and interesting than last weeks, possibly because it involved more about the technological side of typography, which is relevant to my COP quote, and also my personal interests. 

Type is not a natural concept - it's manmade, roots in spoken language. It is necessary, but not found anywhere else in the natural world. The durable visual form is a huge part of human history.

Following the first world war, there was an opportunity to rebuild the world creatively, especially in Germany, where so much had been flattened.

The modern concept of form following function was highly important in developing the fonts we know and use today, as well as other aesthetics and design of the time (around the early and mid 1900s). The graphic design from the Bauhaus turned to promotional, using commerce to drive design. The birth of graphic design.

Additionally, theatre, costume, new technologies, all were adopted into design - all areas of creative practice being threaded in. 

With the birth of technology to a wider commercial audience, along came fonts that we are still familiar with today - one notable one being Helvetica. This font was free of elegance or complications. It is clear, clean, basic. It isn't a political font, or a font that is trying to emulate anything but clarity. In this way, it is the epitome of 20th Century design.

Also, comic sans. Which I am writing this blog post in, to make a point. Or just to maybe get on my lecturer's nerves. I don't have much hatred towards the font itself, at all. More annoyance at the people who use it wrongly. But! I would advise Fred Bates and other comic sans haters watch this video. 

Type became forefronted in our visual culture, by the 1990s onwards. The introduction of the Apple Mac allowed every creative designer their own personal computer, to do with what they pleased. Type became democratised with the birth of computers and the internet.

Today, we see almost a "full circle" of type, with emojis. These hark back to the traditional methods of pictorial communication, using images to convey meaning. This was what interested me most in this lecture, something I had never really considered. 

Ultimately, font is integrated and collaborative. It is visually collaborative.