User:Eleanorg/Works I've Enjoyed

This is a record of works I've enjoyed in each month - not ones that have been newly made, but that I have encountered or re-encountered, and struck a chord at this particular time. It's an attempt to overcome my terrible memory for names; a crib sheet for tutorials, etc.

Feb 2012

• Dead Drops (2011-), Aram Bartholl, http://deaddrops.com/

Another offline network, taking 'digital' into physical space & inviting strangers to take risks together

• Skin (2003), Shelley Jackson, http://ineradicablestain.com/skin-video.html

The aesthetic of a distributed network, taken offline & entirely relying on the living body.Frustrating lack of documentation of the original work; this video is a remix.

• The Time Machine In Alphabetical Order (), Thomson & Craighead, http://www.thomson-craighead.net/

creative use of cutting up a text & deconstructing it in a rule-based way

• EpicPedia (2008), Annemieke van der Hoek, http://www.epicpedia.org/

re-performs collaborative editing. A nice treatment to make sense of the history of collaborative texts

Jan 2012

• The Bank of Time (2001), Richard Wright http://thebankoftime.host.furtherfield.org/

'grows' plants on desktop screen saver; inverts speed fetish of computing; striking superimposition of earthy time on computer time

• Mimeticon (2006), Richard Wright http://mimeticon.host.furtherfield.org/cgi-bin/Baroque.cgi

search by similarity: deconstruction of images vs words; word becomes an image, which then becomes a 'word' (as it signifies, in order to gather 'relevant' results)

• Bicycle Built for 2,000 (?), Aaron Koblin http://www.bicyclebuiltfortwothousand.com/

Another nice example of the many vs the individual; nice how individuals work in isolation & are then combined into a whole

• 10,000 Copyrighted Images (2007), Richard Wright http://futurenatural.pwp.blueyonder.co.uk/film10KVIMEO.html

Deceptively simple format; bases a critique of copyright in age of 'information overload' on human perceptive capability

• ExtInked, UHC Collective http://www.uhc.org.uk/portfolio.php?tag=13&project=54

Beautiful use of volunteers in ritual-like format; demands long-term commitment; participants are 'witnesses not spectators' a la Etchells

• Newstweek (2011), Julian Oliver & Danja Vasiliev http://newstweek.com/overview

Very clean & sophisticated implementation of a simple idea intercepting wifi hotspots. Golden Nica award, Ars Elec. 2011

• The Sheep Market (), Aaron Koblin

Similar aesthetic to InBFlat. Nice how it uses the system itself in an unorthodox way, to critique it

Dec 2011

• Virtual Choir (ongoing) Eric Whitacre http://virtualchoir.ericwhitacre.com/

beautiful juxtaposition of the everyday/isolated and the sublime/communal, as isolated voice uploads become a full choir. Shame about over-literal, tacky visual presentation

• Listening Post (2004), Ben Rubin and Mark Hansen http://earstudio.com/2010/09/29/listening-post/

Meditation on collective mind; integration of pre-designed elements with live data; creation of physical space from virtual material

• Coal Fired Computers (2010), YoHa http://yoha.co.uk/cfc

Strong conceptual linking of hardware/body to 'virtuality'; not just conceptual but visually engaging

• Internet Topography (2006-11), Nicholas Maigret & Nicholas Montgermont (collaborating as 'Art of Failure' http://www.triangulationblog.com/2011/04/nicolas-maigret.html

Beautiful abstract, minimalist exploration of the physical medium of 'the internet' and its glitches

• With You (various performances)

Thoughtful integration of performance into social media; 'fake'/hijacked identity; nice solution to documentation in USB format

• Packet Garden (2006), Julian Oliver http://julianoliver.com/pg

links physical geography to virtual travel; re-imagining geography in networked world