<nettime> _the_post-media_era_?

[Jose-Luis Brea <jlbrea@aleph-arts.org>]

····· the post-media era ·····
http://aleph-arts.org/epm/eng

Hosted by aleph, and organised for arcoelectronico99, "the post-media era"
introduces itself as a system that tries to facilitate a critical approach
to the contemporary transformations of the public sphere --those induced
by the emergency of new media, specially the internet--, focusing the
analysis on the role that concerns all cultural and artistic practices in
that context. 

as such a system, "the post-media era" involves:
* a "constellation of [ web ]communities of media producers".
* a series of referential texts.
* statements of participant webs, 
* and access to the developpement of two panel discussions organized by
arco99 about art & media. 


** presentation of the project:

[The post-media era ]
A constellation of (web) communities of media producers

Perhaps one of the programmatic dreams of the avant-garde -which has been
on hold for the longest period of time over the course of this century-
was that of generating true 'communities of media producers', to use
Bertolt Brecht's well-known expression. His experiments with radio, those
of Soviet artists with film, or of the soixante-huitard neo-avant-garde
with video activism, guerrilla television, or cinéma-vérité were all part
of a dream that never came true (but has never been given up, either):
that of developing -through artistic practice itself, thus conceived as
activism that is simultaneously politically and media oriented- autonomous
public spheres, social interaction devices able to induce in the citizenry
ways of direct communication, not mediated by the interests of industry or
the apparatus of the state. 

The appearance of the Internet has renovated and updated the virtuality of
this dream.  It could even be stated that, from the start, the art world's
approach to the Internet has been marked by the captivating phantasmagoria
of this revisited programme. Meanwhile, artistic methods and languages
have emerged which are devoted to experiencing the formal potentialities
of this new medium, giving birth to what is already usually called
net.art.  But at the same time, and together with these neoformalist
practices, a spirit of Internet activism should be recognised, which
concentrates its efforts precisely on establishing 'communities of media
producers'.  In this case it is a question of 'web communities', which
find each other or exchange their expressive productions on the Internet,
generating their own public interaction devices, their own 'media', in an
autonomous, dehierarchised communications setting -in a post-media domain-
in which public circulation of information is no longer exhaustively
submitted to the regulation that organises the traditional communications
media, structurally oriented towards the social production of consensus
(towards organising 'the masses' rather than the communicational
articulation of 'the public'). 

Through 'The post-media era' we try to bring together, in a common virtual
space constituted on the Internet itself, some of these web communities
(the majority of which have been developed by artists, art critics or
cultural activists), favouring debate and reflection on the nature of the
artistic, cultural and communicative practices in contemporary societies. 


** the constellation of selected webs:

[ alt-X ]
[ betacast ]
[ blast ]
[ convex tv ]
::eco::
[ gallery 9  / Walker art center ]
[ nettime ]
[ nirvanet ]
[ P.A.R.K. 4DTV ]
[ raveface radio ]
[ rhizome ]
[ the Thing ]
[ Xchange ]


** Referential texts

Remaking social practices. Felix Guattari.
The post-media operators. Howard Slater.
Sovereing media. Adilkno.
The world after the media. Adilkno.
Triptych: hypertext, surfiction, storyworlds. Mark Amerika.


** Statements by 

Jordan Crandall (Blast).
Steve Dietz (Gallery 9. Walker Art Center).
Rachel Greene & Alex Galloway (Rhizome).
convex tv.


** Panel discussions:

Panel 1. "MEDIA ART: METHODS OF PRODUCTION, DISTRIBUTION AND EXHIBITION"
Date: Monday, 15 of February Hours: 7 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Director-Moderator:
Carlota Álvarez-Basso. [Head of the Department of Audiovisual Artworks at
the Reina Sofía National Art Centre, Madrid] Panelists: Gregor Muir
[Director Lux Centre, Independent Curator and Art Critic, London] • Hans
Ulrich Obrist [Independent Curator, Curator Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville
de Paris and Advisor of several artistic institutions in Switzerland and
Germany] •  Valentina Valentini [University Professor, Independent Curator,
Director Author Video Festival of Taormina and Editor of several books on
media art] • Stephen Vitiello [Director of Distribution Electronic Art
Intermix, New York]

Panel 2. "NEW-MEDIA.ART: NEW FORMS OF PRODUCTION, DIFFUSION AND RECEPTION
OF ARTISTIC PRACTICES" Date: Tuesday, 16 of February Hours: 7 p.m. to 8:30
p.m. Director-Moderator: José Luis Brea [Contemporary Art Theory Professor,
Universidad de Castilla-La Mancha; Editor in Chief Aleph website]
Participants: Jordan Crandall [Artist, Director X-Art Foundation and Blast,
New York] • Alex Galloway [Editor Rhizome, Co-organizer Digital/Studies;
Durham, North Carolina, USA] • Geert Lovink [Specialist Critic in Theory of
the New Media. Member of "Adilkno" -Foundation for the Advance of the
Ilegal Knowledge and participant in the Digital City of Amsterdam Project]



** credits:

[ organized for arcoelectrónico99 ]
[ hosted by aleph ]
[ curator: josé luis brea ]
[ webmaster: luis fernández ]
[ arcoelectrónico coordination: amaya de miguel ]
[ translations: delories dunn / dena ellen cowan / carolina díaz ]

http://aleph-arts.org/epm/eng



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