[Eva and Franco Mattes aka 0100101110101101.ORG Reenactment of Valie Export and Peter Weibel's Tapp und Tastkino, (2007)] From Plaintext Players to Avatar Actors: A Short Survey of Online Gaming Performance by Mathias Jansson:

Performance art emerged in the mid-1960s into the 1970s and was a way to push the boundaries between art and everyday life. Many artists saw performance as an opportunity to bring art directly to the audience without having to detour through the galleries, curators or agents. Performance therefore often occurs outside the institutions on streets, squares or other public places. It was defined as an antithesis to theatre and the ideal was to “create an ephemeral and authentic experience for performer and audience in an event that could not be repeated, captured or purchased.”(1) Famous performance artists from this time are Yoko Ono, Joseph Beuys, Vito Acconci, Chris Burden and Marina Abramović. Continue reading

You are invited to apply for a place in the 2012 Session of the Johannesburg Workshop in Theory and Criticism (University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa). The 2012 Session, Futures of Nature, is part of a drive within the humanities to reframe the disciplines and critical theory in light of the environmental emergency that is said to endanger most species on the planet, including our own.

We will reflect on some of the major challenges relating to the contemporary conditions and the long-term sustainability of life on Earth. Ours is an age characterized by the indelible imprint of human activity on the Earth’s climate, its geology and its conditions – a process which may lead to the planet’s becoming inhospitable to human life. It is also an era that blurs the distinction between human history and culture and the Earth’s natural history and material composition. Continue reading

Exhibition: Isidore Isou: Hypergraphic Novels, 1950–1984; curated by Frédéric Acquaviva :: until April 13, 2012 :: Book Release: April 12 :: The Romanian Cultural Institute of Stockholm, Skeppsbron 20, Stockholm, Sweden.

Lorsqu’on rompt, on n’a pas de public, on forme un public future.
(When you break away, you don’t have an audience, you are creating a future audience.)
– Isidore Isou, Les Journaux des Dieux (1950, “The Gods’ Diaries”)

The Romanian Cultural Institute of Stockholm is proud to present an exhibition and an accompanying catalogue focusing on one unique but essential aspect of Isidore Isou’s work: his innovative and ultra-contemporary contribution to the novel, especially what he called the hypergraphic novel. Continue reading

The ARPANET Dialogues Vol. IV: ARPANET Test, April 1976, with Jim Henson, Ayn Rand, Sidney Nolan & Yoko Ono.

17 April 1976: The transcript presented here records a conversation between four figures from the broad spectrum of culture: puppeteer Jim Henson; Russian-American writer, philosopher and playwright Ayn Rand; painter Sidney Nolan; and artist and musician Yoko Ono. A few months after the fall of Saigon and the end of the Vietnam War, The Agency’s tests with the ARPANET convened these four individuals, each with a distinct sense of, as well as the potential means for, a competing world-view. Continue reading

Moments. A History of Performance in 10 Acts :: March 8 - April 29, 2012 :: Opening: March 17; 4:00 pm :: ZKM | Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe, Lorenzstrasse 19, 76135 Karlsruhe, Germany. Continue reading

Performance Series at Dia:Beacon — Yvonne Rainer :: February 25-26, 2012; 12:00 pm and 2:00 pm + May 13; 1:00 pm and 3:00 pm :: Dia:Beacon, 3 Beekman Street, Beacon, NY. Continue reading

[Image by boredomresearch. Courtesy of [DAM]Berlin/Cologne.] Intuition and Ingenuity :: February 17–26, 2012 :: Opening Reception: February 16; 7:00 - 9:00 pm :: Artists’ Talk: February 21; 7:00 pm :: Lighthouse, 28 Kensington Street, Brighton, BN1 4AJ. Continue reading

The Aspen Movie Map Beat Google Street View by 28 Years by Derek Mead, Mother Board: Continue reading

On nettime olia lialina wrote: Dear nettimers,

I thought I should post the intro to my Still There research here. There must be still people on the list who remember what I remember, or remember it differently.

In September 1996, I came to Rotterdam to participate in the Dutch Electronic Art Festival – not as an artist yet but as a film curator, or, to say it better, as a film curator from Moscow who made a website for a film club. For many people, the mid-90s were all about going online, making websites, travelling to the East and to the West.[1]

It was my very first media art event. Continue reading

[Sculptor Abdulrahman Katanani is one example of the fact that Arab artists are 'already among us' (Al Jazeera)] On nettime, Prem Chandavarkar wrote:

These are some speculations that have been bouncing around in my head for some time, particularly with reference to architecture — the discipline I practice — but perhaps having wider implications: Ever since the early stages of the modernist movement (since the second half of the 19th century) artistic innovation has been underpinned by the idea of the avant-garde.

The avant-garde are (to use a term from Thomas Kuhn) paradigm shifters. Their work consists of two facets that operate simultaneously. One is a deep critique of current paradigms of cultural production. And the other is production of artistic work that demonstrates a new paradigm and a new set of possibilities. Continue reading