System ID:
22
Title:
Art in the Information Age: Cybernetics, Software, Telematics, and the Conceptual Contributions of Art and Technology to Art History and Aesthetic Theory
Author:
Edward Allen Shanken
Author 2:
Author 3:
Degree:
Ph.D.
Year:
2001
Pages:
327
University:
Duke University
Supervisor:
Hans Van Miegroet, WJT Mitchell
Semail:
Supervisor 2:
Language:
English
Dept:
Art History
Copyright:
Edward A. Shanken
Lang_author:
French, German, Spanish
Url:
Email:
shanken@artexetra.com
Keywords:
art, technology, software, information, conceptual, burnham, ascott, telematics, cybernetics, language, systems theory, information theory, robotics, telerobotics, kac
Abstract:
This dissertation argues that the artistic use of technology demands
greater recognition. Scholarship on twentieth century art generally has
ignored or disparaged the artistic current otherwise known as Art and
Technology. Art History has failed to recognize and incorporate into its
canons the rich historical and theoretical underpinnings of this
tendency. This oversight is especially conspicuous in the literatures
inability to grasp how the sciences and technologies particular to the
Information Age have shaped the formal and conceptual development of
art since 1945. The research presented here employs a synthetic method
drawing on diverse disciplines, archival research, correspondence, and
personal interviews. The work of British artist Roy Ascott and American
art critic Jack Burnham furnish central practical and theoretical
frameworks and are discussed in detail. Their contributions support the
dissertations thesis that the cultural manifestations of the late
twentieth century can be better understood by closely analyzing the
scientific and technological developments that have played a central
role in shaping society. This study does not privilege science and
technology as the engines of discovery that drive subsequent cultural
developments, but demonstrates how artists have integrated art with
science and technology in a praxis that interrogates key aspects of
western epistemology and aesthetics. The dissertation examines how
this praxis seeks to challenge conventional models of communication,
such as aesthetic exchanges in which an authorial message is embedded
in an object by an artist and decoded by an audience. By contrast, many
works of Art and Technology (and artists theories about them)
explicitly propose that richer forms of meaning can arise from a
multi-directional flow of information in discursive networks. Such
works stress the processes of artistic creation and audience
participation. They emphasize the dematerialized forms of ideation and
collaboration rather than the materiality of concrete art objects. The
dissertation problematizes these aesthetic theories, but maintains that
artistic meaning in the Information Age is not embedded in objects or
individuals so much as it is abstracted in the collective production,
manipulation, and distribution of information.
Last update:
Oct 13 2004
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