BIO
Curt Cloninger is an artist, writer, and Associate Professor of New Media at the University of North Carolina Asheville. His art undermines language as a system of meaning in order to reveal it as an embodied force in the world. His art work has been featured in the New York Times and at festivals and galleries from Korea to Brazil. Exhibition venues include Centre Georges Pompidou (Paris), Granoff Center for The Creative Arts (Brown University), Digital Art Museum [DAM] (Berlin), Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art (Chicago), Black Mountain College Museum + Arts Center, and the internet. He is the recipient of several grants and awards, including commissions for the creation of new artwork from the National Endowment for the Arts (via Turbulence.org) and Austin Peay State University's Terminal Award.
Cloninger has written on a wide range of topics, including new media and internet art, installation and performance art, experimental graphic design, popular music, network culture, and continental philosophy. His articles have appeared in Intelligent Agent, Mute, Paste, Tekka, Rhizome Digest, A List Apart, and on ABC World News. He is also the author of eight books, most recently One Per Year (Link Editions). He maintains lab404.com, playdamage.org , and deepyoung.org in hopes of facilitating a more lively remote dialogue with the Sundry Contagions of Wonder.
Cloninger has written on a wide range of topics, including new media and internet art, installation and performance art, experimental graphic design, popular music, network culture, and continental philosophy. His articles have appeared in Intelligent Agent, Mute, Paste, Tekka, Rhizome Digest, A List Apart, and on ABC World News. He is also the author of eight books, most recently One Per Year (Link Editions). He maintains lab404.com, playdamage.org , and deepyoung.org in hopes of facilitating a more lively remote dialogue with the Sundry Contagions of Wonder.
Re: Re: Re: Commission Voting: Finalist Ranking
Hi Jim,
Reduction necessarily involves oversimplification. Having said that, here goes. Of the 27 --
tactical media about maps and travel:
5
physical/virtual body translation:
5
diaritic, exhibitionistic text-based work:
4
new media recontextualizations of old media art forms:
4
collaborative audio and video:
3
text to motion interpretation:
3
network protocol (email, bit torrent) visualization:
2
http://www.learningtoloveyoumore.com 2.0:
1
++++++
No pretty web visuals like http://oculart.com
No funky reactive softwares like http://www.re-move.org
No absurd non-linear narratives like http://www.superbad.com
What would the "project description" of superbad be? "It's this place that links kind of like a labyrinth and there's a story about bees and turkey necks and Captain America and... nevermind." What would the "project description" of oculart be? "It feels kind of like Lautrec on absinthe-soaked mushrooms and... nevermind."
The structure of the call for proposals acts as a major filter, which is unavoidable and perhaps desirable. I'm just foregrounding the kind of work that gets filtered.
best,
curt
Jim Andrews wrote:
> I'm curious about what sort of art gets voted for.
>
> I haven't gone through the finalist list yet. Plan to, though, over
> the next
> few days.
>
> Has anybody done so and have any pithy obs on the type of things that
> got
> voted for?
>
> One may ask quite validly, as Marc has, what voting does for a
> community,
> but I confess I am less interested in community than I am in art, am
> more
> interested in what voting supports as art.
>
> ja
> http://vispo.com
>
>
>
Reduction necessarily involves oversimplification. Having said that, here goes. Of the 27 --
tactical media about maps and travel:
5
physical/virtual body translation:
5
diaritic, exhibitionistic text-based work:
4
new media recontextualizations of old media art forms:
4
collaborative audio and video:
3
text to motion interpretation:
3
network protocol (email, bit torrent) visualization:
2
http://www.learningtoloveyoumore.com 2.0:
1
++++++
No pretty web visuals like http://oculart.com
No funky reactive softwares like http://www.re-move.org
No absurd non-linear narratives like http://www.superbad.com
What would the "project description" of superbad be? "It's this place that links kind of like a labyrinth and there's a story about bees and turkey necks and Captain America and... nevermind." What would the "project description" of oculart be? "It feels kind of like Lautrec on absinthe-soaked mushrooms and... nevermind."
The structure of the call for proposals acts as a major filter, which is unavoidable and perhaps desirable. I'm just foregrounding the kind of work that gets filtered.
best,
curt
Jim Andrews wrote:
> I'm curious about what sort of art gets voted for.
>
> I haven't gone through the finalist list yet. Plan to, though, over
> the next
> few days.
>
> Has anybody done so and have any pithy obs on the type of things that
> got
> voted for?
>
> One may ask quite validly, as Marc has, what voting does for a
> community,
> but I confess I am less interested in community than I am in art, am
> more
> interested in what voting supports as art.
>
> ja
> http://vispo.com
>
>
>
Re: Re: Commissions & judging -
Eric Dymond wrote:
> I know of a retirement package in the Keys, great weather, margaritas
> and Steely Dan playing in the background.
Don't be dissing the Dan:
http://www.pifmagazine.com/vol35/m_clon.php3
> I know of a retirement package in the Keys, great weather, margaritas
> and Steely Dan playing in the background.
Don't be dissing the Dan:
http://www.pifmagazine.com/vol35/m_clon.php3
Re: Re: Commissions
ryan griffis wrote:
> but there are work samples required for these proposals, right? i
> thought there was anyway... up to 5 or something if i remember
> correctly. are people just not looking at them? if someone doesn't
> include work samples, that says something in and of itself.
> i guess this is why i'm confused about this line of critique... i
> don't see how the work samples are disadvantaged here.
> or are we talking about a hypothetical situation?
samples aren't required, but encouraged. And yes, I gather that few people are looking at them (or the full project descriptions, or any more than 15/190 projects). But who really knows.
> i thought it was driftwood and a buck knife :)
that's folk art.
> but there are work samples required for these proposals, right? i
> thought there was anyway... up to 5 or something if i remember
> correctly. are people just not looking at them? if someone doesn't
> include work samples, that says something in and of itself.
> i guess this is why i'm confused about this line of critique... i
> don't see how the work samples are disadvantaged here.
> or are we talking about a hypothetical situation?
samples aren't required, but encouraged. And yes, I gather that few people are looking at them (or the full project descriptions, or any more than 15/190 projects). But who really knows.
> i thought it was driftwood and a buck knife :)
that's folk art.
Re: Re: Commissions
ryan griffis wrote:
> i'm also wary of the "the art world favors conceptual artists who use
> critical theory" complaint.
Not the entire art world. And not grant programs (most of them) where previous work samples are required and integral. Just a granting scheme where you get a thumbs up or thumbs down based on a paragraph. And not "conceptual artists who use critical theory." Just "conceptual art projects."
> if you want to make work that functions in the "market" (i.e. "attention
> economy") well, you shouldn't need grants for that. Your work is either
> "successful" or it's not, based on its sheer ability to grab people, or
> not.
True dat. And to make outsider art, all you need are some broken shards of glass and/or some rusty bicycle parts.
> i'm also wary of the "the art world favors conceptual artists who use
> critical theory" complaint.
Not the entire art world. And not grant programs (most of them) where previous work samples are required and integral. Just a granting scheme where you get a thumbs up or thumbs down based on a paragraph. And not "conceptual artists who use critical theory." Just "conceptual art projects."
> if you want to make work that functions in the "market" (i.e. "attention
> economy") well, you shouldn't need grants for that. Your work is either
> "successful" or it's not, based on its sheer ability to grab people, or
> not.
True dat. And to make outsider art, all you need are some broken shards of glass and/or some rusty bicycle parts.
Re: Re: Re: Commissions
According to my referrer logs, as of today my project proposal has been visited from rhizome 14 times (and two of those times were by me).
During the voting, we are encouraged not to discuss our own projects on RAW (lest we inordiately pimp them); yet we are encouraged to write a zingy proposal that formally pimps them. Use your para-art rheteorical skills to acquire grant money, but only within the rules of the game.
Why are my para-art grant writing rhetorical skills somehow more ethically democratic than my para-art guerilla network marketing skills? It is net art after all. If it's not going to be a normal art world grant process with closed panels and judges and all that, why the inordinate emphasis on the standard grant writing process and the admonition to avoid self-pimping on the network?
For graphic design contests, you can imagine the self-pimping that goes on. A typical post at a graphic design community site or blog might read, "yo. we just got nominated for SXSW best of _ award. go check it out. we're trying to get as many votes as we can. you can vote once per day, so let your voice be heard!" where "go check it out" links to the SXSW online ballot.
There is a "professional" art ethic that says if I really believe in my art, I will pimp it as much as possible and play the game and anyone unwilling to do this is a naive, amateur artist. Then there is a "purist/hobbyist" art ethic that says I'm going to make the art anyway, and sure, I'd like the grant money, but I certainly don't want to trick them into giving it to me. net art has been an arena in which it's not automatically assumed that the "professional" way is the "right" way (for a while there, it was assumed that the "professional" way was the "wrong" way). cf: http://www.easylife.org/netart/catalogue.html and http://www.intelligentagent.com/archive/Vol3_No1_curation_schleiner.html
I find myself mostly agreeing with Michael S. There seems to be a kind of semantic cognitive bias in operation regarding grants and the type of artwork they favor. (The same may be said of contemporary critical theory and the kind of artwork it favors.) If the artwork is highly intuitive, visceral, and doesen't subscribe to a delineatable process, it's much less likely to get funded. Investors (art grant-awarding agencies are investors) want a guaranteed return on their investment. So the projects most likely to get funded are the projects that are most readily reducible to semantic product descriptions. If the award is primarily based on the grant proposal (as opposed to previous work), conceptual artists stand a much better chance of getting funded than abstract expressionists. Thus the "professional" visual arts get increasingly rhetorical and decreasingly visceral. The gallery system works differently (and has its own built in cognitive biases), but few "professional" net artists are operating within the gallery system. "Professional" net artists do the grant thing (and keep their day jobs).
(Incidentally, a similar kind of cognitive media bias operates with television news. You can film an explosion but you can't film a spiritual conversion. So TV news inordinately focuses on destructive materiality -- bad news is good news, so to speak.)
Michael S. raises a valid quetion -- as artists, can we see past these inherent cognitive biases to structure a truly egalitarian granting system that minimizes these biases? There is more to open democracy than giving everyone a vote. How have you structured the logistics of the voting process? What are you giving them to vote on?
curt
peet skeletone wrote:
> i'm not at liberty to discuss any particular projects (neb demmit)
> but i wish there was more from people who are clicking the links
> letting us know some of the gems hidden within the masses of text
>
> sure, with 191 entries the process could be truncated...
> but there's a job to do now !
During the voting, we are encouraged not to discuss our own projects on RAW (lest we inordiately pimp them); yet we are encouraged to write a zingy proposal that formally pimps them. Use your para-art rheteorical skills to acquire grant money, but only within the rules of the game.
Why are my para-art grant writing rhetorical skills somehow more ethically democratic than my para-art guerilla network marketing skills? It is net art after all. If it's not going to be a normal art world grant process with closed panels and judges and all that, why the inordinate emphasis on the standard grant writing process and the admonition to avoid self-pimping on the network?
For graphic design contests, you can imagine the self-pimping that goes on. A typical post at a graphic design community site or blog might read, "yo. we just got nominated for SXSW best of _ award. go check it out. we're trying to get as many votes as we can. you can vote once per day, so let your voice be heard!" where "go check it out" links to the SXSW online ballot.
There is a "professional" art ethic that says if I really believe in my art, I will pimp it as much as possible and play the game and anyone unwilling to do this is a naive, amateur artist. Then there is a "purist/hobbyist" art ethic that says I'm going to make the art anyway, and sure, I'd like the grant money, but I certainly don't want to trick them into giving it to me. net art has been an arena in which it's not automatically assumed that the "professional" way is the "right" way (for a while there, it was assumed that the "professional" way was the "wrong" way). cf: http://www.easylife.org/netart/catalogue.html and http://www.intelligentagent.com/archive/Vol3_No1_curation_schleiner.html
I find myself mostly agreeing with Michael S. There seems to be a kind of semantic cognitive bias in operation regarding grants and the type of artwork they favor. (The same may be said of contemporary critical theory and the kind of artwork it favors.) If the artwork is highly intuitive, visceral, and doesen't subscribe to a delineatable process, it's much less likely to get funded. Investors (art grant-awarding agencies are investors) want a guaranteed return on their investment. So the projects most likely to get funded are the projects that are most readily reducible to semantic product descriptions. If the award is primarily based on the grant proposal (as opposed to previous work), conceptual artists stand a much better chance of getting funded than abstract expressionists. Thus the "professional" visual arts get increasingly rhetorical and decreasingly visceral. The gallery system works differently (and has its own built in cognitive biases), but few "professional" net artists are operating within the gallery system. "Professional" net artists do the grant thing (and keep their day jobs).
(Incidentally, a similar kind of cognitive media bias operates with television news. You can film an explosion but you can't film a spiritual conversion. So TV news inordinately focuses on destructive materiality -- bad news is good news, so to speak.)
Michael S. raises a valid quetion -- as artists, can we see past these inherent cognitive biases to structure a truly egalitarian granting system that minimizes these biases? There is more to open democracy than giving everyone a vote. How have you structured the logistics of the voting process? What are you giving them to vote on?
curt
peet skeletone wrote:
> i'm not at liberty to discuss any particular projects (neb demmit)
> but i wish there was more from people who are clicking the links
> letting us know some of the gems hidden within the masses of text
>
> sure, with 191 entries the process could be truncated...
> but there's a job to do now !