curt cloninger
Since the beginning
Works in Canton, North Carolina United States of America

ARTBASE (7)
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.
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DISCUSSION

Wikipedia Art


Hi MDC,

Point well taken, although de Certeau hardly fits into the category of "Derrida et al" (you're stereotyping your philosophers like I'm stereotyping my Wikipedia editors).

Not that the artists of this piece are necessarily referencing either philosopher. I agree that if the project was meant to preach to wikipedia editors, then it comes across as preachy.

I don't speak for the artists, or Patrick Lichty, or "Rhizome," or academics, or the avant-garde, or "new media artists," or people who are almost 40, or people who have never lived in New York City. In this particular instance, I am personally interested in the way that online consensus (particularly at Rhizome, nettime, iDC, and artfagcity) is being used to evaluate the success or failure of a piece intended (however hamfistedly) to explore the topic of online concensus.

Best,
Curt

DISCUSSION

Wikipedia Art


Hi Tom,

I just re-read your post and noticed that you *don't* doubt my condecension skillz. I feel like such an idiot! The whole time you were actually giving me props for my skillz!

I hope we can still be friends.

Sincerely,
Curt

DISCUSSION

Wikipedia Art


Hi Tom,

First off, you abuse me with your language when you doubt whether I am capable of being even more condescending. It really hurts my feelings. Not only that, but it's condescending. The truth is, I am capable of being much more condescending. I only pray that this paragraph has increased (even if ever so slightly) your respect of my condescension skillz.

The strange thing is, I'm mostly agreeing with you about this particular piece. I don't think it is terribly successful on its own terms. It came out of the gates claiming (in tone) more than it was able to achieve. And in fact, much of the dialogue here and on nettime and iDC has been critical of the piece for exactly those reasons.

I do think it is a bogey and "the soul" of utilitarianism to make an ethical issue out of the poor Wikipedian's longsuffering.

For more on the funky inner-workings of Wikipedia, check:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/12/06/wikipedia_and_overstock/

Best,
Curt

DISCUSSION

Wikipedia Art


There you go again."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wi9y5-Vo61w

Come on Tom. I've got kid gloves on. If you can accuse Patrick of "ginning up... mock outrage and pseudo-discourse," then I can point out the inherent conundrum that one's "intellect" is always required to assess the relative merit of pejoratively dismissed "intellectual" dialogue.

In basketball, when you don't have a referee, you call your own fouls (you say when someone else has fouled you). It's a matter of working out some kind of fun balance. If you cry foul at every instance of legitimate/lively contact, then the level of play is always safe but tends to be boring. On the other hand...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0lbdPKl8hg