Rob Myers
Since 2003
Works in United States of America

ARTBASE (3)
PORTFOLIO (2)
BIO
Rob Myers is an artist and hacker based in the UK.

I have been creating images of the contemporary social and cultural environment through programming, design software and visual remixing since the early 1990s. My work is influenced by popular culture and high art in equal measures. My interest in remixing and sampling has led to my involvement in the Free Culture movement. I have been involved in the public consultation regarding the Creative Commons 2.0 and CC-UK licenses. All my visual art is available under a Creative Commons license.

My interest in programming has led to my involvement with the Free Software movement. I developed the Macintosh version of the Gwydion Dylan programming language compiler. All my software is available under the GNU GPL.
Discussions (509) Opportunities (1) Events (0) Jobs (0)
DISCUSSION

Re: Beyond "Upper" Art


On Tuesday, April 13, 2004, at 08:43AM, <geert@nznl.com> wrote:

>Quoting Dyske Suematsu <dyske@dyske.com>:
>
>> The vast majority of artists comes from the middle class. As they become
>> successful, they often cross over the lines of social classes. A natural way
>> to look at this phenomenon is that with money comes the taste associated with
>> it, but, in some cases, it is also possible to see it the other way around;
>> they became successful because they acquired the taste of the upper class. In
>> order to show what I mean by this, I will take Fine Arts and analyze the
>> class dynamics within it.

(One source of inspiration may be that) Jeff Koons did this with his basketball work. His argument was that white middle-class kids used art for social advancement the same way black lower-class kids used basketball. In this he's like Gilbert & George: "form" is "social form".

"Exploit yourself" can be seen as a call to Open your work. :-)

>Actually, looking in at the art world from the (IT) business world as I do, I'm
>often surprised at how little is charged for a work of art. Considering the
>often time-consuming production process, the intensive deliberations before and
>after selling a work etc. And looking in from the art world to the business
>world, I'm very often more than surprised at the ease with which thousands of
>dollars are shelled out for what I consider to be no more than electronic wall
>decoration.

Heh. I have to agree. But art is no more rational than business: look at much Open Source software costs and how over-budget some projects go ...

- Rob.

DISCUSSION

Re: Re: Paradox of Political Art


On 8 Apr 2004, at 20:27, ryan griffis wrote:

>> Political art as a conceptual art movement was born in the late 60's,
>> and continued on strongly into the 90's.
>
> seriously??? this statement lacks any kind of historical engagement,

Notice the "as a conceptual art movement", but I still don't see how
this helps, as politically engaged art in any sort of modern sense goes
back at least to the French Revolution.

> and even overlooks examples from the 20th century,

Wow, yes. All that Russian revolutionary and German post-WWI and
anti-nazi art and then all the Socialist Realism and Nazi stuff that
followed.

> the most obvious North American examples being the social realists and
> muralists that were active from the 20s-40s. Adorno's critique of
> politically engaged art was self-consciously political, and in
> response to the neo-classical program of socialist realism used by the
> Nazis. The autonomy of art was a necessary condition for art to truly
> be political (as opposed to Political) and emancipatory.

I like Adorno. See the big rant against him by a poster on Amazon
(Aesthetic Theory), though.

>> political criticism. Artists cannot be exempted from the suspicion of
>> having impure motives. If artists are not required to prove the
>> integrity of their motives, why should anyone else be? If we were to
>> speculate hidden motives of government institutions and private
>> corporations, it is only fair that we also speculate the hidden
>> motives of the artists who criticize them.
>
> and this is a problem? what world are you imagining that motives would
> become unimportant if we just knew that they were pure? are people
> against the war in Iraq only validated if the Bush Administration is
> cynical in its motives? the arguments against the war are not merely
> reactionary and dependent on the "purity" of the Administration's
> motives. likewise, art criticism - whether about Politics or not - is
> not about intent (if it's of any consequence at least), but is always
> about politics (little p), context, and ideology (including
> aesthetics). just read Greenberg - his aesthetics were most certainly
> tied to an ideological program based on moral (secular) convictions.

During periods of consolidation, politics tends to be presented as the
business of the other side.

Self-criticism is the most important criticism.

Anyone who hasn't read Adorno on commitment should do so as soon as
possible. :-)

- Rob.

DISCUSSION

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Internet Art Survives, But the Boom Is Over -NY times


On Monday, April 05, 2004, at 11:17AM, Tim Portlock <timportlock@yahoo.com> wrote:

>This issue is particularly compelling as every university art program in the US is rushing to create a digital art major.

Digital Art is not the same as net art. When I was at Middlesex in the mid-1990s we used to do "Interactive Multimedia"* and before that they did computer graphics or computer animation. I think what I currently do would be considered application programming or AI. It's still digital art, I've only ever done a couple of pieces that even run on the net.

Net art's collapse will get a few players some more publicity, but it's as irrelevent to the future of digital art as Neo Geo's market collapsing was to the future of painting. Digital Art can be taught independent of any current fads: aesthetics and programming are two vital skills for the twenty-first century and they deserve to be taught together.

- Rob.

* - Actually we did "Digital Art", but people used to look at you funny if you told them that.

DISCUSSION

Re: Re: Re: Re: Internet Art Survives, But the Boom Is Over -NY times


Digital art needs to be bitfast*. Choosing a well-documented,
easily-reimplemented format (like Lisp for programs, a subset of
PostScript for images, and a raw audio or video format) is a good bet
for archive quality work. Publish the work as a literate program and
it's documented and not even on digital media, although how interesting
that would be for sound I don't know. :-)

- Rob.

* - Like lightfast, only against bit-rot.

On 4 Apr 2004, at 21:16, joseph mcelroy wrote:

> oh. give me a break. do you think there are no conscious decisions to
> preserve paper, brick, and walls? If we assume the continued
> progression of our civilization, then there is nothing to preclude the
> long term preservation of digital media by interested parties.
>
> on the other hand, how successors to our civilization might decide to
> preserve our digital residue, i cannot fathom at this time.
>
> joseph
>
> lee wells wrote:
>
>> I would say that digital computer dependent artwork will die. Will
>> become dead-tech.
>> Newer operating systems will not be able to view or play the media.
>> In
>> the next couple years it will be had to find a VHS player to view the
>> tapes that were made 5 years ago.
>> Painting if done correctly will last for 100's, perhaps thousands of
>> years.
>>
>> All art is dependent upon the stability of its medium and the
>> expertise
>> of its creator.
>>
>> Cheers,
>> Lee
>> On Saturday, April 3, 2004, at 07:05 PM, Tim Portlock wrote:
>>
>>> But what does it mean and how is it decided for this artform to be
>>> dead? Like painting was "dead"? not moving units? conceptually
>> boring
>>> and exhausted? not getting to the next level at the institutional
>>> level? I realise the Walker ratcheting down on digital art means
>>> someone has made a decisioin that this type of work is not the way
>> to
>>> go but what was the sign? Being that I dont live in New York I am
>> not
>>> privy to the secret doubts that have been whispered about. And I
>> find
>>> this ironic since a lot of my digital artist freinds held painting
>> up
>>> as a dead artform only for the situation to now suddenly be
>> officially
>>> declared the reverse.
>>> +
>>> -> post: list@rhizome.org
>>> -> questions: info@rhizome.org
>>> -> subscribe/unsubscribe:
>> http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
>>> -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
>>> -> visit: on Fridays the Rhizome.org web site is open to non-members
>>> +
>>> Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
>>> Membership Agreement available online at
>> http://rhizome.org/info/29.php
>>>
>>>
>> _________
>>
>> Lee A Wells
>> mobile: 917 723 2524
>> studio: 718 349 7951
>>
>> lee@leewells.org
>> http://www.leewells.org
>>
> +
> -> post: list@rhizome.org
> -> questions: info@rhizome.org
> -> subscribe/unsubscribe: http://rhizome.org/preferences/subscribe.rhiz
> -> give: http://rhizome.org/support
> -> visit: on Fridays the Rhizome.org web site is open to non-members
> +
> Subscribers to Rhizome are subject to the terms set out in the
> Membership Agreement available online at http://rhizome.org/info/29.php

DISCUSSION

Re: hot new topics?


On 1 Apr 2004, at 11:34, Kate Southworth wrote:

> I think the space between owning the processes of commodification and
> critiquing the very same processes of commodification is possibly a
> useful space to be right now.

As long as that critique takes the form of action rather than bad art
or (God help us) cultural studies seminars.

Art (and design) should be in the service of (or the exemplification
of) Free (Open/Commons/Gift) Culture. Really producing an alternative
rather than just complaining about the lack of one. Helping make those
ideas accessible, embodying them, singing their praises. The Internet
is already the primary forum for that culture, "Net"-art can feed
straight into it without visiting Eeyore on the way.

http://www.greglondon.com/dtgd/
http://www.creativecommons.org/
http://www.free-culture.org/

- Rob.