Ian Vu

VSAR 405
12/11/14
New Media Final Paper
Since the beginning of time art has existed as a form of entertainment or profession in
order to create a form of harmony, balance and rhythm. This may be either to show a sense of
mystery, express ones imagination or even performed for ceremonial uses. No matter the case,
technology is the main influence on how art develops over time and the way artist choose to use
new advancing technology has changed rapidly over the last century. For example, many kinds
of art is based on data from surveys, patterns in reports and innovative techniques to draw public
attention.
In the case of using data from surveys. The art from Vitaly Komar and Alex Melamid
produced as created using data from surveys with generic questions such as: Favorite color?
Second favorite color? Prefer modern or traditional art? The list of questions goes on and on,
but from this data, these artists can see how trends differ between country to country. Based on
the results, they produced paintings for each country, consisting of what was chosen to be the
most wanted painting and the least wanted painting (Hutton Komar and Melamid). The same
process was also performed on producing the most and least wanted music. Trends that were
observed included for the most wanted category: shorter length songs of about 5 minutes,
moderate volume, tempo, pitch, multiple instruments and rock style sung by adults. On the other
hand, the least wanted music included: really long songs, fluctuating volumes, tempos, pitches,
styles such as opera and rap sung by children. Surveying information, whether on paper or using

the internet is one way to gather information for art. The internet is complicated and a growing
trend still difficult to grasp, but it allows for a wide variety of sources to the unimaginable
(Bauerlein, pg 28).
Another form of art that was created using the internet was the video art produced by
Natalie Bookchin called Mass Ornament. In this video, the artist gathered a large collection of
videos of people dancing in front of their webcams. The videos were then shown within her
actual video but at a reduced size. This way the collected videos could be shown side by side.
Since all the videos gathered were on the same topic, specific moves were then edited together
and placed side by side in order to produce a fluid dance performance. Natalies logic for this
synchronized dance which illustrated essentially a chorus line was done using the concept of
Fordism. She uses the comparison: Just as rows of spectators one sat in theaters watching rows
of bodies moving in formation, today millions watch and move in formation in front of our
screen (Hutton Natalie Bookchin).

These are a few ways that artists have adapted to using new technology. Artists are not
the only ones who can be involved in an art work. For example, in the Johnny cash project, an
interactive website that allows people from all over the world to participate in drawing a portrait
of Johnny Cash, can have their drawing integrated into the video. Each portrait becomes a single
frame within the music video sung by Johnny Cash. Everyone participating is essentially an artist
contributing to a larger cause. As stated by Lovejoy, Art can be seen as pure information. In this
case, the video of art is telling a life story of a famous and inspirational musician (Lovejoy, pg
74). This art also has a long ever changing life as well, because with each new piece of
information, the story and interpretation changes. Just as pictures can contribute to art, so can
photos as well. Random photos can be turned into a collage that turns out to be a masterpiece in
the eyes of the beholder.
These are all forms of art in which artist use to create works of art. As mentioned earlier,
these techniques are only possible because of technology. The inventions of the camera,
computer and printing press allowed mass media to skyrocket and develop into the super
machines we have today. The computer gave rise to the internet in which people use to
communicate and globalize information. This can be done using many of the social networking
sites such as Facebook, Instagram, Flickr, Google+, Twitter and many others. All of the
previously discussed artists use the internet to display and gather information for their art. One of
the most impressive types of art shown was how data on flight patterns was transformed into
moving art showing lights of the plane moving in real time across the world and colors based on
how active areas are during certain times. Using technology this way allows for an interesting
and entertaining perspective of what most of the public would have viewed as boring. This is the
reason art has transformed into the way it is today. Using technology and innovative techniques

are used to draw the attention of the public and entertain them. Whether someone is on the
opposite side of the world, makes no difference with the internet culture. If something is on the
internet, anybody can pretty much view it.
These artworks glorify the widespread use of technology because even just accessing the
art requires some kind of electronic device to view it on the internet. However, in the case of
whether there is a shift in media control. The amount of control on found material that artist use
is shifting toward a more personal control rather than corporate. That is, the material or
information that artist are using is already public forms of material in which they turn into art
that is then inputted back into the internet as art. Artist are doing this to create their own identity.
This could be either their personal identity or their electronic one (Hutton, The Virtual Body). It
becomes hard to differentiate where the line splits between the two identities but social networks,
the things are people post become who they are and what they are judged by. People worry about
their identities because of how the new consciousness show them (Lovejoy, pg 79.
An extreme case of building an identity is the case of Eva and Franco Mattes. These two
artists roam to different museums and galleries stealing pieces of art being displayed. They show
both the before and after picture of the work as proof that they took a certain piece. They stole art
for two years and build an identity on the foundation of deviousness. Their newer works still
include this concept but with electronic uses. Since technology changes who do the methods. Eva
and Franco, like the rest of the work live in the digital age and have adapted. Another example, is
their newer works such as the photo gallery, which they claimed to have stolen over 10,000
photos from personal computers. Although most people would find what they do is frowned
upon, others find it entertaining. The main goals of an artist is self-satisfaction and entertaining
others while building an identity using technology is the only way to do it now.

Work Cited
Bauerlein, Mark. The Digital Divide. New York: Penguin Group, 2011. 26-43.
Hutton, Lisa. Invention of Cinema to Invention of the Desktop in New Media Uses of
Technology for Art Rice of Pictorial World, Muybridge, Lumiere, Vertov, Natalie
Bookchin. CSUSM. San Marcos. .Lecture
Hutton, Lisa. The Virtual Body. Artist in Cyberspace. What is Cyborg. Web. 10 Dec. 2014
http://lisahutton.net/reading/THEVIRTUALBODY.pdf
Hutton, Lisa. Using Data to Make Art Komar and Melamid Create Paintings Based on Survey
Results, audience participation, collecting and rearranging data, curating data, repurposing digital objects. CSUSM. San Marcos. .Lecture
Lovejoy, Margot. Digital Currents: Art in the Electronic Age. Routledge Press, 2004. 62-90.
Web. 23 Oct. 2014.http://lisahutton.net/reading/TheElectronicEraAndPostmodernism.pdf
Manovich, Lev. How Media Became New, 1-8. Web. 10 Dec. 2014.
http://lisahutton.net/reading/new_media_users_guide.pdf
Vertov, Dziga. Prologue: Vertovs Dataset. Web. 10 Dec. 2014. 1-23
http://lisahutton.net/reading/VertovDataset.pdf