Monday, July 29, 2013
Is the Internet a good place to experience video art pieces?
As a result of my attempt to find inspiring video art pieces, I found many works that are filled with cheesy video effects, blood and ripped-off-Quay-Brothers aesthetics. Many of them are simply hard to watch.
Samples: http://videoart.net/home/Artists/ArtistByCategories.cfm?Category_ID=
Video art artists seems to consciously separate their works from conventional, theatrical and entertainment films and videos by avoiding obvious and logical narratives. The video art pieces often employ abstract, experimental and sometimes accidental moving images. By artists' intention, works of this kind cannot be enjoyable in comparison to TV shows or Youtube celebrity videos.
The following article by Mia Fineman explains why online resources, especially video streaming sites are not efficient places to find a good video art pieces:
http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/art/2007/03/youtube_for_artists.html
1st, the author informs that museums refuses to show video art pieces online. It is understandable that those museums are try to ensure their visitors and to protect the values of pieces. This also suggests that many original pieces submitted by artists are ones that have been ignored by the museums.
2nd and foremost importantly, the author asserts that computer screens are insufficient media for viewers to experience video art piece that incorporates other tangible media, space and viewers. Works of this kind cannot be judged without examining its environment and viewer's experience within the space. For example, we should experience Tony Oursler's video puppet installations by using all senses.
Other article entitled Has Video art become obsolete? argues that video art is now considered as a dated media of expression. In fact, many successful video artists has incorporated other media to start their own genre. Currently, the Internet is only suitable for showing video art pieces that are often jeering for its limited use of the medium. If we truly wish to encounter pieces that are inspiring and fulfilling, we better off visit exhibitions in person.
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Thanks for sharing, Yu. As much as I wasn't initially sympathetic to the idea that video art needed to be encountered only in exhibitions, your post/article make a good case. Recently I tried to watch the work of video artist Matthew Barney on youtube, and it fell flat, I suspect because I wasn't far out of my normal environment. Additionally, I saw The Sound of Music at a movie theater last month, for the first time in that environment, and felt that I'd never seen it before. I agree with you, the space one encounters video art is key to the work.
ReplyDeleteHi Chris, thanks for your comment. I've never seen Matthew Barney's works before. He seems to be an interesting guy. Works that moves me has been always ones that I experienced in person. I got to see Olafur Eliasson's exhibit in Chicago (although he is not a video artist). His installations often incorporate information that does not go through the wire, such as smell, humidity, brightness, and scale. Unfortunately, we don't usually get see actual video art or installation pieces in person.
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