Internet art

We use the internet as an everyday object, and it’s amazing to think that it is still growing and that we don’t actually know how much more progress will be made on it. The internet is both a personal and public place, this makes it very hard to display art in it because nothing is truly private. The internet is a free floating signifier, which means that if you find something, you don’t know what the context is and you as a viewer can decide what the context is.

Definition of internet art

1 The computer has become a new media (a new set of media format)

2 To design a digital artifact is to design an experience. Digital design should not try to be invisible.

One of the main aspects of internet art is about being personal. The internet allows us to put our personal behaviour out in the public, for example on networking sites such as facebook or on blogs, where we can write our own opinions. This information usually isn't edited, making it more personal and therefore more provoking if it is hard hitting. Our whole relationship with internet has changed, we now live in the web as well as in real life, it's part of our identity.With the likes of social networking sites, we feel that it is necessary to constantly be sharing and viewing each others information.

Stelarc (an Australian performance artist) brought performance art into the web he embraced the personal element and being able to create a relationship between himself and the audience. For one of his pieces, called ping body, his whole body was wired. Small electric currents were sent into his nerves system via the wires. These currants were created by the net. Data from around 30 internet domains was used and the variation of the ping values controlled the motion of the body. which made him create involuntary movements. He danced for 24 hours. People talk about how someday computers will take over. This was a computer takeover. Here the net determines what happens to the person rather than what the person determining what happens on the net. The machinery completely created the choreography of the body. The body became a "controllable machine".

Another one of Stelarcs pieces was to implant an ear onto his arm. After creating a "virtual arm" which was controlled using sensor gloves, Stelarc wanted to create a third ear. It's a surgical construction of a full sized ear, which can transmit the sound that it hears. I think it is so strange, Stelarcs work really is provoking. It blurs the boundaries, between art and science research and makes you ask questions. Personally I wouldn't want an ear on my arm because its not what your used to seeing. Although i would like to see how it feels and how it works to have 3 ears, and be able to hear sound from a different level.

Stelarc