Re: [microsound] call for content | Digital Salvage v.1

[The pHarmanaut <pharmanaut@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

jeez, I can't believe how many people are offended by the blanket notion of
"rules".  I'm not convinced that rules automatically equate, particularly in
the context of artistic production, to some kind of fascist gesture. I think
that many of the people who've responded to me with disdain for the notion
of the project are missing the point. In a way, the contest is an attempt to
explore the concept of rules, precisely when couched as something of a
manifesto. I came out with the call as a response to the authorial gesturing
of Salvaggio's original post, even despite his last line which struck me as
so silly I almost ignored the whole thing.

As I see it, my call for participation in a contest stemming from these
rules constitutes a kind of critical gloss on the Salvaggio piece. The whole
"please, I'm an artist, there are no rules!" facade is really annoying and
lazy. I'd rather carry on a different conversation.  In particular, I'm
interested in specific responses to the spirit of the project as described
in the call for contributions (not Salvaggio's article). I thought of this
project as an effort to defuse any potential revolutionary/authoritarian
taint on the rules by viewing these rules specifically as a way to structure
a game.

For those of you who don't play games or abide the slightest whiff of
totalitarianism, perhaps the scientific model might work for you. Does this
qualify as an experiment (devslashnull, what do you say?), since it sets up
rules in order to generate a condition of production, and it has specific
standards that can be refered to in order to determine the degree to which
the produced work has been shaped by those rules. But I'm not staking on any
connection to the term "experimental" here. The word is not just over-used,
it's mis-used, most frequently as a synonym for improvisational
knob-twiddling and the like. It's used to mean "weird" (another frequently
misused word) or "I'm too lazy to try to find a way to describe what I'm
doing because, hell, I don't use rules anyway, and what's a description but
a rule trying to sneak in after the fact!"

There's you a new can of worms. Time to get back to violating the Ten
Commandments or something.

-=Trace

----- Original Message -----
From: "michael nisi" <_@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: "microsound" <microsound@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, April 12, 2002 1:43 PM
Subject: Re: [microsound] call for content | Digital Salvage v.1


> ÝÝ
> rules? no thank you.
>
>
> ^
> Michael Nisi
> www.cf-1.com
> -
> www.unescape.com
> www.michaelnisi.com
>
> ÝÝ
>
>
> ##
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> >Hi, all. Thought some of you might be interested in this call for
> >content I've organized. Thus far, most of the responses have been
> >more image-oriented in nature, and I'd be very interested in
> >sound-art contributions.
> >
> >Thanks!
> >-=Trace
> >
>
>---------------------------------------------------------------------------
--
> >DIGITAL SALVAGE v.1: a response to Salvaggio's Six Rules Towards a
> >New Internet Art
> >
> >Please create a Web-based digital project that adheres to the six
> >rules towards a new internet art that Eryk Salvaggion recently
> >posted on Rhizome.org:
> >
> >1. No Flash
> >2. No introduction pages
> >3. No more art for the sake of error
> >4. Images must be unique to the sitemaker
> >5. Technology is not a subject; the Internet is not a subject
> >6. The work stands alone
> >
> >Details on each rule are provided in the Rhizome posting
> >(http://rhizome.org/object.rhiz?3236).
> >
> >Any form of artistic project is acceptable, as long as it exists on
> >the Web and fulfills each rule. Rather than viewing Salvaggio's
> >rules in the manner of a manifesto, this competition takes the
> >game-playing spin: rules not as part of a revolutionary command
> >("out with old, in with the new!") but as a guideline around which
> >strategies can form within a localized and temporary setting.
> >
> >Contributions must be available on the Internet by May 31, 2002.
> >Please send a URL by that deadline to: treddell@xxxxxxx One entry
> >per participant.
> >
> >A panel of peer reviewers will help select the top three works, and
> >all entries will be featured in a new net.art and media theory site
> >launched this summer at the University of Denver's Digital Media
> >Studies program.
> >
> >Thanks,
> >
> >Trace Reddell
> >Assistant Professor
> >Graduate Director
> >Digital Media Studies
> >University of Denver
> >
> >Email: treddell@xxxxxx
> >Web: http://www.du.edu/~treddell/
>
>
>
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