Arty Facts - Vol 2 Issue 3 Nov 1998

To unbalance any state of being and change the angle of reality, it is crucial to be a risk taker. Our current artistic selves are constantly challenged by societies' post-modern notions and regulations. We live in a disposable world, a 15-second nation. Our lives are controlled by what is told to us by the media, and finding common ground can be a full-time job. Before the advent of our boundless technologies, master artisans studied for decades to perfect their chosen artforms. In search for artistic autonomy, we are constantly under pressure to bow to conformist ideals and succumb to technological advances. The questions remain, has technology hindered the way we produce our art? Or is the computer-enhanced image a viable form of expression? Furthermore, does it affect the way we produce and view our work? Critics have argued that society is a butcher of the artistic image, almost trivialising images, that the computer image has become the proxy art for a new generation. Reproduction and mass culture are common allies and in some instances have led to the suffocation of art through over-commercialisation. Unfortunately, simplicity of shape doesn't always equate with simplicity of feelings. From the ordinary to pure oddities, the art world has risen to extreme heights where only the chosen few are lucky enough to reach. We can trace the history of artistic reproduction back to the 12th Century and the printing of the first Buddhist text, Diamond Sutra. They were laboriously reprinted using hand carved wooden blocks, but through the nature of the Chinese language (with 20,000 characters) development of moveable type was virtually impossible. However, in Europe due to the relative simplicity of the language, printers (using movable type) found a cheaper alternative - printing books instead of manuscripts. The majority of texts printed before the 16th Century were technical diagrams or religious images. The industrial revolution of the 1780s transformed art reproduction forever. With the advent of machinery, mass consumption and production, artists were given a new freedom. The turbulence of this revolutionary era broadened peoples’ esteem of artists. With no official artist guilds or trade barriers, travel, and therefore alternative inspiration, was abounding. In 1778 a new style of printing, lithography, was established. Lithography (a process of printing using stone and greasy chalk) gave artists more freedom of expression and preserved artists' individual styles. Even with the creation of new reproduction methods, the pursuit of more mass production methods was inevitable, and in 1839 another advancement was made, Photography! What began as an expensive fine art soon became trivialised and highly accessible to the everyday citizen. Photography's link to any established art form was a too complex concept for many artists to grasp. Only in the last hundred years has it been accepted for other purposes than simple documentation. Photography went on to become an important artform. Although Photography remains one of our most important forms of art and reproduction, with invent of the computer art was destined to change forever. Initially computer usage was limited to the corporate sector, but recent advances in availability, power, and user-friendliness has created new possibilities for (artistic) expansion. Cultural crossover of art styles and expressions to this new medium was inevitable. The shift from pure dance to interactive art and theatrics was a smooth one; potentially liberating and possibly expected. In my discussions with artists, I came to the realisation that not only is the computer age an incentive but a blessing. I recently spoke with Phil, a founding member of M.U.D, Global Village and Every Picture Tells a Story about his inspirations and hopes for the future. With a long history in the party scene (from clubs to raves) and from being a developing artist, his direct approach comes from experience and a knowledge of were he's coming from and were he's going. The idea that dance and art are separate entities has long since faded. More and more people are tuning into the hybrid experience. Phil's most recent venture was Mind a Maze, an eclectic amalgamation of art, dance, optical theatre and music. Initially, the concept was to bring technologically designed (inspired) and tech-infused art to the general viewing public. Through the Melbourne Fringe Festival, an exhibition was curated of "trans-dimensional fluorescent and electronic art works from the Melbourne Rave culture". By taking the technological art out of its context to a non-technological exhibition space, a conversion from impersonal to personal was achieved. One the goals was to bring to the community a sharing and mind expanding experience, that could be viewed in or out of the (rave) musical arena. In creating 'theatrical dance art space', Mind a Maze has shifted the role of the audience from viewer to performer, making the experience whole and interactive. Phil believes that there should be no partitions between art theatre and life, and consequently no differentiation between artist and the art appreciator. He conveyed this by staging Mind a Maze 'art exhibition and party'. Starr*



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