One year later (february 16 2004)
It is about one year ago that I started this page as a response to Rhizome politics.
In the last year a lot of things happened, so time for me to look back and evaluate.
In the first place we saw that "evil genius" Mark Tribe left the Rhizome ship
and was succeeded by Rachel Green. Second we saw Rhizome merge with the New Museum
(New York). In a press
release by the "New Museum" it is called "Rhizome.org will operate as an affiliate
of the New Museum". But the exact (practical) position of Rhizome in this whole
merge stays unclear. This is also the case for it's famous artbase that now seems
to fall under the responsability of the New Museum. Seems because it's exact status
is unclear. There are no documents online that carify it's status. Nor were there
held any serious online discussions about it's status. This draws me to the conclusion
that artists that are participating in the Rhizome community just don't care about
this issue. For so far the leadership and legal issues.
Another point of critique is derived from
a recent article Peter Luining wrote for netartreview. Here Luining compares
the Computerfineart's collection with Rhizome's artbase. But where Luining still
sees something positive in Rhizome's artbase "Rhizome's artbase offers a lot of
additional information with it's linked artworks [which is worth paying for]" I only can see negative points.
This because 1. you have to pay to get access to the artbase that is made out
of freely delivered content by it's participants, information that in almost all cases
can also be found with some googling for free 2. the artbase is a collection
of links that is subjected to rot. And why would you pay for a service that is
not even trying to preserve the most interesting part, which is the artworks. Another
point that I missed in Luining's analysis is that of the status of the work. For
works at Rhizome I only can point to older information (see After
Rhizome Critique), while, from what I have understood, for the works that are hosted
by computerfinearts there is a clear contract. If we compare both it is clear
that at Rhizome the artist gives away a link (which is not problematic) and information
with the link that becomes property of Rhizome (which can be seen is problematic),
while at computerfinearts you put up a work (and maybe some information) which
is preserved with all rights still belonging to the artist. This makes it clear
that the legal structure Rhizome is providing is not in favour of the artist.
My last point of critique is an argument I also stated a year ago and which shows
nothing has changed. While Rhizome continually seems in need of money, because
they need it so hard to keep the community going, they are organizing competitions
with big money rewards. This year's competition theme is "games" (how orginally
chosen) and offers money rewards in the order of 1500 up till 3500 dollars.
So far the inherent critique of Rhizome. Now to the practical situation. Though
Rhizome seemed to have survived it is not the Rhizome from before the
great changes anymore. If I take a look at the frontpage I see especially a lack of quality
articles by respected or talented writers. And also the works that get into
the artbase lack in a lot of cases relevance to any net.art community or net.art
as a whole. Rhizome has become a sort of Disney looking site attracting people
that go for a brandname instead of doing some search for themselves, because there
are free and in some cases even better alternatives. So what about these alternatives.
An interesting alternative to Rhizome seems to be the ever developing site of furherfield.
Over the last year we saw it's content and participants multiplying and multiplying.
Because it's structure is more or less open source participants don't have to
fear for Rhizome like situations (that is that you have to pay to get to your
own content). That said there are other sides that are developing and doing great
as for example the German theoretical Betacity
site that keeps delivering great writings. Another interesting site that seems
to keep on going strong is Netartreview,
that is putting out a lot of interesting items weekly. But not everything mentioned
in my link list is doing so well. An example of this is the net-art.org portal site,
though recently there seems to be some activity again, new items just seem to
pop up only 2 times a month and that's just too little for a portal. A great miss
and probably the greatest miss for the net.art community is the dissapearance
of Dr. Reinhold Grether net.art links, that was by far the largest collection of net.art
links on the web.
Older critique
I started this website after seeing a webcast of Mark Tribe (the manager of Rhizome)
at Deaf03.
What I witnessed shocked me. But before I go any further let me give some information
about Rhizome. They started in 1996 and slowly became the biggest net.art resource
of the internet.
Rhizome was in the first place a community with free access and was made a succes
because a lot of people put a lot of energy in it. From 2000 Rhizome started to
ask money gifts. A logical step because the project grew bigger and more serious,
and because funding seemed too less to pay the bills. A weird step though was
that the money they needed so hard was spend in 2002 on organizing a prestigious
Rhizome net art competition with large sums of money for the winners. Not very
long after this Rhizome started to ask money for access to their community.
Now (march 2003) Rhizome prepares for the next jump: total domination of all netart
resources with the help of heavy financed European Art Institutions. It won't
suprise me if this leap also will mean a higher contribution for members.
Because I think this page should be more than some Rhizome critique I moved my
long and fundamental essay about the lies and strategies of Rhizome to a new page
called After Rhizome Critique and will
from now on be focussing on the free alternatives.
The Free Alternatives (updated: february 14 2004)
2003
Net Art Links This are literally 2003 links to net.artists and projects
collected by German Dr. Reinhold Grether. The largest collection of net.art links
around, if you can't a net.artist here, you probably won't find it anywhere on
the net.
betacity
A German webportal (in English language) that operates on border of net.culture,
net.art, net.critics and net.theoretics. With a clear stress on the last two,
this portal is updated several times a day with news about newly launched projects.
Computerfinearts
Collection of a lot of relevant net.art works brought together by Doron Golan.
Cream
A newsletter with in depth articles about net.art and net.culture by artcritics
and new media curators. On the website you can subscribe yourself also there's
an archive where you can find all back issues, it is issued irregular. The latest
is about electronic music in relation to computers and internet.
furtherfield
The alternative to Rhizome. Free content, frequently updated and a dedicated
team of people that are artists themselves.
crumb
This site aims to help independent and institutional curators, producers, technicians,
and commissioners. Besides that the crumb site contains a few interviews with
new media curators, the crumb list is especially of interest (see also mailinglists
beneath).
Netartconnexion
Find an awful lot of different projects by net.artist in this a full copy of Rhizome's
artbase by b-l-u-e-s-c-r-e-e-n. Stripped from Rhizome's artbase graphics and time
consuming interface you can find anything you search for much faster than in Rhizome's
original.
Netartreview
A weblog that is updated several times a day and reviews websites, new projects,
etc. If you want to be informed about what is going on in the world of net.art
you should check out this site more than once a day.
net-art.org. This site is totally dynamic, which means you
can type the latest news and it will immediately appear, it even offers free webspace.
It looks like this project is just beginning, because the news part is still very
irregular.
soundtoys
Are you interested in interactive soundart this is the place to be. Besides a
lot of different interactive works you also find here a lot of background information
and interviews with artists that make this kind of work.
Stunned
A (net)art portal with a special focus on Irland. Besides an weblog it has a virtual
gallery, some articles about net.art and a lot of interesting links.
the redproject
One reason for people to subscribe to Rhizome is to keep informed about (calls
for) new media art festivals. The redproject is a weekly newsletter that lists
all the calls for participation and dates of new media art festivals all over
the world.
turbulence
A site that commissions net.art projects. What makes turbulence standout from
many other sites that operate with the same idea, is that it gives a lot of background
information (interviews, essays) on the work it commissions.
very busy 4.0
A huge dynamic database of net.art works to which net.artists can directly add
their projects. Everyday another net.art project from the database is featured
on the frontpage. The frontpage features also a (animated) picture uploaded by
an artist. Because there's a very low level of moderation it is easy to participate
here, though this sounds maybe too easy, the quality of the database isn't worse
than Rhizome's artbase. When going through the database it looks that most submitted
net.art works are from 2000, so it could need some more actual input.
Mailinglists
7-11 nowadays
especially used by artists that use email as a medium.
asco-o
ascii art mailing list web archive.
crumb
New-Media-Curating Discussion List, see also crumb site above. Every month another
theme. Theme of march 2003: Curatorial Models.
-Empyre-
an arena for the discussion of media arts practice. Every month another theme.
Theme of march 2003: Curating new Media.
eu-gene
This list exists to bring together generative artists by providing a relaxed forum
for the discussion and sharing of ideas and projects.
Nettime-L
a list with over 3000 members on which you can find besides in depth discussions
about net.culture and net.politics also a lot of announcers of net.art projects
and new media festivals.
Syndicate
Media Culture and Media Art focuses especially on central and eastern Europe.
Thingist
THE THING is dedicated to fostering communication and community in the field of
new technologies and fine art.
Net.artists
0100101110101101.org cut.copy.paste.net.art
Brad Brace 12.hour.ISBN.JPEG.net.art
ctrlaltdel net.sound.art
dextro sound.toys
entropy8zuper pop.net.art
Jimpunk purist.net.art
jodi net.art pioneers
Lia shockwave.toys
lo-y net.code.art
Jessica Loseby intimate.net.art
mongrelx no.net.art.net.art
mouchette French net.victim
Eduardo Navas 3rd.gen.net.art
pavu French net.surrealists
plagiarist plagiarist.net.art
Fredric Madre French net.situationist
Eryk Salvaggio the conscience of net.art
Alexei Shulgin net.art at it's Russian
Alan Sondheim net.email.art
Vuk Cosic ascii.net.art
When you know of a site that should be listened here or if you like to
respond to my arguments on the Rhizome issue let me know.
Vladimir
Kovacevic, thursday 19 february 2004
email: afterrhizome@yahoo.com
I wish to thank to following persons for help and support: Walter Rozendaal, Andrew Thompson and Carla de Groot