CD-ROM
The CD-ROM was a relatively popular carrier for interactive artworks in the mid-1990s. A CD-ROM (Compact Disc Read-Only Memory) is a type of compact disc that can only be read, not written to. It is a digital storage medium that can hold large amounts of data, including text, images and audio. The data on a CD-ROM is encoded in a spiral track that begins at the center of the disc and extends to the edge. This track is read by a laser, which is reflected back to a sensor in the CD drive.
At beginning of 1990s the World Wide Web as a platform was not yet capable of providing the rich, immersive, multimedia experience that artists desired. Simultaneously, this period witnessed the proliferation of personal computers that came equipped with CD-r drives, causing CD-ROM art to flourish as a form of creation and distribution, similar to the previous "VHS Revolution".
Artists created very diverse works on CD-ROM, ranging from virtual spaces to game-like experiments, from interactive music environments to literature and hypertext presentations. Within an individual practice CD-ROMs often have a special place as a unique interactive 'exception' in the career of artists as (Laurie Anderson, Chris Marker, Michael Snow), or they became part of a long series of works in different media as (JODI, Antoni Muntadas).
There was significant production of artistic CD-ROMs during the 1990s in the US, Canada, Netherlads, Germany or the UK. Artists as Valie Export, Chris Marker, The Residents, Zoe Beloff, Simon Biggs, Masaki Fujihata, David Blair, Jim Gasperini & Tennessee R. Dixon, Peter Gabriel, Alain Geronnez, Clive Gillman, Sophie Greenfield & Giles Rollestone, Paul Groot & Jans Possel, Graham Harwood, Bill Seaman, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Troy Innocent, Tamara Laï, George Legrady, Jaime Levy, Marita Liulia, John Maeda, Miroslaw Rogala, Antoine Schmitt & Vincent Epplay, Keith Seward & Eric Swenson (Necro Enema Amalgamated), Alberto Sorbelli, John Thackara, Florian Thalhofer, Luc Courchesne, Morton Subotnick, Linda Dement, Suzanne Treister, or Tamás Waliczky, published interactive works on CD-ROM. Multimedia publisher Voyager was playing an important role, but there was a vivid scene of experimental small productions or by collectives and institutions including Antirom, Andy Cameron, ZKM, many others.
Artists and works
Prominent publishers of CD-ROM artworks were Mediamatic (NL) and Voyager (US).
Contact Zones. The Art of CD-ROM by Timothy Murray was a travelling exhibition from 1999 to 2001 in which a large number of works was presented together. The exhibition website still exists and is an excellent record and source for several projects: http://contactzones.cit.cornell.edu/
Notable works are, among others:
- Doors of Perception 1 CD-ROM (1994) by Mediamatic - digital proceedings of the Doors of Perception conference.
- Architectonic Models I-XVI (1994) by Roland Kuit
- Cyberflesh Girlmonster (1995) by Linda Dement
- Amsterdam (1995) by Roland Kuit - Avenue Magazine, uitgave #5 VOL.2 Amsterdam inside out.
- Paris (1996) by Roland Kuit - Orbe Magazine, music machines.
Events
- CD-Rom: Burning the Interface exhibition by Mike Leggett & Linda Michael, Museum of Contemporary Art Australia (MCA), 1996
- cd-rom cabinet, by Annet Dekker, Sandra Fauconnier, 2013
- Welcome to the Future! exhibition, iMAL, Brussels, 2015.
Links
