Stephen Wilson: Information Arts: Intersections of Art, Science, and Technology (2002)

“A new breed of contemporary artist engages science and technology—not just to adopt the vocabulary and gizmos, but to explore and comment on the content, agendas, and possibilities. Indeed, proposes Stephen Wilson, the role of the artist is not only to interpret and to spread scientific knowledge, but to be an active partner in determining the direction of research. Years ago, C. P. Snow wrote about the “two cultures” of science and the humanities; these developments may finally help to change the outlook of those who view science and technology as separate from the general culture.

In this rich compendium, Wilson offers the first comprehensive survey of international artists who incorporate concepts and research from mathematics, the physical sciences, biology, kinetics, telecommunications, and experimental digital systems such as artificial intelligence and ubiquitous computing. In addition to visual documentation and statements by the artists, Wilson examines relevant art-theoretical writings and explores emerging scientific and technological research likely to be culturally significant in the future. He also provides lists of resources including organizations, publications, conferences, museums, research centers, and Web sites.”

Published by MIT Press, 2002
ISBN 026223209X, 9780262232098
969 pages

Author and reviews
Publisher

PDF (updated on 2012-10-23)

Joe Karaganis (ed.): Structures of Participation in Digital Culture (2008)

Structures of Participation in Digital Culture, edited by SSRC Program Director Joe Karaganis, explores digital technologies that are engines of cultural innovation, from the virtualization of group networks and social identities to the digital convergence of textural and audio-visual media. User-centered content production, from Wikipedia to YouTube to Open Source, has become the emblem of this transformation, but the changes run deeper and wider than these novel organizational forms. Digital culture is also about the transformation of what it means to be a creator within a vast and growing reservoir of media, data, computational power, and communicative possibilities. We have few tools and models for understanding the power of databases, network representations, filtering techniques, digital rights management, and the other new architectures of agency and control. We have fewer accounts of how these new capacities transform our shared cultures, our understanding of them, and our capacities to act within them. Advancing that account is the goal of this volume.

Publisher The Social Science Research, New York, 2007
ISBN 0979077222, 9780979077227
284 pages

PDF (updated on 2013-6-6)
PDF (alt link, added on 2013-6-6)

David Dunn (ed.): Eigenwelt Der Apparatewelt – Pioneers of Electronic Art (1992)

A major reference for the history of media arts.

Artistic director: Peter Weibel
Curators: Woody Vasulka and Steina Vasulka
Publisher The Vasulkas, Santa Fe, 1992
Published on the occasion of the exhibition held “Eigenwelt der Apparatewelt. Pionere der elektronischen Kunst”, June 22 – July 5, 1992, Ars Electronica, Linz
240 pages

authors

PDF (updated on 2012-10-21)
PDFs