Anon Collective (ed.): Book of Anonymity (2021)

“Anonymity is highly contested, marking the limits of civil liberties and legality. Digital technologies of communication, identification, and surveillance put anonymity to the test. They challenge how anonymity can be achieved, and dismantled. Everyday digital practices and claims for transparency shape the ways in which anonymity is desired, done, and undone.

The Book of Anonymity includes contributions by artists, anthropologists, sociologists, media scholars, and art historians. It features ethnographic research, conceptual work, and artistic practices conducted in France, Germany, India, Iran, Switzerland, the UK, and the US. From police to hacking cultures, from Bitcoin to sperm donation, from Yik-Yak to Amazon and IKEA, from DNA to Big Data — thirty essays address how the reconfiguration of anonymity transforms our concepts of privacy, property, self, kin, addiction, currency, and labor.” (from back cover)

Contributors: Anon, Götz Bachmann, Dwaipayan Banerjee, Solon Barocas, Aram Bartholl, Amelie Baumann, Vadim Bernard, Paula Bialski, Andreas Broeckmann, Heath Bunting, Martin De Bie, Bureau d’études, Jacob Copeman, Abigail Curlew, Stéphane Degoutin, Simon Farid, Parastou Forouhar, Randi Heinrichs, Anna Henke, Michi Knecht, knowbotiq, Gertraud Koch, Julien McHardy, Helen Nissenbaum, Gerald Raunig, RYBN.ORG, Daniela Silvestrin, Thorsten Thiel, Transformella, Daniël de Zeeuw, Nils Zurawski.

Publisher Punctum Books, March 2021
Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 4.0 International license
ISBN 9781953035301
484 pages
HT coco

Publisher
PubPub
OAPEN

PDF (11 MB)

Persona (1981)

Features the work of nine artists who, in making or presenting their work, assume specific alter-egos or personae (human or animal, fictitious or historical) that serve as vehicles for greater freedom of expression. With essay by the curators Lynn Gumpert and Ned Rifkin, and artists’ statements.

Artists: Eleanor Antin, Mr. Apology, Colin Campbell, Bruce Charlesworth, Colette, Redd Ekks, Lynn Hershman, James Hill, Martial Westburg.

Preface by Marcia Tucker
Publisher The New Museum, New York, 1981
57 pages
via New Museum

Exhibition
Publisher
WorldCat

PDF (9 MB, no OCR)
JPGs

Ephemera, 17(2): The Social Productivity of Anonymity (2017)

“In a process that started decades ago, a multiplicity of forces is creating a slow, but steadily rising storm against anonymity. Discourses of transparency and accountability often describe anonymity as a threat. Technologies such as the IP-address-based Internet, sensory devices, and machine learning techniques further undermine anonymous encounters. In an age of near ubiquitous surveillance, anonymity is under attack. But what is at stake in such discourses and developments? Based on the premise that anonymity is always socially productive and always socially produced, this special issue draws attention to anonymity as a social form that demands renewed attention. The contributions explore its temporalities, its transformative powers, and its entanglements with public spheres, property relations, and practices of person making.”

Publisher Ephemera collective, with MayFlyBooks, May 2017
Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 Unported License
ISBN 9781906948375
220 pages

HTML, PDFs
PDF, PDF