Ten Key Texts on Digital Art: 1970-2000
Author(s): Lev Manovich
Source: Leonardo, Vol. 35, No. 5, Tenth Anniversary New York Digital Salon (2002), pp.
567-569+571-575
Published by: The MIT Press
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Leonardo
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Ten Key Texts on Digital Art:
1970-2000
LEV MANOVICH
catalogs, which act as key reference points in the field of modern
art. How many visitors to Bitstreams (the Whitney Museum,
2001) and 010101: Art in Technological Times (SFMOMA, 2001)
This article highlights ten major written works that knew that thirty years ago the major art museums in New York
reflect the brief history of digital art. The lack of and London presented a whole stream of shows on the topics of
public knowledge on digital art is largely due to a
art and technology? Together, these shows were more radical and
lack of standard text. While seen by most as a relative-
conceptually interesting in terms of new media than current
ly new art form, several exhibitions are mentioned
attempts. The following are some of these shows: Cybernetic
here dating from the late 196os to the early 1970s,
Serendipity (ICA, curated by Jasia Reichardt, 1968); The Machine
all of which have had a major impact on the devel-
opment of the field. Authors and editors chosen for as Seen at the End of the Mechanical Age (MOMA, curated by
the list include Gene Youngblood, jasia Reichardt, K.G. Pontus Hulten, 1968); Software, Information Technology: Its
Cynthia Goodman, Friedrich Kittler, Michael Benedikt, Meaning for Art (Jewish Museum, New York, curated by Jack
Minna Tarkka, Peter Weibel, Espen Aarseth, and Burnham, 1970); Information (MOMA, curated by Kynaston
UlfPoschardt. McShine, 1970); and Art and Technology (LACMA, curated by
Maurice Tuchman, 1970).
While a number of online exhibitions were organized by Steve
Dietz at the Walker, recent exhibitions at the Z Lounge at the
sW ^ orking on my assignment to select written works New Museum in New York City (curated by Anne Barlow and
con-
Anne Ellegood), the shows and events curated by Christiane Paul
sidered important to the history of digital art, culture,
and technology turned out to be quite difficult. In Whitney, and Jon Ippolito's curatorial work at the Guggen-
at the
contrast to other art fields, the memory of the digital art heim,
field isare all sophisticated. They are also small-scale affairs. In
terms
very short, while its long-term memory is practically absent. As of
a recent large-scale museum surveys, only the exhibition at
result, many artists working with computers, as well as SFMOMA
curators (2001) can be compared to those of thirty years ago. It
wasrein-
and critics who exhibit and write about these artists, keep an ambitious attempt to sample the whole landscape of con-
temporary
venting the wheel over and over again. While other fields usually culture in order to present how artists and designers
have certain critical and theoretical texts which are widely known
across a number of disciplines engage with computing on a variety
of levels:
and which usually act as starting points for new arguments and as a tool, as a medium, as iconography, and as a source
debates, the digital art field cannot compare. No criticalof new
text onperceptual, cognitive and communication skills and habits.
In comparison, the show at the Whitney was a truly reactionary
digital art has achieved a familiarity status that can be compared
with the status of classic articles by Clement Greenberg affair.
and Ros-Here was a show on new media art that did not include any
alind Krauss (on modern art), or Andre Bazin and Lauracomputers
Mulvey or interactive works. Instead, new media was reduced
to flat images on the walls: stills presented as digital prints, or
(on film). So what does it mean to select written works considered
important to the history of digital art? The field did produce
many substantial texts that were important at particular historical
Lev Manovich, Associate Professor, Visual Arts Department
points, but since these texts are not remembered, they have no
University of California at San Diego
bearing on current developments. 9500 Gillman Drive, La Jolla, CA, 92093-0327, U.S.A.
If you think that I am overstating my point, consider E-mail: manovich@ucsd.edu
the fol-
Web site: www.manovich.net
lowing example: Think of important museum shows and their
? 2002 ISAST LEONARDO, Vol. 35, No. 5, pp. 56567-575, 2002 567
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moving images presented with projectors Art, 1971; Expanded Cinema, 1970; Digital Vivian Sobchack, Peter Weibel, Slavoj
or plasma screens. The descriptions of the Visions, 1987). Zizek, Erkki Huhtamo, Margaret Morse,
works were positioned within the familiar Alex Galloway, Matt Fuller, and many oth-
and well-rehearsed narratives and cate- (3) Since the annual festivals and exhibi- ers (and these are just the people who
tions such as Ars Electronica, ISEA, and
gories of standard 20th century art text- write or are available in English transla-
books. In short, new media was SIGGRAPH played a key role in develop- tion; internationally, the list of brilliant
neutralized, diluted, and rendered harm-
ment of the field, I included a couple of commentators on techno-culture goes on
less, similar to the way commercialrepresentative
culture catalogs from the particular- and on) [3].
now takes over most of the new radical ly important meetings (ISEA 1994, Ars I think that each of the four theoretical
Electronica 1995).
cultural developments, from hip-hop to books I selected has something unique
techno. about it. Benedikt's best-selling collection
In contrast, just reading the titles of the (4) I then added the first publication from is exemplary in bringing together theorists,
exhibitions that took place thirty years ago the ZKM Center for Art and New Media's artists and computer designers, or early
you can see that they experimented with Artintact series (artintact 1, 1994). Early cyberspaces such as Habitat, and somehow
new categories and dimensions of the on, ZKM solved the two key problems of forces the designers to write clear and the-
emerging techno-culture. In terms of the the digital art field, distribution and criti- oretically sophisticated descriptions of
works and projects presented, the muse- cism, in a particularly elegant and efficient their projects and research programs. The
ums similarly were not afraid to invite new way. Every year since 1994 ZKM pub- best of the anthologies and conferences on
technologies and new types of artistic prac- lished a CD-ROM/book. The CD-ROM digital arts and new media culture try to
tices within their spaces [1]. For example, create such a mix, but few succeed in
would contain three interactive art projects
The Machine as Seen at the End of the while the book would present critical texts
doing it the way Cyberspace: First Steps did.
Mechanical Age presented works by 100 about each of the projects (today ZKMKittler is probably the most important
artists, including commissioned collabora- continues this successful format with a media theorist after McLuhan, and in his
tions between artists and engineers under new series which uses DVD-ROM instead master opus Discourse Networks he was
the umbrella of EAT. (Compare this to the able to accomplish another difficult con-
of CD-ROM). By following the book for-
current practice of United States art muse- mat and teaming up with a major German
vergence trick: bringing together the best
ums to commission "Net art," which then of what the United States called "critical
book publisher, ZKM assured that Artitact
can be safely "tucked away" on museum theory" (in his case it is Lacan and Fou-
would be distributed through the standard
Web sites instead of in the actual galleries.) cault) with his own brilliant ideas about
book distribution channels. (It only took
The Software exhibition included a num- the Whitney eight years to catch up: thethe effects of communication networks
ber of works which used a PDP-8 comput- Whitney 2002 Biennial catalog similarly
and media recording/storage/access tech-
er in the museum. Meanwhile, the content included a CD-ROM attached to the front nologies on culture. Again, this is a kind of
of the exhibition reflected the information cover [2]). convergence that many attempt, but prob-
and communication revolution on a con- ably only Kittler has succeeded so far.
ceptual level by presenting a number of(5) While digital art does not have a canon Many would agree that the two areas of
projects which asked viewers to participateof critical texts about the art itself, most culture where the new logic of digital com-
in particular communication scenarios con-artists and curators in the field are familiar puting always shows up significantly earli-
structed by artists Vito Acconci and Hanswith at least some theoretical texts dealing er than in other fields are computer games
Haacke. with the larger topics of digital technology, and electronic music. While I know next
Given the systematic absence of long-culture, and society. In fact, I think that a to nothing about popular electronic music,
term memory in the digital art field, justnumber of such theoretical texts are equiv- I found DJ Culture to be a brilliant mix of
ten texts would not be enough to recon-alent to canonical critical texts in other art broad social, cultural, and technological
struct its rich fifty-year history. Here is thefields. Since I was limited to a total of ten history and a provocative theoretical spec-
selection algorithm I ended up following: texts, I could only include a small sample ulation. Many books and anthologies on
of such theoretical works. I chose Discourse electronic music put you to sleep with too
(1) Given my limit of ten texts, I decidedNetworks by Friedrich Kittler (1985, much detail about this or that piece of
to be a little subjective and give weight toEnglish edition 1990); Cyberspace: First technology, but DJ Culture manages to
texts that were particularly important toSteps, edited by Michael Benedikt (1991), stay focused on the concepts. In his writ-
me when I first learned about digital art. DJ Culture by Ulf Poschardt (1995, ing, Munich-based Ulf Poschardt also suc-
English edition 1998); and Cybertext by cessfully integrates a "remix"-inspired style
(2) Given that the digital art field does Espen Aarseth (1997). But I could have of exposition with a more standard histori-
not really have a set of canonical criti- cal structure that keeps you on track
also selected books by Katherine Hayles,
cal texts, I instead selected a few texts Sherry Turkle, W.J.T. Mitchell, Paul Vir-
through this "think" book.
which acted as key reviews of the field ilio, Peter Lunenfeld, Jay David Bolter,Finally, in his thin but dense Cybertext,
during different decades (The Computer inPierre Levy, Geert Lovink, Norman Klein,
Espen Aarseth offers a particularly elegant
568 Lev Manovich, Ten Key Texts on Digital Art: 1970-2000
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solution to the key question of digital arts any works by my Southern California colleagues:
Hayles, Lunenfeld, Klein, and Sobchack. Why am I
and culture: how to separate new and old
being so naive? New Yorkers curate and publish them-
media. Although he is concerned with selves all the time.
texts, his approach can be extended to oth-
er media, providing a fresh paradigm for
thinking about the relationships between Lev Manovich (www.manovich.net) is an
the old and new media. Read this book if Associate Professor in the Visual Arts
you missed it! (I don't want to do his com-Department at the University of Califor-
plex and clear arguments injustice by tryingnia, San Diego, where he teaches courses
to summarize them in two sentences here.) in new media art and theory. He is the
In the end, it is probably for the best author of The Language of New Media
that the arguments in digital arts do not(The MIT Press, 2001), and Tekstura: Rus-
always return to the same few "master"sian Essays on Visual Culture (Chicago Uni-
texts over and over again, the way it oftenversity Press, 1993), as well as fifty-plus
happens in the art world and in the articles, which have been published in
humanities. As Norman Klein once put it, twenty-plus countries. Currently he is
"to paint with a computer is to paint with working on a new book, Info-aesthetics,
a machine gun," meaning that a digital and a digital film project, Soft Cinema.
computer is unprecedented in being the
key engine of modern economy, the key
control and communication technology of
modern societies, and also the key repre-
sentational machine. Given this unprece-
dented convergence, any serious reflection
on the social and cultural dynamics of our
time has to engage with digital computing.
The fact that the theoretical texts which
address the general issues in techno-culture
-a new functioning of space and time,
info-subjectivity, new dynamics of cultural
production and consumption, and so
on-are more important to digital artists and
designers than digital art criticism per se is
ultimately very healthy. It means that the
people in our field have a keen interest in
how computerization affects society and
culture at large rather than just being con-
cerned about the narrow history of their
own field. So while we should all be more
familiar with this history than we currently
are, we should not turn it into a fetish.
REFERENCES
1. For more information on these shows and other
important milestones in the fifty-year history of com-
puter and telecommunication art, see the excellent
Telematic Timeline produced as a part of the show
curated by Steve Dietz (http://telematic.walkerart.org/
timeline/).
2. In 2002, Hatje Cantz Publishers published The
Complete Artintact 1994-99 CD-ROMagazine on
DVD-ROM.
3. I decided not to include in my final "Top 10" list
Lev Manovich, Ten Key Texts on Digital Art: 1970-2000
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7':!p. I '. ' Gene Youngblood
_ 1j'"' ,5j jJjj ' . Expanded Cinema
-. Introduction by Buckminster Fuller
(New York: E.P. Dutton, 1970)
The Computer
in
in r
rtA rt Jasia ReiclUt
::: ............... e--bw* ....... .....................................................
'. ....... II...
11' IXo@
Jasia Reichardt
The Computer in Art
(London: Studio Vista, 1971)
Lev Manovich, Selections 571
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Cynthia Goodman Friedrich A. Kittler
Digital Visions: Computers and Art Discourse Networks
(New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1987) (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1990)
Original German edition, 1985
572 Lev Manovich, Selections
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Michael Benedickt
Michael Benedikt, ed. ZKM Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe
Cyberspace: First Steps Artintact i: Artists' Interactive CD-ROMagazine
(Cambridge: MIT Press, 1991) (Stuttgart: Cantz, 1994)
Lev Manovich, Selections 573
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mP*-:i Minna Tarkka et al., eds.
The 5th International Symposium on Electronic Art
(Helsinki: ISEA, 1994)
WE1C11 E T1 THE WIRED MWOHl
WIELCOME TO THIE WIIRED WIORLD
@rs electronica 95 Peter Weibel et al., eds.
Mythos Information: Welcome to the Wired World
SPRINGER-VI*OA WIEN NEW YOEK Ars Electronica 1995 Festival Catalog
(Vienna and New York: Springer-Verlag, 1995)
574 Lev Manovich, Selections
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Espen Aarseth
Cybertext: Perspectives on Ergodic Literature
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1997)
IU CILTUIn
ULF PISCNAI
Ulf Poschardt
DI Culture
(London: Quartet Books, 1998)
Original German edition, 1995
Lev Manovich, Selections 575
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