Page 41 - Studio International - June 1971

computer, unless you interact in a reasonably they should do with it. undergo an enormously difficult period; it will
passive way. Technology has had a greater effect on the become evident to them that there will be an
Information has affected law. A smart cultural thrust than art. Technology has enormous increased production from artists.
lawyer realizes that evidence which is passed created technological man. It has created And the collection of this production will cause
across an information retrieval system, such political change. It has created aesthetic change. real-estate problems, will cause economic
as television or newspaper, is just as valuable It has created many levels of things that we problems, and will also cause political problems.
as evidence which is presented in court. So thought art would. Probably the greatest reason What it will probably be important for museums
what is occurring in the courtroom now is a why technology has taken over from art is to be doing within the next few years will be
direct reflection of what occurs in the media. because art was always technology anyway. The bringing in the various underprivileged social
It is often possible to actually lose a case in a art of the cave painter was a technological art. groups in our society. Presenting the museum as
courtroom, but win it in the media. If it is won It was an art of how to do it, how to image the a community cultural laboratory rather than a
in the media, it will be reversed in the courtroom. society, how to present society with a working place that sets up high standards and aesthetics.
There is no way of un-knowing information. model of itself that would in fact be a 'conceptual The absurdity of formal art criticism is that
In a society that is addicted to information, tool', a valuable and useful device for the shaping it is pretty much umbilical to collecting. Formal
it is extremely dangerous not to put out of that society. Now we are arriving back art criticism must be judged as organized
information. In a society that demands to know technologically to cave painting. We're now power. For all that formal art criticism hates
everything, the man who remains quiet is at a point where technology can present us with commercialism, it always acts as a very straight
guilty. a working model of ourselves. commercial for the art it's talking about. In
Now privacy is redundant; privacy only It is important that we expand the formal criticism when you say, 'Something is
works in a society that is technically private. technological environment into a completely good', you're saying, 'buy it'. When you say,
It is possible for the government to spy on a biotechnology environment so that we are `It is bad', you're saying, 'Do not buy it'. So
citizen at any time. It is possible for one firm interconnected very directly with the technology formal art criticism will find itself with the
to spy on another firm. If you live in a society and that we can plug into any area of thinking same problem that the collector finds himself
that does not permit privacy, trying to be to create a support system between one another. in. People do not want to be told constantly
private is foolish. If you have sex in your living It is true that we are further apart ideologically what their taste should be any more. Good
room, it shouldn't matter if everybody in the than ever before in the world. It is also true taste, at this time, in technical democracy, ends
world can see you. Because if they wanted to, that we are closer together than we have ever up as nothing more than taste prejudice.
they could. Privacy becomes one-sided when been. Expressing aesthetic authority over another
you resist it. If you don't resist, then you become Where does the art collector fit in ? Apart human being is arrogant.
part of the working environment. The correct from gathering objects to surround him, The artist must, without question, abdicate.
organic cell in the correct organic environment. which give him a certain sense of place or He must realize that his work must not contain
You take the same attitude towards the personal environment, it's also true that authority. It must in fact have the capability
government that they take towards you. collecting art has been a way of socially to succeed or fail as the viewer wants it.
Now people say that computers are identifying oneself. The sophisticate now Thereby being much more supportive to the
dehumanizing us; that there are too many realizes that having a number of paintings on viewer. It must, in fact, be completely devoid
machines. There are even people who blame his wall is not going to increase his image to of logic. The logical vacuum must be there so
the war in Vietnam on computers. Very few very many people. Buying works of art today that the viewer applies his own logic to it and
people have had any first hand use of computers would have little value or importance; everybody the work in fact makes itself before the viewer's
as an information retrieval system, as a surrogate can buy everything anyway. There are no rich eyes. So that it becomes a direct reflection of
brain, as an outside intelligence support, as a people, only middle-class people. The rich the viewer's consciousness, logic, morals, and
form of artificial thinking. We must realize merely have more 'middle class'. ethics. The work should act as a feedback
that if everybody has computers, then it So the artist will have to create a personal mechanism to his own working model.
becomes possible for everybody to talk to publicity system for the collector. He will have Once you have information about something,
everybody else. If you have a Telex terminal to identify these people to the society. So he there is no need to do it. The one thing that
and you want to say, 'Screw you' on that has to decide that these people will become so-called 'Do It' activities, such as Woodstock,
terminal, everybody who owns a Telex terminal media packages. He will package these people make absolutely clear, in information terms, is
will get a print-out saying, 'Screw you'. So in such a manner that they will become that you do it to get the information. That if
that while companies do have the possibility information for society. The problem of you have the information, you don't do it
to control you, if you are hooked into them you collecting art objects is, that the information because having the information means it's been
have the possibility to control back. Once we reads out more about having money and power done. So what we would have in art is a series
all have technological access, then we can talk than it does about being aesthetically involved of 'doing it' that would create information.
to one another. The computer is going to bring or concerned with art. Therefore, if one does Television is pretty much like art in this
about a new era of primitivism in art. The have money and power, there is very little situation. The only thing that occurs which is
computer will in fact be the new folk art. value in buying art because it's going to create of interest to most people is commercials,
In a city, where people have answering bad information. Money and power represent sports events, and newscasts. We will have to
services, instead of talking to people directly, personal politics at a time when everyone is get all the people watching television on
the technology talks to the technology. You trying to get to a broader inter-supportive television so that everyone's watching themselves
phone a person, his answering service answers. system. The only step left now would be for and everyone else.
You leave a message. He phones you back and the collector to become an artist. He must be What we are seeing now is a series of works
your answering service answers. The technology directly involved in art production. He could that are made for the reason that they can be
is making the decision and the people are sitting do it by selecting various groups of art and turned into media. Art now reads out as social
about on the sidelines. One computer is talking showing them in a similar way to that in which software : information. Once we know that the
to another computer. One telephone is talking the curator of the Museum of Modern Art purpose is to influence the social software we
to another telephone. One television is talking put on the 'Information' show, or he could can do away with art and start influencing the
to another television. Humans are merely begin to make art which expresses the kind of social software directly. Beyond that the artist
looking at it once in a while to see what the person that he is, in the kind of environment will probably dissolve, cease to exist in our
result of all this activity is and deciding what that he finds himself Museums will probably society as a separate heroic figure. q

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