Issue 79

I have argued elsewhere (1) that the artist is among the few readily equipped to take up the potential offerings of new technologies and new media, and to use them in unexpected ways, bringing about otherwise unforeseen capacities that these technologies may offer. (more…)

‘The arts are an even better barometer of what is happening in our world than the stock market or the debates in congress.’ – Hendrik Willem Van Loon (historian, 1882-1944) (more…)

In digital, networked culture, we spend our lives engaged with data systems. Although our experience is shaped by interfaces, friendly surfaces, we are inevitably aware of their functional undersides. The web is increasingly a set of interfaces to datasets. (more…)

In the 90s, art based on new technologies began to enter the public space. One aspect of this was that the use of computer systems enabled interactivity – a dynamic reaction to an input whereby the spectator could take the role of a contributor. This notion of technology as an enabler of social interaction came right at a time when there was an enlivened public debate about the role of art in public space and its social potential. (more…)

Since the development of civilisation, humans have been feeling, recording and studying earthquake phenomena. The US Geological Survey (USGS) currently estimates that several million earthquakes occur in the world each year. (more…)

My artistic practice sits in the broad field of translating nature through technological means. A key aim is to perceive elements of the world from a different perspective, one suggested by the intervention of technology in natural systems, usually via some form of sensor. (more…)