The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction

I must say that this reading is much easier to follow than Manovich's essay. I like Benjamin's theory of the cult basis coming from new medias like graphic design and even more so film; that the aura of the artwork is still mysterious and unfamiliar, changing to a functional basis when the progression of the media itself is revealed. I may not have understood that idea fully but that's the overall gist I got from the theory.
A lot of points like the cult basis and production basis are interesting and I appreciate how Walter Benjamin not only ties in cultural and social aesthetics when analyzing artwork and medias but also the political, economical, and proletariat aspects too. I wish he tied more of his epilogue into the reading because to me it threw me off.

interface

I agree to some extent with Manovich's commparison of Worf-Sapir hypothesis to the idea that an interface affects how the viewer takes in and assesses the information, but it is a bit extreme. The interface, in my opinion, can only have a minimal affect on how the information is encoded by the viewer. By stating this, is the author suggesting that the creators of these interfaces have possibly an equal or greater influence on the information presented than the creator of the information presented? I don't agree.
Also, I may need to just think about it more, but how can something created with the AL approach possible? If you assume that, for example, if you create a program, such as a Tamagochi, you need to create the almost infinite outcomes for every possible action/reaction, how can that kind of program be considered to be impossible to predict beforehand?

interface

Is the author saying that modern media is unique in an art sense as well as unique in the way that one pixel could alter the whole semiotic sense of digital art and media.

Is the author saying that the GUI is much like bladerunner because of the way that AI and AL programs evolve depending on the situation they are in much like real life organisms?

The Interface Questions

If in fact the role of the computer has shifted from being a particular technology to a filter for "all culture, past and present" whats to say that it cannot be manipulated? Considering (as someone has already commented on) that society as a whole are not programmers and do not understand the codes and how computers operate beyond what we see on the screen. Why couldn't a historical event be manipulated, or erased completely, keeping in mind that the computer has "replaced cinema and television screen, the art gallery wall, library and book."?

What was the point of the paragraph explaining how the computer has bridged the gap between work and leisure? I don't understand how that relates to the rest of the chapter.

Interface

If the human body is necessarily a technical being, is technology added to the body simply a prosthesis for an already-prosthetic object?

In a society where computers have grown to hold such a great significance, are computers beginning to change the way we think, communicate, react, create, and live as humans? Have we as humans become codependent on computers?

Interface Correspondance

Do the large number of artists who use popular existing programs for creating their own artwork lose credibility?


Is it possible for computers to become a substitute for all "older cultural forms, languages, and conventions" in the education of a particular society?

Interface Reading

I had I hard time understanding what the author was trying to say. I don’t know if he is trying to compare Blade Runner to the fact that technology is a main part of human life now and that one-day we will be doomed for it!

1. Blade Runner showed the world in the future as a computer run dystopia. The human race is slowly weeding out the extremely human like androids as to purify it of all non-organic entities. In our day and age we seem to be working our way up to this, or at least that’s was the move wants us to see. Today, our world is getting to the point where every thing is computer run; we already have hover cars, and art has left the canvas and is now on the computer screen. My question is even though Blade runner shows a world in decay: our reality is that technology is here to help us or are we blind to the fact that we are making machines more intelligent then humans?
2. “In “meatspace” we have to work to remember, in cyberspace we have to work to forget.” Pg 63 this statement from the text brings up an interesting point: are we as a flawed species just leaning on technology in order to help us remember, or does human nature want the satisfaction of being able to delete and then able to retrieve again. Computers have the ability to delete an item (pictures, files, programs) but unless you erase it from the hard drive its not really gone. In Blade Runner man has created androids to help, but they end up only harming humans, so they send out a “blade runner” to destroy them. But new android models are still being created; the problem is never really resolved. Are humans just to ignorant to see that in order to really get rid of something you have to stop it at its source?

Response to "The Interface"

1. Are not there many similarities between interaction with semiotic content through the human-computer interface and analysis of "classical artwork" through the veil of our own psyche? Presumably, the user, in the former case, has no control over the interface that was designed by a third party. And the viewer, in the latter case, did not choose and cannot change his subconsciously developed mental state.

2. The author discusses and seems greatly intrigued by the effects of variabilty of interface and the fluidity of run time on the integrity of new media content. But what are the artistic implications of merely creating artwork that does not, even at the interface, physically exist?

three sweet websites

www.youtube.com you can find almost anything on here

www.pandora.com this is a good way to listen to music and find out about new artists based on genre

www.freightalicious.com this website has a lot of cool pictures of graffiti on freight trains

the interface

1. because technology rules so much of our lives that it can change the way we percieve people, objects, news, etc. in "real" life as well in technology based interactions, why don't we place more control on the orginization on it? we have created a means of transfering information that affects the messages it transmitts and brings its own messages, and by this we have created a being that suddenly has power over us. we, as lay people use computers and technology daily yet, I for one don't understand a bit of what is occuring on the coding level. And this ignorance is so incredibly dangerous, as it affects nearly every aspect of the way we percieve the world. So, why is it that we aren't more informed about the technology? is it simply that humans are lazy and want the convience of technology without the trouble of untangling its coding? is it that we are oblivious and don't realize the potential for distortion and manipulation? is it that the majority of us are too stupid to understand the way it works? is it that we are just apathetic and don't give a shit?

2. can anything exist without the medium to transfer it? doesn't the medium then become part of the information, because it is a) necessary to the transmitting and b) as stated earlier, affects the raw data/art/information? are there millions of ideas and feelings floating about that we aren't even aware of and we have only found mediums to describe a small, small percentage of the total? that doesn't mean that those ideas/feelings/whatever don't exist just because we can see/understand/articulate them? or does it?

interface ?'s

after reading through the text i think i see the connection between blade runner and the interface, but Is the article about connecting the two or about the interface itself?
i see the connections that they rule contemporary culture, and both have been built on and concepts have evolved from the originals that creates much of modern day culture but i feel as the author was using it as a connection for and introduction and it was not meant to be dwelled upon throughout the article.
a quote from page 67 ," to change the interface even slightly is to change the work dramatically" this quote struck my memory to a quote from the movie and helped me to make a connection in the text

i found the connection between the "non-transparency of the code" concept and the Whorf- Sapir hypothesis very confusing what point was the author trying to make in this part of the article?