ars electronica 2009 – human nature – church2 min read

“The more they know about you, the less you exist” – de Kerckhove citing McLuhan

its sunday. feels abit like church, listening to schmidt-salomon, beyond good and evil. #ars09

lawrence malstaf, winner of the golden nica in interactive art, made a funny at the end of his presentation: two planets meet somewhere in the universe. one asks: how are you doing? the other says: not too good, i have homo sapiens. responds the first: oh, don’t worry, it will pass.

jens wunderling, winner of an award of distinction in the interactive art category for default to public, plays around with using twitter status messages in a different context, like printing them as stickers or projecting them in public spaces in the streets of berlin. he realised that some people were outraged at this, surprising in a sense, since it is out there on the internet and available to the public anyway.

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here’s a thought: how come everyone is blogging, twittering, flickring during these conferences yet as soon as the round table public discussions are about to start many get up and leave? sometimes it feels so autistic sitting here surrounded by people yet staring at this screen all the time.

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yesterday i happened to sit close by when derrick de kerckhove met his friends after the morning session, minutes after finishing his talk. he asked his friends, what did yo think? to go ahead and answer himself “ze german… he was … pheeww” big sigh, significant eye movement, letting the sentence trail off, clearly showing his admiration for, even intimidation by schmidt-salomon

it felt like i got a small glimpse beyond his public persona. here was this guy, considered to be one of the top intellectuals in the field, director of the mcluhan institute, eloquent speaker to boot etc. asf. yet even he gets insecure when he meets another man who seems to be smarter than himself.

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americans have this expression, if you cant make it, fake it. for them faking is nothing bad, for europeans faking something has a dishonest ring to it. but if you think about it, why should it? if you start faking something, you start to do it. and practice makes perfect, would be another saying that fits here.

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interesting moment when the jury member asks the winner of the golden nica in the category interactive art, so, what is interactive about your piece? exactly my question. because the answer that lawrence malstaf gave did not satisfy me; all art should hopefully interact with mental processes in the onlooker, that does not make it interactive art.