[nodel-discuss] nodel news mailing list july experiment proposal

[Armin Medosch]

Hi Julie and all

sorry, but 'technology and its aesthetic' was just too tempting. I did
not try to give any definition of media art which would cover all
practices. the main point that my little intervention was meant to
highlight was about 'shared spaces for reciprocal exchanges'as opposed
to 'technology and its aesthetic'. This was not to have a fundamental
discussion about the definition of media art old and new (which is
probably also long overdue but not my concern in the first place) but
because this is a question which is relevant for the development of the
site. 

In my understanding, maybe I am wrong, please correct me, Node.L was
initiated to create a season for media arts in london that was
self-organised, somehow based on mutally agreed decisions making
processes largely free of conventional hierarchies, decentralised and
also 'open'. The website under development is supposed to, I think,
express those values and also offer itself as a communication
infrastructure which fosters those values and types of practices. It is
an 'architecture for participation', as Juha from Pixelache I think it
was, termed such a thing a few years ago. The ways this 'architecture'
allows communications to flow and interactions to happen is a
non-trivial question, it goes far beyond designing a data base. 

Thus, after the great work that Lisa had already done in that direction
I felt that repeated calls for now sticking some design on the site
would obfuscate some of the real issues at stake such as the question of
usage and purpose. I am very interested in good design or aesthetics yet
that also poses the question what is good design? After half a year of
structural work now quickly plugging some flash-laden templates on to it
to create a 'showcase' for some 'art' or the other, is that really so
desirable?  Good design would be integrated with the more structural
'design' decisions made by Lisa and those who support her work following
a form follows function approach. Such a design would probably need to
grow out of the usage that is made of the site in a 'beta' type phase
wth early adopters and not just glued on top of an existing structure.
And it would probably need some close collaboration between design and
information architecture

so much for now, cheers
armin


-- 
thenextlayer software, art, politics http://www.thenextlayer.org