How Does New Technology Help the Arts - Research Paper Example

HOW DOES NEW TECHNOLOGY HELP THE ARTS? by How Does Technology Help the Arts? A.INTRODUCTION In the popular mind of the past, technology was associated with poor reputation when one spoke of creativity. Computers, the fruit of technological revolution, had been related to mere calculations, word processing, banking, and science until the time the World Wide Web was invented. Surprisingly, with the spread of the Internet and innovative software, the boundaries between technology and art started blurring. As a result, interactions between artists and technologists determined the impact of the computer (digital) technology on creative process. Today many artists and digital media specialists agree that technology helps the arts. They point out at the context of the digital society we now live in and how it influences the ways the art gets created, marketed, produced, supported, preserved, distributed, as well as transformed. This paper explores how new technology and digital media help the arts. Objectives The objectives of this research paper were as follows: Provide an overview of contemporary knowledge on the topic of the impact of technology on the arts and on the topic of how technology helps the arts. Determine how new technologies affect the arts in a positive way The paper was intended to provide response to the following question: What positive impacts and what opportunities has technology created/ is creating for the arts, artists, the public, etc? Approach and Methodology It was determined to focus the paper on modern, in particular digital technologies and shape the scope of the research with emphasis on the arts. It was reinforced that the paper should provide information with reference to various arts, various art disciplines, and various art practices if possible. Also, it was reinforced that the research should concentrate on how technology influences creation, production and different ways in which artworks reach the general public. Throughout the research, the author reviewed English-language material and researched publicly-released data from UK and international sources; synthesized information. B. ARTS AND TECHNOLOGIES: LOGICS OF HYBRIDIZATION The hybridization of technology and the arts, as it has been assumed in modern studies, began in the 15th century with the invention of printing and distribution. Connection of the literary tradition with distributive power of the printing technology changed the whole European civilization. The value of cultural hybridization as the fundamental logic of cultural change has been convincingly demonstrated in the research by Marshall McLuhan (McLuhan, 1962; McLuhan, 2001). In particular, using an example of the distribution of the press, McLuhan demonstrates the decisive role of this technology in the cultural dynamics of the period between the 15t and 19th centuries. In the scholarly terminology, the printing technology may be described as the first level of the hybrid of technology and art. In its essence, the printing technology does not define the aesthetic content of art work distribution, yet its use can well have an impact on the artistic content which is being distributed (here: the literature in its broadest meaning), transforming the form of distribution in purely independent art (for example, graphic design, fonts). It may then stimulate the expansion of the variety of literary forms, available in printed format. In addition, the advent of printing marked a fundamental shift from the ancient ‘techno’ and technology - which were about the finesse and skill of a human working with his hand to deliver the product of creativity - to technology which became the logics of self-alienated production. This way it may well be thought to be a harbinger of the machine age (Benjamin, 2008). At the end of the 19th - at the beginning of the 20th century art’s hybridization with technology shifted to a new level in the aesthetics of cinema. Cinema evolved as a hybrid, whose aesthetic (visual) content was largely dictated by theatrical and dramatic narrative frameworks. Cinema became the hybrid of the second level. Specifically, the creative process in the film is completely determined by the technological system of production (fine critique of cinema as a technology is found in the classic work by Walter Benjamin The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction (Benjamin, 2008), where the “anatomy” of hybridization, as well as its aesthetic, social, and political significance was shown theoretically. Although in Walter Benjamin’s view the film remains the same literature (in particular, drama), the visual aesthetics of the camera and film editing, as well as computer art today make it possible to allocate the field of film apart from narrative visual art. In addition, due to technological opportunities in the film a more complex artistic hybridization takes place. Namely, it is about literature, theater, art, music, and the visual arts merging in a new configuration of the genre. The distributive capabilities of the film were reinforced by TV broadcast in the middle of the 20th century. Alongside the rapid development of cinematography, the machine and technology, as the driving forces behind the transformation of art and culture, came to the forefront of the European avant-garde of the early 20th century. Russian Constructivists (Tatlin, Vetrov, Gabo), Italian Futurists (F.Marinetti, L.Rusollo), and representatives of the German Bauhaus school (O.Shlemmer, L.Maholi-Nagy) created a new aesthetic ideology of techno-artistic hybridization, where the technology starts to dictate the form and content. The embodiment of this ideology continued in the avant-garde movements of the 20th century which marked the coming of the ‘machine age’. The idea of ​​‘machine’ within this techno-artistic ideology was looked at as an abstraction of technology with an emphasis on increasing the autonomy of operation. Thanks to the artistic avant-garde, to hybrids of the second level, along with the advent of film, spatial light sculptures, film projection accompaniment of musical and theatrical performances, and musical sound production were added. The so-called technological art came to existence, which will be discussed in the next paragraph. Since then, as the well-known French art critic Frank Popper observes (Popper, 2007), during the twentieth century the integration of art and technology was permanent and irreversible. It has affected the whole genre structure of modern art within the framework of the popular and high aesthetics. Another well-known artist and scholar of art and technology Margot Lovejoy describes the specifics of the cybernetic and digital art not only as the creation of hybrid technology tools and artistic genres, but also as a spread of inter-genre hybridization (e.g., film and computer graphics), which is possible due to computer technology (Lovejoy , 2004). Since the mid-twentieth century, thanks to cybernetics and computer science, we see the formation of techno-artistic hybrids of the third level. Here the technological foundation often almost completely redefines the aesthetics. Computer and video games, electronic music, virtual reality models, algorithmic art, robotic sculpture, and interactive installations are not possible without a system of cybernetic control and continuous operation of its technological base. Hybrids of the third level set a fundamentally different aesthetics whose peculiar features are changes in real time, procedural character, openness, interactivity, active involvement of the audience, dematerialization of the art object. They form a new aesthetic experience. Analysis of the formation of artistic practices, which are mainly based on computer technologies (hybrids of the third level) suggests, on the one hand, the account of self-reliance and mutual independence of the spheres of art and technology. We should not forget that computer technology, for example, originally was not related to the world of art. On the other hand, the new digital art is born at the intersection of art and technology tools. In this context, the complex issues of impact of technology on the arts arise within the cultural discourse, which will be discussed further. HYBRIDS OF TECHNOLOGY AND ART: CREATIVE AND DISTRIBUTIONAL The author will consider the techno-art hybrids using an example of the popular mass culture since the latter play a crucial role in it today. In the Table 1 techno-art hybrids are presented in the framework of the specific genre of the popular culture and described by the use of items regarding computer technology. Creative (genre) Infrastructure Technology Visual Effects / Animation Video Games Animated films and models Digital visual effects in movies Web-animation CD-R, DVD, video game cartridges, "video on demand" (on-line, cable tsif.tv) Gaming portals on-line, open-source game development for users Graphic engines, Artificial Intelligence, Artificial Life, genetic algorithms 3D modeling, Flash animation, Java Digital video compression (mpeg, avi) Music Electronic music (dance, electronic) Pop music (computer processing and assembly) Ringtones Same as creative Internet and TV advertising formats Java, html, flash, vrml, www Raster and vector graphics, databases, etc. Specialized tools, Studio max, AutoCAD, Solid Works. Adobe Design Package, CorelDraw, etc. Literature Hypertext narrative literature and journalism Digital libraries and systems with electronic sources Digital audio books E-books Java, Http, Www, PDF, digital scans Digital recording and compression of audio in various formats Performing Arts Special visual effects for concerts and theater productions Robot show (sports, toys) Direct Internet broadcasts concerts DVD-documenting art events Web-Streaming video, html, java Video mixing in real time Special development of AI, sensors, satellite navigation, etc (Galkin, 2008) In this example we can see that the techno-art hybridization depends, first of all, on the essence of the genre. This is quite clearly shown by the scope of artistic practices of the popular culture. It is quite easy to establish the artistic genre of its hybrid technology ‘genetics’. In addition, the table shows the two types of techno-art hybrids: creative (creative) and infrastructure (distributive). In creative hybrids, the artistic content of the genre is dictated by the use of technological elements (e.g., in a narrative or in an animated film), and conversely, the nature of technology defines the parameters of the creative implementation (technology of functioning of the Internet of to speak about the network art). Infrastructure hybrids are a kind of ‘messengers’ of the arts, in other words, they are technology intermediaries between artists and their fans (for example, distribution is very important for cinema). Digital DVD-ROM with a film or a computer CDR-ROM containing a collection of art or art project, serve precisely this purpose and may seem to have only an indirect relationship to the creative process. Similarly, the website of the popular Tate Modern gallery in London (Tate Modern), which presents in an electronic form the Museums collection, is also a distributive hybrid, but this does not detract from those creative solutions that are embodied in this work by the website designers. From the table above and its sample typology, it is clear that contemporary art is fundamentally different due to its distributive character, which does not necessarily mean its mass character and loss of authenticity (‘aura’ in Benjamin’s terms). In some cases (for example, film and DVD, graphic design or hypertext Literature on the Internet) infrastructure and creative hybrids merge into one (Grusin, 2007). NEW DEFINITION OF ART WITHIN TECHNOLOGICAL FRAMEWORK The impact of technology on the art have led to advent of the new terminology to describe the new art. Modern studies of art and technology use various terms: ‘media art’ (Daniels, 2002), ‘new media art’ (Rush, 2005), ‘computer art’ (Weiss), ‘digital art’ (Paul, 2003), ‘cybernetic art’ (Cybernetic Serendipity, 1968), the ‘technological arts’(Popper, 2005), ‘information art’ (Wilson, 2002), ‘hybrid art’ (Stocker, 2005), and ‘ virtual art’ (Grau, 2003). Terminological differences are at times vague, as for example, between the information and the virtual art, yet sometimes they are more or less clear, as between computer and digital art (digital technology, at least, are used not only in computers). Matthias Weiss (Weiss) defines computer art based on the fact that it is: a) based on digital technologies, and b) involves artistic creativity, which is impossible without computers, and c) that its works lose their meaning without using a computer, and d) it belongs to a massive artistic movement which has its roots in modernism, and e) it builds a certain strategic or linear relationship with the aesthetic context as a whole. Bruce Wands (Wands, 2006), focuses on the translation of scientific knowledge and technology through digital computer art, and especially peculiarities of its perception by the viewer. For Steven Wilson (Wilson, 2002), all of this is a special case of multiple artistic experiments to which artists inspire scientific knowledge. A study by Olivier Grau (Grau, 2003) clearly shows that the most important achievement of the use of computers in the world of art - for example, virtual reality immersion systems - just continue the tradition of Virtual Art, born from ancestors of modern humans in their caves. Technological Arts The term ‘technological arts’ was proposed by the French historian and art critic Frank Popper (Popper, 2005), who is a significant authority in the field of research into techno-cultural hybridization in the history of art. From his point of view, technological art is the result of a fundamental integration of art and technology, rather than a simple aesthetization of the latter. We can observe the active development of technological art before and after the emergence of computer technology. Light sculptures of the past have become laser holographic installations (Roger Malina), film projecting installations have been replaced by the video-and tele-projection works (video art) with the transformation of the image in real time. It is thanks to cybernetics and computer engineering technology that the technological vanguard have given new impetus to the development of contemporary art. Cybernetic Art In the post-war world of the 1950s the rapid development of cybernetics and computer technology became the main context of the transformation of technological art. In strict accordance with the basic idea of Cybernetics of the need of interrelationship between the living and inanimate world (Wiener, 1983), technology became interactive. In this context, one should mention interactive machines and sculptures by Pask, computer music by Hiller, Xenakis and Mathews, cyber-theatre by Robert Rauschenberg, algorithmic art and animation ( Noll, Shuri, Knowlton, Mohr and others ) (Galkin, 2008). The changes were possible after the computer had been successfully tested not only as a tool of cybernetic control, but as a machine capable of independent creativity - as a thinking machine (Ihnatowicz, 1971). That formed a new vision of the possibilities of using computer technology in an artistic context. In particular, that was possible thanks to the capabilities of the computer to demonstrate the universal handling of any type of data – digitization of any type of information. At the time these functions of computer technology start to run fast enough technically and process a sufficiently large volume of data, and digitizing combines them into a single system, the cybernetic art goes digital. It starts losing its materiality machine and moves to a new virtual space of art objects. Digital Art Computers had long been available only in research (university) and business (corporate) centers. However, in 1970 they became the first commercial prototypes to conquer the market of consumer electronics. These were the video games - interactive electronic systems that first turned into small home computers based on microprocessors and digital data processing (the first games console manufacturers were companies such as Atari, Sierra, Nintendo, etc.). Video gaming was the first and unique largely interactive techno-art hybrid which was appropriated by the popular culture (Galkin, 2008). Modern triumphal march of digital art has touched all aspects of cultural production (Galkin, 2007). Computer three-dimensional visual effects and animation created an entirely new visual landscape of the 1990s. That majorly affected the mass cultural production. The cinema has become, in fact, hard to distinguish from computer animation in terms of visual quality and technology of production (due to leaders in this field - Pixar, Silicon Graphics, etc). Graphic and industrial design switched to computer-aided tools (CAD). Also, one can witness as the art of photography and photorealistic graphics also switched to the digital format. CONCLUSION The research has helped determine how technology impacts the art in a positive way. i.e. helps the arts. First of all, it broadens its boundaries through creation of new genres. Next, it plays a crucial role in the distribution of art to the public and makes it accessible virtually for anyone. Also, technology often dictates form and content. It has enabled people to experience art in virtual reality as if it was in real life. Further, it has led to appearance of new branches of culture: digital art, technological art, cybernetic art, etc. Reference List Daniels, D 2002, Media → Art / Art → Media: Forerunners of media art in the first half of the twentieth century, viewed 23 Apr 2013 at http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/themes/overview_of_media_art/forerunners/1/ Galkin, D 2008, Understanding interactivity: Artistic reflections on cybernetics. In Robert Trappl (ed) Cybernetics and Systems. Volume 2. Austrian Society for Cybernetic Studies, Vienna, 126-132. Grau, O 2003, Virtual art: From illusion to immersion. MIT Press (Leonardo), Cambridge-London. Ihnatowicz, E 1976, Towards thinking machines. In R.Leavitt (ed.) Artist and Computer. Creative Computing Press. Morristown, New Jersey. Harmony Books New York, 44-47. Lovejoy, M 2004, Digital currents: Art in the electronic age. New York Taylor & Francis. McLuhan, M 2001, Understanding media, Routledge. McLuhan, M 1962, The Gutenberg galaxy: The making of typographic man. University of Toronto Press. Paul, C 2003, Digital Art. London: Thames & Hudson. Rush, M 2005, New media in art. Thames & Hudson. Noll, A 1971, The digital computer as a creative medium. In Jasia Riechard (Ed) Cybernetics. Art and Ideas. Studio Vista, London, 143-164. Pask, P 1971, A comment, a case history, and a plan. In Jasia Riechard (Ed) Cybernetics. Art and Ideas. Studio Vista, London, 1971, 76-110 Popper, F 2007, From Technological to Virtual Art. MIT Press (Leonardo), Cambridge-London. Stocker, G, Sommerer, C 2005 HYBRID – Living in Paradox. In HYBRID – Living in Paradox: Ars Electronica festival. Ars Electronica Centre, Linz, Austria. Grusin, R 2007, DVDs, video games and the cinema of interactions. Multimedia Histories: From Magic Latern to the Internet. University of Exeter Press. Wands, B 2006, Art of the Digital Age. Thames & Hudson. Weiss, M. What is Computer Art? An attempt towards an answer and examples of interpretation, viewed 26 Apr 2013 at http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/themes/generative-tools/computer_art/ Wilson, S 2002, Information arts. Intersections of art, science, and technology. MIT Press (Leonardo). Read More