Beyond Contemporary Art by Etan Jonathan Ilfeld (review)

The author Ethan Jonathan Ilfeld published his first book Beyond Contemporary Art to share his passion for contemporary art. Thus in no way should it be taken as a compendium of artists illustrating a trend in contemporary art. Ilfeld selected 85 artists/groups of artists, providing for each of them a summary of their work with high-quality illustrations and a website address—official websites, which do not necessarily come up when we enter artists’ names in an online search engine, are extremely useful not only to get further insight into the artists’ backgrounds, work and ideas, but also to hear artists reporting directly about their work. An overwhelming majority of these selected artists are from Western Europe and North America. Russians are almost nonexistent, and there is a small representation for Asia, the Middle East and South America. Artists are classified alphabetically to avoid any categorization. Ilfeld leaves it to readers to devise their own. However, a “selection” implies a level of subjectivity. So what are Ilfeld’s criteria? He is particularly interested in digital art and in artists who create new art forms by mixing various disciplines and practices, including performance, sculpture, architecture, painting, graffiti, design and new media. By bringing them together, he simply hopes to inspire people to think about what contemporary art is—by nature almost indefinable in that artists are constantly pushing boundaries.

In his excellent introduction, Ilfeld reminds us about the current and rapid globalization of the contemporary art market with the blossoming of art fairs, festivals and galleries (both corporate-sponsored and alternative), the opening of modern/contemporary art museums and art schools around the world, the acquisition of contemporary artworks by institutions and private collectors, traveling blockbuster art exhibitions, etc. In this vibrant art “ecosystem,” a cross-disciplinary discourse has emerged, fed by leading art schools and artists themselves. Thus it is not unusual to see trained scientists or designers choose the artistic route to experiment with and communicate their ideas. For example, Patrick Tresset, armed with a degree in computing science, decided to become an artist, exploring nature through drawing. Following a nervous breakdown, he could no longer find inspiration to draw and returned to computing by creating a robot that sketches: AIkon—a genuine art-science integration. Sputniko!, armed with a bachelor’s degree in computer science and mathematics, continued on to a master’s degree in design interactions and currently designs a wide range of devices that sit on the borderline between art and industrial design, such as Menstruation Machine, Nanohana Heel and Pénis Cybernetique. Marina Kassianidou graduated with two bachelor’s degrees, one in computer science and another in studio art. Her practice shows the overlap between art and science, such as creating camouflages to invite viewers to seek beyond what they see. Usman Haque, an architect by training, experiments with architecture-based projects to show how digital technologies are changing our built spaces, taking into account the presence of the people who inhabit these spaces. It is striking to note how younger artists appear to be more market aware. Furthermore, they are better integrated than their older peers in the establishment either in academic institutions holding senior teaching posts or in the business community working on commissions for prestigious corporate brands. Stephanie Posavec specializes in data visualization and information design. Amongst other works, she has designed an artist theme for the Google Chrome browser and a visual index embedded in Stephen Fry’s MyFry iPhone. She created the artwork of limited editions of Haruki Murakami’s 1Q84, for a new edition of Oscar Wilde’s The Picture of Dorian Gray, for a series of album covers for the American rock band OK Go and for projects with various researchers and designers at Microsoft.

Beyond their educational background or market acumen, most of the artists listed in this book experiment with a wide range of art practices and disciplines. Ai Weiwei, a political activist for the freedom of speech, is a real polymath...