Digital Director’s Statement: The Digital and the Physical

Digital Director’s Statement The Digital and the Physical With the evolution of digital technologies, human beings have had to learn how to adapt to their new conditions. Social, physical, and even esthetic concerns have been reexamined . As members of this digital evolution, some artists have heightened their role as communicators and estheticians by choosing to address the changes wrought by technology with, through, or against technology. As one seeks to define the work of a digital artist, one realizes that another role becomes evident — that of the tinkerer, the problem solver, the Curious George. The participants in the Seventh New York Digital Salon are seeking to create an esthetic component — be it in vision, touch, sound, or spirit — that can be found in the confusion of digital technologies and our reactions to it. An overall survey would find that this show has sampled from an eclectic batch. These artists hail from places around the world, and in their work they reveal their variances and similarities. The NYDS7 seeks a model of pluralism. Digital art can be accessible to all ages and backgrounds. Within the exhibition, different artists demonstrate that they can share a common ground. As I write this, I have just completed the installation of the NYDS6 in its final stop in Lisbon. The show has previously visited (and been visited by) the communities of Madrid, Barcelona, Alicante, and Las Palmas, Spain, and Milan, Italy. Never before has my impression of digital art as a physical art form been more acute. Having visited many different locations, I have seen how each work can change based upon its location in physical space. I have seen reactions to each work that are tinged by language barriers or cultural customs. There is a physical and social component to digital art that cannot be fully experienced by simply flipping through the catalog or surfing the Web site. Visitors to this year’s show should watch how this physical and social attribute plays out in the interactive sculpture Crok by Alejandro Dron. Here two different participants can control two different parts of the sculpture. Each “driver” can work independently of the other, or together they can orchestrate a rhythmic beat. The sculpture can take on a musical quality through collaboration. The rhythm can be sonorous or cacophonous. Ana Giron’s sculpture, Artificial Time, is activated by a visitor to her Web site. The viewer in the gallery can watch as a participant in another time zone activates the sculpture to adjust to the absent participant’s hour. Time takes on a physical component. Digital technology, while invisible, still captivates and communicates. I myself feel that I have stepped physically into a world of networks and nodes as I have traveled from city to city, established new acquaintances and friends, learned new languages, reacted to new customs, and saw unaccustomed viewers react to the digital art on display. Digital art has a democratizing ability that may prove to make art more accessible and actually more human. Today we often worry that digital technology has dehumanized us with thinking machines that take over our every move — see Loretta Skeddle’s CyberRosary, a network of linked computers that will pray for you — yet artists using this digital fabric may in fact demonstrate that our emotions and responses to it are more physical than we give them credit for. Kirsten Solberg 412 Digital Salon, Director’s Statement ...