Kunst Raum
Goethestraße in cooperation with Fakultaet
Big f, little f. One is a political label; the other is
a state of mind, a personal philosophy by which to
live.
Airlie Bussell: *Talking Up*, p. 133
"In 'Generation f: Sex, Power & the Young
Feminist,' Virginia Trioli eloquently captures the impact of
feminism on many dimensions of young women's lives today. She
examines the significance of the 1994 AGB McNair telephone poll in
which 70 % of young women polled in Sydney and Melbourne said they
would not call themselves feminist. Trioli highlighted the paradox
implicit in these numbers. Of course they believe in equal pay, a
fair justice system, harassment-free workplaces and sexual freedom.
This then raises several questions. What do the 70 % call these
beliefs, if not feminism? And amongst the 30 % who "identify" as
feminists, what else (if anything) do they see as feminist?
Rosamunde Else-Mitchell & Naomi Flutter: Talking Up. Young
Women's Take On Feminism
The methods used by young artists
of this generation-in comparison to those of the '70s, '80s and
'90s-also invite a similarly ambivalent discussion. So-called "girl
culture" makes use of the entertainment industry to draw attention
to itself with "sex, fun & style" (Baldauf). Generation f
rehashes, slices 'n' dices, copies and remixes the "found footage"
of mainstream culture in order to thus render the Zeitgeist in
intensified and exaggerated form. Its members are appropriating and
redefining terms, or recontextualizing familiar labels and
categories. The results permit us to visualize in ways that are
often bizarre, odd, droll or even ridiculous the extent to which our
society and our social environment are constructs.
The
origin of cyberfeminism, however, is also an example of such an
artificial construct: "... female artists, activists and
theoreticians (...) use the potential of the concept of
cyberfeminism, which is the result of its contradictory nature and
lack of clarity. (...) An important strategy of cyberfeminism in
this sense is the use of irony. Irony deals in humor and earnest
play. Only by means of irony can irreconcilable stances and points
of departure be maintained. All of these irreconcilable points of
view are necessary and important, and generate a frightful tension.
Thus, cyberfeminism is not only a rhetorical strategy but also a
political method. There is an urgent need for a new concept of
politics. Models from previous decades are no longer getting the job
done. This expanded concept of politics must embrace the possibility
of being paradoxical and utopian. It is oppositional, can argue from
different standpoints simultaneously, and nevertheless makes
sensible political action possible. A concept of politics that
simulates politics and is at the same time politically effective.
With such a concept of politics, we are returning once again to the
proximity of art." (C. Sollfrank in: netz.kunst, Yearbook 98/99‚
published by the Institute for Modern Art, Nürnberg, p. 78).
Feminists of the second wave women's movement, on the other
hand, regard being a part of the subcultural milieu as a
prerequisite for critique and social change. For example, in the moo
xxero Panel Room recently, Nova complained that being freed from
burden of doing the labor of reproduction did not represent the
fulfillment of the 1970s feminists' dream. After all, they had never
called for a freedom that is dependent on multinational
conglomerates. It is the power of capitalism that robs the people of
their utopias and dreams by making the dreams come true and selling
them back to those same people at a high price.
Young female
artists, though, create utopias just like they used to. They
construe themselves from scratch and create new social entities that
they themselves-and perhaps society too-would like to have, since
the masquerade and the switching back and forth between genders and
systems makes traditional roles become blurred. Media (video and
computer) have always assumed an important role here; within these
realms, experiments can be carried out without encountering
conventional patriarchic structures. Nevertheless, processes of
transformation are underway, and these make it unavoidable to
confront the changed demands of communication technologies, means of
assuring ones ongoing ability to survive professionally and make a
living, as well as a society that is redefining its structures.
These circumstances create new patterns of behavior: in the area of
capabilities/fields of expertise and methodological approaches,
analyses of the culture of everyday life and social
interrelationships.
It has been said over and over again
that women use the Internet differently. They use it as a tool.
Networks serve as a means of exchanging and disseminating
information, as a meeting place in the virtual domain. The new
Generation f does not primarily utilize women's networks as networks
by and for women, but rather as a mechanism to exchange ideas with
each other and to meet one another. That the network itself becomes
the object of an artistic strategy has to do with the focus of those
who are the driving forces behind it. In going about this, so-called
patchwork biographies are part of the strategies in the artistic
field: adaptation of production methods and approaches to work from
the worlds of business and social services as well as the mechanisms
of a Fun Culture make for a smooth transition from production,
services and the representation of social interconnections. Mixed
realities and mixed media visualize themselves in everyday life just
as they do in art, and vice versa.
In Project female takeover - ff, seven female artists and
groups of female artists working under pseudonyms treat the cluster
of so-called female strategies to link together the non-material
world of the WWW and the material world of real life. They will
confront the methods of the feminist practice of net art (in which
Kathy Rae Huffman, Faith Wilding, Cornelia Sollfrank, Victoria Vesna
and many others are regarded as pioneers who have made a name for
themselves with important, trend-setting works in the WWW) and the
strategies of younger female artists (Nine Budde, Snergurtuschka,
Lina Hoshino, Cue P Doll, N.N.) who discuss purportedly feminist
issues in generalizable, more open, and often ironic forms. To get
things started: What would be appropriate strategies towards
feminism if one proceeds under the assumption that Generation f
wishes to distance itself from this concept? And: does the brief
half-life of works, issues, positions and debates necessitate more
flexible networks in contrast to longer-term concepts?
PROJECTS
Rachel
Baker Cultural Terrorist Agency (CTA)
Rachel Baker is part of the panel I of Kunst Raum, which
presents new strategies by young female artists. Currently embarking
on a residency at HTBA (http://www.timebase.org/).
Rachel Baker hopes to implement an independent media distribution
network facility in Hull. The exploitation of the workplace is an
ongoing project. As part of Cultural Terrorist Agency
(*http://www.irational.org/cta*) she is responsible for strategies
in raising funds for projects that promote cultural interference.
The most recent CTA project to be unleashed was GirM, a brand of
genetically modified goods placed discreetly on supermarket shelves.
The Cultural Terrorist Agency (CTA) is a funding agency committed to
supporting contestation of property and representation. CTA turns
its enemies´ best weapon, that being investment, back onto itself.
Nine Bude
Im Versagen Schön
Sein
What initiated the thought process of this experiment
was the question of how to emotionalize German brains despite their
strongly context/technology/content-oriented way of thinking. It
became clear to me that this was above all a problem of language.
The more monotonous and unmelodic the voice while speaking the
language, the more content-oriented the listener. A book about 13th
century poetry I came across led me to the conclusion that the
solution was to be found in the reintroduction of Middle High
German-a language that is considerably more flexible and (for us)
funnier. A solution equivalent to this would be to reintroduce
courtly love. Analogous to the basically rather unemotional process
of German communication is, in my view, communication in the
Information Age. It suggests emotions but fails to place any
appropriate media at their disposal. At the very least, SMS and
e-mails function in a most one-sided fashion, and are rather to be
understood as play prostheses. My answer is playfully construed: a
1.80 meter high medieval castle made of wooden trash and featuring
integrated courtly love-Karaoke. The knight/dame stands in front of
the house of the object of his/her courtly love and sings along to
the Karaoke into a microphone. This Karaoke is a
compilation-partially refrains with a strophe, partially just
refrains. This communication pruning leads to confusion and,
subsequently to data jams. Nevertheless, the one-sided dialogue
situation accelerates the occurrence of an intuitive clash among all
participants, regardless of whether one is in love or not, since
similar feelings are being produced by the courtly love-adapter and
the abstruseness of the situation.
Hypothesis: the Information
Age is not just a matter of using communication technologies to get
information but also of emotional communication with the help of
technology.
(The medieval castle is based on an actionist work in
the public sphere that was installed for the first time in May
2001.)
Cue P. Doll
CueCat
*CueCat* is a cat-shaped barcode scanner distributed for
free at stores in the US and to subscribers of certain magazines
worldwide. Consumers plug *CueCat* into their computers and then
scan product barcodes in order to be instantly whisked to
advertising webpages for the products scanned. Digital artist Cue P.
Doll was frustrated with the smug assumption of
consumerism-as-leisure-activity evident in the concept of *CueCat*,
as well as the closed system by which *CueCat* feeds the consumer
specifically dictated corporate information under the guise of
interactivity. So Cue P. created CueJack, software that works with
the *CueCat* scanner in place of its packaged software. CueJack
subverts and parodies the *CueCat* concept by allowing *CueCat*
scans to dig up information on the web about corporate misbehavior
by the products' manufacturers. In its "normal" state, *CueCat*
transmits identifying serial numbers with each scan in order to
allow the *CueCat*'s manufacturers to archive information on what
products individual consumers buy. In response CueJack software by
default transmits randomly forged serial numbers instead - but
allows any consumer who prefers to be tracked by corporations the
unusual opportunity to "opt-in" to corporate tracking.
CueJack is
currently available for Windows and Linux and is distributed
courtesy of RTMark. More information on CueJack is available at http://www.cuejack.com/ or http://www.rtmark.com/cuejack.
Lina Hoshino
Chillin'
Woman
Multi-faceted and with a paradoxical life of
negotiating business, art, and life, Lina Hoshino is a graphic
designer, artist, and activist. In her work she initiates questions
like: How does an artist resolve the paradox of the personal need
for expression while financially supporting herself? How does
simultaneously working on opposite sides of the political spectrum,
and blurring the lines between business, art and political
expression sometimes strengthen and sometimes harm the creative
process?
There are benefits to having a consulting income. Most
of my art and activism projects do not have to answer to any
institution or any particular audiences because in most cases, I do
not depend on funding from grants or larger institution. In some
respects, I have the flexibility to work with fluidity. Many of my
projects draw from my personal experiences as a single heterosexual
Asian American woman living and working in San Francisco community
within the larger context of the fluctuating dot-com and global
economy. I work in a wide range of media including video, computer
graphics, stickering, animation and ceramics, and anything that
seems most appropriate for a particular purpose. The projects are
mostly small scale, low budget, quick and manageable for practical
as well as strategic reasons.
For female
takeover - ff the project is focused on strategies which
emphasize:
o Accessing a wide audience beyond traditional
gallery patrons by utilizing the internet, cable access television,
the streets, and appropriating popular communication language
without compromising the quality or the message.
o A belief that
art should be functional and useful in daily life
o Importance of
collaboration by recruiting different specialists to strengthen the
project
o Feminist tradition of drawing from personal
experiences to address larger issues such as the global economy.
Leigh Haas
flora&fauna
media
*flora&fauna media* is an integrating pole at
the intersection of two sets: cultural mainstream and underground.
To this can be added wide-ranging contacts in the media, art and
music scene as well as a pronounced affinity to young urban culture.
*flora&fauna media* puts together the optimal crew for you, to
make your project a complete success from planning to realization.
Commercial interests and artistic demands are fluidly and credibly
interwoven and ensure a lasting, far-reaching communications
success.
SNEGURUTSCHKA
snegurutschka presents a 16-minute women's film that
clears up a few things:
that a one-room apartment has fewer
m²
that to eat breakfast, chewing is indispensable (whether you
read the newspaper or not)
that women take in the linens before
watering the flowers, and that in order to fall asleep, the eyes are
best kept shut ...)
Cornelia
Sollfrank
Die Utopie des Rollenwechsels
Her project is
an inquiry into the contemporary image of the artist. Who specifies
the roles and defines in whose interest they are played, and says
whether social workers or hackers are the artists of today or
tomorrow? Posing a few choice questions localizes, behind this
purported fluidity, traditional power structures whose
representatives understandably have little interest in loosening up
their crusted hierarchies. The ostensible Takeover serves only to
revitalize the art system and to force fresh impulses and ideas into
the classic conceptions of artistic space, presentation and
representation.
Faith
Wilding
subRosa
I am active with the cyberfeminist
cultural research and production group subRosa, which describes
itself as a "reproducible" cyberfeminist cell, focusing on issues in
biotechnology, new reproductive technologies, feminist health
activism, feminist theories of difference, feminist cyborg and body
theory, and gender and technology. SubRosa works with new media and
digital technologies in tactical ways. Through embodying our
differences and our conflicts in both work and conviviality we are
evolving fluid forms of collective work across disciplinary and
generational boundaries. Members have skills and experience in
producing video, digital imaging and animation, photography, WEB
pages etc. As well, we do a lot of theoretical research, writing,
and publishing. We are interested in combinations of high and low
tech, and in detouring consumer electronics. A factor with strong
impact on the collective is the increased competition and
professionalization of art careers within graduate schools and
universities which a tight job-market and over-production of MFA's
have contributed to. In our professional positions in institutions
there is pressure to produce and show our "own" work. No matter how
successful a collective may be, it is still hard to get
institutional recognition and support for collective work. The
process of working with electronic media and digital technologies
requires interdisciplinary collaboration and knowledge. Our
challenge is increasingly to produce and distribute our activist
critical work in and through the larger field of the social, and in
different venues such as clinics, schools, trade shows, public
spaces, etc. For subRosa this means working with many different
individuals, groups, and networks - healthworkers, scientists,
ecologists, theorists, agriculturalists, and the like.
Mariko Horo
Profession: Time and Space
Traveler Art Form: 3-D Horogram
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