Journal for Artistic Research: a focal point for diverse artistic voices
"Introducing a high-quality journal in the field allows an ever-increasing number of artistic researchers to partake in what for the sciences and humanities are standard academic publication procedures. Given that artistic research has become a worldwide movement with many local activities, JAR can serve as a focal point, bringing together diverse voices, facilitating the discourse and thus improving the artistic research community.
In the context of JAR, artistic research is doubly defined: insofar as it is research, it enhances knowledge and understanding; because it is artistic, however, the mode of presentation is essential. This definition excludes works of art that share modes of presentation with artistic research, but do not enhance understanding. It also excludes research that is not dependant on an artistic mode of presentation. Thus, the development of epistemological as well as artistic criteria for the exposure of artistic research is a key ambition of the Journal; part of JAR's mission is to re-negotiate art's relationship to academia and the role and function of research in artistic practice. Furthermore, JAR embraces research practices across disciplines, thereby emphasising the transdisciplinary character of much artistic research.
JAR's unique presentation of artistic research as 'weaves', instead of 'pages', facilitates multi-modal exposition, thereby meeting the desire of artistic researchers to have their work displayed and documented in a manner that demonstrates a respect for modes of presentation. By introducing, together with the RC, a standard for documentation, the Journal is responding to the international artistic and academic communities, which demand high quality referencing and documentation. Moreover, the Journal meets the need of art institutions such as museums, galleries and collections for artistic research to be more easily accessible."
(Michael Schwab)
Fig.1 Deborah Harty and Phil Sawdon (2010). "humhyphenhum: Still 5".
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Internet Cafés: hybrids involving analogue and digital, virtual and real
"Terms like 'Internet café' or 'cybercafé' bring us right back to the 90s along with phrases like 'web page' or 'digital divide', which were invented to describe new hybrids involving analog and digital, virtual and real as well as the present and near future.
It's not that these terms have grown obsolete. It's rather that these 20th-century phenomena they once described have outgrown their terminology. They were born as metaphors, but over time turned into idioms, and their analog parts were the first [to] lose their original meanings. People who did not witness the emergence of the web do not fully understand why browser content is still called a 'page'. It's has also become unclear what public internet access facilities have in common with cafés, yet we continue calling them 'internet cafés' or 'cybercafés'."
(Olia Lialina, 2012-01-10)
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
Monkey Magazine: a new publishing vernacular?
"In the future, as depicted in the 2002 film Minority Report, our periodicals will create interactive, hybrid reading/viewing experiences-with built-in sound and motion-based commercials rather than static advertisements, incorporating news footage with pages that dissolve and re-form to reflect breaking stories. Despite minute gestures in that direction, such as the Amazon Kindle and G24, The Guardian’s PDF newspaper that’s updated throughout the day, that vision of media-if there’s really a market for it-is a long way off. ...
Nevertheless, something ... is now available weekly from Dennis Publishing, the company that gave the world The Week, Maxim and several other British 'lad magazines' as well as launched their American spin-offs. Monkey is proportioned like a glossy, has an interface that mimics the turning of pages and even has a magazine-like layout: margins, a basic two-column grid, images combined with text and print-like pacing. The difference is that Monkey’s text sparkles (literally, if not figuratively), dances and slides onto the page. Many of the photos will turn into movies or slideshows (some rather naughty) when clicked, and on some spreads users can shuffle page elements, substituting one image for another. The format also changes to serve its content. A small mini-magazine with short reviews is digitally 'stitched' into the 'middle' of each issue. Additionally, most advertisements come alive, thanks either to Flash, streaming video or some combination, showing previews of movies or commercials for products framed by the equivalent of a full-page ad.
To be sure, Monkey does nothing that isn’t done on other websites, and it has formal predecessors for its page interface-the arty This Is a Magazine, for one, and the webified versions of print glossies from Zinio for another. But unlike the wider web-which has evolved its own vocabulary and conventions for storytelling-and other web magazine predecessors-for which the turn-the-page interface seems a formal conceit-Monkey truly blends old and new media design conventions in a way that is both appalling and appealing."
(Jandos Rothstein, 29 January 2008)
Fig.1 Monkey Magazine, 2011. Dennis Publishing, Issue 183, pp.8,9.
CONTRIBUTOR
Simon PerkinsSHARE
