For this paper I will be comparing and contrasting two artists
from the several I have chosen to research this year in Art 346. My two artists
are Myron Krueger and Pipilotti Rist. Both of these artists have contributed to
the digital media realm of art in their own way. Even though the mediums at
which they have chosen are different they still have some connecting factors as
well.
Myron Krueger is an American Computer Artist that got his degree
in computer science at the University of Wisconsin. He is considered to be one
of the first generation of virtual and augmented reality researchers of our
time. During his career he created many works that involved computer technology
and an audience that interacted with his works. Krueger collaborated Dan
Sandin, Jerry Erdman, and Richard Venezky to create a computer controlled
environment called “glowflow.” This work would respond to the footsteps of the
audience via sensors that lit the floor as the viewer walked through the room. The
lights were accompanied by sounds produces by a Moog synthesizer. Though the
piece was a success visually Krueger thought it was lacking the user or audience
involvement he wanted. The user was not aware of the interactions they were
having with the technology in the gallery space.
“Videoplace” was
that very video medium he was looking for. Where there was finally a dialog
between man and machine. Originally this was a concept that he had developed during
the mid-70’s that continued to evolve over time as technology became more and
more developed. It consisted of two or more rooms that could vary in distance from
each other. The connected rooms sees both a projection of themselves and of the
other user on the same screen. The other user’s projected image could be
shrunk, rotated, and color keyed. It could interact with both the room occupant’s
image and other computer generated images created. Krueger was quoted saying, “The
beauty of the visual and aural response is secondary. Response is the medium.” It
was the audience actively sharing in the creation of the art that was
important. “Videoplace” no has a permanent residence at the State Museum of
National History at The University of Connecticut. Considering that this is one
of the first instances where audience interacts to create a virtual reality. I relate
Krueger’s stance with virtual reality with Marshal Mcluhan’s thoughts on his
interpretation with television at the time. Virtual reality has a large
demographic potential with the way it can influence the vast majority of the
public. I remember what my engineering professor said once, “Show me and I’ll
forget, teach me and I’ll learn, involve me and I will understand.” That is
what virtual reality has the potential to do. It has the ability to include
people in these responsive environments. Though these interactions at Krueger’s
time were simplistic at the surface level, creating simple images and art
forms. It is the human element that gives these virtual space that chance to
become something more than what they were created for. Krueger didn’t just
create a virtual space for himself, but developed a new world entirely for many
to explore in the opportunity to communicate, learn from, and interact
differently with one another like never before.
My second artist goes by the name Pipilotti Rist, her real name is
Elisabeth Charlotte, she got her nickname from the character Pippi
Longstocking. She studied commercial art, illustration, and photography and the
University of Applied Arts in Vienna and later video at the School of Design in
Basil, Switzerland. She began her video work using super 8 film during her
college year. Rist was largely known for her works to include topics of gender,
sexuality, and the human body. Her films would last several minutes and often involved
heavy editing with its color, speed, and sound. One of her films that gave her
notoriety was PickelPorno (Pimple Porn)
1992. This was filmed using a fisheye camera that had two bodies in various
states of intertwining and suggestive positions while she edited in a
naturistic background consisting of flowers, volcanic eruptions, and other
ambiguous close ups.
Her film Ever is Over All
1997 was the film I decided to go into further detail with. Setup at the Museum
of Modern Art, her film was a Diptych set up in the corner of the gallery space.
On the left you see a woman dressed in a blue dress and red heels strolling
down an urban sidewalk. The right video consists of close up shots of flowers
from various locations of the world. As the woman walks down the sidewalk she
is caring a large flower, she uses this flower like a sledge hammer as she smashes
car windows parked on the side of the road. This is a bronze flower painted in
the likeness to look like one of the flowers in the second video to the right.
Rist also relied upon audio to further create a contrast between the two films.
This was at a time in the world where the generation grew up with MTV, audio
and visual was now fully established as a norm within the culture. It would
lose impact if it did not have audio. I believe that Rist likes to create these
odd combinations of nightmare and magic as it vastly over shadows logic and
common sense. She juxtaposes the acts of aggression or annihilation one might
see in an urban city with the benevolence and tranquility of the nature side of
her story. Even as you hear the birds chirping in such a peaceful manor it continually
gets interrupted by the shattering of the glass and the unnerving drones of the
music on the urban side of the story.
I feel Rist has anarchistic tendencies in her work, she is a feminist,
but actively uses the idea of sexuality and gender stereotypes and turns them
on their head. There is heavy symbolism with flowers and the idea on womanhood and
the fact that she is using a flower as a weapon smashing things in an urban
environment makes me think she is trying to show how woman are continually struggling
with the duality of wanting to be seen as an equal in the work place, but yet
still be able to express themselves sexually and not be seen as an object. She even
furthers her stances on gender roles by showing a woman police officer that
waves at the woman in the blue dress. Since becoming an officer s more commonly
associated as a “man’s” job it strengthens her critique on the social
standards.
One of the few comparisons I found between the two artists’ was
that they needed larger gallery spaces to accurately display their works. As the
space potentially gets smaller so to the message they are trying to convey. The
major connection I saw between the two pieces were their perceptions between
fiction versus reality. Krueger was using a fictional world to create a
connection to the real world. Again, though simplistic at first his ideas would
set the stage for people creating a whole new version of themselves in the
virtual world as technology progressed. It is still a real person behind the
pixels. Rist balances the fiction vs reality with her dreamlike film. Everything
in her film was plausible, as in, it stayed within the ideas of the real world.
Where it becomes fiction is the messing and dichotomy of the two films side by
side making it seem more like a dream. Also the absurdity of the act of running
around downtown smashing windows is not something that one would consider
seeing on a day to day basis. Though using two different mediums both artists wanted
their audience to leave from viewing their art able to discuss the implications
of what the art could mean for the future.
