Daniel Everett

Conversations with a Computer by Daniel Everett. see more here and

here.

"Contained within the operating system of Mac computers is a rudimentary electronic psychotherapist program. Meant to simulate a Rogerian therapist, it engages the participant in a cyclical conversation by taking his or her statements and roughly reconfiguring them into questions. I met with this program three times a week for a month in order to discuss my fear that I was disappearing completely. These are three stills from our conversations."

Find out how to access emacs doctor to help solve total frustration here.

Some Questions - Daniel Everett

[Daniel Everett. Young Forever. 2010]

Thanks for having me as your host this week!

In parting, I figured it was only fair that I at least try and answer my own questions.

In your experience, how has the Internet changed the way that art is discussed, displayed, curated, experienced, or distributed?

What are your opinions on the idea of the Internet as replacement for critique space? As replacement for museum or gallery? Jpeg as replacement for physical art object? Tumblr as replacement for curation?

The Internet, in a number of ways, has freed my art from the burden of existence. I feel a complicated sense of guilt in the production of physical objects – something real, but difficult to articulate - a kind of burden rooted in expectation that weighs on me until the object is finally taken away or destroyed.

The Internet alleviates this by allowing me to create something and immediately liberate it, leaving it to plot its own course – to disappear, buried in the annals of a Tumblr or to spread and change through a series of progressive recontexualizations, often shedding its original framework and any attachment to authorship. It becomes the domain of a stream of co-owners and co-re-creators and various new participants. It’s in this new immortal half-existence that most of my work now meets its potential. I can see this evolution as nothing but beneficial.

Saying this however, I recognize something crucial in my physical interaction with art. I see an inimitable experience in scale and relational context (an embracing of theatricality). I see a function to scarcity (and I don’t mean in a commodity-based, pecuniary sense, but in a “if everything is important, nothing is important” sense). Lastly, there is the inescapable reality of my own physicality. While I can trade my cds for mp3s, my dvds for divx files, my books for pdfs – I still have to buy pants, and food (and external hard drives). I still need a pillow. And ultimately, I still need to interact (at least in part, and somewhat anxiously) with objects.

There is a promise and largely unrealized potential in virtual models of art creation and distribution - I (still) believe in the utopian promises of the Internet. But it is not something meant to eclipse or replace our relationship with the physical. While I can’t wait for current art systems to fall apart and be reborn in new forms, I think that physically-based systems must learn to take cues from the Internet and incorporate the best parts of anonymity, instability of context, a blurring of the location of art between object and documentation, and freedom from profit motivations.

guest blogger • daniel everett

say hello to this week's guest blogger, artist daniel everett. and have a look at more of daniel's work here and here.

[above: daniel everett. fortress. 2009.]

daniel everett

work by daniel everett. see more here. and if you're in chicago don't miss his upcoming show at the mca opening on april 3rd, full details here.

[all daniel everett. top to bottom: search queries III. personal history 1. search queries II.]

daniel everett

new work by daniel everett. the project in the middle, 'journal 2008,' is a stack of 307 dot matrix printer pages detailing daniel's internet activity for the entire year of 2008. see more here.

[all daniel everett. top to bottom: redactions from personal journal. journal 2008. many are called, but few are chosen.]

daniel everett

daniel everett's 'building a more meaningful existence'. as he explains: "for this project i used a graphics editor built into an early arcade game to convert spam emails i had received into a virtual landscape. by reconfiguring the graphics editor interface to accept keystrokes as input, i was able to build these landscapes solely by transcribing the spam messages and compiling them. for this piece i specifically chose spam messages that promised me a more meaningful life, increased happiness, and a greater sense of self-worth." see more here.

[all daniel everett. from the series building a more meaningful existence.]

is it possible to make a photograph of new jersey regardless of where you are in the world?

a sneak peak from i heart photograph's latest "real world" exhibition opening this sunday in new jersey. the show features more than 1,000 images by 189 artists from 18 countries. full details, directions to the gallery, and a list of exhibition-related events can be found here.

top: from rotterdam, netherlands. "i have never been to new jersey, to get an
impression, i googled it, i was looking for something that stood for the state and could represent nj in a picture but i couldn’t really get a grip on this place, what came up again and again was the shape of the map." antje peters was born in berlin, germany in 1979 and currently lives in the netherlands.

middle: from chicago, usa. "i tried to make an outline of new jersey from memory, using a stereo cord and blue masking tape while the cd player played bruce springsteen’s “born to run” on repeat." daniel everett is getting his mfa at the art institute in chicago and his work is about erasure of identity, transitory places, and video games.

bottom: from philadelphia, usa. "some cutting and some retouching." dominic episcopo is a photographer living and working in philadelphia, born and raised in verona, new jersey.

[from the exhibition: "is it possible to make a photograph of new jersey regardless of where you are in the world?"]