[ISEA2011] Panel: Chris­t­ian Ulrik An­der­sen & Søren Bro Pold – A Con­cep­tual Gap Be­tween Art and Busi­ness?

Panel Statement

Panel: DON’T HATE THE BUSINESS: BECOME THE BUSINESS!

What does the cap­i­tal­i­sa­tion of art mean? Joseph Beuys de­clared that “the si­lence of Mar­cel Duchamp is over­rated.” It is up to us to put value on this si­lence. How can you make art out of the con­ver­gence of the aes­thetic field (and aes­thetic judge­ment) with that of po­lit­i­cal econ­omy?  In the his­tory of art, artists have often ad­dressed this re­la­tion­ship both spec­u­la­tively and crit­i­cally. Andy Warhol went shop­ping. At the same time, the Bea­t­les made their own record label to as­sume full con­trol of the pro­duc­tion process (and al­most went bank­rupt). What seems to be the case is that not only af­fir­ma­tion but also cri­tique of the re­la­tion­ship be­tween art and busi­ness de­vel­ops new kinds of busi­nesses. After all, where would de­sign be with­out avant-garde (and Bauhaus)? Where would fash­ion be with­out punk?  Artists often crit­i­cally in­ter­fere and play with the con­ver­gence and trans­ac­tion be­tween aes­thetic cap­i­tal and fi­nan­cial cap­i­tal. The paper will pre­sent key ex­am­ples of this (from Mar­cel Duchamp to Christophe Bruno), and argue that the best crit­i­cal artists also po­ten­tially pro­pose the best and most in­no­v­a­tive busi­ness mod­els.

  • Chris­t­ian Ulrik An­der­sen, PhD, is As­so­ci­ate Pro­fes­sor and chair of Dig­i­tal Aes­thet­ics Re­search Cen­tre, Aarhus Uni­ver­sity, Den­mark. He re­searches within dig­i­tal aes­thet­ics, soft­ware cities and com­puter games. To­gether with Søren Pold he is the ed­i­tor of a new book In­ter­face Crit­i­cism – Aes­thet­ics Be­yond But­tons (2011). He is also a re­searcher in Cen­tre for Dig­i­tal Urban Liv­ing, Aarhus Uni­ver­sity. darc.imv.au.dk
  • Søren Bro Pold, PhD, is As­so­ci­ate Pro­fes­sor of dig­i­tal aes­thet­ics at IMV, Uni­ver­sity of Aarhus, Den­mark, part of DUL and found­ing mem­ber of DARC (Dig­i­tal Aes­thet­ics Re­search Cen­ter). He has pub­lished in Dan­ish and Eng­lish on dig­i­tal and media aes­thet­ics – from the 19th c. panorama to the in­ter­face, e.g. on elec­tronic lit­er­a­ture, net art, soft­ware art, cre­ative soft­ware, urban in­ter­faces and dig­i­tal cul­ture. To­gether with Chris­t­ian Ulrik An­der­sen he edited the an­thol­ogy In­ter­face Crit­i­cism – Aes­thet­ics Be­yond But­tons (2011). digitalurbanliving.dk

Full text (PDF) p. 1949-1954  [title somewhat different]