Artists Re:thinking the Blockchain (FACT) - Softcover

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0993248748 ISBN 13: 9780993248740

Publisher: Liverpool University Press, 2017

Synopsis

The blockchain is widely heralded as the new internet - another dimension in an ever-faster, ever-more-powerful interlocking of ideas, actions and values. Principally the blockchain is a ledger distributed across a large array of machines that enables digital ownership and exchange without a central administering body. Within the arts it has profound implications as both a means of organising and distributing material, and as a new subject and medium for artistic exploration. This landmark publication will bring together a diverse array of artists and researchers engaged with the blockchain, unpacking, critiquing and marking the arrival of it on the cultural landscape for a broad readership across the arts and humanities.

Contributors: César Escudero Andaluz, Jaya Klara Brekke, Theodoros Chiotis, Ami Clarke, Simon Denny, The Design Informatics Research Centre (Edinburgh), Max Dovey, Mat Dryhurst, Primavera De Filippi, Peter Gomes, Elias Haase, Juhee Hahm, Max Hampshire, Kimberley ter Heerdt, Holly Herndon, Helen Kaplinsky, Paul Kolling, Elli Kurus, Nikki Loef, Bjørn Magnhildøen, Rob Myers, Martín Nadal, Rachel O'Dwyer, Edward Picot, Paul Seidler, Hito Steyerl, Surfatial, Lina Theodorou, Pablo Velasco, Ben Vickers, Mark Waugh, Cecilia Wee, and Martin Zeilinger.

About this title

About the Author:

Marc Garrett is an internet artist, writer and curator. He is co-Founder and co-Director of Furtherfield/HTTP Gallery, London, and is one of Furtherfield's principal researchers into net art and cultural context on the internet.

Ruth Catlow is a net artist, and co-Founder and co-Director of Furtherfield. She is involved in research into net art and cultural context on the internet and co-curates featured works on furtherfield.org and HTTP Gallery, London.

Sam Skinner is an independent artist, researcher and curator who directed the 2015 and 2016 Thamesmead Arts Festivals, and coordinates with a number of other Thamesmead-based arts projects, working in collaboration with Peabody. Co-curator of The New Observatory, a major exhibition at FACT (Foundation for Art and Creative Technology), Liverpool in collaboration with the Open Data Institute, London, which explores critical and creative approaches to data gathering and new data infrastructures, he is also chair of Working Group 1 of the EU COST (Co-operation in Science and Technology) Action on New Materialism, co-director of Torque Editions a hybrid publishing project and research platform, and has curated recent exhibitions at Furtherfield, London and The Grundy, Blackpool.

Nathan Jones is a poet, curator. Currently: Reid cross-disciplinary PhD scholar in Literature and Media at Royal Holloway University of London; associate Lecturer Fine Art Liverpool John Moores; and co-director of Torque Editions a hybrid publishing project and research platform.

Review:

"With a diverse list of writers per issue, it is divided into three sections: Documents, Fictions and Theories, respectively hosting explanative, narrative and speculative texts. Among the contributors to the latter, Hito Steyerl elaborates on art as an alternative currency itself, while Rachel O'Dwyer outlines a systematic analysis of upcoming system structures based on blockchain, and Rob Myers points out the strategic importance and then use of trust and 'network consensus'. Beyond them a significant number of contributors have been involved and altogether they have produced a remarkable work." --Aurelio Cianciotta, Neural

About this edition

• Publisher: Liverpool University Press
• Publication date: 2017
• ISBN 10: 0993248748
• ISBN 13: 9780993248740
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 344
• Editor: Catlow Ruth, Garrett Marc, Jones Nathan, Skinner Sam