‘So why does digital art still provoke skepticism in many corners of the art world? Why have we as an industry been comparatively slow to adapt? Yes, much of the NFT craze coming out of COVID was deeply unserious, continuing to hamper perceptions of the field. But so was Zombie Formalism and any number of other speculative tropes. Of those unholy things, let us speak no more. What interests me is the work itself and the fast-evolving possibilities connecting the digital and traditional art worlds.
‘I’ll put my cards on the table. I believe in galleries. I believe in collecting. I believe in curation. I believe in criticism. I believe in museums, art schools, art history, and the community that we collectively inhabit. Above all, I believe art should challenge us intellectually, aesthetically, and perceptually. I also believe that very little art, in any medium, actually does. I am not interested in work that flatters its audience, mistakes spectacle and market logic for ideas, or reduces art to endlessly optimized colorful baubles generated by systems trained on auction results. I am very old-fashioned.
‘Which is exactly why I think digital art deserves serious attention. The artists in this presentation, from Harold Cohen and Vera Molnár to Andreas Gursky and Hito Steyerl, from Avery Singer and John Gerrard to DEAFBEEF and William Mapan, along with standout artists I more recently encountered (shoutout Aziza Kadyri!), have all challenged me to see the world differently. They’ve shown me things I hadn’t noticed, and shown me that the world was not quite the way I thought it was.
‘This work takes on some of the most important questions in contemporary art. What is an image when a machine can generate it? What is ownership when a file can be copied infinitely? What does it mean to make something in a world already drowning in pictures?