Living Agency: Curating in the Age of Digital Networks

Symposium:


Session Title:
  • Curating in/as Open System(s)

Presentation Title:
  • Living Agency: Curating in the Age of Digital Networks

Presenter(s):


Abstract:

  • Since the beginning of 20C, the expression of art has already shifted to ‘discovering’, ‘selecting’, ‘editing’ and ‘collage-ing’ enormous existing daily products in creative ways. As one of the extreme examples that can be seen in Kurt Schwitters’ Merzbau where he extended his body, spirit and memories to the never-ending process, in the form of physical interior and architecture, I would like to interpret this work as a new form of curating, developed rather personally, unconsciously.

    In the beginning of the 21st century, digital, telecommunication networks enabled us to create new ways of curating in the Internet, or networks assisted by the WWW, online software tools and services. Here, you can just type in, choose, recommend, or tag any words and information you like and they would be immediately organized in a certain context or manner, shared by other people via networks, and the process continues.

    This is not only happening in the field of digital networks, but also being extended to the territories of nature and urban, social, cultural environment beyond natural and artificial, analogue and digital, micro and macro, when we consider the current development of nonlinear science. Here, we humans are not only external observers to the world but at the same time internal observers to influence the ever-changing living world as active factors, and this status — acting in/by blurring borders — would become an emerging model of our existence. And curators and artists could act promptly as “agencies” to make it visible for broader public.

Category: