On Saturday, October 5, 2024, one year after the launch of Fondazione Spazio Vitale, the exhibition Bloodchild. Scenes from a Symbiosis opens to the public. The third project I curated for the newborn exhibition space in Via San Vitale 5, Verona, Bloodchild features works by Ivana Bašić, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Oliver Laric and Sahej Rahal. The exhibition will be open until November 16, 2024.
Last year, Daphne Dragona and I spent the summer processing the amazing archive of projects and text that Aksioma – Institute for Contemporary Art, Ljubljana put together in 13+ years, under the label PostScriptUM. The PostScriptUM Anthology (2010–2023). Essays on Art, Technology, Society and the Environment is the result of this effort of re-reading, selection and contextualization of a body of texts that followed the present, and that now document the past.
Beautifully designed by Federico Antonini, the book features a list of contributors that speak by itself: Aude Launay, Bojana Kunst, Clémence Seurat, Daniela Silvestrin, Dušan Kažić, Eva & Franco Mattes, Felix Stalder, Florian Cramer, Geoff Cox, Ida Hiršenfelder, Inke Arns, James Bridle, Jaya Klara Brekke, Jon Lackman, Lev Kreft, Marc Garrett, Martin Zeilinger, Matthew Fuller, Mojca Kumerdej, monochrom, Nika Mahnič, Paolo Ruffino, Primož Krašovec, Régine Debatty, RYBN, Silvio Lorusso, Steve Rushton, Tomislav Medak, Trevor Paglen, Valentina Tanni, Vuk Ćosić.
Here you can order the book or download a sneak preview. After the break, you can read a short postilla I wrote to fill up the final pages. I called it The Lot’s Wife Syndrome.
On Saturday, September 14, artist and precursor (see below) Rebecca Allen was awarded the DAM Digital Art Award 2023/24, and honored with a small retrospective exhibition at DAM Projects, Berlin. Wolf Lieser, founder and director of DAM, invited me to give a laudatory speech. You can read it below.
While I was working on the exhibition A View from Above, Francesco Ragazzi invited me to contribute with an essay to the upcoming issue of the academic magazine JoLMA, published by Foscari University Press and focused on The Art of Mapping Between Land and Mind. The essay, which offered me the opportunity to extend my research beyond the limits of the exhibition, is now available in open access. Check it out!
Domenico Quaranta, “A View From Above. Vertical Perspective in the Age of Total Images”, in Francesco Ragazzi (ed.), JoLMA. The Journal for the Philosophy of Language, Mind and the Arts, Issue 5, vol. 1, 2024: The Art of Mapping Between Land and Mind. Open Access, Peer reviewed, pp. 231-253. DOI: http://doi.org/10.30687/Jolma/2723-9640/2024/01
Un lungo estratto da “Informational Ghosts. Arte e (im)materialità dell’informazione”, il mio saggio in catalogo per la mostra Salto nel vuoto. Arte al di là della materia (GAMeC, 2023), è ora disponibile online su Artext. A questo link trovate invece il prezioso catalogo della mostra, edito da Officina Libraria.
What follows is a short introduction I wrote for the booklet of the exhibition A View from Above (curated by Domenico Quaranta, Salvatore Vitale and Samuele Piazza at OGR Torino for EXPOSED. Torino Foto Festival). The show can be visited from May 2 to June 2, 2024. Italian version below More info
In an order issued on October 25, 2023 in the District Court of Central California, judge John Walter condemned artists Ryder Ripps and Jeremy Cahen to pay Yuga Labs, the company behind the NFT collection Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC), about 1.6 million dollars, including statutory damages, fees and other costs. The decision followed a summary judgement issued on April 21, 2023, saying: “The court granted summary judgment in Yuga’s favor on its false designation of origin and cybersquatting claims, and against defendants’ First Amendment, nominative fair use and unclean hands affirmative defenses, as well as defendants’ counterclaim for knowing misrepresentation of infringing activity.”
I wrote this essay for a workshop held at the University of London in September 2022, and first sent it to the editors in March 2023. It has been released recently as part of the book NFTs, Creativity and the Law: Within and Beyond Copyright, edited by Enrico Bonadio and Caterina Sganga, and published by Routledge. In it, I contextualize Ripps’ practice as conceptual appropriation art. Judge John Walter, I strongly disagree with you.
Domenico Quaranta, “‘If You Don’t Want Something Stolen, Don’t Put it on the Net’. Appropriation Art from Early Net Art to NFTs”, in Enrico Bonadio, Caterina Sganga (eds.), NFTs, Creativity and the Law: Within and Beyond Copyright, Routledge, London 2024, pp. 201-217.
Curated by: Domenico Quaranta, Salvatore Vitale, Samuele Piazza
For: EXPOSED Torino Photo Festival
At: OGR Torino, Binario 2
May 2 – June 2, 2024
Featured artists: James Bridle; Laura Cinti; Mario Giacomelli; Mishka Henner; Hiwa K; Tabita Rezaire; Evan Roth; Susan Schuppli; Tomas Van Houtryve
I’m in this big expensive book with a short text about an artist I love and I’m happy to share it with you! “Encompassing the entire NFTs ecosystem — from algorithmic art to avatars — the first major art history survey of this field includes 10 academic essays and richly illustrated profiles of 101 key artists. Connecting the disruptive contemporary medium to its art historical context, this volume offers a deep dive into the sphere of non-fungible tokens and is also available for purchase in crypto.”
“Domenico Quaranta On Casey Reas”, in Robert Alice (Ed.), On NFTs. Collector’s Edition, Taschen, Koln 2024, pp. 144-145
Alberto Fiz mi ha fatto un paio di domande per un articolo poi pubblicato sul Giornale dell’Arte, sull’arte digitale nel mercato dell’arte e sugli effetti della bolla speculativa degli NFT. A seguire il Q&A integrale.
AF. Sto facendo un’inchiesta sul Giornale dell’Arte sulle ragioni secondo cui il mercato dell’arte snobba l’arte digitale nonostante abbia un ruolo sempre più significativo. Tu stesso ne parli nel tuo libro Media, New Media, Postmedia scrivendo: “Il mondo della New Media Art si regge su un’economia che non prevede nel suo sistema di distribuzione un mercato dell’arte.” In che senso? Pensi che ci possa essere un sistema di mercato alternativo?