[spectre] Celebrating the Demon: The Whitneybiennial.com, two years later

geert geert at xs4all.nl
Fri Mar 12 12:31:50 CET 2004


From: m <m at manetas.com>

Whitney Biennial 2004 : 
According to the NY TIMES :
 
"In general, the show acknowledges the New York establishment taste that
the last biennial, to its cost, ignored. And with its favoring of solid
objects over conceptual and digital art, it is in tune with a
market-happy moment, when annual art fairs are replacing biennials as
new international mega-shows, eliminating whatever illusional line
existed between curating and commerce, critic and dealer."
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/03/07/arts/design/07COTT.html
 
and because you will soon forget this show as you forgot the previous
and you will also forget the next...
and because many of you keep asking me: "will the U-haul trucks surround
the Museum again this year?"
 
Today, in Stockholm:
 
Färgfabriken is proud to present the opening of: 
       
Celebrating the Demon: 
The Whitneybiennial.com, two years later. 

On the occasion of the opening of the Whitney Biennial 2004: 
The Best of Our Stuff against the Best of your Art. 

Opening March 12 at 18.00 
At Färgfabriken, Stockholm 
The project will be presented until March 28. 

On March 12 at Färgfabriken: 
A cocktail party. 
A presentation of the most beautiful websites in the world. 
Selected websites from whitneybiennial.com 2002 and new works. 
Introducing Neen in Sweden. 
Special appearance by Mai Ueda, her IAMMAI songs. 
Live music by Autohorse. Two DJ's. Two bars. 
Logo designed by Angelo Plessas.

 

                          WHITNEYBIENNIAL.COM 

The birth of a Demon. 

by Jan Aman

*

It was February 2002, a month before the opening of the last Whitney
Biennial. Miltos Manetas, a Greek born artist who lives in the USA and
Peter Lunenfeld, an LA based writer, were at the Electronic Orphanage in
Los Angeles, and they were discussing the upcoming show. 

"It would be nice to make an Internet show that will challenge the
Museum show. What about registering Whitney-Whitney.com, said Manetas. 

"Why not Whitneybiennial.com?" suggested Lunenfeld. 

"Come on! said Manetas. "It will definitely 
                               be taken" 

"Don't be so sure, Lunenfeld replied: "Just check. 

The domain Whitneybiennial.com was available! 

"Damn, Manetas said, "now we really have to do it. 


It was one of those rare moments, as if we had inherited the ownership
of a business we never thought of owning, he said later. 

He felt that by ignoring their own domain name, the Museum was
subconsciously commissioning to him personally to do something and spoil
their fun. Large institutions such as the Whitney, don't care much about
what is happening on the Internet. They consider computers and networks
as just another media, a little more complex from the videos and dvd
which they learned to appreciate recently. Computer is the best
invention after the bicycle, a European Museum director said once to
Manetas. Like a bicycle it can do a lot of transport in a cheap and
clean way. But it's nothing really different. 

Manetas instead, who made his reputation by showing large canvas
depicting computers, cables, videogames and the such, thinks of the
Internet as a place. A great, almost empty continent, similar to what
America was immediately after it has been discovered. The opportunity
for a new type of art, theories, and life style. Because most things
which one finds on the Internet, even if they are sometimes smart and
surprising ,are pretty boring and amateur in an artistic sense , Manetas
and his friends created two new concepts, the concept of Neen, and the
concept of Telic. 

While Telic is genius but not necessarily poetic and special, Neen, is
about the most amazing elements of the World of the computer screen.
Manetas believes that certain websites are actually the artworks that
people will remember as a breakthrough and not the installations and
objects, which we usually encounter in exhibitions such as the Whitney
Biennial or the Venice Biennial. He felt that the Whitneybiennial.com
could be a chance for a frontal battle with the art establishment and
that same night, he wrote an email to the curators he knew, including
the Whitney Biennial Curator Larry Rinder, inviting them to propose
artists for the whitneybiennial.com. All that the artists had to do, was
a Flash animation, it didn't had to actually be a concept, a cute moving
image would be enough. 

Larry, will you help me to destroy your show? He wrote to Lawrence
Rinder. 

Yes! Larry e-mailed back and seconds later: No, I cannot do that. I am
the chief curator after all! But why don't you come in NY and we discuss
it. 

Two days after, Manetas was at the offices of the Whitney. He brought
with him some stickers that Rafael Rozendaal designed the night before
with the logo of the Whitneybiennial.com on them. When he laid the
stickers on a conference table, Mr. Rinder's expression changed. He
became more serious and after some silence, said: So, you are really
doing it. Of course, Manetas said. "Because I am not selected for the
official show and I have a lot of free time". Why don't you get the
empty Chase Bank in front of the Whitney, suggested Rinder. You can put
some computers and a projector there and you make your show. Well,
actually I prefer to rent 23 U-haul trucks and turn them to monitors by
projecting each website of my show from the inside of the truck on a
screen which will replace their back door . They will surround your
Museum the night of the opening. That way, my show will not look like a
Salon des Refuse. 

Do you have the budged to do so? Rinder asked, this time slightly
alarmed but without showing it.

Oh, yes, I am selling lots of paintings these days, Manetas answered. 

At that point, Miltos Manetas actually thought that it would be nice to
really rent 23 U-Haul trucks- these are the little camions that are used
in the US for moving stuff around-and surround the Museum the night of
the opening. It would be: Our-best-stuff-against-the-best-of-your-art
confrontation. Michele Thursz , a kind of digital Yvonne Force, agreed
to produce it. An office was improvised and hosted by the headquarters
of Rhizome.org and interns started working on public relations. The
budget for the show was zero and everybody involved was working for
free. But after a round of phone-calls, he realized that nobody would
give him the money to actually do it in such a short notice. His "will
be" collaborators and sponsors were also afraid of the consequences. As
it happens, people, who are important in the artworld, start calling
him, suggesting to not doing it. It was a curious fact, because some of
them, where people who Manetas had never met before. Apparently, this
U-haul truck project was hot. 

Any possible collaborators were also afraid of the consequences. As it
happened, people who were important in the art world started calling
him, suggesting Manetas not to do it. It was a curious fact, because
some of them where people who Manetas had never met before. Apparently,
this U-haul truck project was hot. 

You don't want such a great project to appear as an act of criticism
against the Whitney, the ex-director of a well-known American Museum
said, The U-haul Trucks turned to monitors can be such a good piece for
an installation! 

I don't care about criticizing the Whitney show, Manetas replied. I like
them, they do great shows. What I really want is to use them the Museum
show to advertise my own ideas about Neen and Telic. 

Manetas didn't really try much to actually make the U-haul parade.
Important for him, was to put together a strong Internet exhibition that
anybody can access from anywhere. But the Press seemed to love the idea
of a Whitneybiennial.com that surrounds the Whitney Biennial with 23
U-Haul trucks. They contacted him and started asking questions. 

Is it true that you will send 23 U-haul trucks around Manhattan? a NY
Times journalist asked him. 

If you say so, it must be right, Manetas replied. After all, you are the
press and you must know.

Given all this interest from the Media, Manetas considered that it would
be a pity to tell them that the U-haul trucks would not be there. The
next time a journalist called and asked how it was going, he answered:
Oh, I cannot talk now, too much work, we are installing the projectors
inside the trucks. In reality, he was eating sushi somewhere at Chelsea,
together with his Japanese girlfriend, Mai Ueda. 

Soon, everybody in NY was asking him about the Whitneybiennial.com
performance and he confirmed to all that they were working on it. After
all, a chair painted inside a picture is not a real chair, he said
later. But since most people in the art world never look on websites, he
decided to make something happen in the real space anyway. 

He contacted Miuccia Prada, and asked her to use her new shop in Soho.
That is a location designed by the architect Rem Koolhaas in such a way
that it can be used as a temporary theater for events, a kind of
sidewalk become plaza. Manetas' idea was to get a bus that would bring
people from the opening of the Whitney to the Prada store and offer them
a Demo of the Whitneybiennial.com. But Prada refused to give Manetas the
store, without ever justifying her answer. After that, Manetas contacted
Rem Koolhaas himself and explained the project to him. Koolhaas
immediately liked it. Don't worry, we will get the store, he said. 

It was now a week before the opening of the Whitney. Manetas was getting
nervous but he put all his efforts to create a beautiful website
together with the artist and designer Carbonated Jazz, the architect
Andreas Angelidakis and Neenstar Angelo Plessas. Carbonated Jazz, drawn
for it's splash page the face of an old man, with his glasses breaking
into pieces. The British composer Mark Tranmer, (GNAC) wrote a melody
for the website. 122 creators, not only artists but architects,
designers and programmers, invited by different curators including Jan
Aman, Andreas Angelidakis, archinect.com, Stefano Chiodi, Joshua Decter,
Laurence Dreyfus, Alex Galloway, Paul Groot, Patrick Lichty, Peter
Lunenfeld, Lev Manovich, Magda Sawon, newstoday.com, Hans Ulrich Obrist,
Marisa Olson, Michele Thursz, Roosavelt Savage, Philippe Vergne, Olivier
Zahm and Purple magazine submitted up to five animations each. Artist
Michael Reese offered a Turntable, which is a flash application that you
can use to mix not only sound but also Flash movies. With this tool, all
the pieces of the show became samples and the user had now the ability
to visually DJ, making his/her own composition online. The viewer could
change the colors of the background, make the animation larger or
smaller, transparent or opaque, etc. For the very first time, artworks
in an exhibition could exist as both: samples and stand-alone pieces.
Lev Manovich wrote a beautiful theory called: GENERATION FLASH and Peter
Lunenfeld, wrote a text called Flash is Poptech. 

While he was doing the website, Manetas was constantly calling Rem
Koolhaas, waiting for news about the Prada store. They haven't agreed
yet, but call me back in a few hours, I am sure I will succeed to get
the place for you, Koolhaas said. 

But Prada refused. The morning of the opening, Manetas called Koolhaas
for the last time.

I am embarrassed, I take it as a personal defeat, Koolhaas said. 

I don't understand why they don't give you the shop. I designed it for
such events! 

It was a strange situation. The day before the opening, on March 4, the
New York Times had published an article by Matthew Mirapaul. Most of the
article was dedicated to the Whitneybiennial.com it's artists, and the
promised U-haul trucks. There was some small paragraph talking about the
official show, but the picture illustrating the article was from an
animation by the Whitneybiennial.com. It was David against Goliath and
everybody was talking about it. Manetas decided to keep the illusion of
the trucks until the end and by paying from his own money, reserved the
prettiest club in NY at the time, the Bungalow 8, for the artists and
the guests of the Whitneybiennial.com. The trucks would not be there,
but the exhibition was real: anyone with a computer could visit it. The
idea of the trucks would become a metaphor: The U-haul trucks were there
but they were invisible, he said later. They are the websites where the
whitneybiennial.com is hosted and they are everywhere. 

That night, at the opening, which was invitation only, hundreds of
people who were not invited showed up, waiting for the U-haul trucks.
Some people had also come from other nearby cities; they were the
Internet crowd who probably read about the event in a newsletter. Dozens
of the guests of the Museum, would leave the Whitney and search for the
U-hauls. Many of them would return later and say to their friends: I've
seen them: they are not a big deal, causing a performance that was never
suppose to happen to actually register at the imagination of the public
and initiating an urban legend. Some months ago, I had a drink at Joe's
Pub in NY and I overheard the conversation of three young people. The
Police had put barriers on Madison Avenue so the U-haul trucks would not
pass, one of them explained to the others. I've seen it: I was there! 


Celebrating the Demon. 

It was February 1st 2004 and the day after the opening of Memoirs of the
Devil , Miltos Manetas' current exhibition at the Cosmic Gallery in
Paris. We were sitting at the Café Flore, Miltos and I, late in the
afternoon. We talked a bit about the opening the previous night. Miltos
had made a sort of cliché of gallery show, playing the role of the
artist/painter with an exhibition dedicated to three of the most
important women in his life. 
In the basement there was a room dedicated to his relationship with
Vanessa Beecroft, a small painted portrait of her face in a room turned
into a spatial Jackson Pollock painting. What few visitors knew, though,
was that Miltos a few weeks before the show created a webpage called
jacksonpollock.org. 


Miltos is always playing a game in his art. He plays with his own life
and his role as an artist. He plays with the media, he plays with the
structures and with the expected to set things in motion. It is a risky
business and a serious game, since it is based on the fact that Manetas
wants the very opposite of doing another thing called art (in a
situation where there already is an abundance of precisely that). 
I think this is one of the reasons for his interest in the Internet. It
is new (still). It is more open than an evaluating and regulated art
world could ever be. Manetas is not interested in the technical side of
the net. Not even the new expressions coming out of it is his primary
interest. His energy is into how this new territory actually affects us.
Internet marks the end of one-way communication. It no longer matter how
much media you own or control. It no longer matters how big your
institution is. To be relevant you need to convince the receiver, or
system of receivers, that your message is relevant. That it is fresh.
Otherwise you risk being ignored. You risk becoming an elephant. An easy
target. 
This is why the art, the exhibition and the institution may very well
have more to do with setting boundaries and securing a system rather
than opening up for new influences and possibilities. And this is the
reason why Miltos and I, then and there at Café Flore, gave birth to an
idea of celebrating the demon, of awakening the sleeping beauty, the
Whitneybiennial.com two years later. There is more work to show. New
works. And there is a story to be told. Songs to be sung. Something to
experience and reflect upon. It is as fresh as ever. 

The elephants are still there. But so is the beauty of the gesture. That
very disturbing gesture. 

Jan Åman, Stockholm , 2004

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credits: 

"Whitneybiennial.com 2004, The Celebration" , created in March 2004 

design by Miltos Manetas, based on www.seethrough.org by Rafael
Rozendaal. 

realization by Sebastien Ducos. 


emblems, designed by Angelo Plessas.

thanks to : Jan Aman and Färgfabriken, Daniel Daboczy, Matti Molin,
Cecilia Lindstrom and the COSMIC Gallery in Paris for the office space
that they gave us to create the website. 

the works that are included in the "Whitneybiennial.com 2004 : The
Celebration", are all "complete" artworks. Read also : "Websites is the
Art of Our Days", by Miltos Manetas. 

artists included: Andreas Angelidakis, John White C, Aaron Clinger,
Deconcept, Joel Fox, Roya Jacoby, Carbonated Jazz, Miltos Manetas,
Angelo Plessas,Rafael Rozendaal, Nikolas Tosic, Mai Ueda.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Whitneybiennial.com, 2002, the first version, was created in Feb 2002

a concept by miltos manetas 

organized by the electronicOrphanage and assisted by michele thursz 

website design : carbonatedjazz , music by gnac. 

special thanks : michael rees for "turntable" and rafael rozendaal for
the sticker. 

curators/writers and organisations who invited artists: jan aman,
andreas angelidakis,archinect.com, stefano chiodi , joshua decter,
laurence dreyfus, alex galloway,paul groot,patrick lichty ,peter
lunenfeld, lev manovich , magda sawon, newstoday.com, hans ulrich obrist
,marisa olson, michele thursz, roosavelt savage, philippe vergne,
olivier zahm and purple magazine.

Artists partecipated: 


andreas angelidakis , 

fia backstorm , tobias bernstrup , andrew bucksbarg , christophe bruno, 

mike calvert , carbonated jazz , larry carlson , mauro ceolin , sarah
ciracì , kevin chan , sadie chandler , chiaki , taro chiezo , aaron
clinger , john white c 

nic clockworker , claude closky , jennifer and kevin mccoy , joyce
charis , andrew childs , jordan crane , 

donleo.org , dj.spooky , gisela domscheke , décosterd & rahm 

fat architecture , reinier feijen/marjan lemmens , adam somlai-fischer ,
joseph franklyn & donna mcelroy , amy franceschini , ryan francesconi ,
foreign office architects , joel fox , 

rainer ganahl , joaquin gañez , gnac , valery grancher , stefan gruber ,

debra hampton , elsa harkins , heidrun holzfeind , han hoogerbrugge , 

alejandra jarabo , experimental jetset , roya jakoby 

thorsten iberl , young hae chang heavy industries , digital sisters
indeed , 

mitchell kane , yael kanarek , kol mac studio , eleni kostika , ioanna
kostika , jon krusell , 

katarina löfström , lot-ek architecture , marcos lutyens ,
limiteazero.com , lostpixel.com , 

mashica.com , miltos manetas , jonathan maghen , pablo margaría , ilias
marmaras , aitor mendez , yucef merhi , marcello mercado , sascha merg ,
hidekazu minami , christian moeller , 

nanogod , daisuke nishimura , josh on , 

maria papadimitriou , paper architecture , scott paterson, françois
perrin , angelo plessas , alexandros psychoulis , 

michael rees , autumn rooney , rafaël rozendaal , gerwald rockenschaub ,

rick silva , steven schkolne , scott sona snibbe , leah singer , julia
scher , nico stumpo , 

allan tarantino , teleferique.org , john tremblay , nikola tosic , 

mai ueda , unclickable.com , uncontrol.com , ritsko utchida , petra
trefzger , 

jordi valls , siebren versteeg , leo villareal , 

autumn whitehurst 

jody zellen , david zerah . 


------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Whitneybiennial.com, second version: created in Feb 2003

Website design : andreas angelidakis, angelo plessas. 

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

theories from the whitneybiennial.com

comments for the whitneybiennial.com 

selected press: NyTimes, Salon.com. 


------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Whitneybiennial.com is dedicated to the Italian artist Gino De Dominicis
(1947-1998). 

Other inspirations : 

" Forgotten Silver " New Zealand, 1995 
a movie by Peter Jackson and Costa Botes 

and 

" When We Were Kings ", a 1996 Documentary on Muhammad Ali, directed by
Leon Gast and Taylor Hackford 





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