I unfortunately could not attend the interview, so I wasn’t sure what content to expect when I started watching the recording of the interview. First thing I noticed was that all the members seemed much older than I expected. When I watched the Second Front pieces previously, from the use of non-sequitur humor and avatar’s appearance, I assumed that they were in their 30s or 40s. I felt a dissonance between my prior image of the artists and the artists themselves.

During the interview many topics were discussed such as virtual identity, collaboration, extent of third-space performance art, and politics within the Second Life service. I think listening to the members discuss about how much they put thought into their alter-ego added a context to how I perceived the performance pieces. When I watched them first, I perceived characters as cold and somewhat scary, because they were virtual, moved in certain way, and could not speak audibly. But realizing the real people behind these performance, somehow made me more interested in virtual performance arts. Bibbe talked about how having an avatar that’s transformable in anyway gave her an endless opportunity to become any character – and connected that to her personal medical issue of having dissociative personality. I thought this was really interesting, because although most members of Second Life do not have such condition, how disembodied are we from our real life personality when we are in third space? Not only when we use an avatar, but when we engage in any internet art? The issue of etiquette and behavior on virtual space arises, and I think this is the other factor that adds to the unlimited potential of virtual space performance art. Bibbe also mentioned when the group created avatars based on real life people at a symposium during the bank heist – this is stealing physical identity of a real person into virtual space. A physical reality is leaking into the virtual world.

Another funny point that was brought up, was how one member said he squatted at an American Apparel building on Second Life, and pretended to be a worker there. I think another attraction of Second Life is that the physical location does not set any social boundary as it would in real life, and sometimes this seemingly out-of-location-context situations lets us enjoy the performances. It’s almost like making a real life glitch come true in virtual space, and with more audience participants anything is possible.

I was surprised by how much thought and time was put into the collaboration between Second Front ideas and performances, and seeing the people behind the avatars made it easier for me to imagine my own possibility to create performances in virtual space.

Link to Second Front Interview

Jennifer Ringley, a regular American girl studying at a university in Pennsylvania, started a live feed of her college dorm room when she was 19. The webcam set up in her room would send an updated image every 3 minutes onto the web. It attracted millions of visitors, as back in 1996 Internet was still new, and this kind of live exhibition into personal life was not yet a common occurrence on the web.

When asked where she got an idea for this on her website’s FAQ section, Ringley quotes

Initially I bought the camera to update portions of my webpage with pictures of myself. A friend joked that it could be used to do a FishBowl cam, but of a person. The idea fascinated me, and I took off with it. Initially the JenniCAM had an audience of half a dozen of my close friends, and it spread like wildfire from there.

In recent days, the live stream of animals are still common – showing deer trails, pandas, dogs, in their habitat. Ringley took an idea from live streaming of fish in their habitat, and applied it to her own life. 
Of course, many concerns regarding this conceptual art was the pornographic element to it. Ringley did not censor anything, and nudity was very common. Ringley was considered an exhibitionist, although there were many sociological interests on her relation to the internet through the webcam.

Screenshot of JenniCam Gallery

Victor Burgin suggests in his book The Remembered Film, that while the JenniCam served as a window to Ringley’s privacy from audience’s perspective, for Ringley the webcam was a mirror. She was not concerned about seeing who was watching her, and she replies as follows when asked about why she is giving up privacy:

Because I don’t feel I’m giving up my privacy. Just because people can see me doesn’t mean it affects me – I’m still alone in my room, no matter what.

This concept of solidarity while connected to thousands of people via web, is still present in our current society. In fact, it has become increasingly prevalent, especially with rise of social media, and our communications with others have been dominated by the Internet.

Although I am not sure how I personally feel about Ringley’s conceptual art, I could somewhat relate to her when I watched her interview with David Letterman. Creating a window for others to view your personal life can somewhat emphasize your presence, and assure your existence. In fact, we do this almost everyday now, whether through Snapchat, Instagram, or Facebook updates. Ringley’s extreme example of live streaming of her life can give us an insight to compare our own social media exhibitionist tendency to.

JenniCam Website