Even before analyzing the word or the history of “multimedia”, I have pre-conception. Whenever I saw the multimedia or interactive art exhibited in Seoul, there were always some problems. The works supposed to move were stopped because of the safety problem or sometimes even the artists just left them because they couldn’t fix it during the exhibition. And if the works were moving, the movements were too tough, simple and indelicate so it didn’t make any impression. In my experience, the words ‘interactive, technology, multimedia (art)” mean dull, broken down often, and stopped. So after reading this essay, I realized that I got totally different experience and approaches where the multimedia started.
In this essay, the author focused on Richard Wagner‘s “Total Artwork”. He tried to make a comprehensive integration of the arts, totalizing effect of music drama. And John Cage was mentioned as the key performance artist to influence the next generation artists such as Allan Kaprow, Dick Higgins and Nam June Paik.
The most important scientist among the artists was Billy Klüver who “conceived the notion of equal collaboration between artist and engineer.” He made a lot of artworks with artists and founded E.A.T (Experiments in Art and Technology) to connect artists and engineers to create new works.
I thought that the notion of “interactivity, integration, multimedia” could expand to the way more than two elements/media/people can connect and communicate with each other. It’s not only about the mechanical art using technology, but also about the relationships between artists and audiences, artists and scientists in a non-hierarchical structure.
After reading the essay, I thought about “the Death of the Author” written by Roland Barthes. In his essay, he argues that writing and author are unrelated and the interpretation of the writing is only up to viewer. After blurring the boundaries between artists and audiences, and artworks and viewers, what will remain? Maybe we don’t need the words “artist”, and “audience” because there’s no border anymore. We can call just “user” or “maker” of the system. Let’s imagine the future of the art, could it be “prosumer“?
