[Internet Art & Culture] Research Critique – BOLD3RRR

BOLD3RRR
by Jon Cates

Glitch Art may look like a software malfunction by people who do not understand the aesthetics of it. The artist makes a work of art by almost doing nothing. However, there are more to that. Although it looks as if creating glitch art is something instantaneous, the artist still has to explore, discover and plan the piece out. What is incredible about Jon Cate’s BOLD3RRR  is the fact that the work was done in realtime!

A shot taken from BOLD3RRR by Jon Cates (2012)

After five to six minutes into the video, the glitch became more intense and I would describe the minutes after that as “bizarre”. Even when the piece started to get so overwhelming, we were able to filter our some noise or graphics and point out small section of the glitch. Some elements were dominating the other and some were very subtle you can barely notice it.

But from a dirty new media perspective, what you might want to be doing is “rebugging”, and pushing different aspects of the machine worlds to see their thresholds, and experiment, and play.
– Jon Cates

What is so appealing about the aesthetics and the experience of glitches in BOLD3RRR? It is possibly the process and making of it. The discovery of the artist provoking digital “errors” creates many artistic possibilities of these brief accidents. The process is more important than the result as a lot of things can happen when we use technology the wrong way.

The artist, Jon Cates, in his glitch work, BOLD3RRR (2012)

Glitching can be found in a variety of forms, including games. “Glitch City” is a glitch in Pokemon where the player is seen in a mess of different game pieces. It is a temporarily corrupted version of an existing map. When players accidentally end themselves up into one of these Glitch City moments, they are the ‘performers’ of these glitches as they are able to provoke the errors further. Of course we could not compare them to artists like Jon Cates but this is rather an interesting form of glitching from a gamer’s perspective. A Glitch Community was even created due to this occurrence.

The way to not be stuck is to focus on glitch as a form of surprise and as a way of glitching people’s expectations.  – Jon Cates

Published by

Dina

Believes in creating works that someone can not only see or touch but be part of, to be within them.

2 thoughts on “[Internet Art & Culture] Research Critique – BOLD3RRR”

  1. Excellent! And you are right… what is truly remarkable about BOLD3RRR as a glitch work is that it was created in real-time… and furthermore, that the artist is describing the process of making the work at the same time. That was a nice example comparing Jon Cates’ glitch to Pokeman, to see how the glitch aesthetic has worked its way into the mainstream gaming world.

  2. I liked the part where you mentioned “Some elements were dominating the other and some were very subtle you can barely notice it.” I personally feel that it gives the artwork a sense of rhythm. It started out quite straightforward, and sort of eased the viewer into the more complex layered portions of the piece. I also like the part about Pokemon creating a community around the glitch! It reminded me of video game speed runners who often use and hunt for glitches within the game to create an impossibly fast play-through of a game. Keep up the good work! 

Leave a Reply