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Research

Research Critique : Grand Theft Avatar by Second Front

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Grand Theft Avatar is piece done by this group called Second Front.  Second front is a performance art group that was founded in 2006. They pioneered the art of performing on the online avatar-based VR world, Second Life.  The group consists of  8 members that includes Jeremy Owen Turner (Vancouver), Doug Jarvis (Victoria), Tanya Skuce (Vancouver), Gazira Babeli (Italy), Penny Leong Browne (Vancouver), Patrick Lichty (Chicago), Liz Solo (St. Johns) and Scott Kildall (San Francisco).

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It is very interesting to take note that the people that took part in ” Grand Theft Avatar” were not from the same country but were people from different parts of the world, from different time zones.

“We essentially inhabit a swath of networked space, no longer constrained to the singularity of a single moment or place.” – Packer R. “The Third Space,” (2014) in Reportage from the Aesthetic Edge

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This piece was a great exploration of what the artist could do with the internet and technology. By using “Second Life” as a medium which they could carry out their performance of robbing a bank and making it live with conversations being carried out and the multiple camera angles really changed the rules of the narrative.

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“Second Front creates theatres of the absurd that challenge notions of virtual embodiment, online performance and the formation of virtual narrative.”  – Second Front

I think the internet also gives a sense that we can do crazy things without suffering consequences. Taking for example the part in the video which they jumped out of the helicopter without a parachute and sitting in top of a rocket. These are stunts that we can never pull in real life without killing ourselves. Therefore, I feel that this piece was very successful in showing the what collaborative effort on the net can produce.

Research

Research critique: BOLD3RRR… Realtime: Reflections and Render-times by Jon Cates (2012)

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The purpose of this art piece was to show and explore what one can do by performing/streaming directly from the desktop. This work demonstrates the new possibilities of performances for the artists of the new media. The rise of the internet culture and technological advancements allowed for real-performances to happen.  It was also great that the work was unedited and raw.

In 2012, when Jon Cates did the piece, it showed how video and time can come together to present a different type of work to audiences.

And till now I still feel that the below quotes is very true of the internet culture now.

“the media arts have not fully embraced this potentiality, despite the progressive nature of the field.” – Catlow, R., Garrett M., Packer R., “The NetArtizens Project,” (2015)

In the more mainstream internet, the idea of live performances/ broadcast is still a relatively new idea as Facebook only started to have a livestreaming function in Aug 2015. However, this function is only for celebrities, which is in contrast to BOLD3RRR which is a artist doing livestreaming raw, in front of his computer.

The Rock doing a livestream from his phone
The Rock doing a livestream from his phone, 2015
Jon Cates, BoldRRR, streamed from his computer
Jon Cates, BoldRRR, streamed from his computer, 2012

The availability to stream live from phones may pave a path in the future for more to do mobile live streaming that could perhaps show a more raw side to the video footages that we see on popular social media sites – or not.

This also raises the questions of “why is live streaming on the mainstream media for “celebrities” only?” , “Why is live streaming not democratised”  and it also raises the ultimate question of, ” Does big players on the internet such as Facebook and Youtube sort of sets the rules of the internet?”

 

Ps. For me, so far videos like this is the best live streaming videos on YouTube