Sondra Bacharach - Collaborative Art in the Twenty-First Century

Routledge Advances in Art and Visual Studies

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2 Meanings of Abstract Art
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3 Genealogy and Ontology of the Western Image and its Digital Future
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4 Representations of Pain in Art and Visual Culture
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5 Mangas Cultural Crossroads
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12 Play and Participation in Contemporary Arts Practices
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14 Photography and Place
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Donna West Brett

15 How Folklore Shaped Modern Art
A Post-Critical History of Aesthetics
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16 Installation Art and the Practices of Archivalism
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17 Collaborative Art in the Twenty-First Century
Edited by Sondra Bacharach, Jeremy Neil Booth, and Siv B. Fjrestad

First published 2016
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Bacharach, Sondra, editor.
Title: Collaborative art in the twenty-first century / Edited by Sondra Bacharach, Jeremy Neil Booth and Siv B. Fjrestad.
Description: New York: Routledge, 2016. |
Series: Routledge advances in art and visual studies; 17 | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015050119
Subjects: LCSH: Art, Modern21st century. | Artistic collaboration. | Group work in art.
Classification: LCC N6497 .C65 2016 | DDC 709.04dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015050119

ISBN: 978-1-138-93574-7 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-1-315-67719-4 (ebk)

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This book is dedicated to Stephen and Samantha Eng, Florian and Felix Fjrestad-Jones, and Rafael Schroth: the five human babies who emerged, influenced (slowed down, fast-forwarded), and reflected our growing awareness of the profound and meaningful tangle of art, life, and technology in collaborative practice. It is also dedicated to the cultural and natural resources accessible to all members of a society, including air, water, gardens, information, open source software, and the internet. Long may these resources be held in common, not privately owned.

SONDRA BACHARACH, JEREMY NEIL BOOTH AND SIV B. FJRESTAD

SECTION I
Collaboration in the Age of Technological Innovation

GABRIEL MENOTTI

GEMMA ARGELLO MANRESA AND SONDRA BACHARACH

IZABEL GALLIERA

TIJEN TUNALI

SECTION II
Collaboration and the Identity Crisis

K. E. GOVER

TIM CORBALLIS

HENRY JOHN PRATT

LEGWORK (TIMOTHY MURRAY, TOBEY ALBRIGHT, AND EGLE OBCARSKAITE)

KATERINA REED-TSOCHA

SECTION III
Rethinking Collaborations

LOUISE R. MAYHEW

JENNY GILLAM AND EUGENE HANSEN

BARTRAM ONEILL

LEORA MALT Z-LECA

SHERRI IRVIN

PETER MURPHY

DANIELLA RAMOS BARROQUEIRO

Table

Figures

This book is the result of an extended collaboration between Sondra Bacharach at Victoria University of Wellingtons Philosophy Programme and artists and writers Siv Fjrestad and Jeremy Booth, at the time working together at Enjoy Public Art Gallery. Along the way, we benefited from generous funding from the Royal Society of New Zealand Marsden Fund (collaborating with Deborah Tollefsen of the University of Memphis), Victoria University of Wellington, Enjoy Public Art Gallery, the Public Art Project Fund, and Creative New Zealand. We also benefited intellectually from artist Gregory Sholette during his Artist-in-Residence at Enjoy Public Art Gallery, a selection of the 20 international artists, writers, and critics who collaborated to create the Wellington Collaboratorium: An Imaginary Archive in June 2010, and arts practitioners and scholars who participated in the related public seminar on the topic. We would also like to acknowledge the hard work and wonderful insights of our contributors, to thank philosophy student Chrissy Van Hulst for all her hard work, and to remember Katerina Reed-Tsocha, who passed before this book came to print.

Sondra Bacharach, Jeremy Neil Booth, Siv B. Fjrestad

Collaborative Art in the Twenty-First Century presents an international cross section of contemporary collaborative art practice. It explores what it means for artists to work together, here and now. What we find is an extraordinary richness and variety of significant, new trends that respond specifically to an increasingly dynamic climate. A sign of the times, collaboration today requires a strategic engagement across the arts, social media, networking and technological innovation, as well as economic, business, and community-based spheres. Collaboration has become as much a way of life as it has an essential artistic approach.

The central argument of this collection is that collaborative practice in the twenty-first century is profoundly new: collaboration used to be driven by financial and artistic interests. Not everyone had all the materials, skills, and background to engage in art-making, or specific projects, so they decided to work together. The solo artist couldnt always afford the equipment or the training. Collaborating was a practical and strategic response to pursuing new artistic and political objectives in art, or a necessary means to responding to a compromising position, where working alone significantly reduced your artistic potential.

But, the rise of technological innovations revolutionizes how artists work. The past decade has seen a boom of internet-based art, both in the form of production tools and as a malleable, non-regulated international arena through which artists operate independently from mainstream galleries and institutions. Perhaps most significant is the accelerated expansion and acclimatization to internet-based communication, file-sharing platforms and strategies, online networking, social media, gaming, and virtual worlds.