HTML: Is it Art?

joeljones writes "The New York Times (registration, yeah, yeah, yeah) has an interesting story about two artists who use HTML, Javascript, and other web technologies as their medium. Could be an interesting set of test cases for anyone writing a browser." While we're on the subject of artsy sites, I submit Zombo.com for your perusal. I believe it to be the only web site that claims the infinite is possible.

Comments

computer code as art..

[Unominous Coward]

I guess anything, including code can be artistic if it blends something technical with an art in a subtle way.

That's the whole idea behind poetry, at least. And computer code can be poetic.

Re:computer code as art..

[tankdilla]

Here's some creative computer code art.

Art/medium?

[six809]

Well canvas isn't considered 'art', nor is paint. HTML is just the tool used by the artists. What they come up with can easily be considered art. Examples.

Re:Art/medium?

[khakipuce]

It's strange that the "is it art" question really only ever comes up with visual arts. If someone gets up on stage and plays music from Stockhausen to Madonna, Bach to Kylie, no one asks "is it music", we might comment on it being good or bad, but no quesitons what it is.

One of the few distinguishing fetures of Visual arts is that they have no utility. Anything that has utility is craft, not art.

So if this has no utility and is put up by it's creators as art then yes, it is art. BUT the real question is IS IT GOOD ART?

Re:Art/medium?

[TGK]

I'll submit a few examples to the contrary.

• Japanese and Chinese Writing
• Japanese Swords
• Advertisements
• Fabrigee Eggs (many of which had utility
• Pretty much anything by Frank Lloyd Wright

Art and utilitarianism are not necessarily mutualy exclusive. One might argue, instead, that art that actualy does something useful is more deserving of the word than much of what traditional is attached to the word.

Re:oh my

[Anonymous Coward]

You know, there are people living outside the US. Actually, the majority of people living on this planet do not live there.

gimmie a break

[automag_6]

Sure, I'll say it's art, in the same way I'll nod my head and agree when someone tries to convince me that it's a programming language. In my experience, if a person doesn't understand why HTML isn't a programming language, it's not worth my while to explain it, I'll just play along and know the truth. I recon if people start saying it's art, I'll adopt the same aproach. I'm sure there are people who'll flame me for this, but that's thier 2 cents, this, on the other hand, is mine. Mod me as a troll if you like, I just can't sell HTML as a programming language or art.

HTML: Is it Art?

[zonix]

No. Is a pen or a pencil art? No.

HTML is a Hypertext Markup Language. :-)

z

Re:HTML: Is it Art?

[mirko]

You could also consider consider the Magritte approach, by putting a page like :
<H1>this is not ART</H1>

I personally like the pragmatic logic approach :
art is always composed of both an ethical and an esthetical aspect.
Should one be missing, the result would not be art.
Exemples :

• Constructivism : 100% esthetic, 0% ethics
  
• Abstract art : 0% esthetic (Have you seen Joseph Beuys piles of fat, in the Stuttgart modern art museum ?) 100% ethics.
  

Worst of the Web

[Michael's a Jerk!]

Future artists are advised to take a look at This Site for direction... Enjoy.

HTML is just a medium

[jolyonr]

Just in the same way that you can take a piece of paper and paint a masterpiece onto it, or you can print a pizza leaflet onto it. The existence of pizza leaflets doesn't mean that paper can never be used for art. Jolyon

ASCII as Art

[notestein]

I still prefer old school. ASCII as Art.

The Female Form
Cinema

Sound

[mike1086]

You need to get some sound dude...it came out in the eighties...man...you're way behind.

Re:computer code as art.. (links)

[Draigon]

(sorry for double post, should have previewed first, here they are linked)

http://www.once-upon-a-forest.com/
http://www.snarg.net/
http://www.entropy8zuper.org/
http://www.redsmoke.com/
http://www.absurd.org/
http://www.fakeshop.com/
http://snudd.sil.at/
http://www.jodi.org/
http://www.superbad.com/
http://www.d2b.org/
http://www.silverserver.co.at/lia/

Re:oh my

[Ozan]

What did ZOMBO do to annoy CowbowNeal THAT much?

Hmm...

"Welcome to Zombocom!"

"This is Zombocom!"

"You can do anything... at Zombocom!"

"Anything at all!"

"The only limit is yourself!"

"Anything is possible... at Zombocom!"

"The infinite is possible... at Zombocom!"

"The unattainable is unknown... at Zombocom!"

I think it was letting Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf speak the introduction.

"There are no infidel Americans... at Zombocom!"

the question isn't "is it art?", it's "do I care?"

[Vellmont]

I honestly don't understand why people assign so much value to calling something art. It's as if calling something art assigns it to a higher plane where it can't be questioned.

I guess I wasn't all that impressed by the sites mentioned in the NYT article. IMO superbad.com is far more cool than the jodi sites. Futhermore superbad has been around for years, so I don't see how these people have created anything all that original or special. For those of you who don't know, superbad is a... surrealistic website where you don't really feel in control of the website since it's never really very apparent just how each page works. I'm sure there's many other people that've created strange websites like this as well.

As far as the "you're not in control of your computer" theme goes, there's lots of sites (mostly porn) that have all kinds of annoying javascript tricks to open up new windows when you try to kill the old window. Seems like that's the same idea as this. Sure, I guess the sites the NYT talks about are "art", but so is the tracing of my hand I did when I was 5. I think the NYT has missed the boat on this one, and perhaps should have done a bit more homework on what other people have done in this field.

Duh, of course it can be

[Quila]

Any method used by humans to express themselves can be a vehicle for art. How good that method is for conveying artistic talent is another matter entirely.

Define "art"

[simong_oz]

Something that has always fascinated me - can ayone provide a definition of "art". I mean the type of art that hangs in galleries and modern art museums and people argue endlessly about whether it really is art or is just plain stupid. The type of art that this is trying to classify HTML under?

The best one I've found is "the products of human creativity", but that still seems way too broad. Personally I feel that art should have no functional purpose, so something that has a purpose (a building say) can be beautiful, but I don't think it is art.

Re:Define "art"

[Malic]

I think Scott McCloud of Zot fame (http://www.scottmccloud.com) had probably the broadest definition of all - anything that doesn't involve survival or reproduction can potentially be defined as "art".

The whole point being that you can't just eat and/or have sex all day - you have to find other things to do to fill the time. Thus "art".

Let the arguements begin...

Net.Art

[vitaflo]

I work at the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis in the New Media dept, the largest of any museum in the country. We're responsible for all the digital artwork here, including "net.art".

This is certainly not "news" since net.art has been around for well over 8 years now. jodi.org and 01.org (meantioned in the article) could probably be considered the "grandfathers" of net.art, though I suppose there could be some debate on that, depending on whom you talk to.

And while it's been around for a while it's only been in the last few years that more museums have been taking it seriously. The Walker, the Whitney and the SF MOMA are the big three that come to mind when thinking about museums with a large new media collections. More and more museums are understanding the significance of it as well.

And just with any digital medium there are some ethical questions when it comes to the artwork, such as copyright, and if it's ok to make digital copies of artwork, or does that dilute it? How many is too many? Some artwork is based off of other artwork, so it is ok to "steal" (copy) someone else's work (art or not) to make into my own art? There are parallels here with traditional artwork (like found object art), but also issues that are specific to this medium as well.

Then there's the issue of archiving. If a project runs off a DB and is only usable in Netscape 4, how do we archive it so that in 50 years we can view it? Do we archive just the software? What if future hardware can't run it? Do we archive the hardware as well? What if it relies on some form of online connection, but that online setup changes in the future (think security, etc) so that it cannot be reproduced 100 years from now? Have we then lost this piece forever? Obvioulsy there are a lot of questions that need to be answered in this area.

I think the real question though isn't "is it art", the question is how much impact will it have in the future. When Picaso made his paintings some people said he was crazy, or didn't think it was art, but in hindsight we know the outcome. The same is true for art in new media. Only time will really tell how much lasting impact it has on the way we think and approach art.