【LECTURE】Tseng Yu-Chuan | Information-Procedure-System: An Aesthetical discussion on Digital Art
Speaker: Tseng Yu-Chuan
Language: Chinese
Time: 2015.09.05（Sat.) , 15:00-16:30
Venue: Chronus Art Center
Address: Building 18, No 50 Moganshan Road, Shanghai
This is a free event, please click "here"to RSVP.
About the Leture
Digital technology influences the development of society, life, and culture. Artists work and live with digital technology in the digital environment. For artists, digital technology does not only tool, media, medium but also the subject of creation and mode of thinking. But, compare with traditional media of art works, such as oil painting and sculpture, does the aesthetic of digital art change? What is the digital art theory? In 1968, Jack Burnham published the article “Systems Esthetics”. He stated that the “system” is the logical thinking process of art creation. The core concept is Software and Hardware. In 1970, in the article “The Aesthetics of Intelligent Systems”, Jack Burnham gave a further explanation of the aesthetic of intelligence system. There are the information transition of art creation, the procedure of art, the transform of viewer’s role, and the necessity of environmental system. He also mentioned that artists have to aware the influence of technological progress. Artists need to be the ideologist, ethicist, persuader, and visionary. Artists have to provoke the viewers to concern the issue, to care about the subject, structure, input, output and relational activity during the system. The lecture will introduce the System Aesthetics of Jack Burnham and his curation「Software Information Technology: its new meaning for Art」in 1970. The lecture also will discuss the aesthetic of digital art. It is in the process of information transmission, the control of process and connection, and the systematic relation of whole.
About the Speaker
Tseng Yu-Chuan
Associate Professor, Department of Public Relations and Advertising, Shih Hsin University
Supervisor, Taipei Digital Art Foundation
Board member of Taiwan Women's Art Association
Board member of Taiwan Information Design, Art, Technology, Education Association
Tseng Yu-chuan obtained her PhD from the Graduate Institute of Applied Art, National Chiao Tung University. She specializes in research on innovation and theory in interactive digital art, with a PhD thesis entitled The Characteristics of Contemporary Interactive Digital Art. Tseng adopts Martin Heidegger’s (1889 - 1976) philosophy of technology, with its perspectives on objects, tools, and the essence of human nature, as her conceptual framework. She draws on Heidegger’s theories on human control as her theoretical foundation; while tracing the course of historical development to understand the origins, principles of, and discourse related to interactive digital art, and to reassess various aspects of the history of art, including art and technology, post-90s digital art in the West, and digital art in Taiwan. With this as a basis, Tseng identifies three central characteristics of interactive digital artwork that reflect Heidegger’s theories on human control. For example, interactive digital artwork comprises: programs, code, and execution; is random, automated, and is a derivative of the real thing; and contains logic, procedures, and a system.
Tseng began creating digital artwork in 1998. Starting from 2002, she adopted an interactive online format to produce interactive art. In 2003, Tseng began to ponder the status of the existence of humans in the digital age. Through a series of works, she explored this digital system – built of technology – which brings together the lifestyle, lives, and existence of the masses. In 2002, Tseng’s work was presented in a solo exhibition (“Let’s Make Art”) at the Taipei Museum of Fine Arts. This was the first ever art gallery exhibition in Taiwan to employ instantaneous Web-based interaction. In 2005 and 2006, Tseng’s respective works “Immersing Me” and “Flow” were selected for presentation at the ACM Multimedia International Symposium. In 2007, Tseng was honored for a series of works called “Who”, receiving a special grant for innovation in art and technology from the National Arts and Culture Foundation. She then showcased this series of works at exhibitions held during May and July, 2008, at the Taipei Hong-gah Museum and the National Taiwan Museum of Fine Arts respectively. In 2008, the works “Flowerman” and “All Ways – O’s Chatroom” were selected to be presented at the International Symposium on Electronic Arts, ISEA. In 2008, Tseng’s artwork “Flow” was published in the form of a written thesis in the international journal “Leonardo”.
In 2010, at the request of Prof. Lin Pey Chwen, Tseng took part in the Taiwan Digital Art “Pulse Stream” Plan, serving as the organizer of the Plan’s first exhibition, held at the Taipei Digital Arts Center and entitled “The First Phase: A Digital Art Exhibition on the Body, Gender, and Technology”. In 2011, she helped to organize the “Photon+ 2011 International Techno Art Exhibition of New Taipei City”, which discussed the transmission of meaning through particles of information composed primarily of light. In the same year, Tseng hosted an interactive theater performance called “Dinner of Luciérnaga”, which was produced as part of an art and technology cross-discipline initiative held by the ROC Council for Cultural Affairs (now the Ministry of Culture). In 2012, the Department of Cultural Affairs, Taipei City Government, commissioned Tseng to research and publish the book Life Dialogues – Chen Cheng-po and Paul Tien-shen (published by the Paul Tien-Shen Memorial Museum). Subsequently, Tseng participated in the Leonardo Digital Art Initiative; and then worked with Dr. Chiu Chih-yung and Dr. Ching-Yueh Tseng to organize “The Third Phase: Body / Interface Digital Art Exhibition”. Later in 2012, she coordinated an exhibition for the Taiwan Women’s Art Association (WAA) entitled “Sensoria – New Media Art by Taiwanese Women Artists”. She also traveled to Japan to participate in the 2012 ACM International Conference on Multimedia, where she delivered a presentation on the theater production initiative “Dinner of Luciérnaga”.
