Etoy is a European digital art group formed in 1994. It has won several international awards including the Prix Ars Electronica in 1996. Their main slogan is: "leaving reality behind."
Etoy has routinely experimented with the boundaries of art, such as selling shares of "stock" in the etoy.corporation, a registered company in Switzerland[1] and travelling the world as well as living in "etoy.tanks" (cargo containers).[2]
History
etoy was founded in 1994 by Gino Esposto (etoy.ESPOSTO/CARL), Michel Zai (etoy.ZAI), Daniel Udatny (etoy.UDATNY), Martin Kubli (etoy.KUBLI), Marky Goldstein (etoy.GOLDSTEIN), Fabio Gramazio (etoy.GRAMAZIO) and Hans Bernhard (etoy.BRAINHARD/HANS).
The group first used the name "etoy" in 1994, for performances at raves and techno music events.[3] The group's members, based in various European countries, were referred to as "agents".[3]
etoy reached worldwide fame in 1996 with the digital hijack. In the same year, etoy won the Prix Ars Electronica. The group's work includes numerous digital performances.
Following internal conflicts, only Gramazio, Zai and Kubli were left of the founding members in 1998 after several resignations. New agents supported etoy in 1999/2000 in the battle against the online toy retailer eToys for the internet domain “etoy.com” and American trademark rights, which became known as toywar.
Since 2005, etoy.CORPORATION has been working on Mission Eternity.
etoy "agents" with mortal remains of Timothy Leary (2007)
In 2007, German and Swiss director Andrea Reiter realised a documentary (produced by Hugofilm) about etoy's "Mission Eternity" project, a "digital cult of the dead".[4] This art project dealt with topics such as death and immortalization. She and her team followed the etoy.CREW and their Mission Eternity sarcophagus to Berlin, Zurich, San Jose and Nevada. The Hugofilm production was released in early 2008.
As of 2015, a history overview on the group's website describes it as entering "hibernation mode" in 2013.[5]
Over one hundred etoy shares are owned by art collectors, museums and others. Each certificate documents an (ownership) share in the overall work and at the same time visually represents an important moment in the company or art history.
Toywar
The toywar was a legal battle around 1999/2000 between the Internet toy retailer eToys.com and etoy about the domain name etoy.com. Fearing brand dilution and customer confusion about the similar domain names, eToys sued etoy for trademark infringement, and asked etoy to remove graphic images and profane language from their website that were bringing customer complaints. The artists refused to comply, and eToys eventually obtained a preliminary injunction against etoy which shut down their website.[6] etoy fought back with a coordinated public relations campaign and Internet-based denial of service attacks on eToys.com.[7] After several weeks eToys dropped the lawsuit and the etoy website returned to operation.[8]
etoy activists have called it "the most expensive performance in art history".[9] The story is one of the subjects of the documentary film, Info Wars.
An email campaign was led by Internet activists including etoy agents developing the toywar website.
A book about the story of the etoy corporation, Leaving reality behind, by Regula Bochsler and Adam Wishart was released in 2002.
MISSION ETERNITY
MISSION ETERNITY is a long-term digital art project by the Swiss art collective etoy, initiated in 2005, that explores themes of death, memory, and digital preservation. The project combines physical installations with networked software systems to create what etoy describes as "a mobile cemetery for the information age." The project's centerpiece is the SARCOPHAGUS, a modified 20-foot cargo container equipped with 17,000 individually controllable LED lights that has traveled internationally since 2006 as a mobile memorial installation. In 2007, the ashes of counterculture icon Timothy Leary became the first mortal remains integrated into the project.
Background and Development Conceptual Origins (2003-2005) The conceptual framework for MISSION ETERNITY emerged from a series of strategic meetings held by etoy members in 2003, including gatherings in Saas Fee and Einsiedeln, Switzerland. The project originated from interviews with elderly individuals conducted by etoy to understand perspectives on media art, following the group's earlier work with children in the etoy.DAY-CARE project. The project addressed two interconnected concerns: the philosophical question of how digital societies remember and memorialize the dead, and the practical challenge of preserving media art. After the conclusion of their TOYWAR project (1999-2000), etoy sought to create work with longer temporal horizons than typical internet-based art.
Technical Development Development began in earnest in late 2005 in Berlin, where etoy members collaborated with the Chaos Computer Club and software engineers who had developed control systems for large LED pixel screens. The project required significant technical innovation, including custom circuit board design, LED mounting solutions, and power infrastructure.
By early 2006, financial and artistic pressures intensified when the SARCOPHAGUS was selected for exhibition at ISEA Zero One festival in San Jose, California, scheduled for July 2006. This deadline required substantial upfront investment before the technical feasibility was fully proven.
The SARCOPHAGUS Installation The SARCOPHAGUS is a 20-foot ISO standard cargo container measuring 6 meters long, 2.4 meters wide, and 2.6 meters high, weighing approximately 4 tons. The interior surfaces (walls, ceiling, and floor) are covered with 17,000 individually controllable LED lights creating an immersive environment that visitors can walk through.[citation needed] The installation is designed to function as a mobile sepulcher capable of holding the remains of up to 1,000 individuals (referred to in the project as "M∞ PILOTS"). The container travels internationally, with its location changing over time.
Technical Features Visitors interact with the SARCOPHAGUS through mobile devices or web browsers, accessing digital content associated with individuals memorialized within the installation. The LED display system visualizes what etoy calls "ARCANUM CAPSULES" - interactive digital portraits designed to persist indefinitely in networked storage.
ARCANUM CAPSULES ARCANUM CAPSULES are the digital memorial components of MISSION ETERNITY, described by etoy as "interactive portraits of individuals designed and built to circulate the global info sphere forever." These digital artifacts are stored in a distributed network of servers and private computers, with content shaped by both the deceased individual and the community that chooses to host the data.
Exhibition History and Reception Major Exhibitions The SARCOPHAGUS made its debut at ISEA Zero One festival in San Jose, California in July 2006. Subsequent exhibitions and appearances have included:
2012 Vida – Madrid Spain
2011 CCCStrozzina – Florence Italia
2011 Kunsthaus Zug – Zug Switzerland
2010 Kunsthalle Gwangju – Gwangju Korea
2010 SiliconDreams – San Sebastian Spain
2009 ARS ELECTRONICA – Linz Austria
2009 Heiligkreuz – Entlebuch Switzerland
2009 Museum of Communication Berne – Switzerland
2009 Pollinaria – Italy
2008 Shift Festival – Basel Switzerland
2008 MANIFESTA7 – Bolzano Italy
2008 SYNTHETIC TIMES – Beijing China
Notable Events In 2007, the cremated remains of Timothy Leary (1920-1996), psychologist and counterculture figure, were integrated into the SARCOPHAGUS, becoming the first mortal remains to travel with the installation.[citation needed] The project received two awards and extensive media coverage in the United States, Spain, France, Switzerland, and China between 2006-2009.
Artistic and Conceptual Framework MISSION ETERNITY engages with cultural traditions surrounding death and burial while incorporating information technology and networked systems. The project's aesthetic approach combines references to impermanence and mortality (represented through white coloring) with technology culture (represented through orange accents).
The project addresses regulatory and cultural constraints on burial practices. In many European countries, including Germany, strict laws govern the storage of human remains and memorial practices, such as prohibitions on URLs on tombstones or requirements that remains be stored only in designated cemeteries.
Meisiek, S., & Haefliger, S. (2011). Inviting the unexpected: entrepreneurship and the arts. In Art entrepreneurship. Edward Elgar Publishing.
Petrović-Šteger, M. (2012). Mobile Sepulchre and Interactive Formats of Memorialization: On Funeral and Mourning Practices in Digital Art. Journeys, 13(2), 71-89.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply. Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.
