This article is about display or performance art. For interactive musical performance, see Call and response (music). For interactive digital music, see Adaptive music.
The Tunnel under the Atlantic (1995), Maurice Benayoun, Virtual Reality Interactive Installation, a video link between gallery visitors in Paris and MontrealMusic Room (1983), Jean-Robert Sedano and Solveig de Ory in Montpellier France
Interactive art is a form of art that involves the spectator in a way that allows the art to achieve its purpose. Some interactive art installations achieve this by letting the observer walk through, over or around them; others ask the artist or the spectators to become part of the artwork in some way.[2]
Works of this kind of art frequently feature computers, interfaces and sometimes sensors to respond to motion, heat, meteorological changes or other types of input their makers have programmed the works to respond to. Most examples of virtual Internet art and electronic art are highly interactive. Sometimes, visitors are able to navigate through a hypertext environment; some works accept textual or visual input from outside; sometimes an audience can influence the course of a performance or can even participate in it. Some other interactive artworks are considered as immersive as the quality of interaction involve all the spectrum of surrounding stimuli. Virtual reality environments like works by Maurice Benayoun and Jeffrey Shaw are highly interactive as the work the spectators – Maurice Benayoun call them "visitors", Miroslaw Rogala calls them (v)users, Char Davies "immersants" – interact with take all their fields of perception.
Though some of the earliest examples of interactive art have been dated back to the 1920s, most digital art didn't make its official entry into the world of art until the late 1990s.[3] Since this debut, countless museums and venues have been increasingly accommodating digital and interactive art into their productions. This budding genre of art is continuing to grow and evolve in a somewhat rapid manner through internet social sub-culture, as well as through large scale urban installations.
Interactive art is a genre of art in which the viewers participate in some way by providing an input in order to determine the outcome. Unlike traditional art forms, wherein the interaction of the spectator is merely a mental event, interactivity allows for various types of navigation, assembly, and/or contribution to an artwork, which goes far beyond purely psychological activity.[3] Interactivity as a medium produces meaning.[5]
Interactive art installations are generally computer-based and frequently rely on sensors, which gauge things such as temperature, motion, proximity, and other meteorological phenomena that the maker has programmed in order to elicit responses based on participant action. In interactive artworks, both the audience and the machine work together in dialogue in order to produce a unique artwork for each audience to observe. However, not all observers visualize the same picture. Because it is interactive art, each observer makes their own interpretation of the artwork and it may be completely different from another observer's views.[5]
Interactive art can be distinguished from generative art in that it constitutes a dialogue between the artwork and the participant; specifically, the participant has agency, or the ability, even in an unintentional manner, to act upon the artwork and is furthermore invited to do so within the context of the piece, i.e. the work affords the interaction. More often, we can consider that the work takes its visitor into account. In an increasing number of cases, an installation can be defined as a "responsive environment", especially those created by architects and designers. By contrast, Generative Art, which may be interactive, but not responsive per se, tends to be a monologue – the artwork may change or evolve in the presence of the viewer, but the viewer may not be invited to engage in the reaction but merely enjoy it.[2]
History
According to the new media artist and theorist [citation needed]Maurice Benayoun, the first piece of interactive art should be the work done by Parrhasius during his art contest with Zeuxis described by Pliny, in the fifth century B.C. when Zeuxis tried to unveil the painted curtain. The work takes its meaning from Zeuxis' gesture and wouldn't exist without it. Zeuxis, by its gesture, became part of Parrhasius' work. This shows that the specificity of interactive art resides often less in the use of computers than in the quality of proposed "situations" and the "Other's" involvement in the process of sensemaking. Nevertheless, computers and real time computing made the task easier and opened the field of virtuality – the potential emergence of unexpected (although possibly pre-written) futures – to contemporary arts.
Some of the earliest examples of interactive art were created as early as the 1920s. An example is Marcel Duchamp’s piece named Rotary Glass Plates. The artwork required the viewer to turn on the machine and stand at a distance of one meter in order to see an optical illusion.[6]
The present idea of interactive art began to flourish more in the 1960s for partly political reasons. At the time, many people found it inappropriate for artists to carry the only creative power within their works.[citation needed] Those artists who held this view wanted to give the audience their own part of this creative process. An early example is found in the early 1960s "change-paintings" of Roy Ascott, about whom Frank Popper has written: "Ascott was among the first artists to launch an appeal for total spectator participation".[7] Aside from the “political” view, it was also current wisdom that interaction and engagement had a positive part to play within the creative process.[8]
In the 1970s, artists began to use new technology such as video and satellites to experiment with live performances and interactions through the direct broadcast of video and audio.[9] At this time, Gordon Pask came up with the "Conversation theory". This theory emphasizes the dynamic exchange of information between participants in a system. As a two-way dialogue, this concept of a conversation between the user and the system has shaped artists' thinking about interactivity.[10]
Interactive art became a large phenomenon due to the advent of computer-based interactivity in the 1990s. Along with this came a new kind of art-experience. Audience and machine were now able to more easily work together in dialogue in order to produce a unique artwork for each audience.[5] In the late 1990s, museums and galleries began increasingly incorporating the art form in their shows, some even dedicating entire exhibitions to it.[11] This continues today and is only expanding due to increased communications through digital media.
10.000 Moving Cities (2018), Marc Lee, Augmented Reality Multiplayer Game, Art Installation using smartphones
A hybrid emerging discipline drawing on the combined interests of specific artists and architects has been created in the last 10–15 years.[when?] Disciplinary boundaries have blurred, and significant number of architects and interactive designers have joined electronic artists in the creation of new, custom-designed interfaces and evolutions in techniques for obtaining user input (such as dog vision, alternative sensors, voice analysis, etc.); forms and tools for information display (such as video projection, lasers, robotic and mechatronicactuators, led lighting etc.); modes for human-human and human-machine communication (through the Internet and other telecommunications networks); and to the development of social contexts for interactive systems (such as utilitarian tools, formal experiments, games and entertainment, social critique, and political liberation).
Forms
Maurizio Bolognini, Collective Intelligence Machines series (CIMs, from 2000): interactive installations using the mobile phone network and participation technologies taken from e-democracy.
There are many different forms of interactive art. Such forms range from interactive dance, music, and even drama.[14] New technology, primarily computer systems and computer technology, have enabled a new class of interactive art.[15] Examples of such interactive art are installation art, interactive architecture, interactive film, and interactive storytelling. Since there is a presumed participant or agent in interactivity, interactive art has a deep connection with performance art.[16]
Events and places
There are number of globally significant festivals and exhibitions of interactive and media arts. Prix Ars Electronica is a major yearly competition and exhibition that gives awards to outstanding examples of (technology-driven) interactive art. Others include SIGGRAPH (the Association of Computing Machinery's Special Interest Group in Graphics), ISEA (the International Symposium on Electronic Art), DEAF (the Dutch Electronic Arts Festival), Transmediale Germany, Electronic Language International Festival Brazil, and AV Festival England.
CAiiA (the Centre for Advanced Inquiry in the Interactive Arts) was first established by Roy Ascott in 1994 at the University of Wales, Newport, and later in 2003 as the Planetary Collegium. It was the first doctoral and post doc research center to be established specifically for research in the interactive art field.
Interactive architecture has now been installed on and as part of building facades, in foyers, museums, and large scale public spaces, including airports, in a number of global cities. A number of leading museums, for example, the National Gallery, Tate, Victoria & Albert Museum, and Science Museum in London (to cite the leading UK museums active in this field) were early adopters in the field of interactive technologies, investing in educational resources, and more latterly, in the creative use of MP3 players for visitors. In 2004, the Victoria & Albert Museum commissioned curator and author Lucy Bullivant to write Responsive Environments (2006), the first such publication of its kind. Interactive designers are frequently commissioned for museum displays; a number specialize in wearable computing.
↑ Rosen M., "Gordon Pask's Cybernetic System: Conversations After the End of the Mechanical Age" in Samuel Bianchini and Erik Verhagen, Practicable: from participation to interaction in contemporary art, MIT Press, 2016, pp.25-38.
↑ Dannenberg, R, Bates, J: "A model for interactive art", Proceedings of the Fifth Biennial Symposium for Arts and Technology, 51(78):2
↑ Dannenberg, R, Bates, J: "A model for interactive art", Proceedings of the Fifth Biennial Symposium for Arts and Technology, 51(78):1
↑ Dixon, Steve (2007). Digital Performance A History of New Media in Theater, Dance, Performance Art, and Installation. Boston: MIT Press. pp.2, 3, 4, 5, 6. ISBN9780262042352.
Further reading
Frank Popper, Art—Action and Participation, New York University Press, 1975
Ascott, R.2003. Telematic Embrace: visionary theories of art, technology and consciousness. (Edward A. Shanken, ed.) Berkeley: University of California Press.
Roy Ascott. 2002. Technoetic Arts (Editor and Korean translation: YI, Won-Kon), (Media & Art Series no. 6, Institute of Media Art, Yonsei University). Yonsei: Yonsei University Press
Ascott, R. 1998. Art & Telematics: toward the Construction of New Aesthetics. (Japanese trans. E. Fujihara). A. Takada & Y. Yamashita eds. Tokyo: NTT Publishing Co., Ltd.
Barreto, Ricardo and Perissinotto, Paula “the_culture_of_immanence”, in Internet Art. Ricardo Barreto e Paula Perissinotto (orgs.). São Paulo, IMESP, 2002. ISBN85-7060-038-0.
Dinkla, Söke, "Pioniere Interaktiver Kunst von 1970 bis heute". Hatje Cantz Verlag, 1997. ISBN9783893229239
Dreher, Thomas, The observer as actor in Happenings and context-sensitive installations. A short history of re- and interactive art/Der Beobachter als Akteur in Happenings und umweltsensitiven Installationen. Eine kleine Geschichte der re- & interaktiven Kunst, in German http://dreher.netzliteratur.net/4_Medienkunst_Text.html]
Ernest Edmonds, Linda Candy, Mark Fell, Roger Knott, Sandra Pauletto, Alastair Weakley. 2003. Developing Interactive Art Using Visual Programming. In: Constantine Stephanidis & Julie Jacko (Editors), Human-Computer Interaction: Theory and Practice, (Part II). Volume 2. (Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Human-Computer Interaction, Crete, June 23–27), Published by Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, London, June 2003, pp.1183–1187, ISBN0-8058-4931-9
(in Spanish)Juan Martín Prada, Interactividad electrónica e interacción social, (Chapter 7 of Prácticas artísticas e Internet en la época de las redes sociales), AKAL, Madrid, 2012
Morignat Valérie, Real Presences Within Virtual Worlds, Actualités du récit. Pratiques, théories, modèles”, Volume 34 numéro 2-3, 2006, sous la direction de René Audet et Nicolas Xanthos]
Morignat Valérie, Présences réelles dans les mondes virtuels, Actualités du récit. Pratiques, théories, modèles”, Volume 34 numéro 2-3, 2006, sous la direction de René Audet et Nicolas Xanthos]
Installation art is an artistic genre of three-dimensional works that are often site-specific and designed to transform the perception of a space. Generally, the term is applied to interior spaces, whereas exterior interventions are often called public art, land art or art intervention; however, the boundaries between these terms overlap.
Digital art refers to any artistic work or practice that uses digital technology as part of the creative or presentation process. It can also refer to computational art that uses and engages with digital media. Since the 1960s, various names have been used to describe digital art, including computer art, electronic art, multimedia art, and new media art.
Postdigital, in artistic practice, is a term that describes works of art and theory that are more concerned with being human than with being digital, similar to the concept of "undigital" introduced in 1995, where technology and society advances beyond digital limitations to achieve a totally fluid multimediated reality that is free from artefacts of digital computation. The postdigital is concerned with our rapidly changed and changing relationships with digital technologies and art forms.
Software art is a work of art where the creation of software, or concepts from software, play an important role; for example software applications which were created by artists and which were intended as artworks. As an artistic discipline software art has attained growing attention since the late 1990s. It is closely related to Internet art since it often relies on the Internet, most notably the World Wide Web, for dissemination and critical discussion of the works. Art festivals such as FILE Electronic Language International Festival, Transmediale (Berlin), Prix Ars Electronica (Linz) and readme have devoted considerable attention to the medium and through this have helped to bring software art to a wider audience of theorists and academics.
Electronic art is a form of art that makes use of electronic media. More broadly, it refers to technology and/or electronic media. It is related to information art, new media art, video art, digital art, interactive art, internet art, and electronic music. It is considered an outgrowth of conceptual art and systems art.
Information art, which is also known as informatism or data art, is an art form that is inspired by and principally incorporates data, computer science, information technology, artificial intelligence, and related data-driven fields. The information revolution has resulted in over-abundant data that are critical in a wide range of areas, from the Internet to healthcare systems. Related to conceptual art, electronic art and new media art, informatism considers this new technological, economical, and cultural paradigm shift, such that artworks may provide social commentaries, synthesize multiple disciplines, and develop new aesthetics. Realization of information art often take, although not necessarily, interdisciplinary and multidisciplinary approaches incorporating visual, audio, data analysis, performance, and others. Furthermore, physical and virtual installations involving informatism often provide human-computer interaction that generate artistic contents based on the processing of large amounts of data.
Algorithmic art or algorithm art is art, mostly visual art, in which the design is generated by an algorithm. Algorithmic artists are sometimes called algorists.
Rebecca Allen is an internationally recognized digital artist inspired by the aesthetics of motion, the study of perception and behavior and the potential of advanced technology. Her artwork, which spans five decades and takes the form of experimental video, large-scale performances, live simulations and virtual and augmented reality art installations, addresses issues of gender, identity and what it means to be human as technology redefines our sense of reality.
Scott Snibbe is an interactive media artist, author, entrepreneur, and meditation instructor who hosts the Skeptic's Path to Enlightenment meditation podcast. His first book, How to Train a Happy Mind, was released in 2024. Snibbe has collaborated with other artists and musicians, including Björk on her interactive “app album” Björk: Biophilia that was acquired by New York's MoMA as the first downloadable app in the museum's collection. Between 2000 and 2013 he founded several companies, including Eyegroove, which was acquired by Facebook in 2016. Early in his career, Snibbe was one of the developers of After Effects.
Maurice Benayoun is a French new-media artist, curator, and theorist based in Paris and Hong Kong.
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Golan Levin is an American new media artist, composer, performer and engineer interested in developing artifacts and events which explore supple new modes of reactive expression.
Telematic art is a descriptive of art projects using computer-mediated telecommunications networks as their medium. Telematic art challenges the traditional relationship between active viewing subjects and passive art objects by creating interactive, behavioural contexts for remote aesthetic encounters. Telematics was first coined by Simon Nora and Alain Minc in The Computerization of Society. Roy Ascott sees the telematic art form as the transformation of the viewer into an active participator of creating the artwork which remains in process throughout its duration. Ascott has been at the forefront of the theory and practice of telematic art since 1978 when he went online for the first time, organizing different collaborative online projects.
Fred Forest is a French new media artist making use of video, photography, the printed press, mail, radio, television, telephone, telematics, and the internet in a wide range of installations, performances, and public interventions that explore both the ramifications and potential of media space. He was a cofounder of both the Sociological Art Collective (1974) and the Aesthetics of Communication movement (1983).
Internet art is a form of new media art distributed via the Internet. This form of art circumvents the traditional dominance of the physical gallery and museum system. In many cases, the viewer is drawn into some kind of interaction with the work of art. Artists working in this manner are sometimes referred to as net artists.
Maurizio Bolognini is a post-conceptual media artist. His installations are mainly concerned with the aesthetics of machines, and are based on the minimal and abstract activation of technological processes that are beyond the artist's control, at the intersection of generative art, public art and e-democracy.
New media art includes artworks designed and produced by means of electronic media technologies. It comprises virtual art, computer graphics, computer animation, digital art, interactive art, sound art, Internet art, video games, robotics, 3D printing, immersive installation and cyborg art. The term defines itself by the thereby created artwork, which differentiates itself from that deriving from conventional visual arts such as architecture, painting or sculpture.
Cybernetic art is contemporary art that builds upon the legacy of cybernetics, where feedback involved in the work takes precedence over traditional aesthetic and material concerns. The relationship between cybernetics and art can be summarised in three ways: cybernetics can be used to study art, to create works of art or may itself be regarded as an art form in its own right.
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