An Art and Technology of Understanding

Abstract

Those of us active in the work of art and technology seem a comparatively anxious, self-critical bunch. It has been pointed out elsewhere and often that communities engaged with "new media," "art and technology," and "multimedia" are rife with artist-researchers, craftsman-critics, and technologist-theorists. These people are in the business of simultaneously employing and critiquing the material and social complexes we call "technology" in ways more emphatic than other artistic methods, aesthetics and histories (Criticalengineering.org provides an encouraging and exciting recent example of these kinds of practical motivations). Why all this questioning of form, of motivation, of intention? What's with all the talk of context, architectures and infrastructures? Why continue to bother with the work of fusing and conjoining fields and conventions separated by historical, cultural, and institutional silos, misunderstandings and discords? In short: Why not just relax, and paint yourself a nice watercolour landscape?