Since artists began to experiment the Internet as a medium, showing web-based art in public exhibition spaces is a difficult puzzle to solve. Many curators, artists, and art institutions tried to find the more appropriate solutions to show in the white cube, works originally made to be seen on personal computers.
In 1999, Olia Lialina began to write Location=”Yes” an essay in which the artist claims the importance of leaving visible the URL bar when showing net art in an exhibition space. She reveals how crucial the web location and the structure of the URL can be, by listing projects which lose their meaning if the online location gets hidden.
During four weeks, I will focus on bringing out the complexity of a web-based piece’s location. I will gather on the same piece both its geographic place and its location on the cyberspace. The result will be a hybrid object visible on the same URL, between net art and a physical installation that takes two forms depending on the place it is displayed. In a public exhibition space, the work will require being shown on a horizontal flat screen supporting a pile of local earth. In all other environments, the piece will show a custom-made web algorithm, generating graphic patterns from the device’s geographical coordinates. In both cases, the piece will take advantage of its site and environment, revealing the complemental aspect of the two forms.
