I Like The Internet And The Internet Likes Me
I Like the Internet and the Internet Likes Me is an investigation of the effects of the web on contemporary life with an emphasis on perceptions of the fine art object. It promotes the de-materialization of the work of art through a negation of physical form and absence of traditional aesthetic characteristics. It further utilizes the conventions of fine art establishments to obfuscate the exact location of the work of art, displacing notions surrounding traditional media. In addressing the internet as media, exhibition space, and promotional means, the works speak to notions arising out of countercultural beliefs existing in online communities. Specifically, it investigates the availability and accessibility of information on the web, in addition to how that information changes. It does so through the lens of fine art objects and institutions in order to compromise a shift in the ways in which artworks are experienced.
The internet is quickly becoming a primary means of disseminating culture and information. Through the traditional means of artmaking, works are incapable of spreading without being copied and reproduced through photography and print technology. According to Benjamin, this removes the fundamental existence of the artwork by separating it from its "aura," and any experience of a reproduction of the work immediately becomes secondary information. By utilizing the internet as a producer or exhibitor of artworks, the reproduction of the piece is inherent in the work, and all forms of recreation exist as primary information.