Some time in 2004, I logged onto Facebook for the very first time. My alma mater was one of the few allowed coveted access to the Harvard-originated social network. I filled out a profile, uploaded a picture and began adding friends. A coast away, Tim O’Reilly coined the term “Web 2.0” … Computers and the Internet, after decades of association with nerds and misfits, were on the brink of mainstream cool.
AX Mina
AX Mina is a wandering artist and culture writer exploring contemporary spirituality, technology and other sundry topics. Her work has appeared in the Atlantic, the New York Times and Places Journal, and her art has shown in places like the Museum of the Moving Image, the V&A Museum and the Brooklyn Museum. She co-produces Five and Nine, a podcast about magic, work, and economic justice.
Join Our Social Media Art Roundtable on Facebook
Just as social media have quickly gone mainstream, we’re starting to see social media art received more attention from the mainstream art world. I’m currently writing a survey of social media art’s (brief!) history for Hyperallergic and as part of my research, I’ve invited a number of contemporary social media artists to a roundtable discussion on Hyperallergic’s Facebook page.
Off the Beaten Path with the Mysterious @MuseumNerd
One of the most popular art feeds on Twitter right now doesn’t have a name or a face or a gender. It doesn’t represent an established arts institution or magazine, nor does it have any kind of credentials. And yet, less than a year since it started, it now boasts 10,000 followers.
Cover Art, or Vito Acconci Gets a Follow Back
An Xiao organized a 40th Anniversary tribute to Vito Acconci’s “Following Piece” (1969) for @Platea, the social media art collective she performs with. She likes to call what she did a form of “cover art” and she explains why.