As art increasingly shifts online, it is able to take on new forms. But what actually is digital art? And how does it look today? In many cases, digital art can be art that’s produced traditionally for the “real” world, but which is later adapted and documented for display via social media and other digital platforms.
What’s the impact of digitalisation on contemporary art? Is it giving rise to completely new opportunities, ideas, purposes, and expressions? Or is there a risk that art will be diluted and reduced into some sort of simplistic quick-fix entertainment? Is the slow and contemplative giving way to quick-click art?
In tonights live stream art expert Maija Kasvinen will interview professor Margrét Elísabet Ólafsdóttir to get an Icelandic perspective on ”Art Online”.
Maija Kasvinen is a curator who has studied in Stockholm and now works as an art advisor at the Arts Promotion Centre Finland (Taike). She has worked with public art and enjoys talking about art’s relationship with society, including in the podcast “Kuution jälkeen” and at the annual meetings of the chamber of commerce.
Margrét Elísabet Ólafsdóttir is a specialist in the field of modern and contemporary art theory and aesthetics. Her research focuses on the emergence of modern art in Iceland and the history of electronic and digital art in the Icelandic context, with an emphasis on video and computer art. She has curated exhibitions in Icelandic museums, e.g. Reykjavík Art Museum and LÁ Art Museum, and organized art events in collaboration with artists. She is a founding member of Lorna, an association for of electronic arts, which organized the art festival Piklsaverk. She is an editor and translator and has worked as art critic and journalist. Ólafsdóttir has a PhD in aesthetics and art theory from Pantheon-Sorbonne University in Paris, France and she holds a position as professor at the Iceland University of the Arts, Reykjavík, and as associate professor at the University of Akureyri.