Trevor BATTEN

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Trevor Batten (Amsterdam, Jan/July/Aug, 1996)

Translation by Than Ohn. Thanks also to Khin Mya Zhin.

Download RTF document What is Media Art? by Trevor Batten.

i. Loving one's Job more than ones Friends

I've just finished reading "Oppenheimer The Story of a Friendship" by Haakon Chevalier -written in 1965/1966.

The book is an account (using official transcripts) of what happened between two friends as a result of the conflict between Oppenheimer's earlier Communist sympathies and his need for security clearance after he became scientific leader of the US team that developed the Atomic
Bomb in WWII.

Some Personal Observations Regarding the CopySouth Workshop: Trivandrum, Kerala, December 2008
(first draft)

An Important Note for the Reader:

Please note: This is not an objective report of the presentations within the workshop. It is a highly subjective collection of notes and thoughts based on the issues raised by various speakers. My personal notes have been edited and restructured (even extended with my own viewpoints) afterwards. This text is therefore purely a reflection of my own interests and obsessions as manifest through, and by, the CopySouth workshop. However, hopefully, it may also be of interest and use to others.

This book is a collection of selected writings by British computer artist Trevor Batten.

About Trevor Batten (http://tebatt.net/)

Born 1945 in Hillingdon, England. Studied at Loughborough, Exeter and Brighton Colleges of Art specializing in Sculpture (Exeter, 1964/67) and printmaking (Brighton, 1968).

Part-time lecturer at art colleges in Brighton (3-d studies, 1968) and Sunderland (printmaking, 1970/71).

On R. Hauben's article* "ARPA's 50th Anniversary and the Internet, A Model for Basic Research"

(*Hauben's article was written for Futurezone and appears in German at its website. Futurezone is the Technology web site for Orf, Austria's national public broadcast media. The url is http://futurezone.orf.at/hardcore/stories/253842/ Below is Trevor Batten's critical analysis of the article's celebratory message.)

This article really does need close scrutiny -because (in my view) it sketches the rise of a pernicious Military-Industrial complex (as warned against by President Eisenhower) -but which has now become even more dangerous by linking up with educational and entertainment systems (the edutainment business) to become the Military-Industrial-Edutainment complex.....

Celebrating FREE SOFTWARE FOR A SLAVE SOCIETY?

Our contribution to Software Freedom Day, September 20, 2008.
Process/yon Artists' Book and Dialogue Series II:
Free Software for Slave Society?

"PROCESS/YON" is a multi-location, interactive, experimental and collaborative, Social-software Performance Art project by Fatima Lasay and Trevor Batten. It is concerned with creating, exploring and developing new attitudes and creative strategies regarding the technology of the artist's medium.

SURFERS OR SERFS: DIGITAL FREEDOM OR DIGITAL FEUDALISM?

Within the context of issues addressed within the free, open-source, and open-standards community, "Surfers or Serfs" seeks to investigate realities of Freedom within the Culture of Ignorance: Are humans being turned into machines so others can exploit them without them questioning their own slavery? Why do we consider somebody "computer literate" when they can only operate the controls of a commercial computer system?

Replies to "Aesthetic" by Adrian Cristobal Jr, Business Mirror
http://www.businessmirror.com.ph/09182008/opinion03.html

Reply from Trevor Batten

Of course Cristobal's write-up raises many interesting issues -including the nature of property, design, aesthetics and perhaps even the foolishness of politicians.

East is East? (A Euro-centric view of Middle-Earth)
by Trevor Batten

Abstract:

SO WHAT IS MEDIA ART?
by Trevor Batten / Amsterdam Jan/July/Aug 1996

1. Terminology:

a. Art and Media:

The term "Media Art" is of course a rather silly term. All Art is "media" Art.

However, the current (i.e. permanent) crisis of confusion and decay regarding the meaning and value of Art suggests that dropping the term "Media" allowing a total dissolution into the category "Art" would be a loss of opportunity to revitalize both concept and practice of "Art".