PC dump days, 28.8 Kbps surfing and feline filesharing - Thursday 25th of February

For the second lecture evening of Gym of Obsolete Technology, we will be joined by Dennis de Bel, Olia Lialina and Peter Luining.

De Bel’s exploration of interactivity and utility has led him to make humorous design interventions, manifested word puns, useless software and more recently noware. This term describes some of his latest works that are no longer hardware nor software but non-products, unique multiples and mass-produced one-offs that question functionality, inventiveness and innovation.

Olia Lialina created the iconic Internet artwork My Boyfriend came back from the War 20 years ago, which is currently on show at MU with 15 interpretations by other artists. The memory of the net as it passes through time changing in technology and culture is central in her work. She saved Yahoo!, GeoCities and Hyves from extinction, and continues to point at the relevance of the http://best.effort.network/ in the centralised proprietary net it is rapidly becoming today.

Peter Luining is one of the pioneers of Internet Art, emerging in 1995. His long commitment to Internet-based art made him aware of the hardware issues behind the pixels, leading him to document trashed CRT monitors during long nightly walks through the city. He also visited the infamous PC dump days, massive flea markets of computer related trinkets, which have gone obsolete themselves.

Doors open at 7pm and talks start at 7.30.

** Entrance is pay-what-you-will **