Anyone interested in understanding the political, artistic and ethical
situation in the world today could start by looking at the Web.Art of Serbian
artist Andrej Tisma. He offers an insight into complex issues with intelligence
and creativity particular to his local situation but with international
relevance. After experiencing his work you will feel compelled to consider your
own circumstance and role in global society. Here I will begin to explain some
background concerning the history and context of Tisma’s art followed by
examples. His work however is vast and would need more space than is available
here for a substantial representation that it deserves.
Tisma has a history
of involvement in networked, communications-based art as seen in his mail art
from the 70’s and 80’s to his early inclusion and participation in Internet Art
projects and histories. He is therefore on these terms a respected producer and
commentator on both movements. Tisma’s work follows the tradition of mail art
and is part of a strand of Internet Art based on communication, collaboration
and democracy rather than another formal and media-installation orientated
variety of Internet Art that is also practiced. He is responsive to global
events, producing art works reacting to situations concerning international
politics, globalisation and the separation of individuals from the political
process. The net as a medium allows for alternative opinion to spread as quickly
as the media spin so typical of contemporary politics.
Ecology: geopolitics, society and the Internet
Ecology has been important to Tisma's work dating back to his mail art
project 'Nature Gives...' in 1992 which served as a homage to nature and brought
attention to catastrophic situations in the world. Since then he has expressed
an extended interest in 'ecology', that is, relationships between living things
and their environment or as Tisma puts it, “ecology is not only about clean air,
water and healthy food but also about clean social relations and ethically clean
deeds”.
Globalisation is an example of how these relationships are upset.
Vast differences between rich and poor countries result in manipulation and
corrupt use of national powers to further increase corporate expansion. This
hovers above all and with it comes massive opposition in the form of
demonstrations degenerating into riots by extremists and heavy-handed security
forces. The enclosed and secret situations whereby ministers and corporate
bosses discuss the future composition of the global economy, which in turn
effects the lives and well being of many in exploited nations, causes distress
amongst citizens excluded from the political process who turn to the streets.
Tisma's work acts as a constructive protest, a creative healing process to both
the lives of individuals and the sour relations cultivated between rulers and
the ruled. His work sets a positive example of how communication and creativity
provide the means to comment on ones position in the world.
The role of Art
Institutions is also an important issue when considering Web.Art. Their
privilege as brokers on art presentation and production is an authority the
avant-garde has sought to dismantle. Internet Art, and Mail Art before it, seeks
in the tradition of the avant-garde to operate independently of such
institutions by producing a direct and immediate art form experienced between
the creator and viewer without mediation or censorship. Tisma’s work exploits
this situation enabling a critique easily communicated and digested. A networked
community exists on the Internet and serves to lubricate artistic practices by
providing a context for production and consumption of works.
Web Works
Tisma adopts a particular language suitable for the Internet sometimes appropriated
from the targets of his critique or constructed as a game or puzzle imbued with
humour and irony, often simple but direct. 'New World Odour'
and 'Adult censored Pics' are both works imitating commercial web
sites with a difference. The former presents a series of perfumes with cleverly
worded marketing slogans and strategic names. For example a scent called IMF
is accompanied with the description, “When you are in poor spirits and a bad
mood this scent will give you the needed illusion of happiness.” The same goes
for U.S.A., “it smells a little bit strange, in big amounts even disgusting.
So use it very carefully or it could drive away your best friends.” These examples
act as a snide but apt remark concerning their practices. Other varieties of
perfume are included each with a name mimicking an institution of the New World
Order complete with an adequate message. This piece acts as a light-hearted
but serious comment on the forces of globalisation.
'General Vision'
heads Tisma’s 'American Nightmare' series on the web site. The page
is divided into images showing the NATO General Clarke’s head and his military
badges. Firstly users are instructed to test his senses by clicking on
parts of his eyes, nose and ears. Images below the face change to depict devastating
incidents, artillery and bombers from the military campaign against Yugoslavia
in 1999. This symbolically replaces Clarke’s badges of achievement and status
with gross acts committed during the war. In ‘testing’ his eyes, nose and hearing,
the user is made aware of the senselessness of the acts committed. One is encouraged
to imagine what generals actually see and hear and at what level they experience
wars conducted at their command.
Within
these web works the user is an active component reading and untangling the web
specific languages whilst watching Tisma's ideas and beliefs unfold. Questions
are raised concerning the users own opinions, confronting and challenging their
position. In combining language with structure and ideas Tisma has ensured a
successful artwork whereby the viewer leaves the piece but retains the message
and purpose of it. In this case the ethical principles, an awareness of ones
circumstances and the ability to engage with ones social and political
environment. This is marked by Tisma’s personal experience as an individual in a
society suffering as a result of the current geopolitical situation. Only
by confronting such difficult issues will it be possible to repair and heal the
damaged social ecology. That is the position held by Tisma as understood through
his works all of which must be experienced for a complete understanding of his
concerns, wit and creativity.