Speed

I had a conversation with a coworker a few days ago about his ambitions to develop a p2p network for artists and their work. How do we bring physical locality into digital space? Why are invitations to warehouse parties circulating on a platform like Facebook? Shouldn’t they exist on an equally underground platform? While early internet spaces may have formed intimate communities, today’s platforms often feel fatiguing in comparison. Why does connectedness make us feel that way? Should it? As corporate capital increasingly overtakes digital space, how do we make sure artists maintain their ability to litigate if everyone’s careers are so closely tied to… Instagram?

In Troemel’s essay, he states, "in the wake of social media, the majority of views an artist’s work gets online is often not through her own website, but through the accumulated network of reblogs, links, and digital reproductions that follow it through social media.”

In our conversation, my coworker asked: isn’t the intention of posting on social media to redirect their audiences to the artist’s other venues? Perhaps initially, yes. Like Troemel, I wonder if artists, especially younger artists who have grown up only knowing artmaking in what Troemel describes as “aesthletics,” will know how, or find purpose in making work without immediate public output––making it all the more interesting and important to speculate alternative platforms and internets and how they may change the economy of art and artists in digital space.