Appendix 2
Why I Don't Take Part in Network Telefax Art Projects
by Ken Friedman
A Reply for Guy Bleus
(NOTE: This text was sent by FAX as a reaction to a FAX-project
held by Guy Bleus, Belgium,
at 'De Fabriek' in Eindhoven, Netherlands, in
which Ken Friedman writes about his views to FAX art.)
Guy Bleus's statement on Telecopy Art is intelligent and interesting. Much
of what Guy writes is true. Even so, I don't take part in telefax exhibitions.
I want to explain why.
The telefax is a one-line instrument. When my fax is busy, I can't send or
receive other messages. Most network messages are broadcast messages using
narrowcast tools. The mailbox is a paradoxal receiver: it is a narrowcast
receiver that can receive a large number of broadcast messages at once.
Receiving one item in the mail doesn't prevent receiving another.
The telefax is a true narrowcast receiver. When you are receiving one item,
you cannot receive another. Today's fax technology is still primitive. The fax
cannot receive multiple messages and stack them for later feedout. My fax is a
fax, and not a computer. I cannot read messages, choose to print, select among
them and dump the rest.
Today's telefax communication is always narrowcast, and I use my fax as a
tool of private communication. I want to keep my fax open for incoming private
messages. When I travel, I want the paper supply left available for specific
communications intended personally for me, not for the network. I am a
businessman as well as an artist. I cannot afford to miss a direct
communication from a client because the fax is busy all day - or because a
full roll of paper runs out on the third day of a six-day trip.
A friend who directs a gallery was once asked to take part in a fax-show.
She agreed. Her fax was busy for four days solid. She ran through several
dozen rolls of paper. Her colleagues couldn't reach her. They phoned her to
find out why the fax was broken. She wasted hours on the phone every day
explaining the problem rather then spending her time getting messages and
acting on them. Her colleagues had to spend hundreds of dollars sending urgent
information by courier that could easily have been sent by fax if the fax has
been available.
This was an instructive lesson to me. The fax should be a tool, not an
intrusion. I decided then that I would not take part in telefax exhibitions or
projects until the technology changes enough to make it possible for me to
avoid these problems. Right now, this isn't with my cheerful, old-fashioned
telefax. I use my telefax as a personal tool. I do use my telefax to send and
receive information for art projects and exhibitions. In some ways, it is the
tool that Guy Bleus suggests. At this time, it is a private tool, and I am not
willing to open my fax line to the network.
I only want faxes from people who want to communicate directly with me as
an individual. I do not want telefax communications from people who see me as
part of a network or an undifferentiated member of the category of artists who
own telefax machines.
Privacy is an important right. I welcome letters and telephone calls from
network friends. I accept network broadcast mailings. I am willing to receive
letters and calls from people I don't know; they may be people I want to know.
I don't want to use my fax as a tool for mail art. Telefax and mail are very
different-processes. I prefer to use them in specific and different ways.
Ken Friedman, March 1993
Appendix 3
SAMPLE OF AN E-MAIL MESSAGE:
PINE 3.90 TEKST VAN BERICHT Postvak:INKOMEND Bericht 57/59
Date:
Mon, 25 Sep 1995 12:36:24 +0200
From: "ken.friedman"
To: [email protected]
Subject:
Answer
RJ: Well, I couldn't work without documentation. But isn't the
danger of documentation that it forms its own truth, and that reality (things
that happen on a specific moment) can never be captured in an objective
documentation because this reality is different for everybody who observes it,
and everybody recognizes his own truth by observing. Only the ones that
document then would form the 'history.' Is documentation that powerful?
KF: This is a danger. It's the basic problem of all forms of
documentation, no matter who makes them and no matter the purpose for which
they're made. It seems to me that there is a strong argument to be made for a
variety of clear, understandable sources of document from several views. In
the recent past, most documentation on art has been compiled or presented by a
handful of journalists, critics and finally by art historians. I suggest that
there can be valid approaches to art documentation by scholars from several
fields and by artists themselves. The better, the broader, the more clear and
conscious a body or documents is, the better we can understand what's
happened. I believe that there documentation has valid goals and purposes, and
that these can be fulfilled or abused. How we handle documentation, how much
and how well, makes the difference.
Ken Friedman, Ph.D.
Associate Professor, Leadership and Strategic
Design
Norwegian School of Management NMH
Box 4676 Sofienberg
N-0506 Oslo, Norway
Telephone Direct: +47 22.11.56.10 (tone) 505
Telephone Switchboard: +47
22.11.55.60
Telephone Private: +47 22.60.85.60
Telefax: +47
22.11.56.20
[EINDE van de tekst van her bericht]
Appendix 4
E-Mail About the E-Mail Projects
STATEMENT: Why I Don't Take Part in E-mail Art Projects
I don't take part in e-mail art projects. I want to explain why. I use my
e-mail as a tool for research and communication. I subscribe to several
listserv lists that have a combined posting of some 200 or so messages a day.
In addition, I usually receive another 30 or 40 messages a day to which I must
respond, more if a project is under way.
When I travel, I come back to a full mail box. It takes me an average of
two hours for every day of travel to get through my mail. I need the
communication -- and I value my time. There's too much impersonal e-mail art
communication taking place to interest me.
E-mail should be a tool, not an intrusion. I use e-mail as a personal tool
and a re search tool. It is a private tool and I do not want to open my line
to the network.
I only want posts from people who want to communicate directly with me as
an individual. I do not want e-mail communications from people who see me as
part of a network or an undifferentiated member of the category of artists who
have computers and e-mail access machines.
Privacy is an important human right. I welcome letters and telephone calls
from network friends. I accept network broadcast snail mailings. I am willing
to receive letters and calls from people I don't know; they may be people I
want to know. I don't want to use my e-mail address as a tool for mail art.
E-mail and snail mail are very different processes and I prefer to use them in
specific and different ways.
THE POST THAT I GOT . . .
Subject: Jive Ruud
To: [email protected] (Ruud Janssen)
Date: Thu, 16 Nov 95 7:59:53 CST
From: Chris Dodge
Cc: [email protected]
If ah' only had time
If ah' only had
If ah' dun didn't need da
damn bre'd
I wouldn't do wo'k fo' oders
I would wo'k all de time
fo' mah'self and produce sump'n supa' fine
If ah' only dun didn't
need bre'd
If ah' only had 25 hours some day
If ah' had da damn time
to answa' all de quesshuns
dat mosey on down down in mah' mind.
--Karen Elliot for DeSirey Dodge Peace Post
Chris Dodge, Hennepin County Library, 12601 Ridgedale Drive, Minnetonka, MN
55305
e-mail: [email protected], phone: 612-541-8572, fax:
612-541-8600
Ruud Janssen with
Ken Friedman
