Copyright 2008 Rhizome.org

It is actively involved in the creation, presentation, preservation, criticism of new technology based art works, and as the platform for exchange or co-operation of artists, it seeks the revitalization of creative community through the administering such programs as commission, exhibition, discussion, archiving, and producing portfolios online.  Of course off-line programs like exhibition and educational programs are also being progressed.  In 2003, it was named for the new art and idea sharing organization and a new museum was established under it.

Programs and Resources

All the programs and resources of Rhizome are focused in helping the activities to expand new media art related community.  Online discussion bulletin board has been created for lively discussion promotes environment for healthy debate.  In 2009, Rhizome plans to conduct the 7^th commission for the new and emerging artists with the prizes ranging from $3,000 to $5,000.  This year, the area of commission has been expanded from the existing and limited internet-based art to broader formats and works under new media art category.   The deadline for submitting initial application for the 2009 commission is midnight, April 13, 2008.

At the recent exhibition called, ‘Montage: Unmonumental,’ which was held from February 15 to April 6, international groups and leading artists worked together.  They expanded the basic works of collage to internet through dissecting, attaching, ripping, and mixing the various resources brought from the web resulting a creation of rich new art works which can be called ‘new internet-based collage.’  Their works consist of various formats and elements such as digital images, sound, video, code, and fiction and fantasy based on online.

Kenneth Tin-Kin Hung's video(2007)_Montage: Unmonumental

Oliver Laric _video_50 50(2007)_Montage: Unmonumental

ArtBase

ArtBase is Rhizome’s online archive established in 1999 and holds approximately 2,110 new media art works.  The collected art works come from various projects done by artists around the world working with such resources as software, code, website, moving images, game, and browsers with purpose of aesthetic and criticism.  The art works commissioned by ArtBase is reviewed and introduced by Rhizome’s curators every month.

Contemporary Art New Museum

As the tool for realizing the Rhizome’s mission of encouraging the production of new art and ideas, New Museum is a unique museum in New York for dealing with contemporary art only.  Originally in 1977, this museum was the center for those unknown artists whose works received mixed reviews to exhibit, inform, and record.

It is proud of its unique history built on the sweat of its curator who was rich in knowledge of current culture, ability to handle it, and full of passion without owning any personal collection.  In the beginning, the curator Marcia Tucker picked the museum’s location somewhere in-between big-scale major museum displaying historically valuable art works and popular alternative spaces.  Her intended emphasis appeared as combative idea showing a new art with daring vision, and critical and academic context with the name ‘New Museum.’

And what started as a one room office museum on Hudson Street, moved to a gallery in New School, then expanded to SoHo in 1983, and finally opened anew at its first own independent building in 2007 after 30 years of history.  New Museum made it clear that it would continuously play a role in pioneering new territory by providing effective policies.  Also made clear was that one of its mission was to continue forecasting the future through challenging and lively programming and answering the question of what shape of art and what kind of art should exist in the 21^st century.

Eyeball Editor_Shon Seihee