Statement for MPhil/PhD application

Some Other Kind of Information 
Informational Relationships and (within) Art (as) System(s)

The information revolution has massively increased our capacity to structure and share information, yet it is still framed first and foremost as technological rather than cultural in nature. In it's standard definition data has no meaning unless current and accurate, yet it's entry into information space is generally handed down to low-paid clerical workers with no particular incentive to get things right. In this paradigm everything hinges on their accuracy. I believe the debate has moved on. Information no longer holds value intrinsic to itself, but has increasing value as a pointer or link to other information. This idea, raised by David Weinberger in his article The Ecstatic Document, goes on to say that the expert is not the person with the most facts but the one with the ability to discover how things relate. This seems to be an extension from Edward de Bono's assertion that “Meaning is not something that lies within an object but a description of the way the object affects the mind, the way it fits in a pattern of thought.” For this accuracy and truth hold no sway.  

In his novel Idoru, William Gibson describes the Cyberspace of DatAmerica; a repository for all data, all traces of our electronic patterns no matter how mundane, and thinks that there might be a larger perspective. He wonders if in this information there might be a way of getting to “some other kind of truth, another mode of knowing, deep within gray shoals of information.” My work seeks to explore the notion of what we can know from the information we connect with. What can the information we generate tell us about ourselves? Is there ‘some other kind of truth’? Can we track people in a way that helps us bring to bear new ways of understanding, from their electronic traces? What kind of field craft do we need to learn to track these footprints? What kind of Art can we generate from making new links, new relationships and new ways of knowing?  

I intend to focus my artistic inquiry into how data, information and knowledge relate, and on how we can utilise the Internet’s potential as a venue for artistic investigation. I see this as a project that focuses on the personal rather than the social. It’s about how we see, create, define, or model individuals rather than seeking to map a wider social context on how data is used e.g. surveillance and privacy issues.  
Traditionally sculptors have used clay and stone to explore notions of form, volume and human space, and to express their idea of humanity. I intend to explore this notion by modelling in dataspace. My role is one of instigator. This study will be by practice and theory.
  
Initially what I want to do is initiate a small number of profiles for people. These might be termed information identities that exist only within information space. This will be done by subscribing to newsletters and magazines, opening accounts, e-mail etc, and returning junk mail, creating an information presence. The aim isn't to mislead or defraud but to see how information space reacts, to create real identities or a closer term, profiles. These profiles will have names and as the project progresses, almost by natural selection, will hopefully gain stature in the databanks, or information space, of marketing companies, banks and credit reference agencies, the information space where all our identities are being mapped.
  
These profiles will exist solely in information space, there can be no need for a physical presence, however a WWW web presence will be created as a focus for the research.

Last Updated 08 October 2000