CONTRIBUTION
The Exhibition is in Transit vol. 1 : Cosmos Carl
Joe Rowley : Cosmos Carl has been around for a good number of years now and felt like it was right there in the front of the pack in the resurgence of internet art in the 2010s. How did Cosmos Carl start? What was the impetus for the project?
Cosmos Carl : Initially we wanted to establish a project space in our shared flat in New Cross in London just across the street of Goldsmiths, where we were studying at the time. Soon into the process we decided to open an online project space for practical reasons.
We wanted to find a way of showing art with the least coding involved and out of this thinking the idea of only sharing hyperlinks to external platforms came into being. At first we did not find it significant but as the idea grew on us we started to appreciate the model for its simplicity and elegance.
JR : How do you think digital exhibition-making has developed as a field of practice since you started with Cosmos Carl?
CC : Nowadays it is more common to see works of art infiltrating existing commercial platforms than back in 2014 when we started Cosmos Carl. As online platforms have become an intricate part of our daily routines, their usage has become more diverse and in many ways misused for their intended purpose.
Pinned location “sighting” of an “Unrooted Flying Object” on Google Earth by Monica Mays
A series of “rooms” on linktree with various different videos in each hosted by YouTube by Beatriz Conefrey & Miguel Witzke Pereira
Hyperlink Soap on online marketplace Etsy by Jip van Steenis
Cosmos Carl - Platform Parasite is an online platform that hosts nothing but links provided by artists, writers, thinkers and curators. Be it encrypted, inside an archive, available through open source software, live-streamed, downloadable, in a webshop, on the dark web, or on street view, the CC work, although on public display, is directly accessible through the hyperlinks displayed on the website.
CC encourages artists to reclaim (commercial) online platforms to produce and display their art. This means that the work is displayed on a website that is neither designed nor hosted by the artist.
The fact that the work is made on an existing online platform implies that visitors may stumble upon it, not necessarily viewing it as art.
Examples of platforms explored:
drive.google.com, torrent.net, ebay.com, hostmypdf.com, docs.google.com, pinterest.com, jsfiddle.net, youtube.com, maps.google.com, soundcloud.com, vimeo.com, earth.google.com, aws.amazon.com, tumblr.com, megaupload.com, facebook.com, kickstarter.com, clyp.it, etsy.com, castingcallpro.com, vodlocker.com, airbnb.com, sketchfab.com, instagram.com, change.org/, allrecipes.com/, bandcamp.com, zazzle.com, periscope.tv, twitch.tv, and many more.
* CC is run by Frederique Pisuisse & Saemundur Thor Helgason
** Typeface of CC: 'Cosmos Skrift' by Gnax Type
The Exhibition is in Transit vol.1 features contributions from Cédric Fauq, Cosmos Carl, Jaakko Pallasvuo, Jade Foster, Martí Manen, P*D*A*, Tal Gilad and Winnie Herbstein.
Ephemeral Care focuses on ethics, practice and strategies in artist-led and self-organised projects.