Temporary Autonomous Pavilion (Net.art at the Venice Biennale)

The male history of net.art?

I'm not sure what was more disturbing during this years' Venice Biennale opening week: the endless 'Luc Tuymans appreciation society' conversations at the Haig Bar or the notion that across town, net.art history was, yet again, being written by men - and hardly anything was being done about it.<*>

Safely packaged into an artworld-friendly exhibition format, the Temporary Autonomous pavilion curated by Vuk Cosic, stood as a testament to the 'heroic period of net.art'. In Cosic's own words, the pavilion included work of 'several artists that have shared the net.art adventure since the early days'. Housed in a disused church, the pavilion included a number of key projects by Heath Bunting, Vinyl Video, Tom Jennings, Jodi, Rtmark and Cosic himself, providing the Biennale the much needed soupcon of that 'net art thing'. Setting aside the problems of showing this type of work in static (gallery) spaces, the Temporary Autonomous pavilion included some of the most interesting work in this years' Biennale.

What is perplexing, however, is what seems to be by now, an accepted omission of many equally important projects dating back to the 'heroic period'. Presented in the context of a major exhibition such as the Venice Biennale, a show like the Temporary Autonomous pavilion is likely to become what the art establishment equates with net.art. A question that is difficult to avoid is: Didn't artists such as Olia Lialina, Rachel Baker and Natalie Bookchin (to name but a few) share the net.art adventure, and why will the Venice Biennale visitors never know this?

<*> In an action called 'Mind the Flowers', incensed representatives of the cyberfeminist group Old Boys Network presented Cosic with an ironic bouquet and commended him for his 'services' rendered to net.art and on reaching the pinnacle of his career. He didn't seem to get the joke.

Slovenian pavilion and Temporary Autonomous Pavilion:http://absoluteone.ljudmila.org/Lina Dzuverovic - Russell <lina AT metamute.com>