I think one of the most wonderful things about the net is the way that it’s democratised access to art and enables artists of all kinds to get their work out there. Now we can watch artists’ films and studio interviews; exhibition openings, performances and documentaries – and understand more about why artists do what they do and how they do it.
Saatchi Online TV reports today “HITS IN THE LAST 24 HOURS: 69,073,647. RANK TODAY IN THE WORLD’S TOP 50.000 WEBSITES: 195″ – this just shows how much visual and contemporary art is now embedded in our culture.
The BT Tate Player (which I’m proud to have been part of during planning and developing) offers an immense archive of webcasts and vodcasts (Tateshots) and there are films dating back to at least 1935. Tate were also recently the first to develop a gallery tour for iPods and iPhones (for the recent Klimt exhibition at Tate Liverpool which I visited a couple of weeks ago).
For craft lovers there is also Etsy which if you haven’t heard of by now you really need to check out. It’s a site for people who make amazing hand-made stuff to sell their wares and connect with other artists through a really supportive online community. They’ve done some cool things with live webcasting which I’m trying to find out more about, and have a load of videos on their Etsy YouTube Channel.
Vernissage TV specifically offers coverage of openings and is a really simple site with absolutely tons of content. It’s somehow very good at being global and the clips are great quality. There’s obviously a plethora of niche sites and other gems out there too such as our own client the Video Art Gallery who offer online previews of work available to rent or buy, Baltic’s video podcasts, The Guardian’s multimedia offering of art reviews via journos turned webTV presenters.
One of my favourite’s last year was being able to see Bill Viola’s work for the Venice Biennale. Couldn’t make it to the show, but at least I got to watch it online. If anyone knows how to make video and art work together it’s him!
