Beyond the Future: Papers from the Third Asia Pacific Triennial of Contemporary Art

Asians understand each other in terms of national idioms. There also seems to have been an overt promotion of politically critical art in these regional arenas, echoing the hegemonic 'democracy' rhetoric of the 'new world order'. As artists from non-western countries struggle to domesticate digital technology, there has emerged a similar tendency for them and the new curators of new media art to put forward works that index national idioms. This amounts to a kind of 'techno-orientalism' wh ich favours dig ital expressions of indigenous forms over attempts to address the universal issues of art and technology. The problem with this scenario is that the centre stage seems to belong to those from the centres of cultural authority, wh ile the 'others' are relegated to ornamenting the periphery. In constructing the emerging digital aesthetic, it is important to recognise we all have equal claim to the centre and Asians will be more influential if we are less token istic in our expressions of d ifference. It must be noted , with regard to new media, that some Asia-Pacific countries have very poor infrastructure wh ile others have poor human resources even if the infrastructure is available, and others still have no concept of the fruitful engagement of art and technology. While it is easy to criticise the dominant arenas of the region as neo-orientalist hegemonies, it wou ld be irresponsible to do so without offering practical alternatives . The challenge for artists in developing countries is to overcome financial and technical inadequacies and institutional inertia at home to produce our own networking hubs giving others the opportunity to criticise us for a change. In this regard I would l ike to announce a fledgl ing web project that we are currently developing at the Faculty of Applied and Creative Arts, Universiti Malays ia Sarawak - E-Art Asean Online. 1 1 This will be an interactive resource for electronic art in Southeast Asia. It will consist of a comprehensive database of new media art including profiles of artists and samples of artworks, a dealing with the historical development of electronic art in Southeast Asia, theoretical and critical issues related to the use of electronic media in the visual arts as well as reviews and analysis of electronic artworks. The site will also host an Internet discussion arena or forum as wel l as an index of links to related websites world-wide and, eventual ly, a space for webart. 1 Victor H . Mair. Painting and Performance. Un iversity of Hawaii Press, 1 988. 2 N iranjan Rajah . The Failure of Marcel Duchamp!Japanese Fetish Even! 1 996 . <http:/ www .hgb-leipzig.de/waterfall/ > 3 Paul Gilster. The New Internet Navigator. New York: Wiley, 1 995. 4 Official Anwar lbrahim's Online Resources : <http :/pages .whowhere .com/sports/vr4> 5 'Postscript' <http :/ /neptune.spaceports.com/-ps/> 6 Niranjan Rajah. 'Who Do You Represent?' in Present Encounters: Papers from the Conference of The Second Asia-Pacific Triennial of ContemporaryArt, Brisbane, Queensland Art Gal lery, Brisbane, Australia, 1 997. 7 Robert Gombrich . 'Ancient Ind ian Cosmology' in Carmen , a . & M ichael, L., eds. Ancient Cosmologies, George Allen & Unwin Ltd . , London , 1 975. 8 Titus Burckhardt. Sacred Art in East and West: Its Principles and Methods. Trans. Lord Northborne. Perenn ial Books Ltd , London, 1 967. 9 Ting Ting Hook. Tortoise Zone. 1 998 <http://westwood .fortunecity.com/gucci/369/index.html> 1 O Niranjan Rajah, La Folie de la Peinture. 1 998 <http:/ www .kunstseiten.de/installation > 1 1 E-Art Asean Online <http:// www .freespeech .org/eartasean/index.html> Note This paper has been consolidated and developed from ideas expressed in 'Towards a Universal Theory of Convergence', (INET98: Entering The Mainstream Proceedings on CD­ Rom , Eighth Annual Conference of the I nternet Society, Geneva 1 998), 'Sacred Art in a Digital Era' (presented at the 2nd 'Consciousness Reframed' Conference, Centre for Advanced Inquiry in the Interactive Arts, Un iversity of Wales College 1 998), 'Regionalism In A World Of Borderless Transactions: Networking The Art Of The Asia Pacific' (Australian Network for Art and Technology Newsletter, #37, June 1 999) and 'Slow Download ! ' (Third World Wide Web, Special Digital Issue, Third Text no. 47, Summer, 1 999). 1 21 journal