Net.Art Exhibited: Distributed Museums

Net.art represents an artistic language which, by virtue of its hypertextual essence, can connect people with one another by centering its practice on the interaction with audiences. A crucial component of net.art is direct experience: audiences truly engage with a net.artwork only when they interact directly with it. In a gallery or museum, net.art becomes more of a concrete document, an object of memory, losing its fundamental aspect of unfiltered practice, as well as the elements of surprise and positive disorientation—this loss results from net.art’s transposition into a physical place and transformation into an object to be exhibited. This visual essay dwells on pioneering projects that need to be reconsidered in order to further historical, museological, and curatorial discussion of net.art based on its intrinsic qualities, diffusion, and exhibition. The essay is not intended as an ending to the discussion or its resolution; instead, it aims to bring attention back to net.art’s social aggregator function that was lost in the age of digital disillusionment.