MEDIA DIGITAL ART AND CULTURE IN FLANDERS BELGIUM - BAM

‘Media Art in Flanders’ encompasses more than discussing an artistically
well-defined domain in a geographically well-defined area. Any attempt to
determine the scope of media art proves to be as difficult as trying to delineate
the regional borders of Flanders. As if we are always in the middle of it.
M E D I A A R T ?
The first thing this essay should do, is try to define media art. A broad definition
would read: media art is the art of mediating, the art of connecting, always
in-between, art with a broad ‘inter-esse’. Media art ignores labels such as
sculpture, painting, graphic art or even video or computer art. It is always a
combination of different arts. This was the case even before video art evolved
out of performance art in the 60s and was made by musicians (Nam June
Paik and other artists from the Fluxus movement), architects (Vito Acconci),
choreographers (Joan Jonas) or sculptors (Lynda Benglis).
This story could start with early seventies video art in Belgium – first in Liège,
where in 1971 the first video exhibition took place in gallery Yellow Now and
after that in Antwerp, where in 1974 the ICC installed a video studio – a long
time before it would fuse with the current M HKA. Or even further back in time,
in the 50s, with surrealists such as René Magritte or Marcel Mariën who used
film to expand the field they worked in. But that would be a story in which
media art would lag behind and would not go further than remediation or the
reconsideration of traditional art forms in new media. Instead, this story is a
story in which mediation comes first – and remediation comes second. A story
that deals with artists who use media to come up with ideas and images and
give media art an entirely unique interpretation.
I M A G E S O F W O M E N
In an interview given in the September issue of 2008 of the Flemish art
magazine art, the Antwerp-based artist Anne-Mie Van Kerkhoven calls
herself a media artist. In the interview Van Kerkhoven discusses an exhibition
of the drawings that she has made over the last thirty years. She names herself
media artist, not because many of these drawings were at a certain point in
time used in the films, videos or computer games that span her career, but
because she, as an artist, draws important inspiration from mass media:
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