About the WebStudio
The WebStudio is an Internet-based collaborative art project,
which allows participants to interact with Miami artist Xavier Cortada through two webcams
and a live chatroom. The composition, specific theme, and colors of the paintings will be
determined by input provided through the live chatroom during
scheduled sessions.
Participants are also encouraged to post writings on discussion forums and to e-mail scanned images and text on the painting's
topic to the WebStudio. Cortada will collage these unto the paintings.
previous projects | upcoming projects
the planning process | the concept | artist's statement | media
previous
projects (documentation):
- April 1999: The Love Painting: "How we interact with our
life-partners: Intimacy in our personal relationships."
How does one begin to paint love?
What is love? Is it like a math formula, with transitive properties (i.e.: if
A = B, and B = C, then does A = C?). Or is it more like the laws of thermodynamics
(energy can neither be created nor destroyed)? Does the Bible give us guidance ( 1
Corinthians 13:4)? Must it adapt? Must it be unconditional? Must it be
eternal? Does it turn into hurt or hate, or is that something all together
different? Is it intimate? What does that mean? Is it a process, something we
share with our life partners? With others? Love, can it be defined, painted?
Should we? Why?
Enter The Love Painting page to see documentation of the
process, including webcam images and transcripts of live chatroom sessions and articles
posted in the "Discussion Forum on Love"
(still open).
upcoming
projects
During the next few months, participants
will be asked to consider these topics in the WebStudio project. If you'd like, you
can click on the discussion forum and begin to frame issues for discussion, themes for
composition, and the like. As the months approach, the WebStudio's webcam and
chatrooms will focus on those topics:
- May 1999
: The Painting on Society: "How we interact in
Society: Civil liberties and the limits of individuality (e.g.: Censorship, expression ,
the limits of free e-speech?
Your rights end at the line where they
meet mine. But who is to say where that line is? Majority rule, is it fair
enough? What about an individual's perspective? What are the limits: our speech, our
actions? In society we engage in mutual contracts to keep order--from obeying
traffic lights to the rules of etiquette. Does paying taxes or making donations to
charity absolve us from social responsibility? Do we hold each other
accountable? How? Do we focus on proscribing "negative" behaviors instead of
inducing positive ones? At what point does it infringe upon our individuality.
As communication and travel make our cultures assimilate more and more, how do we
remain individualistic? Does it matter? Why?
Enter "Discussion Forum on Society"
(now open)
See Schedule for times the Webstudio
live will be open during this month
June 1999:
Enter "Discussion Forum
on God" (opens May 15)
July 1999:
Enter "Discussion Forum on
Environment" (opens June 15)
the planning process
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After months of planning and work on
artistic, operational, and technical matters, Xavier Cortada's WebStudio
opened on April 6th, 1999 at 11:00 a.m.
Documents leading to the opening of the
WebStudio include: the New Forms Miami grant
application, the e-mail invitation sent to encourage
visitors to the site, and the WebStudio's press
release.
The WebStudio also involved a large amount
of work focused on the computer infrastucture. For more information on technical
matters and the planning process, contact webstudio@cortada.com.
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the concept
Too often the lines defining those who
make art and those who consume art are too rigid. The "WebStudio" project aims
to blur those lines by inviting the participants into the studio through the use of the
Internet. Too often, people stare into paintings and wonder how they were created. Why
they were created. By whom they were created.
Using the Internet and a web-cam (a
camera that broadcast live images on an Internet website), Miami artist Xavier Cortada
will invite others to "enter" his studio. During scheduled sessions three times
a week, they will see him at work and collaborate with him in the creation of five
theme-specific art pieces. Using e-mail, participants will send comments to the artist
--giving feedback on the art work, the process underway, or the theme being explored.
When facilitating a collaborative
process in a public venue, the artist stands back while others create, offering his
advice. At times, he is involved in the painting. However, in the "WebStudio,"
the artist is the one being guided. He paints, but listens to folks talk about technique,
composition and color. About issues, policies, and personal perspectives. Their ideas will
be integrated --their actual words and sketches incorporated-- into the collaborative
painting.
Each month the "WebStudio"
will also feature a theme-based chat room (where participants can openly communicate with
one another about the artwork, process and/or the theme), bulletin board (to post
writings, citations, links and personal comments on the theme) and virtual gallery (to
post digitized pictures of individual artwork on the topic). At the end of the month, the
collaborative piece will be "hung" in this electronic gallery and an artist's
statement about the process in the bulletin board. At the end of the project all the
completed theme-specific pieces, video installations of the web-cam, and text from the
electronic communications will be exhibited at a yet to be determined alternative space.
In 1998, over 5,000 people accessed the
artist's website. They surfed through the many paintings and community projects but
weren't engaged in the creative process. They came to observe something that occurred in
the past, not to witness or participate in its creation. The best they could do is click
on the e-mail icon and say "nice painting." This project brings them "in
the studio" and changes all that.
artist's statement
Just the other day at the coin laundry
the manager asked, "How long does it take for you to make a painting." He was
trying to compute my hourly rate. Too many look at a museum art piece in disbelief and
claim, " I could have painted that!" --as if its very presence was a direct
assault on their person. Many don't understand the role of the artist anymore. Sadder
still, some aren't aware of the creativity inside them. Many dismiss the creative process
as thing done by others
People in society have lost their
connection to art. Many wonder what it would have been like to be in the artist's studio.
What it would be like to see art come alive. And wonder how they would react. Would they
sit quietly or be engaged in conversation with the artist? Would they offer advice? Would
they go further? Would they create?
I am a social artist. I mean that. One
that actually enjoys painting in social situations. And usually addressing social issues.
Having collaborated with others across four continents in creating pro-social art, I have
explored ways in which I can inspire and facilitate others in individual and collective
expression. Indirectly, all these life experiences find their way to my studio--whether in
painting with street children in Bolivia, AIDS patients in Geneva or kids in a Miami
cancer clinic. And naturally my artistic influence, the stuff I perfect in my studio, is
found in all of these collaborative projects.
Regardless of whom the art belongs to,
how can I as artist truly interpret society if I don't give society the last clear chance
to respond? I do so in a community setting when I paint a mural. Comments reinforce the
process: "How beautiful. That's too strong." Or they do so subtly through
questions: "That's not finished yet, is it? Can you add such and such." Too
often the role of the studio artist is too narrow, suffocating. An artist at times is
forced to play psychic. Summoned to interpret his reality, his world. But being incommunicado
from that world during the actual creative process.
Well, there is one simple way of
exploring that. Put a web cam in my studio. And open the e-mail channels. Set up a
painting schedule. And be receptive to the incoming e-mail. Start up a chat line. Have
people scan and e-mail suggestions on how the painting should proceed from beginning to
end. Incorporate their texts and drawings as I've done dozens of times before in community
murals. Except this time it's in my studio. Made to feel communal. As if society at large
is commissioning you to proceed.
media
Read about the WebStudio in The Miami Herald Liz
Balmaseda's April 10, 1999 column : "From
Cyberspace to the Canvas: Artist's interactive Website mines chat rooms for muses"
back to the
WebStudio.
