Art Forgery Detection Software and Computer Art in the Former Soviet Block

by Art Fag City on September 8, 2008 · 6 comments Newswire

Wheatfield with Crows
Vincent Van Gogh, Wheat field with Crows

European police estimates suggest as much as half the art in circulation on international markets may be forged, a surprisingly large number The Independent says may decline with recent technological advancements. Scientists Joris Dik and Koen Janssens have developed a new technique which uses high intensity x-rays from a particle accelerator to reveal a high level of detail in the under painting. The software also detects “wobbles”, a slight revealing shake of the forgers hand presumably not present in original paintings because they represent the painter’s natural style.

All of this is very interesting of course, and while a few more forgeries may be identified within museums I doubt it will make such a significant dent in the forgery market. After all, John Myatt, a man who is described as the biggest art fraud of the 20th century, confesses he was never a great forger, an assessment backed by the fact that he was eventually caught when he created a Giacometti drawing depicting a female body with a male head. Sure all this happened before this new technology was in place, but the fact of the matter is someone has to suspect a forgery to think to test it. In the case of Myatt, the accompanying faked provenance was good enough that virtually no one thought to do so.

computer-art.jpg

In other news, Eric Engle’s Computer Art in The Former Soviet Block, a paper on the development of computer art in Eastern Europe is worth a look, even if it isn’t the best piece of prose you’ll ever read. Engle sees video art as the precursor to interactive art, and provides economic, historic, and technological background for discussion as well as a number of great illustrations. There’s a fair amount of political context provided, which is particularly useful for people such as myself, who don’t have deep pre-existing knowledge of European history, and a good portion of the paper is devoted to the Yugoslavian art movement of the 1960’s and early 70’s, New Tendencies, and what came after it. Perhaps there is an interested reader who can translate “Bit International” (nos. 1-9/1968-1972), a magazine mentioned in the article without commentary as it is written in Serbo-Croatian. Via: Jorg Colberg.

{ 6 comments }

Eric September 8, 2008 at 5:24 pm

Has anyone written about the use of the word ‘interactive’ and how it is used to describe specific works of computer art? Many of the works of computer art that are called interactive seem as interactive to me as a Pavlovian maze; in other words, those who encounter the work of art using their mouse and monitor and hard-drive might have a few choices to make with regards to going from screen to screen but there is no real open-ended choice involved. Just a thought, not a definitive statement about the issue.

Eric September 8, 2008 at 12:24 pm

Has anyone written about the use of the word ‘interactive’ and how it is used to describe specific works of computer art? Many of the works of computer art that are called interactive seem as interactive to me as a Pavlovian maze; in other words, those who encounter the work of art using their mouse and monitor and hard-drive might have a few choices to make with regards to going from screen to screen but there is no real open-ended choice involved. Just a thought, not a definitive statement about the issue.

L.M. September 8, 2008 at 7:33 pm

First of all thanks for the Eric Engle’s essay link. I’m researching whether I want to teach a class on interactivity in art that I’ve been offered, so I will read it very soon.

Eric you are partially correct, this is an issue I’ve had since it became a buzzword in the early 90’s. When I’m paid to program kid’s educational games I’m well aware of all the manipulation built into the medium. (talk about pavlovian sound effects! I’ve got them all, I am master of little puppets)

However choosing not to define a set a parameters within a piece of web art as interactive, doesn’t really diminish its value as art. That said, machine-based interactive art treads a fine line between an art piece and a tool. (forgive me if you talk about that in your essay) I haven’t had to think about these issues in a while, but I remember one thing that bugged me in the 90’s and that was the pretence that there was nothing directorial about interactive art projects, or that somehow the director/artist was suddenly an undesirable presence in a piece of art.

L.M. September 8, 2008 at 2:33 pm

First of all thanks for the Eric Engle’s essay link. I’m researching whether I want to teach a class on interactivity in art that I’ve been offered, so I will read it very soon.

Eric you are partially correct, this is an issue I’ve had since it became a buzzword in the early 90’s. When I’m paid to program kid’s educational games I’m well aware of all the manipulation built into the medium. (talk about pavlovian sound effects! I’ve got them all, I am master of little puppets)

However choosing not to define a set a parameters within a piece of web art as interactive, doesn’t really diminish its value as art. That said, machine-based interactive art treads a fine line between an art piece and a tool. (forgive me if you talk about that in your essay) I haven’t had to think about these issues in a while, but I remember one thing that bugged me in the 90’s and that was the pretence that there was nothing directorial about interactive art projects, or that somehow the director/artist was suddenly an undesirable presence in a piece of art.

Anonymous May 27, 2011 at 1:52 pm

Wow,computer art is so beautiful!

Anonymous May 28, 2011 at 9:03 am

thank you

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