New Age Default: Dump.fm Weekend

So I went to the dump.fm weekend opening last night at New Gallery London in Camberwell. The exhibition is one part of the short series New Age Default curated by Ben Vickers.

I was curious to see how the exhibition was going to be laid out, because how do you exhibit a live chat stream slash image dump? I guess Ryder saved everybody that problem with dump fullscreen, and it was pretty nice to see a bunch of random supersized gifs projected on the wall, though you do miss out on the multi-image combos. In addition, there were two computers signed in as NuGallery1 and NuGallery2 for in-gallery anonymous dumping, an image dumping webcam known as DumpBooth and a hotdog under a pillow (part of a series called Adding to the Internet by Justin Kemp)


(left: folks enjoying dump, right: DumpBooth)

It was kind of interesting dumping in a different environment. I usually have a hard time keeping my concentration up while dumping because it usually happens at night after having worked all day. When you consider how low your attention span needs to be* to keep up with the incessant chat and imagery - not to mention the fact that I'm sitting on a lumpy couch with a slow laptop burning my legs while I do this - you might not be able to keep your energy levels up for very long, so brighter lights, louder music, cold beer and a bunch of hipsters leaping in front of a webcam behind you can made for some exciting (anonymous) dumping.

* [EDIT] This sounds really derogatory, but I mean it in the most positive way. TV and the internet are always accused of lowering people's attention spans, but I think that's what makes everybody capable of taking in so much information at once. I'm just saying that I'm not fast enough for dump.


(left: dump by jeeeelings, right: dump by noisia)

It was good to see dump being exhibited. Mostly because it's only exhibit-able as an interactive piece (art gallery as internet cafe) and so doesn't lose what makes dump so amazing, but also because, for some reason, internet based work and new media just isn't that popular in London. It's been going gangbusters in New York, Toronto, and even Berlin, but doesn't have the audience here. I briefly chatted with Ben, and he's got a bunch of plans in the works to help change that, so I'll try and keep in the loop to support any future projects (and by support, I mean go to).