Analysis Of Nam June Paik

2695 Words6 Pages

Introduction

Are we sure to use technology to achieve a better life, to help to ease our work, to be more safe fast and efficient? Or is technology the one who is shaping our society, towards a fast process of globalization where we loose our cultural identity in name of progress and a better life? When technology becomes a product of mass consumption this is a legitimate question. Can we switch off our computer, our mobile and TV set and still consider ourselves not disconnected from the rest of the world? Maybe not, maybe technology already as the power to change our life and like one of Nam June Paik's robots we are already half men and half machine.
The increasingly present electronic moving image and media technology in the 20th century …show more content…

Paik uses irony to let us reflect on the danger of media and technology from which our society is drunk on. Has an artist and visionary, he could see the role technology would play in our lives. These robots are an example of dehumanized people, with only little element to suggest their sex, culture or belief. Can we really preach and meditate in front of a television set? Paik's life in art as John HanHardt wrote “grew out of the politic and anti art movement of the 50's 60's and 70's”(9). His artistic and social engagement to humanize TV which was at that time a monopolistic one way media used exclusively for commercial, military and entertaining purposes, is still actual. We can deduce that Paik is not totally against technology “Our life is half natural and half technological. Half-and-half is good. You cannot deny that high-tech is progress. We can need it for jobs. Yet if you make only high-tech, you make war. So we must have a strong human element to keep modesty and natural life.”(10) Paik understood the potential of this wonderful media but what he criticized was the actual use of it. He wanted to rescue it and apply it to more artistic and educational purposes, as we can see in his work “Do you know how soon artists will have their own TV channels?” (1973), where he dreamt of an art channel for artists. To do this he decides to humanize technology, modifying and changing it, disabling its normal functions, using it as a “canvas” for a free dialectic art pieces. As an artist I greatly admire Nam June Paik, he could understand what was happening in the world after the creation of television and how it affected society as well. He was also the creator of Video art, a medium which is used today by many video artists in different ways such as David Hall and Douglas Gordon.

Open Document