Hrag Vartanian, Hyperallergic, October 9, 2013
“It is a boom time for new media art, but the artists themselves have not necessarily been the beneficiaries of the gold rush — the web is brimming with talented work of all kinds, and on many platforms. The problem is that few, if any, of these new media artists have been able to create a sustainable career without corporate support. Though if curator Lindsay Howard has her way, that may change.
Howard is one of the best young curators of new media art working today. She is a curatorial fellow at Eyebeam in Manhattan and curatorial director of 319 Scholes in East Williamsburg, Brooklyn, but her latest project is Paddles On!, a digital art auction co-organized by Tumblr and the Phillips auction house. Featuring 20 works by 18 artists, including Rafaël Rozendaal, Molly Soda, Joe Hamilton, and Petra Cortright, the small show has the potential to open up a market in the world of auctions that didn’t really exist before. While digital works do occasionally appear at auction, a concentrated effort like this is rather unique, and Megan Newcome, director of digital strategy at Phillips, says that they believe it might actually be “unprecedented” at this scale.”
