Cédérom Stéphan Barron – Art Planétaire / Earth Art

Cédérom Mac/PC, Français-Anglais – Catalogue 24 pages, Format 21×21 cm, couverture calque, texte bleu

ISBN: 2-95141175-1-9 – EAN: 9782951417519

This CD-ROM is described in numerous publications in France and abroad (Dictionnaire Larousse des Arts et Nouvelles Technologies by Florence de Mérédieu, etc.).

This CD-ROM brought together 19 interactive multimedia presentations describing 19 works by Stéphan BARRON, a sort of box in a suitcase (like Marcel Duchamp’s) containing the bulk of his archives.

This CD-ROM helps to understand the connection between 20th-century art forms and digital art forms: the transition from analog arts (video art, contemporary art) to digital arts, but above all the invention of net art from a global art perspective, planetary art.

This CD-ROM, which received support from FIACRE in Paris, was distributed in 1,500 copies.

Developed on the first multimedia software, Director, it has become unreadable on current computers.

The 2000 CD-ROM was developed by Stéphan Barron, Téréza, and Yannick Haralambous with the help of the Tourcoing School of Art and the Société oeil pour oeil in Lille. It received publishing assistance from the Ministry of Culture (Fonds d’Incitation à la Création (FIACRE-CNAP)).

An updated version was then developed between 2009 and 2011. It was posted online at http://www.riendespecial.com

This new version, Art Planétaire 2.0, brings together 32 interactive works expressing 32 original works or projects in planetary art or video art, created by Stéphan Barron between 1984 and 2010.

The Art Planétaire artist CD-ROM combines multimedia sound creation with interactive presentation.

Stéphan Barron has opted for sound-based navigation in multimedia: the summary is a sky of sound clouds providing access to multimedia projects. Access to the text is possible at a later stage, reinforcing non-linear and intuitive navigation and emphasizing the latent thread running through Stéphan Barron’s approach: sound perception.

This CD-ROM is a kind of suitcase box like Marcel Duchamp’s, which is an archive-work of art.

Two versions of the multimedia are included on this CD-ROM: a French version and an English version, allowing for international distribution.

The navigation options disconcert the user by making this multimedia resemble a labyrinthine game. Multimedia navigation standards have been deliberately avoided (arrows turning into fingers on active areas, etc.) in order to make navigation more minimalist, but also to counteract the “formatting” of intuition imposed by software.

The catalog allows even users who are not computer savvy to have progressive access and to find their way around complex navigation, by giving them keys to understanding this unusual navigation.

The Art Planétaire CD-ROM also contains texts related to Technoromanticism.

Stéphan Barron’s thesis “Art Planétaire et Romantisme Techno-écologique” (Planetary Art and Techno-Ecological Romanticism) and his HDR “L’Art Planétaire, genèse d’un Technoromantisme dans l’Art Contemporain au tournant du millénaire. Recherche, expérimentation, création” (Planetary Art, the genesis of Technoromanticism in Contemporary Art at the turn of the millennium. Research, experimentation, creation), more than 900 pages written by Stéphan Barron on his approach.

Around a hundred texts, amounting to more than 600 pages with color illustrations: theoretical texts, critical texts, and newspaper articles.

The following critics and philosophers have contributed high-quality texts to this CD-ROM, many of which are previously unpublished:

Roy Ascott (GB), Théo Barbu (F), Paul Brown (AUS), Laurent Benoit (F), Augustin Berque (F), Anna Capella (E), Mario Costa (I), Jean-Paul Fargier (F), Vilem Flusser (Br), Jürgen Engel (D), Fred Forest (F), Edmond Couchot (F), Jacques Donguy (F), Derrick de Kerckhove (CDN), Antonin Kosik (T), Markus Müller (D), Louise Poissant (CDN), Pierre Restany (F), François Terrasson (F)

Users of the CD-ROM can search these texts by keyword using Acrobat Reader software. They can export and print these texts, making them easier to use.