Ubermorgen.com: Media Hacking Vs. Conceptual Art

You would think that most media art books, or any kind of computer type book would be really boring, but fortunately "Ubermorgen.com: Media Hacking Vs. Conceptual Art is not one of those books. Presenting the work of Hans Bernhard and lizvlx, the book reads like an "old photographic or graphic design reference manual crossed with one of the popular web design survey books of the early 2000s." Both controversial and sometimes mainstreamed, the artistic duo has completed many media art based works over the past decade including "Voteauction" during the 2000 presidential election, "Google Will Eat Itself," and "Nazi-Line," one of their more controversial works of art. This book shows how the artists take media art seriously. From "introducing uncomfortable truths and repressed memories into the net and into the gallery," the artists take serious subject matters and display them on a media accessible to everyone.

What caught my eye about this article was the fact that not only was the art getting great reviews, but the the book about the art got great reviews. Taking a look at a decade's worth of media art, which is a long time in the media art world, can certainly show how different the art form has changed, but with these artists, it showcases all of their strengths, even if some of the techniques are outdated. What was really impressive is how they successfully dealt with controversial and non-controversial topics. Both were given the same amount of thought and are well executed, which displays the underlying meaning even more. With hopefully more to come from the media art world and more books about it, these artists are a great foundation for the field and are displayed as such in this book.