Eva & Franco Mattes (both born in Italy in 1976) are a duo of artists based in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
. Operating under the pseudonym 0100101110101101.org, they are counted among the pioneers of the
Net Art
upright=1.3, "Simple Net Art Diagram", a 1997 work by Michael Sarff and Tim Whidden
Internet art (also known as net art) is a form of new media art distributed via the Internet. This form of art circumvents the traditional dominance of the phys ...
movement and are known for their subversion of
public media
Public broadcasting involves radio, television and other electronic media outlets whose primary mission is public service. Public broadcasters receive funding from diverse sources including license fees, individual contributions, public financing ...
. They produce art involving the ethical and political issues arising from the inception of the
Internet
The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...
. They are based in
Brooklyn, New York
Brooklyn () is a borough of New York City, coextensive with Kings County, in the U.S. state of New York. Kings County is the most populous county in the State of New York, and the second-most densely populated county in the United States, be ...
, but also travel frequently throughout
Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...
and the United States.
Activity
The work investigates the fabrication of situations, where fact and fiction merge into one. From 1995–97, the Mattes toured major
museum
A museum ( ; plural museums or, rarely, musea) is a building or institution that cares for and displays a collection of artifacts and other objects of artistic, cultural, historical, or scientific importance. Many public museums make these ...
s in
Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...
and the United States, and
stole 50 fragments from well-known works by artists such as
Duchamp
Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, , ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, and conceptual art. Duchamp is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Picasso ...
,
Kandinsky
Wassily Wassilyevich Kandinsky (; rus, Василий Васильевич Кандинский, Vasiliy Vasilyevich Kandinskiy, vɐˈsʲilʲɪj vɐˈsʲilʲjɪvʲɪtɕ kɐnʲˈdʲinskʲɪj; – 13 December 1944) was a Russian painter a ...
,
Beuys, and
Rauschenberg
Milton Ernest "Robert" Rauschenberg (October 22, 1925 – May 12, 2008) was an American painter and graphic artist whose early works anticipated the Pop art movement. Rauschenberg is well known for his Combine painting, Combines (1954–1964), a ...
. This work, titled "Stolen Pieces", exhibited the stolen fragments in glass cabinets: a porcelain piece of
Duchamp's urinal
A urinal (, ) is a sanitary plumbing fixture for urination only. Urinals are often provided in public toilets for male users in Western countries (less so in Muslim countries). They are usually used in a standing position. Urinals can be with ...
, skin from an
Alberto Burri
Alberto Burri (12 March 191513 February 1995; ) was an Italian visual artist, painter, sculptor, and physician based in Città di Castello. He is associated with the matterism of the European informal art movement and described his style as ...
painting, etc. They have manipulated
video game
Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This fee ...
s,
internet
The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...
technologies and street advertising to reveal truths concealed by contemporary society. Their media facades were believable enough to elicit embarrassing reactions from governments, the public, and the art world. In addition, they have orchestrated several unpredictable mass performances, staged outside art spaces, and involved unwitting audiences in scenarios that mingle truth and falsehood to the point of being indistinguishable. Their off-the-wall performances—for which they have been sued multiple times—include affixing fake architectural heritage plaques (''An Ordinary Building'', 2006), rolling out a
media campaign
Mass media refers to a diverse array of media technologies that reach a large audience via mass communication. The technologies through which this communication takes place include a variety of outlets.
Broadcast media transmit information e ...
for a non-existent
action movie
Action film is a film genre in which the protagonist is thrust into a series of events that typically involve violence and physical feats. The genre tends to feature a mostly resourceful hero struggling against incredible odds, which include life ...
(''United We Stand'', 2005) and even convincing the people of
Vienna
en, Viennese
, iso_code = AT-9
, registration_plate = W
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code =
, timezone = CET
, utc_offset = +1
, timezone_DST ...
that
Nike
Nike often refers to:
* Nike (mythology), a Greek goddess who personifies victory
* Nike, Inc., a major American producer of athletic shoes, apparel, and sports equipment
Nike may also refer to:
People
* Nike (name), a surname and feminine given ...
had purchased the city's historic
Karlsplatz
Karlsplatz () is a town square on the border of the Innere Stadt, first and Wieden, fourth districts of Vienna. It is one of the most frequented and best connected transportation hubs in Vienna. The Karlskirche is located here.
The first distri ...
and was about to rename it "Nikeplatz" (''Nike Ground'', 2003).
Their art has been featured at the
Biennale of Sydney
The Biennale of Sydney is an international festival of contemporary art, held every two years in Sydney, Australia. It is a large and well-attended contemporary visual arts event in the country. Alongside the Venice and São Paulo biennales and ...
(2016),
Whitechapel Gallery
The Whitechapel Gallery is a public art gallery in Whitechapel on the north side of Whitechapel High Street, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. The original building, designed by Charles Harrison Townsend, opened in 1901 as one of the fir ...
, London (2016),
Hammer Museum
The Hammer Museum, which is affiliated with the University of California, Los Angeles, is an art museum and cultural center known for its artist-centric and progressive array of exhibitions and public programs. Founded in 1990 by the entrepreneur- ...
, Los Angeles (2016),
Minneapolis Institute of Art
The Minneapolis Institute of Art (Mia) is an arts museum located in Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. Home to more than 90,000 works of art representing 5,000 years of world history, Mia is one of the largest art museums in the United State ...
(2013),
SITE Santa Fe
SITE Santa Fe (often referred to simply as SITE) is a nonprofit contemporary arts organization based in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Since its founding in 1995, SITE Santa Fe has presented 11 biennials, more than 90 contemporary art exhibitions, and wor ...
(2012),
Sundance Film Festival
The Sundance Film Festival (formerly Utah/US Film Festival, then US Film and Video Festival) is an annual film festival organized by the Sundance Institute. It is the largest independent film festival in the United States, with more than 46,66 ...
(2012),
MoMA PS1
MoMA PS1 is a contemporary art institution located in Court Square in the Long Island City neighborhood in the borough of Queens, New York City. In addition to its exhibitions, the institution organizes the Sunday Sessions performance series, th ...
, New York (2009), Performa, New York (2007, 2009),
National Art Museum of China
The National Art Museum of China (NAMOC, ) is located at 1 Wusi Ave, Dongcheng District, Beijing, People's Republic of China. It is one of the largest art museums in China, and is funded by the Ministry of Culture. The construction of the museu ...
(2008), Collection Lambert, Avignon (2006),
New Museum
The New Museum of Contemporary Art, founded in 1977 by Marcia Tucker, is a museum in New York City at 235 Bowery, on Manhattan's Lower East Side.
History
The museum originally opened in a space in the Graduate Center of the then-named New Sc ...
, New York (2005),
Walker Art Center
The Walker Art Center is a multidisciplinary contemporary art center in the Lowry Hill neighborhood of Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. The Walker is one of the most-visited modern and contemporary art museums in the United States and, t ...
, Minneapolis (2001),
Manifesta
Manifesta, also known as the European Nomadic Biennial, is a European pan-regional contemporary cultural biennale.
History
Manifesta was founded in 1994 by Dutch art historian Hedwig Fijen. The first edition took place in Rotterdam. One of ...
, Frankfurt (2002) and the
Venice Biennale
The Venice Biennale (; it, La Biennale di Venezia) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy by the Biennale Foundation. The biennale has been organised every year since 1895, which makes it the oldest of ...
(2001).
Internet projects
The couple first gained notoriety in 1998 by taking the
domain name
A domain name is a string that identifies a realm of administrative autonomy, authority or control within the Internet. Domain names are often used to identify services provided through the Internet, such as websites, email services and more. As ...
''vaticano.org'', in order to undermine the
Catholic Church
The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...
's official website. They then went on a
cloning
Cloning is the process of producing individual organisms with identical or virtually identical DNA, either by natural or artificial means. In nature, some organisms produce clones through asexual reproduction. In the field of biotechnology, cl ...
spree, copying and remixing other artists' works, e.g.,
Jodi.org. They also targeted "closed" websites, such as
Hell.com, thereby turning private art into
public art
Public art is art in any Media (arts), media whose form, function and meaning are created for the general public through a public process. It is a specific art genre with its own professional and critical discourse. Public art is visually and phy ...
.
This activity is born out of their desire to create truly interactive works (as opposed to most net.art that they believe only poses as interactive). They define this in an interview with Jaka Zelenznikar where they discuss audiences reaching a website, regardless of it being the subject of net.art or not, and "by their mouse clicks they choose one of the routes fixed by the author(s), they only decide what to see before and what after". They argue that this is not true interactivity and compare it to a gallery space, suggesting that it too could be called interactive since one is able to decide what room to look at and when. Their definition of interactivity is more associated with the freedom the user has to not only govern their own movements but to duplicate, manipulate and simulate the subject matter. This includes doing something that is not predicted by the author of the website, "the beholder becomes an artist and the artist becomes a beholder: a powerless witness of what happens to his work." Their 2010 work, "No Fun" epitomizes the sentiment in the previous quote because it utilizes the social networking and video chat website
Chatroulette
Chatroulette is an online chat website that pairs random users with a choice between two other users for webcam-based conversations. Visitors to the website begin an online chat (audio, and video) with another visitor. At any point, either user ...
to exhibit Franco Mattes staging a false suicide (hanging) in part of the screen and people's responses to it in other parts of the screen. Another example of their work, where the audience is the subject, is "Emily's video" (2012) where they invited volunteers to watch what they called "the worst video ever," combined of clips from the
Darknet
A dark net or darknet is an overlay network within the Internet that can only be accessed with specific software, configurations, or authorization, and often uses a unique customized communication protocol. Two typical darknet types are social ne ...
. The viewers were filmed whilst watching it and the original video was destroyed. What remains are the reactions of the viewers, recorded on webcams. When displayed in a gallery setting the monitor is positioned on its side with the reaction playing on the top half while the bottom section remains black. This space is where the original video would be positioned and also allows for the live audience to catch their reflection. The work is also set up to face away from the gallery's entrance in order to enable new visitors to first see the reactions of the live audience before watching the ones on the screen.
Darko Maver
The Mattes shocked the mainstream art world with the invention of "Darko Maver", a reclusive radical artist, who achieved
cult status
A cult following refers to a group of fans who are highly dedicated to some person, idea, object, movement, or work, often an artist, in particular a performing artist, or an artwork in some medium. The lattermost is often called a cult classic. ...
and was paid tribute to in the 48th
Venice Biennale
The Venice Biennale (; it, La Biennale di Venezia) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy by the Biennale Foundation. The biennale has been organised every year since 1895, which makes it the oldest of ...
, before being exposed as pure fiction. The fiction was that this Serbian artist created very gruesome and realistic models of murder victims and positioned them so to obtain media attention. He was exposing the brutality of war in the Balkans to the world. In reality, the photos were found on the web site
rotten.com
Rotten.com was a shock site active from 1996 to 2012. The website, which had the tagline "An archive of disturbing illustration", was devoted to morbid curiosities, pictures of violent acts, deformities, autopsy or forensic photographs, depictio ...
and depicted real-life atrocities. They mutated reality to mimic fiction but in doing so produced an alternative reality. Their message to the world was: while artists are making shocking artwork, absorbed by the market, real violence is being perpetrated and ignored by a media-anesthetized world.
Works on Second Life
Eva and Franco produced several works employing the video game
Second Life
''Second Life'' is an online multimedia platform that allows people to create an avatar for themselves and then interact with other users and user created content within a multi player online virtual world. Developed and owned by the San Fra ...
. The first of these being the series titled "Portraits", photographs taken of avatars in the game printed onto canvas. In an interview with Domenico Quaranta they explained that they "see Avatars as 'self-portraits'. Unlike most portraits, though, they are not based on the way you 'are', but rather on the way you 'want to be'. Actually, our works are not portraits, but rather 'pictures of self-portraits'." The Mattes wanted to stress that our culture revolves around plagiarism. They followed up by saying that their project was not a completely original piece. In fact, they stated that anyone who claims that their work is an original, should really "start doubting" their mental health, because practically everything in this world, not just art, is a reproduction or remix of something that has been released before. One of these portraits went on to be destroyed by a young artist at the MAMbo Museum, Bologna. He was reportedly a fan of their work but not the prints. The, now destroyed, portrait has become a new work, 'Killing Zoe', another edition to their attempts to debunk originality; this has only become something new due it being a part of a new event, all the subject matter is the same but it comes in a new form.
Inviting other members of Second Life to participate or watch, the Mattes created ''Synthetic Performances''. Before scripting their own performances, in 2007 they started out with ''Reenactments'' of historical performances: ''
Marina Abramović
Marina Abramović ( sr-Cyrl, Марина Абрамовић, ; born November 30, 1946) is a Serbian conceptual and performance artist. Her work explores body art, endurance art, feminist art, the relationship between the performer and audienc ...
's Imponderabilia'', ''
Gilbert&George's The Singing Sculpture'', ''
Valie Export
Valie Export (often stylized as 'VALIE EXPORT'; born 17 May 1940) is an avant-garde Austrian artist. She is best known for provocative public performances and expanded cinema work. Her artistic work also includes video installations, computer an ...
's Tapp und Tastkino'', ''
Vito Acconci
Vito Acconci (, ; January 24, 1940 – April 27, 2017) was an influential American performance, video and installation artist, whose diverse practice eventually included sculpture, architectural design, and landscape design. His foundational p ...
's Seedbed'' and ''
Chris Burden
Christopher Lee Burden (April 11, 1946 – May 10, 2015) was an American artist working in performance, sculpture and installation art. Burden became known in the 1970s for his performance art works, including ''Shoot'' (1971), where he arranged ...
's Shoot''.
Riccardo Uncut
Riccardo Uncut (2018) is a nearly 1 hour and 30 minute video consisting of photos and videos of a man called Riccardo. Riccardo was chosen by the artists from a social media notice in which the Mattes offered $1,000 dollars to anyone willing to give full access to the photos and videos in their phone to be turned into art. There are around 3,000 photos shot between 2004 and 2017 in the video; photos of daily life things such as work, home and food and other more adventurous photos of travels, some art galleries and architecture. The project lets the viewer into the archive made of more than 10 years of memories of Riccardo's life. The work was commissioned by the
Whitney Museum of American Art
The Whitney Museum of American Art, known informally as "The Whitney", is an art museum in the Meatpacking District and West Village neighborhoods of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1930 by Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (1875–1942), ...
.
Ceiling Cat
Ceiling Cat (2016) is the sculptural recreation of the old internet meme: a taxidermy cat peeking through a hole in the ceiling. After the
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
The San Francisco Museum of Modern Art (SFMOMA) is a modern and contemporary art museum located in San Francisco, California. A nonprofit organization, SFMOMA holds an internationally recognized collection of modern and contemporary art, and was ...
acquired the work, the artists made an agreement with the museum to give up ownership of the photo, so that anybody can copy it and use it for whatever purpose, free of charge. The hires image was released to the public domain through Wikimedia.
[Eva & Franco Mattes]
''Ceiling Cat''
(2016)
References
Further reading
* Gassert, Doris, and others (2021). ''Dear Imaginary Audience''. Spector Books.
* Quaranta, Domenico, and others (2009). ''Eva & Franco Mattes: 0100101110101101.ORG''. Charta.
* Ippolito, Jon and Blais, Joline (2009). "New Media: Introduction". ''Innovators Shaping Our Creative Future''. Thames & Hudson.
* Ippolito, Jon and Blais, Joline (2005). ''At the Edge of Art''. Thames & Hudson.
* Jana, Reena and Tribe, Mark (2006). ''New Media Art''. Taschen.
* Greene, Rachel (2004). ''Internet Art''. Thames & Hudson.
* Paul, Christiane (2003–2008). ''Digital Art''. Thames & Hudson.
External links
0100101110101101.orgEva & Franco Mattes homepage
Postmasters Gallery, New York"The Influencers"Annual festival founded by Eva & Franco Mattes (2004-2019)
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"Newsmakers: Italian Artist Couple Eva & Franco Mattes"Modern Painters (2016)
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"Eva & Franco Mattes Dive into the Dark Web in New Tribeca Show"The Village Voice (2014)
"Eva & Franco Mattes"Frieze magazine (2012)
Associated Press (2012)
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"Eva & Franco Mattes' virtual world"Interview, Phaidon (2012)
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Mattes, Eva and Franco
Italian conceptual artists
Italian contemporary artists
Living people
Art duos
1976 births