Zombies of the Revolution

Abstract

Although the body of cybernetics died in the 60's, some of its parts live a ghostly (or uncanny) existence in New Media Art discourse. Cybernetics once promised so much: a new ontology closing the gap between animate and inanimate; a new unity of arts and sciences (or at least the two cultures); the reconciliation of subject and object and what else not. And little machines were built for the Epistemology Fair. Some people called this the 'end of philosophy', the 'end of the myths of art', the 'end of history' or the 'end of ideology'. And some people thought that playing around with the latest technology is just fun and didn't bother about such old european issues. Considering the phenomenon of well-funded and established New Media Art over the last 20 years it seems that such differences got lost sometime and historical memory became blurred. Is New Media Art discourse just a farce of the (somehow tragic) cybernetic discourse of the 50's and 60's? What elements of cybernetics had to be forgotten, suppressed or altered for New Media Art to be successful?