We recently caught up with Steve Dietz, Director of New Media Initiatives at the Walker Art Center, about "Shock of the View."

Steve Dietz (real): What is "Shock of the View?"

Steve Dietz (virtual): "Shock of the View" is fundamentally an attempt to generate discussion about the relation of digital media to contemporary museum practice--and vice versa. At the same time, we hope the project is modeling some potential variations on traditional museological practice.

SD: What does that mean?

SDVR: Well, for one thing, we are treating the net as "real" exhibition space, not just as an information conduit for "real exhibition space." One implicit message of pairing a museum object or event with a virtual object or event is that the virtual is real, so to speak.

By working with partner institutions--Wexner Center for the Arts, Davis Museum, and the San Jose Museum of Art--we are looking at the network as a way to extend or change the model of traveling and collaborative exhibitions.

By inviting artists, writers, educators, and curators from across the Net to respond to some fairly generic questions--What is virtual? What is real? etc.--using the exhibitions as potential concrete reference points, we definitely want to avoid the traditional, authoritative institutional voice. [laughs] Judging by the initial responses, many of which have taken us to task for asking the wrong questions, let alone assuming we know the answers, we don't have too much to worry about on that score.

Finally, Shock can really only be considered a success if the listserv conversation is dynamic and ongoing. Where we end up in six months is really more important than what we think we have to say starting out, which is only intended as a jumping off point.

SD: A lot of that doesn't sound particularly new.

SDVR: Exactly!

SD: Huh?

SDVR: From artnetweb to ada'web to rhizome to nettime to the irational-ljudmila-easylife-jodi axis to V2 and ANAT to Eyebeam, among many others, there is amazing work going on. Work that consciously or not challenges traditional, institutionalized, museological practice and perhaps certain notions of Art with a capital A. The museum community--curators and educators as well as funders and the museum-going audience--are increasingly interested in this work. Hopefully, "Shock of the View: Museums, Artists, and Audiences in the Digital Age" can be a shot-term medium of exchange among these groups.

SD: Sort of like net.art 101.

SDVR: I think that's the trap. If Shock is perceived to be presenting the 9 "best" net/virtual art projects, we've missed the mark. I mentioned Eyebeam because I think it was an exemplary discussion in many ways, which focused on artistic practices. We're hoping for a similar airing of ideas about curatorial/museological practice, while being as concrete as possible. Hence the exhibitions. By the same token, yes, we have asked the curators to make judgment calls. But that's because we think critical context is, well, critical. Not as some sort of intro course or top 10 list.

Walker's mission, not uniquely, includes programs that "examine the questions that shape and inspire us as individuals, cultures, and communities." One of those questions is the interactions and roles of museums, artists, and audiences in a digital age.

SD: Ok, one last question. What's with all the quotation marks everywhere--"real," "virtual," etc.?

SDVR: I agree, let's stop doing that. Semantics are a powerful cultural force. We have intentionally started with simplistic, binary opositions with the expectation of exorcising the distinctions, just as the various categories we have picked--object, space, performance, hybrid--are based on traditional models that may not make as much sense with net/virtual art. Let the discussions begin.