GUEST CURATOR - Gretchen Andrew
GUEST CURATOR - Gretchen Andrew
Gretchen Andrew
Dec. 20 – 24, 2021The artwork of Gretchen Andrew utilises press, online media, and search engines as tools for creation while exposing the political and social implications of these corporate-owned apparatuses. She is best known for her SEO manipulations through which she places her art within the top search results for important art institutions, collections, and events. Her seemingly playful works have serious implications for reconsidering our relationship to the online information we create and consume, and the impact these monolithic yet malleable structures have on our lives and society at large.
Gretchen Andrew manipulates systems of power with art, glitter and code. She is best known for her playful hacks on major art world and political institutions, including Frieze, The Whitney Biennial, Artforum, The Turner Prize, and The Next American President. In these digital performances she reimagines reality with art and desire. She does this by making assemblage “vision boards” that she programs to become top internet search results. The feminine and trivialized materials of her vision boards purposefully clash with the male-dominated worlds of AI, programming, and political control they also operate within. "Future News", such as shallow fakes of Art Forum and The New York Times, and real press are deeply integrated into Gretchen’s work. She has recently been featured in Fast Company, Flash Art, CNN, The Washington Post, Fortune Magazine, Monopol, Wirtschaftswoche, The Los Angeles Times, and The Financial Times.
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So like me, my curation of the Artist News Network will be composed of news *about* me from 2021. It's all part of my practice, I promise, & not an easy craft to master. Watch this video (link below) to learn more and follow @artistnewsnetwork throughout the week to replay the wonderful 2021 I had with my team PR for Artists and with the fabulous writers and publications that have gotten my story out there, and therefore become part of the story.
View the video Here
SEO Artist Gretchen Andrew: “I want Love, Money and Belonging”
Published by The Y Circus (Now called The Overview)
Feb. 6, 2021
Read the article Here
Published by The Y Circus (Now called The Overview)
Feb. 6, 2021
Read the article Here
When I get press to cover my work, the articles and my quotes within them act as technical vectors that help propel my artwork to the top of search results. A part of how I manipulate Google is by making articles about my practice to simultaneously be about what I want to happen in the future. Both can be true at the same time. The internet is so black and white, just 1s and 0s, so it has a particularly difficult time understanding the nuance of "both".
By making work about aspiring to be in the art world I've become part of it. It can be really uncool to admit to our desires or ambitions but there is huge power in that. By making work about wanting to be on the cover of art magazines ("Cover of Artforum") I have been put on the cover of art magazines! This is, of course, exactly what I visualize on my Vision Boards, and exactly what I get Google to manifest for me but there is also a magic to it, the sort of magic that comes only from art, from throwing yourself into a practice and process and trusting your weirdest instincts...like getting rid of my studio to hire a PR firm.
I love teaching workshops on the technical methods I deploy to achieve Google and Facebook manipulation. I want people to both be impressed with me and also terrified by how easy it is. Apart from the technical aspects, today I want to share 3 tips that I've found can help any artist gain more control over their online practice
1. Success comes when What you do = What you say you do = What people think you do. Start in your studio, does your work match your artist statement? News is an important part of this loop but you can start by sitting down with your peers and your parents and hearing what they think you do. Does your website, instagram, and your work all say/do the same thing?
2. Behind every big press outlet and major artworld instagram account is a person. Connecting person to person, remembering you are sharing your story to a person instead of an entity, will help you relax and form a more authentic and valuable connection. Find your favorite writers and follow them, not just the magazine accounts.
3. Remember it's your team, your table. You don't have to do everything for yourself, or traditionally hire people, but remember that you are 100% responsible for communicating with, educating and inspiring your potential audience, collector base, sales, curatorial, and press team.
1. Success comes when What you do = What you say you do = What people think you do. Start in your studio, does your work match your artist statement? News is an important part of this loop but you can start by sitting down with your peers and your parents and hearing what they think you do. Does your website, instagram, and your work all say/do the same thing?
2. Behind every big press outlet and major artworld instagram account is a person. Connecting person to person, remembering you are sharing your story to a person instead of an entity, will help you relax and form a more authentic and valuable connection. Find your favorite writers and follow them, not just the magazine accounts.
3. Remember it's your team, your table. You don't have to do everything for yourself, or traditionally hire people, but remember that you are 100% responsible for communicating with, educating and inspiring your potential audience, collector base, sales, curatorial, and press team.
When I hacked the 2020 presidential election results and CNN covered the story a troll commented that this was not so impressive as once CNN reported on it of course my Vision Boards would become a top search result, totally failing to recognize that CNN would not have covered it had I not already successfully hacked the results. When you google "the next american president" many of the images are from major news sites, those having supplanted the ones hosted on my own wordpress site. I record all these changes in an archive hosted by Rhizome that documented the change in search results over time through a live web recording format. I then sell this performative aspect as an NFT.