“technology is the mortal enemy of art.”

I disagree with this statement as a contemporary practitioner because I believe the day and age we live in today, technology plays a huge role in art. Maybe before in art it would be considered the mortal enemy because technology has really developed dramatically and quickly it would have been hard to adjust easily, making artists feel almost threatened by this as they didn’t want people to lose interest in their work which could have been on the more traditional side of things.

As a contemporary practitioner, I use technology within my work to help me make my work, whether that’s from taking the photo using technology like a phone or a professional camera, or to digitally editing my work by scanning in what I have done.

A movement that probably agrees with the quote is the Dada movement which was a big between 1916 – 1922. Dada was an anti-art stance which created their art alive and to the moment, so back then in the 1920’s technology wasn’t as big as it is now, so this art movement wouldn’t have welcomed technology as openly as we do now because it would’ve been very new to them and where they create art to the moment technology would have been a massive change, so they could have accepted it but most likely rejected the idea of using technology as art back then was still more on the traditional side.

In conclusion technology isn’t the mortal enemy of art and everyone should embrace it more into their art and appreciate it as it does help a lot.

Source intro to Manifesto of the Constructivist Group (c.1922)

100 Artists’ Manifestos From The Futurists to the Stockists (edited by Alex Danchev Penguin, London 2011)