Look #1, Adam Harvey, http://cvdazzle.com/assets/images/comparison_lg.jpg (accessed October 12, 2012).

My text “The New Aesthetic and The Framework of Culture” was published in the Media-N Journal issue for Fall 2012: v.08 n.02: Found – Sampled – Stolen – Strategies of Appropriation in New Media . Media-N is The New Media Caucus‘s peer-review journal. Many thanks to Joshua Rosenstock and Pat Badani for their generous feedback, and editing.

Part of the introduction follows below.  For the full text visit Media-N.

This essay is a critical overview of the New Aesthetic in the context of what I define as The Framework of Culture. The New Aesthetic relies heavily on principles of remixing, and for this reason it is not so much a movement, but arguably more of an attitude towards media production that is overtly aware of computing processes that are embedded in every aspect of daily life. Material considered part of The New Aesthetic often, though not always, consists of pixilated designs that make reference to digital manipulation of contemporary media.

One of the The New Aesthetic’s resonating issues is that by using the word “new” it appears invested in the recontextualization of cultural production that is aware of its materialization through the use of digital technology. At the same time, it also appears to be revisiting much of what new media already examined during the early stages of networked communication beginning in the mid-nineties. [1] The subject of interest in this text is not whether The New Aesthetic may be something actually “new,” or simply a trend revisiting cultural variables already well defined by previous stages of media production. Rather, what is relevant is that The New Aesthetic makes evident how recycling of concepts and materials is at play in ways that differ from previous forms of production.

Read the complete article at Media-N