Timebase

“Time-Base Corrector” was an indispensable unit in video technology. It stabilized electronic signals that were susceptible to fragmentation and corrected possible errors in synchronization, sound and picture, thereby making the message visible and audible in high quality to viewers. By now, this tool, which is unnecessary in the digital world, has disappeared – before ever having been given a proper term in Hungarian.

The “Time Based Art” category is also a product of this period when analogue gave way to digital. It was introduced as an inclusive designation of works which make different demands on the viewer’s time than paintings, sculptures, prints and buildings. While in the cases of the latter, the amount of time devoted to the contemplation of a work depends on the viewer, in the case of time-based works – often referred to as media art – a fundamental stipulation of the process of reception is that the viewer dedicate a determined amount of time (his/her own personal time) during which s/he ponders the work, listens to it, and watches it in full. Music, theatre, film, radio and television are all time-based works, as are interactive multimedia works, virtual realities, augmented realities, computer games and works created on the Internet.

The core of the works is a selection of compositions that were created over the past five years (2010–2015). Alongside so-called “single-channel” video works, installations and, offering a kind of archival perspective, earlier works and compilations provide a survey of the current state of affairs and insights into the background of these transformations.

A special part of the exhibition, the <19 Freestyle Computer Competition, interprets digital culture in a broader sense, offering visitors glimpses of the diversity of creative computer usage by the youngest generation (anyone under the age of 19), in some cases independent from art.

Miklós Peternák