Rhizome.org: Enhancing artistic collaboration online

Community is diverse, pluralistic, and alive. It develops around shared interests and passions, and carefully balances mass collaboration and personal expression. Rhizome’s value lies in its community, one that has driven new media art and discourse for the past ten years through the exchange of ideas, arguments and practices around an emerging form.

Rhizome was founded in 1996 as an email list for some of the first artists experimenting with art online. Since that time it has grown into a dynamic non-profit organization that serves diverse individuals and communities, yet the spirit of internationalism and exchange remains at its heart. Now, Rhizome serves artists through a commissions program, exhibitions and editorial coverage. We also maintain our community discussion platforms, and archives which hold digital art and new media art-related commentary produced over the past yen years.

Currently, we are interested in enhancing and developing online spaces for collaboration, in order to maintain our vitality as a platform for emerging artists as we move into our second decade. These include tagging of our archives and simple comments on our reBlog amongst other possibilities all geared towards collaboration and discussion. For me, We Media seems like a great opportunity to connect with leaders in technology and non-arts fields, people whose work, undoubtedly, informs my own practice. Discussions related to digital tools and communities are of the utmost importance to me and the substance of my everyday labor. I believe I will have quite a bit to contribute to conversation, and know I will take ideas back with me that will fuel my own work.

Lauren Cornell
Executive Director
Rhizome.org