Performance
Dec 29 2024
is this thing on?
NO-THING is a hybrid 24-hour performance and exhibition on the theme of nothingness, produced by is this thing on?, an experimental livestreaming network created by and for artists.
Why nothing? Because maybe nothing matters. Because December 29th is that weird time where nothing happens between Christmas and New Years. Because the earliest live streams often featured what would feel like nothing to us today: coffee pots, fish tanks, a suburban front lawn. Even tuning into a stream from a famous lifecaster like JenniCam would often reveal an empty desk chair. NO-THING is inspired by collaborative “nothing” streams such as IDPW’s The Internet Bedroom, a virtual sleepover where 90 volunteers gathered to sleep on camera via Google Hangouts. As well as Laurel Schwulst and Ellie Hunter’s World Wide Wind Chime Festival, in which artists from around the world were sent webcams to collaboratively live-stream their handmade wind chime.
NO-THING will feature performances by is this thing on? founders (Christopher Clary, Sarah Rothberg, Bhavik Singh, and Molly Soda), friends of THING, and the general public through an open call — alongside historic recreations of The Internet Bedroom, The Trojan Room Coffee Pot (the first webcam from 1991), and Watching Grass Grow (streaming since 2005). Ultimately, doing nothing is doing something (together).
Performances will be livestreamed to thing.tube on December 29th from 12:00am to 11:59pm EST. During that time, and through January 2nd, the streams will play on monitors in the windows of the NYC gallery Nguyen Wahed.
NO-THING is made possible with support from Museum of the Moving Image (MoMI) and Nguyen Wahed. It’s being produced as an offsite museum event, leading up to THING+YOU, an exhibition and performance at MoMI in 2025. Streaming support for NO-THING provided by Stream.
Background
thing.tube is developed as a process of software creation as performance art. Its features and form are driven by our own desires, conceptual questions about online platforms, and the current context of livestreaming and the web. Currently, thing.tube allows performers to stream from customized rooms, connected by a webring and a universal chat.
First launched in 2022, the website has featured performances by Chia Amisola, Herdimas Anggara, Darla Devour, Maya Man, and the founding members. THING is made possible with support from the Gray Area C/Change grant, NEW INC Next Web grant, Onassis ONX, Museum of the Moving Image, and developers Mark Ramos and Kevin Yeh.
Livestreaming is a hundred billion-dollar, global industry owned and controlled by Big Tech. Although streamers create the core value of these platforms, they/we have little agency, from how streams appear to how profits are shared, terms of service, and what social agreements exist between audience and streamers.
is this thing on? is in service to art, a software- development-as-critical-performance project that looks at the past to question the future. THING hopes to restore some of the radical origins of the early web, like live-streams Trojan Coffee Pot, JenniCam, and drivemeinsane. We’re building and connecting in the spirit of web3, decentralizing technology in the service of decentralizing power, without (necessarily) relying on the blockchain or crypto. We plan to slowly grow THING across Seasons where each builds upon the last using research > dev > performance > public debriefs.
Season 1 — Before THING
On October 23, 2022, thing.tube was a ‘network’ of links to Big Tech live streams on YouTube, Twitch, Amazon Live, and Chaturbate. It explored the constraints around platformism. Because most of these Big Tech platforms disabled us from using iFrames on our own site, we weren’t able to easily co-mingle audiences. How does it feel to be siloed? What are the systems of consent? Who controls the stream?
Season 2 — THING
From November to December in 2022, thing.tube was a centralized network — the infrastructure and audience was shared and controlled by a single admin powered by Google and Amazon cloud services. We also introduced NRG, an accounting number within each performer's room to record network transactions. What is web 2.0 actually — a marketplace of shopping, gifting, liking, loving, chatting, sharing(?)?
Season 3 — THING+1
On December 14, 2023, thing.tube was expanded so each founder could invite a guest performer: Bhavik Singh’s +1 is Chia Amisola, Christopher Clary’s +1 is Darla DeVour, Molly Soda’s +1 is Maya Man, Sarah Rothberg's +1 is Herdimas Anggara. We continued to 'decentralize' by using different terms of service and stickers for each room, to enable performers to determine the context of audience interaction. We removed NRG, as it no longer aligned with our values. What does streaming look like when it’s centered on creativity and community, not capital?
Season 4 — NO-THING
See above
Season 5 — THING+YOU
From April 2025 through the summer, Museum of the Moving Image will host a retrospective of is this thing on? that opens with a live performance by the THING founders. Their performances will be installed throughout the museum, livestreamed to thing.tube, and projected back into the exhibition space.
Bios
Christopher Clary is a new media artist who makes interactive works that we can live through and expand with to know our own affective, queer selves. Chris has been an Eyebeam fellow, NEW INC member, and New Jersey State Council on the Arts awardee. He has also been commissioned by Rhizome and Meta Open Arts, collected by the Whitney and MoMA, exhibited at ETH Zurich and Rencontres d'Arles, and reviewed in Art in America and Hyperallergic. Based on the Jersey shore.
Sarah Rothberg is an interactive media artist creating experiences that invite you to reconsider your relationships to the world around you. These take many forms ranging from installation to immersive experiences, performance, websites, video, writing, workshops, and experiments with emerging technology. Rothberg is based in Brooklyn and teaches at the Interactive Telecommunications Program.
Bhavik Singh is a Sikh artist interested in alternative futures for social software. He works across new media art and product development to create slow, intimate, communal spaces online. He has been a fellow at the Processing Foundation, a member at NEW INC, and has taught at Cooper Union School of Art and Hunter CUNY. He currently works at Patreon and is based in Brooklyn.
Molly Soda is a visual artist working in video, installation, interactive art, performance and print media. Her work is often hosted online, specifically on social media platforms, allowing the work to evolve and interact with the platforms themselves. Soda engages with questions of revisiting one's own virtual legacy, how we present ourselves and perform for imagined others online and how the ever shifting nature of our digital space affects our memories and self concept. Based in Brooklyn.
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Museum of the Moving Image (MoMi), founded in 1985, celebrates the history, art, technology, and future of the moving image in all of its forms. Located in Astoria, New York, the Museum presents exhibitions; screenings; discussion programs featuring actors, directors, and creative leaders; and education programs. It houses the nation’s most comprehensive collection of moving image artifacts and screens over 500 films annually. Its exhibitions—including the core exhibition Behind the Screen and The Jim Henson Exhibition—are noted for their integration of material objects, interactive experiences, and audiovisual presentations. For more information about MoMI, visit movingimage.org.
For more information, please contact Christopher Clary