explorations in toronto art.

Yesterday night I had the great pleasure of attending Ryeberg Curated Video ‘s first-ever live event, in which some smart people showed us some interesting videos scavenged from the internet, and talked about them in relation to each other and to contemporary culture.

Not only was the content interesting, the format was a model for what I hope to see in future art chats and presentations. More lively than a slide presentation in a lecture hall, but less derail-able than an open forum (or a moderated panel, for that matter), the event was the blog personified. Too often, I’ve been witness to panels getting derailed by people with outrage to vent or agendas to push— everyone leaves frustrated. The opposite is just as bad: a brilliant speaker wasted on a disengaged audience, usually because of inappropriate venue, low turnout from lack of publicity, excessively long introductions/thank you’s, or lack of context. What I’m trying to get at here was that the balance between talking and listening at Ryeberg Live was right on the money.

If you haven’t checked out Ryeberg, you should— it is a treasure trove of YouTube curiosities, a collection of thoughtful essays on contemporary culture, and, in my opinion, a refined version of contemporary print and web magazines. I think this format is a strong candidate for the future mainstream medium!