The Museum Inside The Telephone Network, 1991

In this experimental event, the most familiar tool of communication – the telephone network – served as an analogy for the museum…. It was an event that provided a preview of the ever-widening world of cyberspace.

–  ICC Concept Book, NTT Publishing, 1997

 

 

How local is local? From March 15th to 29th, 1991, anyone wishing to attend one exhibition could only do so via a fax machine, telephone or dial-up modem. The Museum Inside The Telephone Network did not inhabit a physical space.

Created by the Project InterCommunication Center (ICC), founded by the Japanese telecom NTT, the exhibition wanted to look at ways communication networks could affect museums and other institutions.

Visitors to The Museum Inside The Telephone Network could access five channels. They could hear talks and readings on the topic of communication through the phone-based “Voice & Sound Channel”. They could push telephone buttons to create musical tunes in the “Interactive Channel”. In the “Fax Channel”, they could transmit novels, artworks, comics and essays. Live performances by artists and phone conversations between intellectuals were broadcast in the “Live Channel”. Visual materials could be downloaded by modem and observed via a computer monitor.

The line-up was impressive. The likes of Laurie Anderson, J.G. Ballard, Laurie Anderson, Pierre Boulez, Ryuichi Sakamoto, John Giorno, William Forsythe, Enki Bilal, Robert Longo, William S. Burroughs, Merce Cunningham, John Cage, Jacques Derrida, Allen Ginsberg, Philip Glass, Félix Guattari, Pontus Hultén, Derek Jarman, Jeff Koons, Steve Reich, Ryuichi Sakamoto, Paul Virilio and John Zorn all participated.

Highlights from the exhibition catalog – faxed, naturally – is below:

 

  

 

Via: You can see the entire brochure here.