IMA's ArtBabble: Get your babble on

Art-Bab-ble [ahrt-bab-uhl]
noun; verb (used without object) -bled, -bling

1. free flowing conversation, about art, for anyone.

2. a place where everyone is invited to join an open, ongoing discussion - no art degree required.

After talking about video in the previous two posts I wanted to highlight an exciting new experimental video undertaking by the Indianapolis Museum of Art: ArtBabble.org. It’s still in private Beta, but if you’re interested in checking it out, I’ve got about 50 invites to give away. Just leave your email address in the comments.

ArtBabble can best be described as a social network based around high-quality art video content. The video content is not itself art; rather, it is educational and expository in nature. It ranges from forthright interviews with the artists featured within IMA’s walls (In the Factory), offering users insight into the artist’s sources of inspiration, creative process and vision, to staff profiles (Employee Profiles) and recordings of museum talks (Talks). There is also a series of webisodes shot on location at the Louvre highlighting the Louvre’s Roman Art collection and discussing the pieces in the context of Roman history (Roman Art from the Louvre).

The content is masterfully produced, engaging and informative. It’s not the kind of dry, academic, dusty tweed jacket content one would expect from a museum. One of the Roman Art webisodes is called “I love the A.D.’s” and is inspired by the popular VH1 series “I love the 80s.” In it, scholars discuss Roman-era fashion and epicurean trends. Their sage commentary is spliced with hilarious asides by a toga-wearing J Noland (a young IMA staffer?) like, “Juvenal, ah, the Roman scholar! I believe it was Juvenal who said, ‘Girl, you look good. Why don’t you back that a$$ up. Wobbidy, wobbidy.”

My favorite feature, however, is the additional links tab that appears on the right-hand side as you watch any video. The links direct you to any number of additional resources meant to supplement the video content and enrich your viewing experience with additional information and a deeper sense of context.

While watching the video on Orly Genger and her project “Whole,” for example, I was directed to Orly’s IMA blog post about the work, the IMA’s Flickr set on Orly’s installation, as well as a short YouTube video of Orly’s previous work, “Mr. Softy,” in which Orly pants and heaves as she struggles to crawl under the massive, heavy rope structure while ice-cream truck music plays in the background—an image at once mesmerizing and strangely unsettling. There are also some cheeky, seemingly random clips, like one of Arnold Schwarzenegger in his Mr. Universe days and a look at the Earth’s layers (this all makes sense in the context of the video, I promise).

ArtBabble’s design is slick and easy to navigate, allowing users to easily download videos onto their iPods, share them on external social media platforms and embed them on their blogs. As far as social networking capabilities though, the options are kind of limited at the moment. Users can post comments on videos both within the video stream and in comment boxes below it, but there doesn’t seem to be any way for one user to friend another or to engage in a conversation beyond the comment stream. It’s also unclear whether users can upload their own videos, or post things like video comments, though this type of functionality may be in development.

Overall though, it’s an interesting project and a great educational tool. Kudos to IMA for taking the initiative to try something new and building a space where people can have intelligent conversation centered around smart art videos. I’m looking forward to watching this project grow!