A surprising and original application of theories of new media art

In this intellectually groundbreaking work, Timothy Murray investigates a paradox embodied in the book’s title: What is the relationship between digital, in the form of new media art, and baroque, a highly developed early modern philosophy of art? Making an exquisite and unexpected connection between the old and the new, Digital Baroque analyzes the philosophical paradigms that inform contemporary screen arts.

Examining a wide range of art forms, Murray reflects on the rhetorical, emotive, and social forces inherent in the screen arts’ dialogue with early modern concepts. Among the works discussed are digitally oriented films by Peter Greenaway, Jean-Luc Godard, and Chris Marker; video installations by Thierry Kuntzel, Keith Piper, and Renate Ferro; and interactive media works by Toni Dove, David Rokeby, and Jill Scott. Sophisticated readings reveal the electronic psychosocial webs and digital representations that link text, film, and computer. Murray puts forth an innovative Deleuzian psychophilosophical approach—one that argues that understanding new media art requires a fundamental conceptual shift from linear visual projection to nonlinear temporal folds intrinsic to the digital form.

Text as Ride re-situates our understanding of new media in the social contexts of mobile apps, thrill rides, walking in the city, 3D cinema, video games, and DJ culture. Rather than a continuation of print-based literature by other means, this book considers electronic literature as a practice that foregrounds new media’s specificity. Janez Strehovec deals with post-hypertext eLiterature that has become conceptual: Moving beyond hyperlinked storytelling, it deals with digital materiality and boundaries of language; with code, textual ecology, and the limits of the sayable. This book will appeal to scholars of electronic literature, gaming, urban studies, cinema, and digital culture.