Andrew Wing
the artist
There is no single artist, only an ongoing series of inputs from
whomever accesses the website.
the art
Purely jaundiced sardonicism as expressed by any and all people who
share total disdain for advertising.
The piece: The central character is a certain "T.Q. Merchant." He is
a holographic rotating head in a 3-D fully interactive animated web
page. He endlessly recites maxims of consumerism run amok. These
maxims are made up by net.citizens who drop by the Virtual Beret web
page. His voice is a rough, gritty gestalt of all the worlds best fly
by night sales and con men.
the beret
T.Q.'s beret is in two layers. The first is a halo of televisions
alternately facing inward towards the head and outward towards the
observer. They are at just above the head's eye level. These TVs play
an endless series of inane, lowest common denominator commercials.
The second, outer layer of the beret is a free floating ribbon
streaming in from out of view below, spiraling around the TV halo
several times and then rising up out of sight. The ribbon is a stock
market style lighted display bar that instead of showing the latest
trades, plays the maxims input by the net.observers.
Submitted by Andrew Wing (agwing@temple.edu), on Wednesday 27th September, 1995, from somewhere in the world