‘The year 2012 was a momentous one for the animated GIF. The popularity of Dump.fm was just beginning to fade, but the platform, which facilitates real-time chat with images, had sparked GIF-making among countless creatives, from programmers and musicians to designers and visual artists. With the rise of Tumblr, and the launch of Google+—social networks used extensively by artists to connect with each other and share GIFs—the medium became so ubiquitous that it was even dubbed the “Word of the Year” by the Oxford Dictionary.
‘Years on, has the mass popularity of GIFs affected art GIF-making communities? Rich Oglesby, who runs the Tumblr blog Prosthetic Knowledge, reminded me that GIFs have been present in online culture since the early days of the web, long before the rise of the GIF industry—Giphy, Gifpop!, Giphoscope, NewHive, etc. Back then sites like Word, Geocities, and B3ta were hosting familiar GIF archetypes that remain today: animated illustrations, stop-motion, glitchy discolorations, and digital low-res vectors. “And let’s not forget the glitter-vomit of MySpace pages,” Oglesby recalled.
‘It’s this history of relatively widespread accessibility that informs the artists making art GIFs. Artist Tom Moody, an early adopter, described what makes the art GIF distinct. “It’s a matter of context,” he said. “You have to catch the movement of images—the reacting or punning flow of one into another as people respond to each other’s posts. If it’s a ‘surf club’-type situation, if it’s happening on Tumblr or Dump.fm… to me that can be very much in the art domain, like a performance, whether the individual GIFs are self-consciously ‘art’ or not. That’s not the only ‘art’ use of GIFs, just one of the more subtle and difficult to identify (and document).” Another GIF-maker and artist, Anthony Antonellis, preferred to describe successful GIFs as silent “melodies”. They can take on as many different shapes as a song has stanzas.
‘“I feel like there’s not a good way to view [GIFs] in the gallery setting,” Benson told me. “They really belong on your browser.” And the problem with a web browser, according to Benson, is that it’s “a pretty terrible art viewing context.” The physicality of an object in a gallery commands attention in a way that the online artwork does not. “Because [the browser] is a general, all-purpose context, it doesn’t feel special,” Benson added. “It’s kind of like when I see art in a coffee shop; I’m there to drink coffee and do work. I’m not there to study the art.”
‘This anecdote highlights the challenge of even describing the medium, a problem Chan articulated in an email. “The GIF finds difficulty in occupying a genre and even resists many categorizations (it’s not photography or video, and there isn’t something else you can apply dither to and load in browser),” she wrote. “If there are inherent properties to GIFs like we mentioned (movement, jerkiness, short messages, repetition), maybe people can’t assess them with the same contemplative lens they bring to the fine arts.”
‘And while that mentality seems very much behind the rise of the art GIF party, sustained growth at the level seen in 2012 seems almost impossible. The Dump.fm community has shrunk over the years, and nobody I spoke to uses Google+ anymore. “I really do think of that first summer with Google+ as a beautiful era for GIFs,” Antonellis recalled. “It did something more than Dump.fm could,” he said, referring to the extended time users had to respond to posts. Google+ acted more like a blog than Dump’s chat room.
‘Conversations like these reveal just how much GIFs live or die by these platforms. “We’ve come to rely on these consumer-grade solutions because that’s what’s available, but it was never the intention of the makers. It was never the intention of Google+ to be the platform for sharing animated GIFs,” Benson said. “It feels like the community has contracted a certain amount in the last year. Maybe it’s just the fossilization of my own social network, but I’m not seeing these big expansive GIF group shows.” A. Bill Miller, by contrast, is a little more optimistic in his assessment. “It feels like [the community is] always growing and contracting.” he tells me. “It’s in a middle stage.”’ — Paddy Johnson
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Dina Kelberman Cloud Formations (2012)
Dirt
Gunfight at the OK Corral
Marjorie Morningstar
Night Passage
Over the Edge
Private House of the SS
Roller Boogie
Saskatchewan
Seminole
Sleepaway Camp
The Apple Dumpling Gang
The Black Knight
The Day After
The Last Chase
The Pursuit of DB Cooper
The Babysitter
The Prince and the Showgirl
The Secret Life of Plants
They Came to Cordura
Tumbleweed
Yankee Buccaneer
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Bill Domonkos Untitled (2016)
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Jack Goldstein Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (1975/2010)
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Luis Ricardo Various
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Cory Arcangel Super Mario Clouds (2002)
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7Z Untitled (2014)
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Three Frames Various (2020-2022)
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Alexandria McCrosky Untitled
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Crego Various (2022-2023)
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Gustavo Torres Untitled (2015)
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Nicolas Monterrat Various (2011-2019)
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‘AS Long As Possible (ASLAP) is a 1000 year long animated GIF loop. It’s an art project by Juha van Ingen in collaboration with Janne Särkelä. It is the longest GIF in the world. After 1000 years it’ll start again from the beginning.’
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9NUE Untitled (2021)
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Cristóbal Valenzuela The Alternative Late Show with Stephen Colbert (2018)
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Dario Alva Untitled
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Erdal Inci Clones Project
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Juan Mastro Baby Jesus
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James Kerr Untitled (2014)
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Steven Purtill Four Languages (2018)
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Micaël Reynaud Untitled (2011)
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Marisa Olson 102 Dalmatians (2010)
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Maciej Drabik Smol
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Barin Untitled (2018)
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Kevin Weir Various (2014)
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p.s. Hey. ** Dominik, Hi!!! Coolness. At least of late, love seems to like big asks, so go for it. The potential sortserve place is on today’s agenda, but I feel confident that it’s not going to be the wonderful 90% chemicals, dipped in chocolate and sprinkled with jimmies type I crave. But hope springs eternal. Love filming you scratching your nose with his iPhone then feeding the footage into gifmaker and donating the results to the Louvre who replace the Mona Lisa with it, G. ** Lucas, Hi, Lucas! Those collages are really good! You have the total touch! Both so charismatic. I am cheerleading you further into that seemingly made-for-you medium with no checks on your instincts. Thank you! No, it won’t be too bad here yet when you’re here, Olympics-damage-wise. Yep, hit me up, I’m here and not too time crunched. Today’s your graduation? Embrace irony, I guess? Do you have to wear a cap and gown? I skipped mine. I don’t remember if I ever even got an actual diploma. My yesterday wasn’t much, but today holds some promise, although it’s raining hard yet again and most of my promise is outdoors, so we’ll see. Let’s compare notes. ** Jack Skelley, Jack of ‘Manny, Moe & Jack’ fame! Jackie makes me think of Jackie Kennedy. Who could be your doppelgänger, let’s face it. Oops: instagram. I just get threats over at Facebook. Of course I do remember seeing the Bunnymen at the Whisky. That’s when they were fiery. Me too, re: Welles, and Ozick too. Signed, Moe of ‘The Three Stooges’ fame. ** dwt, Minutes are relative around here. Hey! Wow, I was so all over your dream. My material is honored. I wish I could remember my dreams. You could have been in mine last night and I would never know. I’m good-ish. Hope you’re good sans -ish. ** _Black_Acrylic, I do think maybe I remember that tale? But it needed a brush up, if so, so thank you, dream weaver (nothing to do with that horrible song). Is Hungary a tough bunch? My fingers are starting to move into a crossed position. ** Cletus, Hi. Glad you liked them: the posts, works. Uh, … hm, no one springs to my mind re: sadomasochism and poetry. That’s interesting. There must be others, but I’m blanking. Let me think on that. Hope you’re great. ** Bill, At the moment, no get-away plans, but Zac and I want to do an amusement park-focused road trip, and that would be the perfect time to do so, so maybe. Right, Fritsch was quite a thing back when. Apparently she still is in certain parts of Europe. But … but .. but … you naked in a bathtub playing guitar on video is such a genius idea! ** Dev, Hi. Hm, I should find that Foerster story. I haven’t read him since, gosh, the 1980s? Yeah, I have friends who have kids and then tell me they can’t read my books anymore and a couple who’ve told me I should never have written books like that in the first place. Having a kid is a powerful thing. Really powerful. ** Mark, Hey there, bud. Wow, website, and it looks so great at first peek! Everyone, Mark’s amazing Mattazine Society now has its own website, which looks very explorable. Go here and heavily peruse and poke ‘bookmark’. So great! Our film is about an inch from being finished, and I don’t know if there’s new news, but happy to share any. Thank you, maestro. Have big fun at the zine fest. ** Harper, Hey. Indeed about the MAGA-like contingent of meat eaters. When I turned vegetarian at 15, my mom was constantly sneaking meat into my food thinking I would eat it and go ‘yum’ and she could say, ‘Ah ha!’ but meat can’t hide when you’re vegetarian. It’s singularly blatant. I wouldn’t worry about using the patch. I used the patch the two times I quit, and both times I managed to quit for years, and it really, really helped. I too found Delmore Schwartz through the Velvets/Reed. I sort of feel everyone who reads him does. Maybe you changed those Jehovah’s Witnesses lives. It’s not impossible. I don’t know if they have JWs over here. I don’t remember even seeing a Christian on the street ranting and raving. Oh, wait, there are these Korean cult member people proselytizing here and there, but they’re very polite. ** Justin D, Hi Justin. Thanks! Great, you’re reading ‘Fable’ and digging it! Wonderful! Such a huge favorite of mine. How’s everything else? You sound really good. ** Uday, Happily my stomach isn’t as hungry as my brain, otherwise I’d look like Edmund White. Oops, that’s mean, sorry. I think I ‘high five’ here because it’s the most ridiculous thing when people do it live, or so it seems to me. Mm, no, I don’t think I greet usually. Handshake in the States, double air-cheek kiss over here, the occasional hug. I don’t know what ‘dapped up’ is. I’ll look it up. That was a dreamy couple of sentences you wrote there. I’m going to study them. Actually, I really need it to stop raining today because I have a couple of long walks I have to do thanks-no thanks to the metro stations being closed due to the fucking Olympics. But I guess a ‘pleasant’ rain would be doable. So thank you. You want some rain? I’ll go far above my station and bequeath it if so. ** Don Waters, Oh, no. Hi, Donny. Take that. I think the only Genesis I could possibly still like if that’s even possible would be from the Peter Gabriel era only. We don’t get that wallpaper country music over here. The French aren’t into that stuff, not even the good stuff, as far I can tell. I’ve never seen any country artists do concerts here whereas the shittiest rock bands you can imagine come over here and play huge sold out shows. Strange place, music-wise. It does seem like the French are singlehandedly keep jazz alive though, and I guess that’s good. Good old Pig Destroyer. Yeah, I think if I had a kid or kids I’d be a very different person/artist. Probably not a very good one, or maybe a worse artist and better person? I don’t know. I’m going to meditate on that. ** Nika Mavrody, I didn’t come across any abortion related art in my search. Strange, right? ** Oscar 🌀, Hey! That’s interesting and makes sense about Dora. Huh. I love the way Danish people pronounce Dennis, so thank you. Do you like skywriting? Of course you do. Good. Well, go outside and look upwards at 2:47 pm today and the sky might just have a friendly greeting for you. No, yeah, that Australian TV show. I can’t stop looking at those gifs. I too knew/know nothing about gay Korean webcomics, but I will join you in your investigation. Dialed up pitfalls: nice! Weekend … see a film today, a little art, softserve ice cream possibly, power meeting at 6 pm with film people, and then a weekend of film script writing and absence of rain hopefully and, gosh, who knows. You got something imminently going on? ** Right. You all are extremely aware of my love for animated gifs, and today I present to you some self-styled artists who work with them. How about that? See you tomorrow.
Now available in North America 
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The Argentinean director Eduardo Williams made an installation called JUST A LONG GIF, shot with a pill-sized camera traveling through his guts! (THE HUMAN SURGE 3, which I saw a few days ago, is amazing.)
My surgery yesterday went pretty well, and I’m not in pain, but I have not been able to get to sleep yet. It’s 5:30 AM in New York as I type this, and I’m still up. Part of the issue is that the meds I was prescribed had a stimulant effect, another is that I have to crank the AC up as loud as possible.
Film Forum is reviving THE DEVIL, PROBABLY & LANCELOT DU LAC for week-long runs in September!
Early Genesis had their moments, much more than ELP or Yes. The first two albums are more psych than prog, and by THE LAMB LIES DOWN ON BROADWAY, they could actually write songs.
I hope you make great progress on writing the next film over the weekend.
hey, great stuff today! it’s so interesting to see video art that’s like, less than a second long. i went on a sort of pseudo date thing (one of those gay “I’ve seen you naked but we haven’t had an actual conversation” kind of dates) with someone recently to a video art exhibit recently, and we were both kind of shocked to see people just kind of wander around video art exhibits without taking that long to really watch them, or even wait until they were finished to watch the opening. i guess gifs kind of offset that?
it’s really interesting to see more of this kind of art, i sort of assumed it was mostly just you. really incredible, particularly kevin weir. I’ll definitely be checking out more of his stuff!
anyway, just in brief around the “””date”””, it was with someone else who was rather into your work, who politely asked if I’d just hang around and mildly stalk him, after giving me his routine / workplace. bizarre, but kind of endearingly weird.
by the way “dap me up” is basically a sort of gen z handshake. anyway! enough of that, have a great day.
Some delightful GIFs on display today! Cory Arcangel – Super Mario Clouds has been a longtime favourite of mine.
A bright and sunny day outside. In fact, today is summer solstice so it’s the day to dance around naked at Stonehenge if you’re into that kind of thing.
Hah, yes! It felt especially relevant to share the dream when i open up the blog and see that its all kids in art.
I finally got a job, it’s a lot more hands-on then I’m used to but it’s a job. My coworkers are so sweet and i have a whole warehouse of them. My new half-worry is wondering when I can spring “the boobs” on them–I’m a “trans man” and don’t mind having boobs until people get weird about it and that’s always a hurdle at a new job. I only really have two shirts that conceal them well so it has to happen eventually, probably today.
Glad you’re good-ish. Ish is better than bad-ish, maybe. I am good, yeah. Much better than I have been. We have been getting some uncharacteristic humidity and drizzle so that has been fun for me. I was happy to see the last few blog posts–I do a lot of web art, or like to, and to try to explain that its worth anything one of the things I showed my professors was Shu Lea Chang’s ‘Brandon’. I don’t think I changed anyone’s mind. Whatever! Oh, and that fabricated john cage interview… That had me laughing
I remember you mentioning bit ago about the audiobook for I Wished having been out of your hands–I guess I get it but that seems… Nerve wracking. To not be referenced at all, to not be able to explain what feeling or context is running thru a certain conversation. I think your feeling to not want to try it out is probably a good one. Not that it was bad, but. I imagine it would be jarring (maybe funny if you can manage being lighthearted about it) to hear someone read something in a tone you did not at all intend. Of course, everyone gets to have their interpretations anyway. But, idk.
Sewer time yet?
Hi!!
For some reason, I’m finding 9NUE’s “Untitled” so fascinating. Really great post! Thank you!
How was the soft-serve ice cream?
I have to be honest – I didn’t expect to ever make it to the walls of the Louvre. Especially not with so little effort. Thank you dearly, love! Love making my migraine go fuck itself, Od.
Hey, D, Love these GIFs, esp the old film shots. I snagged some for use in my texts. Oh, I don’t know re: kids. I know lots of great writers with kids! The universal theme among us is time, like time to wander and daydream, which is crucial, as I’m sure you know. My mind’s been blown with all the dad knowledge I’ve acquired, things that would have never passed through my head. So, it’s all just a matter of contraction and expansion, and you just have to manage it, or not. Over these last eight years I’ve kind of assumed the role of superdad. That’s probably due to mine skipping out at an early age, which, btw, primed me for my eventual love of outsiders and underdogs. I exorcised all this in my dad / surf memoir. Anyway, funny about the shitty rock bands, packed Paris clubs. And…hm…jazz? I guess that’s good? Are there many cool music / record shops in Paris, or do you just wait to hit Amoeba whenever you return to LA? We have some great shops in Portland. Speaking of, how familiar are you (or not) with this city? Just mention it because it was curious that character in The Sluts high tails it to Portland, so I thought you might be familiar? Have a great weekend! Take care, Don
hi dennis!
thank you so much for the feedback!! I guess I’ll show you the next ones if you want to? all I have to share today are the balloons from my graduation and the rose we all got from the teachers haha https://imgur.com/a/50LQOkz I hope the weather cleared up for you. how was your day?
no, I didn’t have to wear a cap and gown, just vaguely formal clothes. the ceremony went really well, far better than I expected! I’m really happy it’s all behind me and the general mood was super pleasant. I guess I’m grateful I went too because I sat behind this guy I’m totally obsessed with who I stared at all the time hahaha. and I went to get ice cream after too!
my day before that wasn’t great but I’m thinking positively that it’ll all be fine tomorrow. I’ll call two of my friends tomorrow to celebrate graduating in some small way. I think we’re going to see ‘barbarian’ together but I’m not sure. did you see that movie? came out like 3 years ago I think. I’ve heard it’s supposed to be good.
Hey Dennis! Thanks for putting my stuff up there. I should do more with GIFs probably. I’ve been exhausted because I’m super anemic for some reason. I just got iron infusions and it only improved things slightly. Meh. Other than that all is more or less well. Very excited for Flunker, so happy things worked out with AS. Hope you are better that good xo
Hello. Wow that’s crazy about your mother putting meat in your food. Luckily I grew up with a mum who was vegetarian. She was the only one in the family who didn’t eat meat though, and when I was really young and wanted to quit meat she told me not to because I needed the protein or something. I only properly did it when I was 17. I think that you really appreciate all the flavours that exist when meat isn’t the cornerstone of every meal. I don’t even have cravings for it. My flatmates were frying bacon the other day and the smell made me feel ill.
I made a bad decision and read some of my old diaries today and re-discovered all of these things I was writing and trying to write. It’s crazy because I see drafts and ideas for things that I’m only just writing now and I didn’t even remember that it was an idea I had years ago. Like, I see myself planning out the book I’m writing now, but I was in high school. Obviously, it’s horribly written in the diaries, but I’m always thinking about how I’m a completely different person from who I used to be, but I guess I’m not. I just look different.
I say it was a bad decision to read them because I remember how depressed I was and remember all of these people who I suddenly want to contact on a whim. People who I didn’t even know, who were either nice to me once or I wanted to be friends with or had a crush on. I don’t know if it’s a good idea to devote time to thinking about these people, but they frequently come up in dreams anyway. I often have fantasies about prank calling people who bullied me, but that would be very obviously stupid.
Hi Dennis, how are you? Been meaning to write to you for a while now… Miss you!
This was a wonderful post to get through while playing Tosca in the background. I’ve recently become obsessed with non-looping GIFs. That was mean! Poor Edmund White. I did rather like his Genet biography, as much as I am generally suspicious of biographies. I do really like the Gorky-writing-about-Tolstoy model though. The one that’s less focused on mere facts and more focused on insisting that the verbose Russian master would be a pelagic fish should he choose to take ichthyic form. Sorry for wishing for rain for you. I thought you might appreciate it because everywhere’s been really hot. Why would they close the subways? One would think they’d operate at higher capacity. Regardless: today I do not intend on making the mistake of assuming your weather needs. I hope the skies give you what you want, whatever that is.
In honor of ur post I made a gif https://s1.ezgif.com/tmp/ezgif-1-88f55ff394.gif
And i wonder what the story is thought I should share it is
Hey, Dennis! Love today’s post. I especially like those ‘Cloud Formations’ GIFs. They’re so wonderfully chaotic/frenetic. I’m doing OK. I think I’m one of those rare people who gets the ‘summertime blues’. It’ll pass. Did you get your soft serve? I had a Blizzard from Dairy Queen about a week ago. I think it had three different types of cookies in it. 🍦
I do love skywriting (who doesn’t?), but I looked up to the sky at 2:47 pm yesterday and saw nothing but rain clouds. Maybe you meant 2:47 pm your time? My bad. Today I woke up even earlier than usual and went on a morning run, and I tracked the route on Strava so I could send it to you but, sadly, I’ve horrifically misspelled ‘Hi, Dennis!’ and I’m real embarrassed about it.
Gifs today! This was such a fun scroll. Loved all of the ‘Untitled’s especially, which is a funny coincidence, but particularly James Kerr’s. I’m a sucker for anything medieval-y.
How was the film/art/ice-cream/meeting? If it was a bit hectic then I hope a less-hectic weekend, filled with some plain-sailing script writing, smooths it back out. Semi-imminently, I’ve got tickets to see Troye Sivan tomorrow. I’ve got kinda mixed feelings about it, mostly because we’ve got standing tickets, but it should be good!
See ya later! :3
Also! ‘Flunker’ went live for UK pre-order, so I jumped on that. Trying to think of some catchy one-liner but failing. ‘Let’s get Flunked up’? ‘Here we Flunking go’? ‘…Flunk…’? There’s got to be something.