Art meets blog

Haydn Shaughnessy is one of the most interesting people in the blogosphere. As a Irish journalist, he brings a refreshing European flavour to TheGoodBlogs. Combining his journalist endeavours with his past as a technical strategist, he brings to his blog a unique insight into digital world. But at heart I suspect he is also a digital sociologist, someone who thinks and talks about digital culture and the impact of the digital world to society at large.

His latest adventure is creating an art gallery. Wow! That is a deviation from the norm, you would say. But not for Haydn. I asked him what drove him to take a step so bold and unexpected (at least to me).

Haydn: "I wanted to do something to reflect a long held belief that
computing, IT etc has negative effects on culture which will only be put right by
cultural producers,creatives etc augmenting it with objects of beauty
derived from the IT/comms technology. By negative effects I mean like
me, today, spending too much time at a keyboard, the years I've spent
looking at powerpoint presentations, the fact that I utilise my memory so little
nowadays because a machine does memory for me.

The purpose of the gallery is to showcase people who are using IT/the
web etc in ways that have a clear aesthetic value but which also use that
technology to make us look again at the world around us - the gallery
is bringing togther people who are able to say this technology can make
the world more beautiful and satisfying, not just more productive or
connected."

Support his passion and visit Haydn's gallery. I suspect while Haydn hopes to make money with his new venture, changing and challenging people like me to think about digital culture differently is probably his much higher goal.

I, for one, can now claim to know a friend how owns an art gallery, how cool is that!