Mark Napier: Shredder 1.0:1998

Shredder 1.0 was created by Mark Napier and was presented in 1998. The way Shredder 1.0 works is that it takes websites that have already been created and put on the web and it rearranges and takes apart the coding of those websites. The ending result is an abstract work of net.art.

I think this inventive net.art piece by Mark Napier is very appropriate in relation to the culture of the internet. This piece goes to show that anyone can take something from the internet and alter it any way they like and then re post it on the internet, sometimes creating untrue texts and pictures. Shredder plays into the idea that the internet is a free zone open to everyone.

Mark Napier's work shows relevance to net.art by his using text on the web to create art which is a common theme in net.art. In fact Mark claims "By altering the HTML code before the browser reads it, the Shredder appropriates the data of the web, transforming it into a parallel web. Content become abstraction. Text becomes graphics. Information becomes art." Mark's work goes to show that something so simple like text and information can be altered slightly to create a wonderful piece of net.art.