The artists of the modern Information Age have a wider audience than ever before, and the tools offered by the rapid advances of information technologies will allow them to explore as well as create new forms of artistic expression. Computers have enabled artists to experiment with interactivity and multimedia just as the re-discovered knowledge of the Renaissance enabled DaVinci to experiment with pastel and mural preparation. There are many historical similarities between the emergence of art in our modern times and the emergence of new forms of art in previous eras. When photography was first introduced, artists tried to force their old ways of thought onto the new medium. They saw photography as "drawing with light" and applied principles of painting to photography. It took many years for artists to learn the new language of photography, which was very different from the old language of painting. The artists of today are making the first hesitant ste

ps into this new era, and their experiments have met with varying degrees of success and failure.

In the mid-1980s a noticeable new concern with digital systems and technologies emerged, although the previous optimism toward these tools was replaced with openly critical and often distrustful regard. In addition to the vital and still continuing exploration of video as an artmaking tool, artists such as Alan Rath, Jenny Holzer, Simon Penny, and many others would make groundbreaking works using specialized, cutting-edge digital hardware. Much of this new work delivered openly following content which self-reflexively condemned the mass media consciousness enabled by the same tools used to create the work. In 1984, Apple released the "Macintosh" personal computer, which the visual arts community rapidly embraced. In 1971, no college art department owned a computer, but by the mid-80s this was a standard item in art schools, with entire departments devoted to the new "media arts."

Some topics in this essay:
Information Age, Mona Lisa, Futurist Manifesto, Simon Penny, Artists Eno, Industrial Revolution, Internet Eno, , Renaissance Baroque, Brian Eno, technological advances, tool artists, artists eno, advanced technology, wider audience,