Petra Cortright is a Santa Barbara, California based Internet art

Internet art

Internet art is a form of digital artwork distributed via the Internet. This form of art has circumvented the traditional dominance of the gallery and museum system, delivering aesthetic experiences via the Internet. In many cases, the viewer is drawn into some kind of interaction with the work...

ist. She studied at Parsons The New School for Design

Parsons The New School for Design

Parsons The New School For Design, known colloquially as Parsons, is the art and design college of The New School university. It is located in New York City's Greenwich Village, and has produced artists and designers such as Marc Jacobs, Dean and Dan Caten, Norman Rockwell, Donna Karan, Jane...

 in New York and California College of the Arts

California College of the Arts

California College of the Arts , founded in 1907, is known for its broad, interdisciplinary programs in art, design, architecture, and writing. It has two campuses, one in Oakland and one in San Francisco, California, USA...

 in San Francisco. Her work has been shown at the New Museum in New York, Rhizome

Rhizome (art)

Rhizome is a not-for-profit arts organization, that supports and provides a platform for new media art.-History:Artist and curator Mark Tribe founded Rhizome as a small email list in 1996 while living in Berlin. By August, Rhizome had launched its website, which by 1998 had developed a significant...

, the Venice Biennale

Venice Biennale

The Venice Biennale is a major contemporary art exhibition that takes place once every two years in Venice, Italy. The Venice Film Festival is part of it. So too is the Venice Biennale of Architecture, which is held in even years...

. and the 2010 01SJ Biennial

01SJ Biennial

The 01SJ Biennial is a multi-disciplinary, multi-venue event of visual and performing arts, the moving image, public art, and interactive digital media held biannually in San Jose, California, curated by ZER01's artistic director Steve Dietz.-History:...

 in San Jose, California.

vvebcam (2007), one of her early works, relates to the activity of looking at a video online. Instead of being a simple consumer of YouTube

YouTube

YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....

, Cortright films herself while weaving into her video animations that both interrupt the experience of watching and question the entire physical process of sitting on front of a monitor. She refers to the physical nature of the computing experience in her blog piece, slecht-lands.

In 2011 she collaborated with Ilia Ovechkin to create Video Catalog, a work where the monetary value of her videos is determined by an algorithm based on YouTube

YouTube

YouTube is a video-sharing website, created by three former PayPal employees in February 2005, on which users can upload, view and share videos....

views.

Further reading

Sterling, Bruce (February 2, 2010) "Petra Cortright is an Internet artist born in 1986 in Santa Barbara, California." Beyond the beyond, Wired Magazine. http://www.wired.com/beyond_the_beyond/2010/02/petra-cortright-is-an-internet-artist-born-in-1986-in-santa-barbara-california/

Capps, Kriston (January 20, 2009) "New-media artist Petra Cortright explores digital artwork in Dallas exhibit" Dallas Morning News. http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/ent/stories/DN-cortright_0120gd.ART.State.Edition1.4e6cebf.html

McKay, Sally (2009) "The Affect of Animated GIFs (Tom Moody, Petra Cortright, Lorna Mills)" art&education papers. http://artandeducation.net/papers/view/14

Troudaire, Gregoire (August 27, 2008) "Petra-sans-effet" fluctuat.net http://www.fluctuat.net/blog/12750-Petra-sans-effet

DeNorch, Dan (August 25, 2008) "Young Curators, New Ideas" ARTCAL The Zine.http://zine.artcat.com/2008/08/young-curators-new-ideas.php

Johnson, Paddy (March 27, 2007) "Petra Cortright's Webcam Video" artfagcity http://www.artfagcity.com/2007/03/27/petra-cortrights-webcam-video/