An art movement for the computer age, couldn't be better introduced by anyone but Jorges Luis Borges. I met Borges on Sept 3 1983. I was walking down the Panepistimiou Street toward Omonoia Square and he was slowly - assisted by Maria Kodama- walking his way to the opposite direction, towards Syntagma. Our eyes and bodies met for just a second but that second was to last- as memory- for the rest of my life: one of my most precious and vivid memories of an encounter that could have happened, but never did..

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This book is not a Neen book. Alas, Neen is not what it looks like when you see it in pictures; neither can it be described by words. Risking appearing mystical, I would say that the whole of Neen is larger than the sum of its parts. That’s also because Neen started from the word itself—it was only a sound without sense when we bought it from the Lexicon Branding, it was just a feeling really, and later it met some of its expressions in the works and the activity of the people who are included in this volume.

Most of these works are animations and Web sites, but Neen can also be found in industrial design and fashion, in music and poetry, or in certain contemporary life coincidences such as looking at your watch and noticing that it’s 4:44 am. Even some people’s style can be Neen (such as: “This person is very Neen!”).

Last century’s concepts of cyberspace, contemporary art fashion, and style slipped together with us into our present and they are now the same they were before, but still a bit different. This universe is animated in a different way than the one before 2000 and Neen is definitely an element of this newly Animated World.

This book describes the first steps of Neen, how it all started with a presentation at the Gagosian Gallery in New York, how a group of foreigners who found themselves playing together with some native guys in Los Angeles discovered the first sides of Neen, and how these people and their friends began showing these findings by using art galleries and the museums around the world as temporary Neen hotels. Miltos Manetas, Milan, March 2006

Lexicon Branding Inc. was founded in 1982 and is based in Sausalito, California. Lexicon is responsible for creating memorable names such as PowerBook, Pentium, BlackBerry, OnStar, and Dasani. Lexicon is the patriarch of the nascent naming business. President David Placek worked his way up and out of advertising proper to found the company in 1982, gambling on the need for such a niche. Alex Frankel, “Name-o-rama,” Wired, no. 5.06, June 1997 We want to name something we don’t really know, but we know it exists. A new feeling. (instructions to Lexicon)

“Art movements are almost always named by critics or historians after the fact. But on a recent evening at the Gagosian Gallery on West 24th Street, Miltos Manetas, who creates computer paintings, staged ''Project: ?Word,'' a happening in the form of a news conference to introduce a term for today's contemporary art and style. ''Neen'' describes visual culture inspired by or based on computer technology, including fine art, Web design and video games, as well as by any number of things sleek, portable and plastic. ''No one knows exactly what it refers to,'' said Steven Pinker, a professor of psychology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology...” The New York Times

”A Vaio laptop presenting the new name: “Ladies and Gentlemen. May I have your attention please? The new name for contemporary art is ‘Neen.’ Shall I repeat? N-E-E-N. I hope that you like it. It is made by a computer program. Have a nice evening”

"above all works by Lucio Fontana"

Miltos knew that contemporary art was being banal and conformist these days, that there should be something new and exciting related more with digital and machine culture, but not as cold. So let’s name it and the rest will come. Mai Ueda, "Mai Ueda Times", newspaper sponsored by Celine, 2006

Miltos and I became partners and moved to Los Angeles where it’s easy to build a new culture and situation just like a simulation in a virtual world. We found a space in Chinatown on a street called Chung King Road. The space was called ElectronicOrphanage (E.O.) and the activity of it was a non-profit lounge, where cool people could come and brainstorm about new media theory or just have fun hanging around in a virtual world together with people who are on the other side of the real world. Mai Ueda, Mai Ueda Times, 2006

We thought about cute moments of Internet and technology as a part of lifestyle and as a possible new form of art. We created Neen situations on and off the Internet. We spent every day thinking what is Neen and what is not, who is Neen and who is not. More and more, intellectuals and smart lost souls joined our movement. Mai Ueda, Mai Ueda Times, 2006

You got paid $8 per hour to do nothing really, just look at computers and the Internet and play video games. You were free to do anything you wanted to, but if you created stuff that looked like contemporary art, or design, you would lose your job.

Between Neenstars, we exchange ideas according to our identities. For instance, if one of them makes a graphic that will suit my personality, it becomes my piece, or if I invent a domain name that will go with Angelo’s interactive piece, I would give it to him. It always has to be poetic and have a sharp point of view. Mai Ueda, Mai Ueda Times, 2006

This generation writes its own software code to create its own cultural systems, instead of using samples of commercial media. Lev Manovich, whitneybiennial.com/theories, 2002

After two years of E.O. activities in Los Angeles, I missed New York and went back there. New York was not Neen at all. Things have to have business outlets or academic explanations to survive. Neen does have those, but it is so avant-garde you have to be even more advanced to make immediate connections to it. After two years of fighting, suffering, and going to therapists, all the Neen went to Europe. Mai Ueda, Mai Ueda Times, 2006

when you fold up the seats and push back the columns, they form a projection wall in the back of the space, turning the storefront into a screen. Andreas Angelidakis, 2002

2001, worldplusplus-- mike calvert (eviandesktop), zhu zhiq (fight animation), john white c (steg) lev manovich (froze) ryan francesconi (performance) amy franceschini, siggraph nights, wipeout poster, amy alexander, valery grancher ("heart time / time heat"), biennale.net, steven schkolne, (meatpuppet) biennale.net (at deitch projects), leah singer, angelidakis/plessas ("last year")

2002, marmaras/rozendaal, steven schkolne, joel fox (magicrobot.org), whitneybiennial.com, maiueda (porn purntable), adam brody, mike calvert, nice disk (concert)

2003, angelo plessas (very upset with you), mai ueda (a "retrospective"), yi zhou, textfield magazine magazine (launch party, whitneybiennial.com (release of exhibition final version), carbonated jazz (performance), afterneen (presentation of the group show "afterneen" at casco, holland) Sept 2003: The EO in LA, becomes TELIC, curated by Christian Moeller. The electronicOrphanage is now a nomad.

2004, EO in Stockholm: Whitneybiennial.com 2004: The Celebration, EO in Paris: Mai Ueda: The Neen Songs, Angelo Plessas: Bananalinks Tree, Miltos Manetas: StupidForum.com

Miltos Manetas photographed in Los Angeles by Rafael Rozendaal

"They are professionals. They find names for whatever. They charge an average of $ I00.000 to $150,000, and they offer different names from which to choose and to purchase. "

INTERVIEW WITH MILTOS MANETAS BY OLIVIER ZAHM, from Purple, no. 11, Spring 2002

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To become a public persona not only using the available media but transforming oneself into media, which is more than being a popstar or a flaming sun. A NEENSTER is a pro­ducer, not a product. NEENSTERs do things not as a job and not even for creativity or self-expression.

INTERVIEW WITH MILTOS MANETAS BY OLIVIER ZAHM, from Purple, no. 11, Spring 2002

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"You mean that your paintings look better as JPEG pictures on the Net than they do in a living room in Paris's 16th arrondissement?"

INTERVIEW WITH MILTOS MANETAS BY OLIVIER ZAHM, from Purple, no. 11, Spring 2002

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Oneaftertheother.com, 2003

An artist after Videogames should not create anything himself but only extract the hidden notions of the game. He should do that, by examining carefully the parade of symbols the game is offering.

A Painter doesn't eat a piece of bread but paints it.

Artists after videogames don't play videogames but relate to them.

"Manifesto of Art After Videogames" by Miltos Manetas, 1997

Beautiful Losers next to the ElectronicOrphanage graffiti next to Internet Graffiti in Chung King Road

PEOPLE AROUND NEEN

ENGLISH-NETHERLANDS, & NETHERLANDS-ENGLISH. Neen was always present at MU's office!

Computing is to Neen as what fantasy was to Surrealism and freedom to Communism. It creates its context, but it can also be postponed. Neenstars buy the newest products and they study how to create momentum. They glorify machines, but they get easily bored with them. Sometimes they prefer just watching others operating them

A month before the opening at the Whitney Museum, I noticed that they had not registered the domain name, and so having nothing else to do, I decided to buy it and to do an exhibition online that would be more interesting than their exhibition. from an interview by Vito Campanelli with Miltos Manetas, boilermag.it

And now you’re doing this project with the U-Haul trucks and WhitneyBiennial.com. Why? Because the domain was available. It was the official show’s unconscious desire. I see all this as a commission by them. Like a Coca-Cola advertisement where they left a little window open: You can put your mark there. SALON.COM, THURSDAY, MAR 21, 2002 , John Glassie: "The man from Neen"

whitneybiennial.com is dedicated to the Italian artist Gino De Dominicis (1947–1998) other inspirations: Forgotten Silver, New Zealand, 1995 a documentary by Peter Jackson and Costa Botes and When We Were Kings, USA, 1996 a documentary on Muhammad Ali, directed by Leon Gast and Taylor Hackford

There was a lot of confusion and everyone was talking about the whitneybiennial.com instead of the official exhibition, and today the story has become some kind of urban legend. In other countries, the press referred to how the U-Haul trucks had circled the Museum, which is true in a certain sense because the U-Haul trucks of the whitneybiennial.com are invisible and omnipresent vehicles: you can see their Web sites everywhere. from an interview by Vito Campanelli with Miltos Manetas, boilermag.it, 2003 http://www.boilermag.it/article.php?sid=173 WHITNEYBIENNIAL.COM

And then, a miracle happened. A computerized Mercedes, driven by a drunken kid, collapsed at the space of Casco and destroyed everything. It was a cruel accident because one of the people who was working there was seriously injured, but it was also significant: a real crash between our World and the World of the computer screen.

Some of these buildings were inspired by Neen works such as Mai Ueda’s philosophyinthebedroom.com, Rafaël Rozendaal’s whywashesad.com, and Angelo Plessas oneaftertheother.com.

Other buildings like Blue Wave and Teleport Forest were inspired as a natural landscape for the Web, and others were just a psychological profile of the NEENSTAR, like Miltos Manetas’ tower or Nikola Tosic’s cave.

Other buildings like Blue Wave and Teleport Forest were inspired as a natural landscape for the Web, and others were just a psychological profile of the NEENSTAR, like Miltos Manetas’ tower or Nikola Tosic’s cave.

this show stayed open only for a minute, on April 4, 2004 at 4:44 pm, and closed just 60 seconds later.

this show stayed open only for a minute, on April 4, 2004 at 4:44 pm, and closed just 60 seconds later.

this show stayed open only for a minute, on April 4, 2004 at 4:44 pm, and closed just 60 seconds later.

this show stayed open only for a minute, on April 4, 2004 at 4:44 pm, and closed just 60 seconds later.

The exhibition was commissioned by Alexandre Pollazon.

The exhibition was commissioned by Alexandre Pollazon.

The simulation of the virtual world is questioning the meaning of reality. Are we real? Are we in real space? Is somebody moving us with the mouse? Screens, projectors, and computers are installed in different spots of Angelidakis’ architecture, and these display Neen pieces at random. Some of them are interactive and need the “user.” The computer and the laws of probability completely control the SuperNeen show, and nobody exactly knows when and what can be seen or done. Every single “real avatar” is exposed to all possible Neen accidents that can happen at any moment. You can stop it only if you “log out.” Nina Vagic

There are no gallerists, there are no artists, there are no curators, and there are no museums. There are people that play with these illusory things. It is not a system; it is a mess; it is like fog, a fog where things appear and then disappear. It is something almost metaphysical. Miltos Manetas, in Vito Campanelli, L’arte della Rete, l’arte in Rete. Il Neen, la rivoluzione estetica di Miltos Manetas. Aracne editrice, Rome, 2005

what in a Japanese garden may look like rocks and sand in a well-arranged composition is, for a better-trained intellect, black holes and chaos. The Web came from this chaos, in a certain way, directly out of the Trojan Horse, described in Homer’s Iliad. And now we are all again Ulysses lost in the ocean. Miltos Manetas, in Emma Reves (ed.), “Beyond Borders,” Another Magazine, no. 6, spring–summer 2004

You find a script, you test to see if you can start a fire. from an interview by Isabelle Arvers with Angelo Plessas, fluctuat.net, Paris, August 2002

There no longer exists real space and digital space. Right now, you are meeting me here, but at the same time, someone is clicking on my Web page and meeting the other Miltos Manetas. So what are we doing? We are not making art, we are making a new style, charming, beautiful, and intelligent, in order to dress our other body that is found on the Internet. Miltos Manetas, in Vito Campanelli, L’arte della Rete, l’arte in Rete. Il Neen, la rivoluzione estetica di Miltos Manetas. Aracne editrice, Rome, 2005

You can find some cool places to hang out on there and create a certain behavior as in real-life situations. It is very interesting to see how easily social relations are changing there, too. If you get the chance to play with famous online players, then it feels like being in a V.I.P. Hollywood party. These stars, as in every kind of society, have their ups and downs. The death of an online player in a role-playing game can be a bigger headline on Google News than, for example, if Tom Cruise is gay or not. I don’t know if these societies are better places, but we can surely give it a try.

Neen: as you understand from the name, it doesn’t mean anything that you know. So we have to create what it means from scratch. Mai Ueda, Mai Ueda Times, 2006

Rafaël Rozendaal, fataltotheflesh.com

I drew a big anti-copyright logo on my body in shining red paint and wore a red costume of my own. People cut away the dress. Once the dress was gone, I was naked, and the logo on my body was revealed. Mai Ueda, Mai Ueda Times, 2006

The essence has to be strong enough, so while you sing the “lalala” part people can meditate on the lyrics of the essence part and make their own fantasy while they hear the whole song. We can play with the same idea with existing songs. ” Mai Ueda, Mai Ueda Times, 2006

Neen is built on words as much as it is built on aesthetics: if something sounds nice, it has to be nice; therefore, it has to be done. Miltos Manetas

Computing is to Neen as what fantasy was to Surrealism and freedom to Communism. It creates its context, but it can also be postponed. Neenstars buy the newest products and they study how to create momentum. They glorify machines, but they get easily bored with them. Sometimes they prefer just watching others operating them

Like the old miracle of Jesus walking on water: if he came back today and he did it again, it would be a sort of “déjà vu,” “Jesus as usual.” Instead, if he started swimming, most people would refuse to believe that he is actually Jesus. Miltos Manetas, 2004

2. Use a projector to display the picture you want to paint on the canvas. If you know how to draw, do not make paintings: make Flash animations instead.

that machines came alive in 1967 and that "now they are in an angelic state." According to him, "advertising is communication between angels." Miltos Manetas, “Web Sites Is the Art of Our Times,” Distant Explosions, 2004

Neen like Janus contains the circle of time and life, therefore the future of art.

there are scenes on the Internet that nobody knows about and nobody cares about, and within those milieus, very specialized sensibilities are evolving. from an interview by Eric S. Elkins with William Gibson, ugo.com 2003