Understanding Audience Engagement in the Contemporary Arts

artists is often when the book is at its best, as readers can experience the processes that went into the development of different artistic works. The text is brought to a conclusion with an engaging piece by Chris Clarke who works as an art curator and explores the challenges he has faced in adapting spaces that are often focused on contemporary art forms to be able to properly showcase digital art. Clarke also challenges a misconception that online exhibitions remove artistic gatekeepers and argues that the online world may have ‘invisible’ (140) gatekeepers who are even more controlling. The book offers a deep dive practitioner-led exploration into digital art in Ireland that should prove an invaluable read to anyone interested in the genre and its major events since the turn of the century. Two issues which arise when reading this book though are firstly, that it sometimes feels too insular in presenting a field of study that is quite small and, secondly, that the book was written before the Covid-19 pandemic and, therefore, is not able to comment on the changing ways audiences are interacting with digital art. However, these issues do not necessarily detract from the overall purpose of the text. Contributors to the book themselves note that the field largely comprises of a small community of artist–researchers. In the book, contributors often discuss the work of other contributors and this overlap risks presenting an insular view of digital art in Ireland. However, considering this is a study of a small but growing artistic field, Digital Art in Ireland succeeds in covering the most significant events in Ireland’s digital art scene without leaving out much. Moreover, contributors approach the work from different angles and disagree with each other in certain instances. The fact this volume was written before the Covid-19 pandemic makes it feel slightly dated, as the ways in which audiences interact with art presented digitally are changing drastically as a result of the pandemic. Yet, there is something powerful in a text that captures a movement up to the point of significant change. This text can act as both a historical account of digital art in Ireland in pre-Covid times and a theoretical foundation for the work that now needs to be done to investigate audiences’ relationship with the digital in light of the pandemic.