Lori Landay used these slides in a presentation on a panel at the art gallery Jack the Pelican Presents, in Brooklyn, NY, the actual world home of the mixed reality art project Brooklyn Is Watching, which also exists in the virtual world Second Life. The criteria for virtual art are used by Landay for evaluating and making virtual art. The presentation also summarizes some of her research on virtual subjectivity, part of her sabbatical project, 2008-09.

2. MY CRITERIA FOR CRITIQUING & MAKING VIRTUAL ART Is it . . . 1. VIRTUAL? 2. FORMALLY INTRIGUING? 3. SELF-REFLEXIVE? 4. IMMERSIVE? 5. INTERACTIVE?

3. VIRTUAL Tower of Light , DanCoyote Antonelli/DC Spensley BIW Year One 30 Best, KU Art

4. FORMALLY INTRIGUING Beacon , Oberon Onmura BIW Year One 30 Best, KU Art

5. SELF-REFLEXIVE Spiral & Attractive Object , Selavy Oh BIW Year One 30 Best, KU Art

6. IMMERSIVE Desert Places , L1Aura Loire Future of Virtual Subjectivity, or From the Gloom Meteor, Fiteiro Cultural, Casa Millagrosa

7. INTERACTIVE Irrecovably , Bryn Oh BIW Year One 30 Best, KU Art

8. WALTER BENJAMIN & AURA In "The Work of Art & the Age of Mechanical Reproduction,” (1936) Benjamin proclaims, "that which withers in the age of mechanical reproduction is the aura of the work of art.” He defines the aura of a natural object as "the unique phenomenon of a distance, however close it may be." In later writings, Benjamin continued to explore the idea of aura, explaining, “To experience the aura of a phenomenon we look at means to invest it with the ability to look back at us.”

9. After a year of studying virtual subjectivity in Second Life, I have come to the following conclusions: Over time, as we develop our relationship with our own avatar, we invest it with that ability to look back at us; we give it aura. Virtual art creates virtual aura.

10. Experiencing immersive & interactive virtual art is one of the ways we create virtual aura. Immersive Scale At Greenies

11. The paradox of closeness & distance in a virtual world creates new conditions for aura, for looking & looking back, for experience, subjectivity, identity, community, meaning, & art.