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What am I talking about?

Those sometimes clever, often funny and occasionally beautiful animations you can find on the Net that are produced with Macromedia Flash.

Now, while I've gone on the record many times to state that Flash has been abused beyond belief (mainly by the pony-tail and laté brigade who work in the advertising industry), I have to admit that sometimes it works incredibly well.

The very best use of Flash is found, not when some idiot decides it might be clever to invent some ergonomically disastrous animated menu, but when it's boldly used simply to entertain.

Some of the funniest stuff on the Net is built using Flash and comes in the form of animated cartoons.

These occasionally feature in Aardvark's Lighten Up section each Friday and almost always produce quite a bit of positive feedback from readers.

There are some very clever people out there who seem to regularly use this medium to parody current events as in this case.

There was a raft of similar multi-media Flash cartoons around shortly after September 11, most featuring George W. Bush and Osama bin Laden.

Readers Say (updated irregularly) From Yesterday... What? You still buy... - Richard CD copy protection... - Robert The Record Industry... - Paul Have Your Say

These satirical animations may be funny but are they art?

Well I think they are, and since art is in the eye of the beholder, they must be.

Besides which, if Andy Warhol's soup can counts as art, then surely anything qualifies.

Of course I'm no art critic -- I can't even draw stick-figures with a white-board marker and until recently I thought Picasso was another type of pasta -- so I could be wrong.

However, just time has seen the comic book change from cheap pulp to a bona fide form of artistic expression, I believe these Flash animations are bound to take the same path.

This becomes even more likely when you look at how many of today's box-office movies are completely computer-rendered. I suspect it won't be too long before keen artists and producer/directors are able to create their own animated Net-based feature material designed to be viewed over the Net on regular home PCs.

I certainly hope that someone, somewhere is archiving these works of art so that they can be used to document our history, in much the same way that cartoons published in the newspapers of the day now provide important perspectives on the world during WW1 and WW2.

Given the current government's strong commitment to funding The Arts, I wonder what chance any budding hi-tech artist might have if they were to apply for a grant to create contemporary content like this?

Unfortunately, given that NZ On Air seems completely unwilling to consider streaming video or audio as a "broadcast medium", I suspect that the path to state-funded Flash animations may not be a smooth one.

I'd still like to see someone try though.

What do Aardvark's "Arty" readers think? Is Flash a legitimate tool for modern artists?

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