Darat al Funun launched its website in 1997 to be one of the first Arab Art hosts on the World Wide Web. Since then, the development of the internet as a space of communication has shifted significantly. The internet has evolved from an enigmatic, free, yet exclusive space to one marked by increased accessibility and regulation.
The impact of internet culture can be traced in various fields, from politics to philosophy, media theory, and art. While in the last decades online practices have affected all aspects of the non-digital world, the Covid-19 global pandemic reinforced the Online as an encompassing space not only affecting art and culture but also transforming everyday life interactions, rendering it radically dependent on the internet.
While amateur bloggers, musicians, and videomakers have used the internet to publish and distribute their work, contemporary artists employed online spaces for experimenting with various mediums such as email, audio, video, and websites to produce works that range from the technical to the conceptual.
Today, social media, online gaming, radio, and video streaming platforms are fixated as essential services. Hence, the Internet has become a container and subject of this multitude of cultural output. It is in this context that Darat al Funun Online is presented as a platform and space dedicated to exploring online curatorial, artistic, and publishing practices.
