The Digital Signature

Art in the Age of the QR Code

Artists today now have the opportunity to add a fourth dimension to their work, one that can take you deeper inside the art through the use of the quick response code. The QR code is similar to the ubiquitous bar code. But there is one significant difference: any consumer smartphone with a camera can scan these codes and reveal a secret world. Scanning a QR code can trigger a video or link to a predetermined website, automatically place a phone call, or launch a text message.

Scan a QR code on that bag of Starbuck’s coffee and you’re off to Nicaragua, trekking through an organic and sustainable grove of coffee plants. Trying to decide which flowers to plant in the spring? Scan the QR code stickered on the pot, and bang! A video on the history, genus, and care of that rose bush in front of you comes to life.

But what does this have to do with art? Well, we’re beginning to explore that. Let’s start with the artist’s signature. It has been a longstanding tradition for artists to sign their work as a way to claim authorship. But that’s it. No other information or insight is provided. Now imagine that next to his signature Picasso placed a QR code. By scanning his digital signature Pablo appears gives you the context of Guernica. Or maybe a QR code on the Mona Lisa where Da Vinci settles the matter of her enigmatic smile. How about Henry Fox Talbot placing on his first photograph a QR code that explains the process that led to the birth of a new art medium?

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