ebayaday is a month-long, curated exhibition on eBay designed to exploit, redefine or underscore eBay's potential as a site for the exchange of ideas, objects and commerce. Each of the 24 artists juried into the show received instructions for one specific day and time to post a listing in a 7-day online auction on eBay.com. Unlike the thousands of traditional art objects for sale on eBay at any given moment, the pieces in ebayaday incorporate the various methods and systems of eBay as elements in the work. Each aspect of the listing (item for sale, descriptive text and placement within chosen categories) is a part of the artwork. Keywords (used to search for items) and descriptions within listings may elaborate on physical characteristics of an item, but may also describe that item’s history or train potential buyers in how to operate, employ, love or neglect that which is for sale. For example, William Pope L. informs seekers of “art, lemons, blackness and fruit” that his particular lemon cannot be kept, even when bought. In addition, artists consider buyer/seller feedback, self-monitoring devices and other ways that the site generates and cultivates internet “community”. Ellen Harvey uses the listing to track and sell an artwork no longer in her possession. Her auction “Stolen Monster: legal title to painting by Ellen Harvey” calls for the sale or the return of her painting, stolen from a Chelsea gallery. Was the theft an act of longing for a desired object or a crime for financial gain? Is Harvey’s listing a poignant anecdote of loss or a clever way to profit from nothing?

site-specificity
With eBay.com as the site, ebayaday features a series of site-specific works. As a site, eBay has highly specialized categories, though their sheer number makes it tremendously inclusive. Browse the 34 categories, which include Baby, Musical Instruments and Real Estate, and you’ll discover Kevlar bullet-proof vests in Personal Security, a rare Akro Agate Moonie experimental marble in Classic Toys, or a Grave Groomers, LLC. franchise in Business and Industrial. Each category or subcategory provides a site-specific context without crossing physical barriers. Care to speak to veterans and military families (rather than your art friends)? Target any special group by listing your ideas, items or services under categories and keywords. No chance of installing the work at the Pentagon? eBay is a miniature model of the universe with encyclopedic opportunities for context.

The Institute for Infinitely Small Things, on display under Military & War and Law & Government, auctions off the definitions to words created during the Bush regime’s ‘War on Terror’. Annie Varnot positions her stunning constructions as a wildlife sanctuary among other plots of land in Real Estate. Dan Price joyfully describes the emergence of a rogue underarm hair with the delight and bewilderment of an explorer stumbling upon new frontiers. His placement of the listing in Science and Medical Collectibles indicates his confidence that like-minded medical and science enthusiasts will share his excitement.

democracy
Research by the Nielsen/Net ratings (March 2005) indicates that at least one third of all US internet users peruse eBay’s listings and that their bidding habits can be predicted; for example, more visitors flock to eBay on Sunday and Monday evenings. eBay’s access to a large section of the population offers an advantage in the artist’s utopian search for a democratic means of distribution and the breakdown of art/non-art distinctions.

While discovering an artist’s website is dependent upon links from other sites or chance encounters by those surfing the internet searching for artist authored content, eBay functions as a wide open territory of multiple audiences who are easily accessible. Every eBay browser who reads an ebayaday listing, whether he/she bids or not, sees part of the show.

The lineage of broadly distributed artists’ projects – artist books, zines, Fluxus interventions, correspondence art – finds a home through artistic involvement in the eBay marketplace. If each listing is seen as a separate “page”, linked together by a common seller or “author”, eBay can be reinterpreted for mass publication. If one Fluxus dilemma concerned how to reach the general public (viewers who were not artists or art professionals), then eBay offers great potential for artists to negotiate cultural meanings. If mail art undercuts a static commercial exhibition system by turning the postal route into an alternative gallery, then eBay introduces the auction as a temporary platform before the object’s actual journey. Better still, as more and more artists intervene in or subvert the language, structure and values of eBay, all listings will be implicated in a kind of persistence of vision — after exposure to an artist’s eBay posting, every other listing will be scrutinized as a type of emotional, financial or cultural communication.

individual and collective forays into commerce
This exhibition allows artists to position cultural production as a viable part of the exploding space of online marketplaces. Contemporary art practice and theory often take an interventionist approach, intentionally creating artworks that fit into or oppose the paradigm of a market. Since eBay’s conception, artists have used the online auction as a means of reaching a broad audience and responding critically to the marketplace. Artists have used eBay listings to sell or inventory all their belongings (Trong Gia Nguyen, John Freyer www.AllMyLifeForSale.com, and Michael Mandiberg www.mandiberg.com) or to question property and identity (Keith Obadike attempted to sell his “blackness” and Jeff Gates offered his socio-economic status, TV viewing habits and purchasing habits as marketing data to the highest bidder). So far, most subversive forays into the online market are discrete attempts by solitary artists, often publicized as individual actions, ignoring the larger system of bidders, browsers and managers at play.

the marketplace as destination
eBay is called the world’s marketplace, but humans who go to any market do more than just shop. They absorb the sights and smells, the gossip and political grandstanding, the street food and the chance encounters with neighbors or interesting strangers. There is the opportunity to see and be seen. eBay simulates some of these experiences. Frequent buyers, such as those who search exclusively for used car parts, learn about their hobby as they shop, and may even develop an online community of other interested hobbyists or add to their knowledge of automotive history. Artists in ebayaday have chosen to populate the eBay landscape with the diverse types of expression found in any marketplace. Yashas Shetty becomes a street-corner musician on eBay by creating one-of-a-kind pop songs for sale. Artist Carl Diehl’s kit describes the smells and adventures of an actual marketplace so that virtual shoppers can create fake memories about thrift shopping.

the aesthetics of eBay
Experienced buyers who quickly surf a category in eBay engage in a form of pattern recognition, noting the changes that have occurred since they last surfed. Buyers learn to quickly scan the flow of images, grammar and syntax presented by a particular seller. A buyer may be less likely to bid on an item with a blurry photograph or improper grammar, yet more likely to bid if they like a user’s slang or unusual photography. With garish clip art & borders, banal snapshots and economical or descriptive use of language, eBay becomes a site for expression and poetry. While William Pope L. joins a simple image and short text to create a poem/riddle, Nick Tobier’s long essay exploits the unlimited space allowed for auction descriptions. It is no surprise that artists are interested in pushing the possibilities of the eBay aesthetic, but it will be interesting to see how prospective buyers react to an interruption in the usual flow they experience in scanning the eBay landscape. ebayaday listings may create an annoyance en route to more streamlined information, or they may offer an unexpected opportunity to pause and reflect.

alternative transactions
While eBay primarily involves an exchange of money for goods, many people use the site specifically for the kinds of personal experiences it offers — communications between buyers and sellers, the thrill of seeking a particular item, the anticipation inherent in acquiring something remotely and waiting for it to arrive. Charles Fairbanks’ project relies on anticipation and surprise. His roll of photo film with latent images heralds the possibilities that come with receiving the undeveloped film, dropping it off to be processed, and waiting to see the results. The images may be interesting, but the thrill of waiting and the moment of revelation is the real draw. Other works involve gift giving or contests. For example, while Fairbanks’ work proposes a mystery, Josh Greene’s auction of an apology to professional basketball player Chris Webber promises an end to the drama of an ongoing curse.

limits
Marshall McLuhan wrote “Art is anything you can get away with.” In ebayaday, artists test the limits and edges of the eBay landscape. They add cultural breathing room or a carnival atmosphere to the online marketplace, not with a scheme to make some quick cash or get rid of a product, but by making a gesture, sharing an idea or carrying out a plan. Listings such as Abhishek Hazra’s “Bengali Manuscript of Marx and Engel's Communist Manifesto” slow down the flow of voracious deal seekers and create a moment of deliberation or resistance. Hazra and other artists push the inherent aesthetics of listings to the limit and challenge the idea that online auctions are primarily for the exchange of money for goods. We hope that these works will stimulate conversation and delight , challenge assumptions, and pave the way for future collective actions on eBay.