Artpack

An artpack (also called "pack" for short) is a periodic compilation of digital art - mostly ASCII -, ANSI - and pixel art , digital music and software art - that is created by the members of a digital artist group (also called "artgroup" in the language of the scene) were created in a certain period of time. Artpacks are usually published as compressed archive files in ZIP or other archive formats .

With the publication as an Artpack, the artists quite deliberately do not allow fast and therefore superficial viewing in the web browser . An artpack has to be downloaded, unpacked “ offline ” and often manually explored using a file manager . In this way, the works of art are placed in a context to each other and the viewer is more consciously included in this context.

Other forms of publishing digital art used by Artgroups are Diskmags and Music Disks , each of which has its own graphic interface in place of the file manager.

history

→ Main article : "History" in the article demo scene

Art groups usually see themselves as an association of digital artists for the purpose of non-commercial distribution of their art. Artgroups were founded in the 1980s and 1990s as subgroups ("subdivision" in the language of the scene) of cracker groups , but today they mainly work as independent demand groups.

Internationally known American art groups are ACiD Productions (since 1990) and iCE Advertisements (since 1991); a well-known German art group is Black Maiden (since 1985).