A brief history of the GIF (so far)

Abstract

Footnotes

Jason Eppink serves as Associate Curator of Digital Media at Museum of the Moving Image in New York City where he focuses on video games, remix, interactive art, online communities, and (of course) animated GIFs. He has organized three exhibitions about animated GIFs: We Tripped El Hadji Diouf: The Story of a Photoshop Thread (2012), Under Construction (2012), and The Reaction GIF: Moving Image as Gesture (2014). Outside of the Museum, Eppink creates interventions that emphasize participation, mischief, surprise, wonder, transgression, free culture and anti-consumerism in public spaces on and offline, and they are all available online for free at . Eppink is a core member of art collective Flux Factory and a senior agent with prank group Improv Everywhere – he also plays the recurring character 40-Year-Old Goosey on The Chris Gethard Show.

References

Dulac

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For an excellent illustrated look at the particulars of the format, see: Flickinger

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Much credit is due to Olia Lialina for her tireless defense of the amateur web of the 1990s (and for likely inspiring the visual treatment of this history). See ‘A vernacular web’ (pp. 19-33) and ‘A vernacular web 2’ (pp. 58-69) - also available at Lialina’s website (art.teleportacia.org) - for essential examinations of the attitudes and aesthetics of what is now referred to as Web 1.0: Lialina

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27.

DiVito

(2012) cycloid. Available at mrdiv.tumblr.com/post/26634486527/cycloid (accessed 29 August 2014).

28.

Know Your Meme (2014) Nyan cat / pop tart cat. Available at: knowyourmeme.com/memes/nyan-cat-pop-tart-cat (accessed 29 August 2014).

29.

Community creator Dan Harmon intentionally directed moments for fans to turn into GIFs. Jeffery

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34.

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35.

Cinemagraphs™ (2011) Available at: cinemagraphs.com (accessed 29 August 2014).

36.

For one of Buzzfeed’s most notorious listicles, see: Johnson

(2013) The story of Egypt’s revolution in ‘Jurassic Park’ Gifs. In: BuzzFeed. Available at: www.buzzfeed.com/bennyjohnson/the-story-of-egypts-revolution-in-jurassic-park-gifs (accessed 29 August 2014).

37.

The author organized an exhibition about Reaction GIFs at Museum of the Moving Image with the help of nearly one hundred members of Reddit: Museum of the Moving Image (2014) The Reaction GIF: Moving Image as Gesture. Available at: www.movingimage.us/exhibitions/2014/03/12/detail/the-reaction-gif-moving-image-as-gesture/ (accessed 29 August 2014).