Art has a magical quality. Art feeds-off, grows and evolves out of other art.

The LP album cover is a great recent example of this. You make an LP containing the recorded art of musicians and then you insert the LP in a carton sleeve. Now you have a huge paper surface which you can use as a platform for displaying another piece of art.

What more, this piece of art is now central to the whole music experience recorded on the LP. This piece of art must capture the listeners visual attention and hopefully encourage a purchase. This piece of art must be memorable and imprint itself in the listener’s mind. Finally and magically, this piece of art must distill the essence of sound into a printed image.

Media in general follows this growing and evolving characteristic even quicker. Out of print came virtual, out of virtual came interactive, social. Paper now mixes with computer screen through scan-able advertisement, smart phone apps interact with your magazine. Your virtual can become your printed. You can mash-up text, images, video and sound to create other media.

For example, Wired’s article on Best Album Art of All Time, the article that inspired me to write this post. Wired is a print magazine, but it also has a web facet. The web allows for such rich mixes between image gallery and written article, such as the article above.

Actually, “article” is not the right word here, “piece” would be more correct. This piece can be viewed in any order, just by clicking on different images. Finally, all readers can augment the piece by leaving comments. This piece is an accomplishment of media art, best suited for the internet media.