Xenia Imagines is a proposed website telling a hyperfiction of a painter who allegedly paints xenia, an early form of Roman still life. The paintings, if they do exist may be part of an imaginary collection of paintings inspired by the descriptions of Philostratus. The painter is based in Northern Europe, based in a studio known to a few. Here he lives and near to the small painting space is a bed and a chair, here the painter would read, or dream of paintings he may one day paint. A series of Polaroid based images show images, objects, locations and a scant text, illustrate the painter and his life. The website use’s the hyperlink as a form of storytelling, with internal and external links. It does not have a linear narrative; each user/reader/performer creates their own hyperfiction unique to their choice of links. The website remains unrealised in that it resides locally on hard drives of some machines. It has not yet been networked on the World Wide Web. It reflects some aspects of the net.art, specifically Olia Lialina and her piece"My boyfriend came back from the war”. Whether it is net.art, net art or internet art is open to discussion.

Simon Chambers www.fstudios.org