Giverny of the Midwest: Nathaniel Stern @ GALLERY AOP in Johannesburg, South Africa
|
art and tech
Archives
Nathaniel Stern in London, Milwaukee, Stellenbosch and Montreal
|
Archives
MADE REAL: An exhibition by Scott Kildall and Nathaniel Stern, London
MADE REAL
Scott Kildall & Nathaniel Stern @ Furtherfield
Date: Friday 27 May – Saturday 25 June 2011
Venue: Furtherfield Gallery (formerly HTTP)
Links: http://www.wikipediaart.org
MADE REAL
an exhibition by Scott Kildall and Nathaniel Stern, the founders of Wikipedia Art.
Private View: Thursday 26 May 2011, 6.30-9pm
Unit A2, Arena Design Centre, 71 Ashfield Rd, London N4 1NY
Networks – social, political, physical and digital – are a defining feature of contemporary life, yet their forms and operations often go unseen and unnoticed. For this exhibition Scott Kildall and Nathaniel Stern, artists and co-founders of Wikipedia Art take these networks as their artistic materials and play-spaces to create artworks about love, power-play and a new social reality.
Three works are shown for the first time in the UK: Wikipedia Art, a collaborative work “made†of dialogue and social activity; Given Time, an Internet artwork that creates a feedback loop across virtual and actual space; and Playing Duchamp, a one-on-one meeting and game between an absent artist and viewer/participant.
Contact Alessandra Scapin ale[at]furtherfield[dot]org +44 (0) 2088022827
Free admission to exhibition and events
Wikipedia Art by Scott Kildall and Nathaniel Stern
‘if you claim something to be true and enough people agree with you, it becomes true.’ Steve Colbert on Wikiality
‘I now pronounce Wikipedia Art … It’s alive! Alive!’ Kildall and Stern
Scott Kildall and Nathaniel Stern famously used Wikipedia as an artistic platform, creating a collaborative project that explores and challenges our understanding of how knowledge is formed and disseminated. For over a year they planned the initiation of Wikipedia Art, a socially generated artwork that exploits a feedback loop in Wikipedia’s citation mechanism. Here, a “word war” across blogs, interviews and the mainstream press, which involved Wikipedians, artists, journalists, lawyers and even the Wikimedia Foundation itself, continuously defined and transformed a work of art in much the same way that these categories define the discourses of the everyday.
This is not Wikipedia, oil on canvas?, 2010, – Wikipedia Art Remix by Patrick Lichty
‘We ask our potential collaborators – online communities of bloggers, artists and instigators – to exploit the shortcomings of the Wiki through performance.’ Kildall and Stern
(Often unwitting) collaborators ‘performed’ the work through a debate about its aesthetic, conceptual and legal legitimacy in over 300 texts in over 15 languages on the Internet via blogs and forums such as Rhizome and Slashdot, and in the press including the Wall Street Journal and the Guardian UK.
This exhibition charts the inception, birth, life, death and resurrection of Wikipedia Art, which questions the authoritative role of Wikipedia, and reveals its fallibility whilst debating the control of access to and creation of knowledge.
Wikipedia Art featured in the Internet Pavilion of the Venice Biennale 2009. In 2011 it was an awarded finalist at the Transmediale festival in Berlin.
Also showing in this exhibition
Given Time by Nathaniel Stern
Furtherfield presents Stern’s polar projections of Second Life lovers. Second life is a 3D simulated and virtual world, inhabited daily by thousands of people around the globe. To access Second Life, you must embody an avatar (a virtual human representation of yourself), seeing what they see through a computer screen. Stern places us, and his lovers, in a feedback loop between virtual and actual space.
In Given Time, two life-sized and hand-drawn avatars simultaneously stare longingly across their virtual pond, and the real world gallery floor. They hover in mid-air, almost completely still, supported by the gentle sounds of their breath, the wind blowing, and birds in the far off distance. The viewer is both the observer and participant of this reciprocal relationship. Through the bodies and eyes of another, we see, look and are seen. Stern says: “Here, an intimate exchange between dual, virtual bodies is transformed into a public meditation on human relationships, bodily mortality, and time’s inevitable flow.”
Playing Duchamp by Scott Kildall
The American artist Scott Kildall, exhibiting for the first time in the UK, has fused the two worlds of art and chess in an homage to Marcel Duchamp, chess master and artist recognised for shifting the paradigm of conceptual art. Using the recorded matches of Duchamp’s 72 tournament games, Kildall has modified an open source chess engine to play chess as if it were Marcel Duchamp. By sitting down to this game of computer chess, visitors interact with the ghost of Marcel Duchamp, whose love for chess rivaled his attraction to art.
Furtherfield invites you to come and play because as Duchamp said: “The creative act is not performed by the artists aloneâ€.
Events
Going the distance for fine dining with global friends
To accompany this exhibition, in June, Furtherfield will be hosting two telematic dinner parties with the aim to create a co-presence dining experience with our remote friends mediated by digital technologies (network connections, projections, laptops and sonified objects). As food is the greatest mediator, we aspire to a satisfying remote connection through the frame of the dining experience.
Contact ale[at]furtherfield[dot]org for details on how to become a dinner guest.
About the Artists
Scott Kildall
Scott Kildall is cross-disciplinary artist working with video, installation, prints, sculpture and performance. He gathers material from the public realm to perform interventions into various concepts of space.
Scott has a Bachelor of Arts in Political Philosophy from Brown University and a Master of Fine Arts from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago through the Art & Technology Studies Department. He has exhibited his work internationally in galleries and museums and received fellowships, awards and residencies from organisations including the Kala Art Institute, The Banff Centre for the Arts, Turbulence.org and Eyebeam Art + Technology Center.
Scott is a founding member of Second Front — the first performance art group in Second Life. He is an artist-in-residence at Recology San Francisco. He currently resides in San Francisco.
More information: www.kildall.com
Nathaniel Stern
Nathaniel Stern (USA / South Africa) is an experimental installation and video artist, net.artist, printmaker and writer. He has produced and collaborated on projects ranging from interactive and immersive environments, mixed reality art and multimedia physical theatre performances, to digital and traditional printmaking, concrete sculpture and slam poetry.
Nathaniel has held solo exhibitions at the Johannesburg Art Gallery, Johnson Museum of Art, Museum of Wisconsin Art, University of the Witwatersrand, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, and several commercial and experimental galleries throughout the US, South Africa and Europe. His work has been shown at festivals, galleries and museums internationally, including the Venice Biennale, Sydney Museum of Contemporary Art, International Symposium for Electronic Art, Transmediale, South African National Gallery, International Print Center New York, Milwaukee Art Museum and more. He is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Art and Design at the University of Wisconsin – Milwaukee.
More information: http://nathanielstern.com
Download Wikipedia Art: Citation as Performative Act (Creative Commons licensed)
by Scott Kildall and Nathaniel Stern, to be included as a chapter in ’ Wikipedia: Critical Point of View. Eds. Geert Lovink and Nathaniel Tkacz. Amsterdam: Institute of Network Cultures (University of Amsterdam), 2011. Forthcoming. Print.
Furtherfield, Unit A2, Arena Design Centre, 71 Ashfield Rd, London N4 1NY, +44 (0) 2088022827
Free admission to exhibition and events -contact Alessandra Scapin ale[at]furtherfield[dot]org
Archives
Nathaniel Stern in Manhattan, Kansas – TODAY!
Digital Art Lecture, Nathaniel Stern, March 30, 4:30pm
Experimental installation/video and net artist, Nathaniel Stern Lecture, Wednesday, March 30, 4:30 pm in the Mark A. Chapman Gallery, Willard Hall, Kansas State University
Nathaniel Stern, Stuttering, interactive installation, size variable, 2003 / 2009
MANHATTAN —Kansas State University Department of Art will present a lecture by internationally recognized experimental installation and video artist, net.artist, printmaker and writer Nathaniel Stern, March 30, 4:30 pm in the Mark A. Chapman Gallery, Department of Art, Willard Hall on Kansas State University campus.
Admission is free and open to the public.
Archives
Nathaniel Stern in Minnesota, Berlin and New York
|
Archives
Tops of 2010: A Different Kind of Year in Review
Merry Christmakkah! Happy new year!
I skipped a year, so it’s been 2 since I posted my surprisingly popular Tops of 2008: A Different Kind of Year in Review. Here, I go with four different Top 5 lists: The Top 5 people I newly met in 2010, The Top 5 people I’d like to meet because of what they did (or the work I saw from them) in 2010, The Top 5 exhibitions for me (what I found most enjoyable), and The Top 5 shows I wish I had seen, but didn’t. Hope you like it! Feel free to comment, leaving any things/people I missed but might (or should have) enjoy(ed)!
The Top 5 people I newly met in 2010:
- Erin Manning + Brian Massumi. I know, although partnered, these are two very different people, and it’s probably wrong of me to put them together under one heading. But I met them together, have only seen them together, and it’s kind of fun, given that Brian has been an academic crush of mine for many years (one of the “like to meets” of 2008) and Erin is a new discovery who I am utterly enamored with. Both brilliant thinkers, both extremely generous spirits, both creative and funny and easy to hang with. I know I’ll be reading and citing and dialog-ing with them professionally for some time to come, and I hope our meeting is a long-time friendship in the making.
Mary Louise Schumacher at the Journal Sentinel. Mary Louise is part of a dying breed – a full-time arts critic at a daily newspaper. Not content to merely cover art in Milwaukee and its surrounds, Schumacher has gone to great efforts to put together a team of writers, both paid and volunteer, who engage with the community through her blog and regular print column. Like all good arts community-builders, she sees critics, artists, academics, gallerists and appreciators (extant or potential) as playing for the same team; but her courage and integrity in trying make shit happen with that? Very rare. ML: I owe you one martini.- Norah Zuniga Shaw (@ OSU, and Synchronous Objects, the project I met her through). A recipient of one of ISEA‘s commissions for 2010, Norah Zuniga Shaw is a brilliant artist and choreographer who studies, and asks us to re-examine, movement and stasis: in objects, ourselves, our surroundings, and more. If you’ll forgive the pun, her Synchronous Objects collaboration was very, um, moving. Also? Both she and her work are super fun.
- Richard Grusin. The new Director of the Center for 21st Century Studies at UW-Milwaukee, author of this classic book and this new one, and fun to have a beer with. Honest and opinionated, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Steven Sacks of Bitforms Gallery. A visionary in his approach to contemporary media art, the commercial gallery scene, and his blending of the two, several of my favorite artists working in digital domains show with Steven. Off the top of my head, I know he’s shown Yael Kanarek, Danny Rozin and Rafael Lozano-Hemmer this year, and currently has Daniel Canogar’s first NYC solo on exhibit.
Top 5 people I’d like to meet because of what they did (or the work I saw from them) in 2010:
- Kate Mondloch, author of the book, Screens: Viewing Media Installation Art published by University of Minnesota Press. I wrote a very positive review of this book for Rhizome.
- Joseph Delappe. Brilliant media artist with a long history of engaging with technology and the social practices it influences. One of very few contemporary practitioners I know of that can pull off conceptual mixed reality work that is both implicitly and explicitly political,, beautiful and smart. He will be moving to the “people I’ve met” list in 2012!
- Richard Noyce, curator and writer, author of Critical Mass: Printmaking Beyond the Edge. We’re hosting him here at UWM in the Spring, another one from my list(!)….
- Anna Münster, curator, artist, writer – finally got around to reading Materializing New Media, and was super impressed.
- Patricia Briggs. My newest guilty pleasure is urban fantasy, and my favorite character from the genre is definitely the were-coyote (sort of, Briggs calls her a “walker”) and mechanic, Mery Thompson (ha, Volkswagen mechanic named Mercedes!). Although it’s unlikely I’d meet the former, it’s impossible I’ll meet the latter (being fictional and all), so Patricia makes the list.
- BONUS PERSON: as of last night, December 10th, Bernie Sanders!
The Top 5 exhibitions for me (what I found most enjoyable):
- ISEA 2010! The 16th International Symposium on Electronic Art in the RUHR Region of Germany was probably the highlight of my year. Great art, conference, music, conversations, new friends, food, beer and more. I’m totally on board for future ISEAs now as well (see, for example, my name here).
- Theatrical Properties at Bitforms Gallery. Co-curated by Emily Bates and Laura Blereau, with brochure essay by Sarah Cook, this exhibition turned everyday objects into kinetic props for really interesting narratives. Totally loved it and the great brochure.
Claude Monet, Gagosian Gallery. His late work just blew me away. I wish the catalog didn’t cost three times as much as one of my students’ works. I wish I had seven of these (and now I don’t mean the catalogs).- Real Postcard Survey Project at the Portrait Society Gallery in Milwaukee. See what I wrote about it in the Journal Sentinel.
- Passing Between. Yes, I know, it’s cheeky to include my own show. But I’m not putting it forward because I want to convince you of its brilliance. Rather, I want to reiterate how much I love working with Gallery AOP in Johannesburg and with Jessica Meuninck-Ganger, my collaborator in Milwaukee, as well as the brilliant folks who helped us produce the catalog and work: Nicole Ridgway with her essay, Sean Kafer and his video documentary, Michael Spzakowski and his music, Jeff Ganger and his design, and of course my former studio assistants for all their help: Jesse Egan, Garrett Gharibeh and Bryan Cera.
The Top 5 shows I wish I had seen, but didn’t
- Colleen Alborough’s Balance at the Standard Bank Gallery in Johannesburg. A former student, good friend and great artist, Colleen’s show feels like it is both the culmination of years’ worth of work, as well as the beginning of a fantastic exploration of ideas and materials. Her work is smart, moving, and very well made.
- #class. I never publicly commented on this. Actually, I’m not sure I’ve spoken to anyone about it, a fave of Jerry Saltz and an ongoing project with #rank. On the one hand, I am very very fond of artists trying to make a community, and make sense of how we engage with museums, the gallery scene, the public, etc. On the other, I tend to shy away from art about the art world – I just don’t find much of it that interesting. Often, however, I do like the work of Jennifer Dalton and Bill Powhida (the people behind this project), so I withheld judgment until now. And I’m glad I did; in fact I sometimes wish I had tried to be involved myself – it’s a great project. I’ll say I’m especially fond of the collaborators’ reflections on their work, and find many of the interviews and blog posts with and by them to be curious and provocative, personal and intelligent, funny and entertaining, and full of gems that critically analyze not just the art scene, but all the roles played in it, including their own.
William Kentridge’s Nose. I had the privelege of seeing much of William’s design work in progress for the Nose in his studio in South Africa; I also consulted on a derivative piece from his last opera for him; and I even saw the launch of the Nose print suite at David Krut in Joburg. But I’m yet to see one of the Kentridge performances myself! I find William to be smart, generous and thoughtful, as both artist and person – and his prolific work is brilliant. He’s kind of my hero. And so it pisses me off that I’m yet to see either of his operas.- Art Basel Miami. The work of Jennifer Dalton and Bill Powhida, and some chats with my friend Heather Warren-Crow (among others), have lead me to believe that Art Basel Miami is kind of insane. Paradoxically wonderful and horrible, commercial and interventionist, low-brow party wrapped in high-brow culture, I’m not interested in intervening or even participating – I just wanna go one year, and get drunk a lot.
- David Wojnarowicz’s A Fire in My Belly. Not a show in itself, and not new, but a bit of recent controversy in the press has made the public again aware of what I hear is a stunning and heartbreaking work.
I’m sure I missed plenty, but that’s what I have off the top of my head. Enjoy the holiday season!