CAM Raleigh Presents Born Digital January 28-April 30, 2012

CAM RALEIGH PRESENTS BORN DIGITAL A MAJOR EXHIBITION ON INTERACTIVE DIGITAL DESIGN AND NEW MEDIA TRENDS

On view January 28–April 30, 2012

Raleigh, December 2011— CAM Raleigh’s newest feature exhibition, Born Digital, invites visitors to physically explore digital culture and movement-driven artwork—to exercise their creativity and act on their curiosity. Opening January 28, 2012, the exhibition showcases the contemporary, visitor-dependent art of 12 national and international pioneers of digital and new media art.

Born Digital features 18 remarkably inventive artworks, including such seminal and pioneering works as Daniel Rozin’s Snow Mirror; Durham, North Carolina–born Jacob Ciocci’s largest work-to-date, Copy Cat; and Karolina Sobecka’s interactive artwork Sniff. “The twenty-first century is about artists suggesting new ways of experiencing. This exhibition implores visitors to look at action and reaction, at our physical relationships, as critical experience,” said Elysia Borowy-Reeder , exhibition curator and executive director of CAM Raleigh.

Most of the featured artworks in the exhibition employ computer vision technologies, more commonly known as interactive video. The combined use of digital video cameras and custom computer software allows each artwork to “see,” and respond to, bodies, colors, and/or motion in the space of the museum. The few works not using cameras in this fashion employ similar technologies towards the same end; they are reflections of our digital culture. Sniff is an interactive projection in the CAM Raleigh gallery windows. As visitors walk by the projection, their movements and gestures are tracked by a computer vision system. A computer-generated dog follows the visitors, dynamically responding to their gestures and changing its behavior accordingly. Daniel Rozin’s Snow Mirror, is a video software projection which slowly reveals our images in what looks like falling snow. Kate Shafer, gallery and exhibitions manager at CAM Raleigh, describes the piece as, “stepping into an electronic snow globe.” R. Luke DuBois’ most recent and large-scale series, A More Perfect Union, provides commentary about our online selves through maps. DuBois joined 21 different online dating sites and constructed a census of the United States based on an analysis of the profiles of 19 million single Americans; shown as a series of colored and relabeled maps, the work investigates the lexicon of American self-identity in the twenty-first century.

Making their United States premiere, Scenocosme, a collaboration between French artists Grégory Lasserre and Anaïs met den Ancxt, presents an interactive garden. Akousmaflore is a small garden composed of living musical plants, which respond to visitors’ gestures. Each plant replies in a different way to contact or warmth by producing a specific sound. The plant “language” or song occurs through touch and the close proximity of the visitor. The plants sing when the visitor is touching or stroking them lightly and a plant concert is created.

Working in the tradition of artist as mythmaker, Brent Green takes the story of the woman who sewed the spacesuit for Laika, the ill-fated dog launched into space in 1957 by the Soviets to test whether a living creature could survive space flight, for the beginning of his 10-minute animated film, which is housed in a modified phonograph. Green is high school educated, and lives and works in a barn in Cressona, Pennsylvania, a town of 1,600, where he grew up. As an aspiring writer-musician in his early 20s, he taught himself how to draw cartoons so that he could animate the images in his stories and songs, continuously inventing new ways to merge film, sculpture, and music.

Born Digital Featured Designers and Artists

Born Digital contributors include: Advanced Media Lab, Jacob Ciocci, R. Luke DuBois, Channel TWo, Brent Green, Ajay Kurian, LoVid, Cole Pierce, Dennis Rosenfeld, Daniel Rozin, Scenocosme, and Karolina Sobecka

Born Digital Featured Designers and Artists Bios

Advanced Media Lab

Collaborating designers, Lee Cherry, Pat Fitzgerald, David Gruber, and David Rieder from the Advanced Media Lab at the North Carolina State University, College of Design created and developed a new commission for Born Digital. Recent projects, and interactive installations include the opening of CAM Raleigh, the opening of the new North Carolina Museum of Art, Zoom Raleigh, The Consumer Culture Garden (with EAT at North Carolina Museum of Art, MINT and New Britain Museum of Art), 2005 GoMAP2.0, and ID:ENTITY SELF : PERCEPTION + REALITY at CAM Raleigh.

Jacob Ciocci

Jacob Ciocci is a founding member of the Paper Rad art collective and the performance group Extreme Animals. Ciocci ‘s work is concerned with the relationship between popular culture, popular technology, and popular beliefs. In his videos, installations and performances, the cultural symbols of our time, both the popular and the obscure, the contemporary and the recently forgotten confront one another and the viewer on a visceral, emotional, and experiential level. He has performed and exhibited at a variety of venues including the New Museum and MoMA in New York, Tate Britain, and more recently the TBA festival in Portland, Oregon and the Penrith National Gallery in Australia.

R. Luke DuBois

R. Luke DuBois is a composer, artist, and performer, and explores the temporal, verbal, and visual structures of cultural and personal ephemera. He holds a doctorate in music composition from Columbia University. An active visual and musical collaborator, DuBois is the co-author of Jitter, a software suite for the real-time manipulation of matrix data developed by San Francisco-based software company Cycling’74. He appears on nearly twenty-five albums both individually and as part of the avant-garde electronic group The Freight Elevator Quartet. He currently performs as part of Bioluminescence, a duo with vocalist Lesley Flanigan that explores the modality of the human voice, and in Fair Use, a trio with Zach Layton and Matthew Ostrowski, that looks at our accelerating culture through electronic performance and remixing of cinema. His artwork is represented by bitforms gallery in New York.

Channel TWo

Channel TWo is collaboration between Adam Trowbridge and Jessica Westbrook. Channel TWo explores the aesthetic possibilities that arise as communication breaks down. They invent incidents and simulations that occur slightly above the noise level, between words that organize our communities and the chaos that lies beyond them. Their work has been featured internationally and was recently awarded a 2010 Turbulence Commission.

Brent Green

Brent Green was born in 1978 and lives and works in Cressona, PA. Green is a self-taught artist and filmmaker whose critically applauded animated shorts have screened at Sundance for the last four consecutive years. Green writes, produces and performs intensely intimate and personal work. His work has received acclaim with screenings and performances at such venues as Museum of Modern Art, New York, The Hammer Museum, the Walker Art Center, The Wexner Center, and The Getty Museum of Art. Recent solo shows of Green’s work include Arizona State University Art Museum, the Berkeley Art Museum, Matrix Program, Andrew Edlin Gallery, New York, Site Santa Fe, Art Basel Miami Beach, and Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis Front Room. Recent performances of Gravity Was Everywhere Back Then have taken place at the Berkeley Art Museum, Berkeley, The Hammer Museum, The Kitchen, the Walker Art Center, and the Museum of Fine Arts. His work was awarded the Grand prize for best fiction feature at the 2011 L’Alternativa film festival in Barcelona, Spain.

Ajay Kurian

Ajay Kurian, born 1984 in Baltimore, has a BA in visual art and art history from Columbia University. He is an artist living in Brooklyn, NY and the founder of Gresham’s Ghost, a curatorial project that has found its home in various locations around New York City. Kurian recently organized a project at The Artist’s Institute, New York, entitled No More Presence and Robert Filliou. Last year he organized a show at White Flag Projects, St. Louis, entitled Which Witch is Which? and/or Summertime, accompanied by a trio of catalogues designed by Dexter Sinister. His work has been previously exhibited as part of group exhibitions at Rachel Uffner, Harris Lieberman and Gavin Brown enterprise, New York. He recently had his first solo show at Audio Visual Arts (AVA), New York.

LoVid

LoVid is an interdisciplinary artist duo composed of Tali and Kyle Lapidus. Their work includes live video installations, sculptures, digital prints, patchworks, media projects, performances, and video recordings. They combine many opposing elements in their work, contrasting hard electronics with soft patchworks, analog and digital, or handmade and machine produced objects. This multidirectional approach is also reflected in the content of their work: romantic and aggressive, wireless and wire-full. They are interested in the ways in which the human body and mind observe, process, and respond to both natural and technological environments, and in the preservation of data, signals, and memory.

Cole Pierce

Cole Pierce is a Chicago-based artist who makes paintings, video installations, and audio multiples. He earned his MFA in Art Theory & Practice from Northwestern in 2007 and has exhibited work internationally. Pierce recently exhibited a collection of new paintings at Hinge Gallery in Chicago, and had a video screening at Townhouse Gallery in Cairo, Egypt. He co-authors Field Mic, a sound art and music blog, contributes music mixes to Headphone Commute’s podcast series, and is a DJ at NUMBERS.FM, an Internet radio station.

Dennis Rosenfeld

Dennis Rosenfeld is a Canadian artist and technology specialist currently living in Los Angeles. His work spans a range of media including painting, sculpture, photography, video, electronics, and software. He holds a BA in philosophy and a BFA from Emily Carr University. He has been involved in a number of new media projects for galleries, institutions and festivals including recently co-produced new media experiences for the Surrey Art Gallery, Vancouver Art Gallery and 2010 Cultural Olympiad. Much of his work can be characterized by an interest in the social and cultural effects of technology, global mobility, and life in the 21st century.

Daniel Rozin

Daniel Rozin is an artist, educator and developer, working in the area of interactive digital art. As an interactive artist Rozin creates installations and sculptures that have the unique ability to change and respond to the presence and point of view of the viewer. In many cases the viewer becomes the contents of the piece and in others the viewer is invited to take an active role in the creation of the piece. Even though computers are often used in Rozin’s work, they are seldom visible. Born in Jerusalem and trained as an industrial designer, Rozin lives and works in New York and has been exhibited widely with solo exhibitions in the United States and internationally. His work has earned him numerous awards including Prix Ars Electronica, ID Design Review and the Chrysler Design Award.

Karolina Sobecka

Karolina Sobecka works with animation, design, interactivity, physical computing, computer games, and other media formats. Her work often explores cultural repercussions of scientific and technological advances, and the subjectivity of perception. Sobecka received her BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and her MFA from Calarts in Experimental Animation/Integrated Media. Sobecka’s work has been shown internationally, including at the Victoria & Albert Museum, MoMA, Beall Center for Art + Technology and ISEA. Sobecka’s art and design studio FlightPhase develops a variety of projects at the intersection of art, design, and technological innovation.

Scenocosme

French artists Grégory Lasserre and Anaïs met den Ancxt are two contemporary artists who work together as a duo with the name Scenocosme. They use interactive art, music and architecture in order to create evolutionary and interactive artwork. With multiple forms of expression, they invite the spectator to be in the center of musical or choreographic collective performances. They also explore invisible relationships with our environment. They can feel energetic variations of living beings, and they design interactive projects where spectators share sensory experiences.

Also On View at CAM Raleigh

Dara Friedman—Dancer

On view January 28 through April 30, 2012

Miami-based artist Dara Friedman documents a series of dances that took place on the streets of Miami, Florida during the spring of 2011. Unfolding predominantly in fluid tracking shots, the film captures 66 performers in 40 segments as they dance, during the day and at night, along the city’s sidewalks, in its parks and parking garages, street corners, bus benches, and occasionally on its beaches. Flamenco, ballet, modern, break, pole, belly, musical-theater and ballroom dancing are all robustly represented, as are skateboarding and voguing. Enmeshed with the performances is a soundtrack, which paces the film throughout its 25-minute running time. Dancer is the most recent film in an unofficial trilogy of new works by Friedman that focus on performance and public space.

Chris Bradley—Close One

On view February 24 through May 26, 2012

Predicated on common desires, like maximum leisure time and the thirst for travel, the exhibition Close One celebrates idiosyncrasies found in our average daily monotony. Included in the exhibition are spoofs and spin-offs of ordinary, blue-collar subjects that hint at potential fictional histories behind the work. What you encounter is a duality of play of reproductions where material specificity and trompe l’oeil painting put authenticity to question; and the byproduct of inebriated reverie and wishful thinking are front and center.

A recent School of the Art Institute of Chicago MFA graduate, Bradley balances humor with thoughtful composition in his playful installations and pairs unlikely elements with more common sculptural materials such as wood and steel. By arranging prosaic objects in uncommon ways, Bradley assigns them new importance and suggests new ways of relating to them. The use of disparate materials, such as discarded auto parts and cast bronze forms, Bradley creates a conversation amongst the work that diminishes conventional means of appraisal and embraces the material’s immediate effect. Busts made of broken saw blades sit atop plinths of shattered car windshields, while cast bronze junk food rest whimsically, waiting to be shot at as subjects of target practice. As you walk through Close One, be sure to stay out of the line of fire.

Upcoming Programs and Events January–April 2012

For more information about the below program and how to register please visit, www.camraleigh.org

Born Digital Exhibition Teacher Lounge Preview & Curator Tour
Thursday, January 26, 2012 | 4:00–5:30 p.m.
Triangle area K-12 educators are invited to a special preview the Born Digital exhibition to learn about upcoming programs at CAM Raleigh.

Born Digital Member-Only Preview Day
Friday, January 27, 2012 | 11:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
Be among the first to see the exhibition before it opens to the public. Free for Members.

Born Digital Founders and Leadership Circle Preview Reception
Friday, January 27, 2012 | 5:00 p.m.–7:00 p.m.
Join CAM Raleigh’s Leadership Circle to attend this special exhibition preview.

Born Digital Member Preview Reception
Friday, January 27, 2012 | 7:00 p.m.–9:00 p.m.
Become a CAM Raleigh member to attend this special exhibition preview.

Born Digital Curator Gallery Tours
Saturday, January 28, 2012 | 12:30 p.m.
Friday, April 20, 2012 | 7:00 p.m.
Join Curator and CAM Raleigh executive director Elysia Borowy-Reeder in a tour and informal discussion of Born Digital. Space is limited, please arrive a few minutes early. The tour is free with admission.

Emerging Artist Series Lectures & Receptions
ID:ENTITY Artists Gallery Talks
Friday January 20, 2012 and February 3, 2012 | 7:00 p.m.
Artists featured in ID:ENTITY Self: Perception + Reality will give an in-gallery talk and tour of their exhibition.

Chris Bradley—Close One
Opening Reception
Free with museum admission
Friday, February 24, 2012 | 5:00–7:00 p.m.

Youth Education Programs
Exhibition Related Workshops:
LOL GIFS Made IRL (Laugh Out Loud GIFS Made in Real Life)
Workshop with Born Digital artist Jacob Ciocci
Saturday, January 28, 2012 from 11:00 a.m.–3:00 p.m.
In this one-day workshop, students will work with Born Digital exhibiting and internationally renowned artist Jacob Ciocci to make animated gif portraits of themselves using both analog and digital technologies. $50, registration information available online, space is limited. Grades 9-12. Please email sarah_blackmon@camraleigh.ncsu.edu or call 919.513.8153 for more information.

Plug-n-Play
Video Game Graphics Workshop with the Advanced Media Lab
Saturday, February 4, 2012 | 1:00–4:00 p.m.
Workshop participants will create their own graphics in an interactive game, and then adjust how elements in the game behave. Students will get access to their finished game after the session. $30, registration information available at www.camraleigh.org, space is limited. Grades 8-12. Please email sarah_blackmon@camraleigh.ncsu.edu or call 919.513.8153 for more information.

Born Digital Middle School Student Docent Program
Public Tours: Saturday, January 28, 2012 (1:00 p.m.-3:00 p.m.); Friday, February 3, 2012 (6:00 p.m.-8:00 p.m.); Sunday, February 5 (1:00 p.m.–3:00 p.m.); Friday March 2 (6:00 p.m.–8:00 p.m.)
CAM Raleigh’s middle school docents attend a series of after-school sessions with a Museum Educator. When training is complete, these young docents use the same approach to engage museum visitors in a conversation about the work on view. Moore Square Museums Magnet Middle School and Exploris Middle School are the school partners in this program.

Open Studio Sessions for High School Students
Wednesdays: January 11, 2012; February 8, March 14, April 11 | 4:00–6:00 p.m.
CAM Raleigh hosts a monthly Open Studio session for local teens to bring in works in progress and receive feedback from their peers, NC State College of Design students, faculty and guest artists. This is a great opportunity for students serious about preparing portfolios for art and design college admissions. Space is limited. Open Studios are free, RSVP required. Students may RSVP by emailing their name and grade level to curator of education, Nicole Welch at nicole_welch@camraleigh.ncsu.edu.

Community Programs & Events
First Fridays
Fridays: January 6, 2012; February 3, March 2, April 6
Museum open- 11:00 a.m.–10:00 p.m. (special activities 6:00 p.m.–10:00 p.m.)
Drop by the CAM Raleigh classroom each First Friday for a new hands-on project inspired by the artists, designers, themes and materials featured in Born Digital. All First Friday activities are provided free with museum admission. Enjoy beverages, music from local DJs, special guest performances, and cutting-edge exhibitions. Enjoy beverages, music from local DJs, special guest performances, and cutting-edge exhibitions. All First Friday events are provided free with museum admission.

Third Friday After Hours Events
Fridays: January 20, 2012; February 17, March 16, April 20 | 6:00 p.m.–9:00 p.m.
Relax after a long workweek with a truly unique happy hour experience at CAM Raleigh. Enjoy beverages, music from local DJs, special guest performances, and cutting-edge exhibitions.
All Third Friday events are provided free with museum admission.

Family Sundays
CAM You Be Mine Family Sunday
Sunday, February 5, 2012 from 12:00 p.m.–3:00 p.m.
Featuring Valentine inspired hands-on projects, exhibition exploration activities, family-friendly tours of Born Digital and ID:ENTITY and other fun surprises. All Family Sunday activities are free with museum admission.

Spring Fling Family Sunday
Sunday, April 15, 2012 from 12:00–3:00 p.m.
Featuring a range of hands-on activities, exhibition exploration activities, family friendly tours of Born Digital and Chris Bradley—Close One exhibitions, and other fun surprises. All Family Sunday activities are free with museum admission.