LookingOutwards-10 – Page 4 – [OLD FALL 2018] 15-104 • Introduction to Computing for Creative Practice

Caroline Sinders is a UI/UX designer based on the content of consent. One of her works that interested in me the most was her project on NightWitches because it was vastly different from her other projects. The project was a storytelling game on the IOS using Unity as the engine. I was really interested in this project due to the concept of putting her work into a game that is on the apple platform rather than just doing her usual work with 3d objects. It showed the depth of her experience and expertise in the field, and I admire how she was able to work on a 2d platform, like a game, and the amount of process and choices she made throughout.

Kai Zhang-Looking Outwards-10

Katherine Bennett

For this week’s looking outwards, I’m going to talk about an artist called Katherine Bennett. Katherine Bennett is a media artist. She utilizes sound and light to represent people, relationships and activities that happen in other spaces and times. She creates a delicate presence of these entities, mapping it over time and making it visceral. She utilizes programming and physical computing to create interactive and responsive multichannel installations and narratives. She earned her MFA from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago, in Art & Technology Studies. She has won several grants. Her work has been featured in many exhibitions nationally and internationally.

One of my favorite works of her is the Memory Capsules. Memory Capsules is a series where organic structures enshroud personal memories, protecting them from vanishing. Big P is a small felted structure that houses a small LCD screen, WiFi-enabled micro-controller, breathe sensor and LED’s along with custom software. When a puff of air breathes on the structure, a memory is stirred and appears on the screen. As our own breath sustains us, our memories sustain us and impact our identity.

This is a rather simple device, nor any of the codes are anyhow hard to generate. But I really appreciate the ideology of putting thought into how the most gentle interactive actions can be stimulating the most feelings. Memory Capsules seeks to nurture those memories by preserving them. As it’s said in the description: “technology’s role in our culture is called into question, as different algorithms curate and weave different narratives, while erasing others. These narratives may be erroneous. Is technology a “true” mirror? How much does it shape us with what we remember? ”

The narrative of this single object is woven by the nuances of the sensibilities we have and how the technology is informed in a much more reflective manner.

Memory Capsules

Memory Capsules: Big P (2015)
Felt, silk, breath sensor, LED’s, micro-controller, WiFi, LCD, custom software
5 x 5 x 4 inches

Katherine’s personal website: http://www.katherinebennett.net/index.html

Jenna Kim(Jeeyoon Kim)- Looking Outwards- 10

Of all the innovative women producing interesting works in the field of computational design and new media arts, Tina Frank’s works interested me the most. She is a graphic designer and a media artist who does most of the projects based on web design, cover design, music visualizations, and many more. Tria, and her background is in web design and cover design for electronic music in the 1990s. She is also a founder and a creative director for design office, and she is a heavily influential being because she creates amazing works to visualize music through using generative tools. She is currently a professor for graphic designer in AusOne of the most interesting project she did in the past is called the “A/V performance COH & Frank”. It is a musical performance by two designers who would program to create music and images live. The images were produced during the performance by utilizing the audio frequencies of the music and these went through Synchronator. After it has been put into Synchronator, it tells the computer to play a digital video that can be projected on to the wall. I admire this project because unlike any other musical performances which involve voice or instruments, this project is a performance by designers’ manipulation of the programs, music, and images.

Jenni Lee—Looking Outwards—10

For this week’s looking outwards, I chose the artist Roz Dimon. Roz Dimon is a digital artist based in New York city. She studied in Italy and moved to New York in the early 80’s to begin working and training in digital media. She has been invited to teach various pioneering courses in digital art at various art universities. She enjoys mixing fine art with corporate design and communications. The work I chose of hers is a digital art series titled “Guns” in which she creates abstract, digital illustrations of guns consisted of mark-making and calligraphy. She states that the symbol of guns have been reoccuring throghout her pieces, and that this motif examines gun violence in America. I was particularly drawn to this not only because of the elegant and engaging visuals of the digital art, but I also felt that this subject matter was very relevant to current events, especially in light of recent events in Pittsburgh.

View the rest of the “guns” series here here

Hannah Cai—Looking Outwards—10

Stranger Visions

I chose the project “Stranger Visions” by Heather Dewey-Hagborg. I was drawn to, and impressed by, the fact that she created her own software to generate digital “portraits” of strangers based on their DNA (which she collected by picking up random pieces of gum, hair, etc from streets). She started this controversial project in 2012 as a means to call attention to “the developing technology of forensic DNA phenotyping, the potential for a culture of biological surveillance, and the impulse towards genetic determinism.” These predictions came true two years later, when police and crime investigators started analyzing DNA as a part of trying to determine the culprits of crimes.

Heather received a PhD in Electronic Arts from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and in her bio states that she is “interested in art as research and critical practice,” which I find very interesting as a design student. Art is normally seen as very different from design; as purely aesthetic and usually meaningless (in terms of real-world application). Heather turns that notion on its head. I would call her a researcher and data visualizer, and not an artist; but I still find her practical approach to art interesting and admirable.

Alexandra Kaplan – Looking Outwards – 10

Picture of Yael Braha’s project “Google Made With Code”

For this week, I am focusing on the artist Yael Braha. She has a Bachelor’s degree in Graphic Design from the European Institute of Design in Rome, and a Master’s degree in Cinema from San Francisco State University. She currently works at the Moment Factory, a multimedia company focused on creating experiences as a multimedia director. A project of hers that stands out to me is called “Google Made With Code” which she made for Google to get girls interested in STEM and computer coding. It seems like that she made coding interesting and fun for the girls participating as an introduction to what coding can do. I think that this work is very important, as coding can seem scary to newcomers, so making it fun at the beginning can help make girls more confident and keep going with coding careers.

Looking Outwards 10 rrandell

https://www.behance.net/gallery/8137337/Reality-Reduction

link to the piece

https://www.behance.net/lornabarnshaw

link to her other work

Photo of work ^

For this looking outwards I decided to explore the work of Lorna Barnshaw. She uses Computer Animation in tandem with Fine Arts to make 3D computer sculptures and glitch art. I am particularly interested in her work called ‘Reality Reduction’ in which she sculpts forms on the computer and will lay an image over it. This work was made in 2013, and Barnshaw is still a working artist. The computer sculpture than moves and rotates, and with it, the overlaid image. The result is a very beautiful and captivating work. Ms. Barnshaw used softwares Maxon Cinema 4D, 123D catch, and the Apple iPhone to capture the overlaid image. There isn’t much widespread information about Lorna Barnshaw but her specifications primarily lie in 3D graphics and has worked on very many blockbuster movies like Star Wars: Rogue One, Assassin’s Creed, Ant-Man and Wasp, and many more.

Jessica Timczyk – Looking Outwards 10

Some of the man hole coverings included in Ingrid Burrington’s website and book about New York’s networks and infrastructures.

Ingrid Burrington is an author, activist, and hacker and has worked on many exhibitions, projects making maps, writing books and teaching at various schools including Cooper Union and the Rhode Island School of Design. She is from and still lives in New York City, and I unfortunately was unable to find where she went to school. One of her most interesting works, I have found, is her website and book Seeing Networks in New York City, that details New York’s network infrastructure. I found this project incredibly interesting because when in New York, normally a visitor is looking for and paying attention to all the sight-seeing and famous buildings and etc. that are there, but this project provides a map of city focusing on features that are commonly over looked. For example man hold covers, street markings and antennas. This project provides a different way to look at New York that I find incredibly interesting.

Mimi Jiao – Looking Outwards 10 – Section E

Claudia Hart, Inside the Flower Matrix, 2017

Claudia Hart is a new media artist who emerged as a part of the identity art movement. Her works center around observing identity, perception, and the physical being through the lens of technology. A work I particularly was interested in is virtual reality environment and sound installation Inside the Flower Matrix, 2017. This piece is a play on Alice in Wonderland in the digital age, where rationality and technology goes off-rail. There are multiple parts of this piece where viewers can experience it through a virtual reality app by pointing their camera at the artwork. In addition to the digital version, there are also hand thrown ceramics, quilts, wallpaper to accompany the experience. I am really impressed by the way that she has brought a digital environment into the real world and added instances of tangibility to further emphasize her idea. The way she has integrated items that the user can interact with and experience through touch and sound really drives her idea of the integration of technology with the human body. I really wish I could visit the real site installation of this piece – the online experience of this piece is nowhere as representative as it would be in the real space. It would be interesting to see her build a web and digital experience off of this piece.

Victoria Reiter – Looking Outwards – 10

Kristin Neidlinger Augmented Fashion Designer

This week I chose the augmented fashion designer Kristin Neidlinger as the focus for my Looking Outwards post. I thought that her work was really interesting, because it combines a lot of different sectors that may not seem like they relate to each other.

Kristin is no doubt a fashion designer, as you can see by the elegant design of her clothes, but she also makes use of code and scientific technology. This “Goosebump Poof” is embedded with biosensors that track mood through heart rate, excitement (GSR), and breath. Thus, Neidlinger also utilizes elements of the human body, itself a complex system albeit a natural when compared to computing and technology.

Furthermore, Neidlinger’s projects really contribute something to their wearers. This project allows people to intimately self-reflect, and be in touch with their own emotions, feelings, and memories, also something that may seem to be juxtaposed with technology. Another one of her projects is a corset that detects stress levels and constricts in order to relax its wearer.

What’s even more is that her projects are made out of recycled materials!

Full info on the project can be found here!

Category: LookingOutwards-10

Nina Yoo – Looking Outwards – 10