Cyposium Lecture

For starters, Cyposium is a very creative and fascinating way of creating a cyber group meeting, presentation, or event. With this being my first time witnessing a lecture through the Internet, I was of course shocked and excited. Vicki Smith, the facilitator did a great job of organizing this lecture.

 

[Stephen A Schrum] ATHEMOO & Netseduction: Censorship & the Art of Sexting Before Cell Phones

First up was Stephen A. Schrum, an artist and educator at University of Pittsburgh at Greensburg and he specializes in the digital aspect of art. He presented his involvement in ATHEMOO and Netseduction. Like the cyber world, Second Life, ATHEMOO functions lively and allows very humane actions. It’s like living in another world, but the difference is Schrum incorporates more graphic and actual imagery rather than a representation that Second Life presents. With my prior experience with Second Life, I totally understood his push for actuality instead of a constant representation, text, or falsifying of certain activities in Second Life. He definitely gets my attention in his direction of ideas in art.

[Joseph Delappe] Headshot!: Performative Interventions in Mixed Realities

Next, was Joseph Delappe, a physical and digital artist as well as an educator at the University of Nevada Reno. He is also my professor in a digital media course (Art 345: Image & Sound) at the University of Nevada Reno. Some of his works done physically were the Vagina Mouse, Joystick resembling a penis, and a cardboard polygon sculpture of Gandhi ranging 17 feet which is the same height as Michelangelo’s historical sculpture, “David”.

  Each of these pieces was astonishing to the audience and generated lots of conversation, but not as much as his digital works called “Dead In Iraq” and the “Gandhi Walk” done physically on a tread mill and transferred into the cyber world, Second Life. “Dead In Iraq” stirred up a bit of controversy and some questioned his level of patriotism, which he mentioned in the lecture. The accomplishments and level of effort he put into each of the projects are amazing and I look forward to seeing more of it.

[Adriene Jenik] So Far, Yet So Close: Lessons From Telematic Improvisation

There was a quote she included in the beginning of her lecture: “ Technology is not just about computers and movement is not just about dancing bodies. Both are about communication across people in a rapidly advancing technological age in which the relations traversing bodies, art, image technologies, and the marketplace need to be continuously evaluated and changed if necessary” –Closer. That quote couldn’t have been assembled any better way and somewhat gave instruction to people who plan to head in the direction that involves mechanics, art, image, or technology. Some of the works she accomplished were the “Desktop Theater” and “Women In Black”.  She is interested in political issues as well as Delappe and she shows this in her piece “Women In Black” which she created as avatars in 2001. 

 
   In “Desktop Theater”, she created a space that one could walk through and was made in September 2001.  She works digitally rather than physically. She catches my attention with her works, but most of ideally. Towards the end her words “We’re always living in the future and the past at the same time”, stuck with me because we as artists do work to achieve what has already been done. She’s awesome!