Hybrid Forms symposium

w/ Joe Davis, Warren Neidich, Frank Theys

18 mei 2013

Symposium on overlaps and emergent practices within art, science, and culture

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Join us at noon on May 18th for a symposium on overlaps and emergent practices within art, science, and culture.

The work coming from ArtScience efforts is often difficult to define in the traditional frames of art, science, or technology. Perhaps such works can be considered as new formations. Each a sphere to its own, conquering existing discourses while at the same time defamiliarizing them. There are no doubt tensions here. Disruptive artwork, like disruptive science, has power to challenge status quos while also facing opposing pressures to be subsumed by them.

Are terms like cross-disciplinary and hybrid adequate? Or do they sidestep a more holistic perspective? One where it is not art. science. technology. crossing over, but all three and none of the above.

To present a platform for discussion around these topics, the graduating class proudly presents talks by two artists who we feel embody the slippery here, there, and not at all of hybrid forms: MIT's "mad scientist" artist in research Joe Davis and brain-mind-society artist Warren Neidich. The discussion will be moderated by technocultural researcher and documentary filmmaker Frank Theys.

Date: 18 May, 2013
Time: 12:00 - 15:00
Location: Korzo Theater (Club) - Prinsestraat 42, The Hague
Entry: Free

This event is a part of the larger ArtScience 2013 preview expo. For more information please visit the full event page here:
http://stichting.interfaculty.nl/spheres

Joe Davis

Joe Davis is an artist and Research Affiliate at Alexander Rich laboratory in the Department of Biology at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in Cambridge and Artist-Scientist in the laboratory of George Church at the Department of Genetics at Harvard Medical School in Boston. He received his B.A. in Creative Arts from the Mount Angel College, Oregon, USA. From 1981 to 1990 he was a Lecturer and Research Fellow at the MIT Center for Advanced Visual Studies, and from 1995 to 2008 a Research Associate at the McLuhan Program at the University of Toronto. His research covers areas that include optoacoustics, microscopy, molecular biology, microbiology, and bioinformatics for the production of genetic databases and new biological art forms. He helped to pioneer fields in art and molecular biology and carried out several widely recognized contributions to the Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) and also created works such as Earth Sphere, a landmark at Kendall Square, Cambridge installed in 1989.

Warren Neidich

Warren Neidich is a Berlin and Los Angeles based post-conceptual artist who explores the interfaces between culture, brain research and post-Fordist economic structures. Art before Philosophy not After. In his multi-disciplinary works Neidich disrupts through beautifully crafted thought experiments and artistic interventions the intimate and seamless relationship between brain, mind and world.

Recent awards include The Fulbright Specialist Program, Fine Arts Category, University of Cairo, 2013, The Murray and Vickie Pepper Distinguished Visiting Artist and Scholar Award, Pitzer College, 2012, The Fulbright Specialist Program Fellowship, Fine Arts Category, Faculty of Fine Arts – University Ss. Cyril and Methodius in Skopje, Macedonia, 2011 and the Vilem Flusser Theory Award, Transmediale, Berlin, 2010. Selected exhibitions include The Whitney Museum of Art, New York City, P.S.1, MOMA, Long Island City, Palais de Tokyo, Paris, Ludwig Museum, Koln, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles,California, Walker Art Museum, Minneapolis, Minnesota, and the MAK, Vienna. Recent publications include Cognitive Architecture: From Biopolitics to Noopolitics, 010 Publishers, Rotterdam, 2010 and The Psychopathologies of Cognitive Capitalism, Archive Press, 2013. His Belrin Works: The Noologist's Handbook and Other Art Experiments is forthcoming late 2013. He is currently Artist in Residence at The Townhouse Gallery, Cairo.

Frank Theys

Frank Theys is a filmmaker, writer and visual artist. He lives and works in Brussels and Amsterdam. His audiovisual work varies from interactive installations to documentary, experimental film and theater performance and has been acquired for the collections of a.o. the MOMA (New York), SMAK (Ghent), the Museum for the Moving Image (New York) and the Centre National de la Cinématographie Paris. His recent documentary series Technocalyps has generated many debates in the cultural world as well as the scientific and academic world and the broad Internet community; it was the central thematic piece in several art exhibitions and scientific congresses from Paris till Shanghai.

Frank Theys is considered one of the founders of Belgian media art. In 1989, Theys set up the arts centre Argos together with a few colleagues. It became an international renowned place for video art and new media. He was also cofounder of Dziga, Belgian union for media artists, of which he has been alternatively the chairman and secretary until 2007. He has taught at St-Lukas Film School (Brussels) and at DasArts, multidisciplinary Master's course in the Performing Arts at the Amsterdam School for the Arts (AHK). He has been a visiting teacher and lecturer at universities, film and art schools worldwide. He currently is a researcher at the KUL (Louvain, Belgium) and teaches at the ArtScience Interfaculty in Den Hague (The Netherlands) and at the LUCA Art Academy in Ghent (Belgium).

A special thanks to Joost Rekveld, Sebastian Frisch, Frank Theys, Caro Verbeek, Leonie Zweekhorst, Korzo Theater, Baltan Labs, and all of our sponsors for making this event possible.