Kenneth Newby,
Martin Gotfrit, Aleksandra Dulic and Dinka Pignon, showed us One
River (running) and talked about their work with the Computational Poetics Research Group.
One River (running) is an interactive, immersive audio environment designed
to create both a visual and audio experience of rivers using a complex
system of moving sound, moving images, and a physical structure also
designed to echo the riveršs undulating geographic form. The artworkšs
images originate from digital photographs of peoplešs mouths whom the team
interviewed. These still images were then algorithmically programmed. The
mouths recognize the voices, and move as though they are speaking the words
they hear. The artists created a voice recognition software program to do
this synchronization. The video is listening and responding to the audio.
The piece was recently exhibited at the Surrey Art Gallery.
Kenneth Newby, Martin Gotfrit and Aleksandra Dulic are part of the
Computational Poetics Research Group, a research project that works at the
intersections of art, culture and computation and aims to articulate some of
the features of an emergent poetics of digital art performance while
developing a tool-set to enable artists working in the computational medium
to create, present and document their work. A key objective of their work
is to share the compositional process and the issues that arise in the work
of interdisciplinary computational media performance. Contemporary
computational techniques enable creative and performing artists to enter
into new collaborative relationships with encoded systems.
Kenneth Newby, BA, MFA (Simon Fraser University), is a media artist working
at the boundary conditions between embodied practice and responsive media.
Recent sound works include a commissioned web-audio work for AudioSpace at
Open Space; a composition for gamelan orchestra and chorus, Dreams He is a
Ball of Fire... Or a Butterfly, recently published as part of the New Nectar
CD of contemporary compositions for gamelan; and his commissioned work for
spoken word and sound design, Seasonal Round. A co-director of the
Computational Poetics Research Group, he is currently developing a series of
collaborative works combining live animation, performance documentary, and
music techniques for performance and installation. A co-founder of the New
Forms Media Society, Kenneth is currently on faculty at the School for
Interactive Art & Technology, Simon Fraser University, and the Integrated
Media Program, Emily Carr Institute, and has taught as visiting faculty in
several international fine and performing art universities.
Martin Gotfrit studied film and music at Concordia University and completed
a Masters degree in Communications at McGill. As a composer his work
includes electroacoustic and acoustic scores for feature and documentary
film, video, theatre, dance and the concert stage. As a sound designer he
has worked as a practitioner, consultant and teacher. Actively engaged in
computational art for many years, Gotfrit was one of the founders of the
federally funded Centre for Image and Sound Research (1988 - 1992). The
designer and curator of the Music Machines show (B.C. Science World, 1989),
he was also the facilitator of the "Computed Art" Summer Intensives at SFU
in the 1990s. He currently co-directs the SHHRC funded Computational Poetics
Research Group (with Kenneth Newby & Aleksandra Dulic). He has been on
faculty at the School for the Contemporary Arts, Simon Fraser University
since 1981 where he currently holds the position of Director.
Aleksandra Dulic studied visual arts and film animation at the University of
Arts in Belgrade. She completed her Master of Fine Arts at Simon Fraser
University in 1998 and has since traveled in Bali, Indonesia to study the
contemporary tradition of shadow play as a source for new media performance
and animation. She has created a variety of interactive installation works,
painting exhibits, produced documentary films and animations for television
broadcast and festivals across Europe and Canada, and has received a number
of awards for her short animated films. Aleksandra has taught computer art
and media performance as visiting faculty at the Fine Arts University in
Belgrade and National Academy of Arts in Surakarta, Central Java, Indonesia.
She is one of the founders of the NewForms Media Society and the New Forms
Festival. She is currently teaching and working towards her PhD in media
art at Simon Fraser University and is a part of the Computational Poetics
Research Group.
Dinka Pignon
Dinka Pignon is a senior interdisciplinary artist working in
installation and performance art that involves spatial video
projection, physical objects and sound. Characterized by a strong
affinity for the phenomenal, conceptual and liminal, her work is
situated in the area of 'mixed reality'. She has produced over 30
pieces that have been shown throughout Europe, in the U.S.A., Canada
and Asia. She studied computer science, linguistics, art theory, and
digital media art, in Yugoslavia, Hungary and Sweden. She has
participated in symposiums dealing with technology, science and art,
and worked for Ericsson Media Lab (Sweden) on developing a 3D
music-on-demand user interface with tools for describing music by
visual means. Her artistic practice has revolved around alternative art
groups and artist-run centres. Over the past 20 years, she has
coordinated and curated a number of art events, festivals, and
international art exchange programs in Sweden and in Canada. She
currently works for the Video In Media Arts Centre and the New Forms
Media Society, while continuing to pursue her practice as independent
artist.
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