avad

La Esquina, 1000 West 25th St, www.urbancultureprject.org
Feb 1- March 22, 2008, Hours Thurs & Saturdays 12-5


Artists: Corrie Baldauf, Darlene Charneco, Brian Collier, Matt Dehaemers Andrea Flamini, Jorge Garcia, Adriane Herman, Mike Hill, Wopo Holup, Timothy Hutchings, Anne Lindberg, Justin Newhall, Garry Noland, Anne Pearce, Dana Sperry, VxPxC, James Woodfill, and Matt Wycoff.
Curator: Kate Hackman

exerpts from the pdf essays accompanying the exhibition:
"In 2008, we are in the midst of a mapping revolution. Thanks to the personal computer, the Internet, space satellites for data collection, and an expansive array of related technological tools, the scope of information available for mapping has exploded; we simply choose how we would like to select, filter, manipulate, magnify. Tracked by GPS, our physical locations and motions may be mapped in real time (never to be lost again), while at the same time we navigate through a vast virtual network, locating and relocating ourselves perpetually. Using Google Earth to view one's own neighborhood or childhood home; routinely linking Mapquest directions to e-mailed party invites, building networks of Myspace friends: we have become habitual mapmakers as well as blips on a vast array of other people's maps.

...With thick, slick, clear resin surfaces coating colorful, glittery, minutely detailed aerial maps of imaginary interlocking architectures and lawns, Darlene Charneco's sculptural paintings have a terrific physical presence. Yet her appealingly homespun approach is in fact significantly inspired by aspects of cyberspace, particularly its potential for empowering "social, interactive and collaboratively built spaces." Like aerial views, which provide an instant glimpse of patterns and connections not so easily discerned from the ground, so do virtual worlds collectively constructed through games like SimCity and Second Life reveal, more rapidly than in "real life" a vivid picture of societal tendencies and desires." Rather than overly discouraged by what these virtual worlds currently suggest, Charneco is "inspired by the thought that with the continued progress and eventual integration of mapping tools such as geographic information systems with computer gaming technologies, we just may be able to evolve the needed feedback to recover from what seems to be a dangerous myopia." Her work communicates this hopeful sense of a humanitarian re-mapping.

Charneco's Sitemap generates specifically from the concept of a memory palace: "a mentally constructed architecture or location which has been used since ancient times as a mnemonic device for the recollection of intentionally embedded information," she explains; and from that of a sitemap: "typically used in web-based information architecture to enable a more thorough exploration of a website's content by search engines." Seeing potential for merging the two types of structures, her Sitemap, with its interlocking parts, meandering passageways, and mushroom-like nodes projecting from various chambers functions as a sort of imagined prototypical structure for storing information to be later accessed/recalled..." and armature for a theoretically infinite number of different exercises."..

Photos from the show
Complete essays for parts 1 and 2 available in pdf form (16pages!), email me if you want em!:)

...and talk into the web.

"..In sensor networks the objective is to get many such devices to collaborate and monitor specific phenomena. Each device then becomes a node of the network. The challenge is to aggregate sensor nodes into computational infrastructures that are able to produce globally meaningful information from raw local data obtained by individual sensor nodes: understanding for example that spikes in local measurements may correspond to a moving pollution front, and tracking its evolution."

tasty lil article on The arrival of geosensor networks on ZDNet.

Let's think about the phenomena of the web, and picture ourselves as sensors...then think about things like livejournal and myspace...and now let's illustrate with some art.;):

So far I have nine of these smaller pieces, each a zoomed-in world from above with landing coordinates.
Same idea as the large tabletop pieces, but scaled down and collectible.;)These are 12" square with the circular mixed media 3D painting against white background. To be displayed on the wall.
At Scope I hope to display them in a square grid of 3 rows x 3.

Here we have 'Dorthvo Cottages 76,212'

Dorthvo Cottages offer the very latest in streamlined efficiency. Smarthouse technology and integrated datastorage put all you need at your fingertips in one virtual home. Whether you're sharing files, brainstorming with friends or creating a multi-media presentation, your Dorthvo cottage will keep you organized and prepared. Intuitive mnemonic devices, clickable bookshelves and filefolders, video and sound components. Move right in if you choose. Or keep shopping for the right virtual community.I've got more!.;)

( see more )

Oh Beautiful World, Sparkle World....Been spinning in artmaking and thought.I'm still not clear what I want to do with the screen layering- I've still got to experiment...because I'm NOT happy with how the screen is not 'integrated' with the piece and how the colors get lost, drab, darker when the black screen is placed over.....Might have to try spray-painting the screens in white or green first...something to keep pieces bright. I'm very specific about color these days. Obsessed with certain combinations like a specific pink with a specific green. latex/gloss/plastic....has to look almost toy-like, like a Barbie or Deery Lou wonderland.
I've been researching/reading up on suburban planning/ aka non-planning, artificiality....and cyberspace 'architectures' like the whole Sims phenomena (check out simgallery.net)and AlphaWorld activeworlds.com. Being pulled, can't seem to swallow enough information/images fast enough! Something is definitely trying to come out of me with regards to all this. I keep dreaming these oddly beautiful artworks, in perfect detail, and then when I wake it's so hard to remember all the details. frustrating.
anyhoo. Books I browsed through and wanted to eat at Borders and then inter-library loan ordered:
(1)Variations on a Theme Park:
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg/detail/-/0374523142/qid=1064759961/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_1/102-9734640-3946523?v=glance&s=books
(2)Home from Nowhere: amazon link
(3)The New Urbanism: amazon link
(4) Building Suburbia: amazon link
a lil mapping I made: