[Won 25th Oscar Signorini Prize] Notified on December 11th 2008 that I won the 25th Oscar Signorini Prize (Fondazione D'Ars Oscar Signorini Onlus). Documentation of my work will be shown at Studio D'Ars Milan (Italy) from December 16 to 22, 2008. I will have a solo show in 2009 in Studio D'Ars Milan. Some information can be found at http://conceptlab.com/roachbot/v3-signorini/. A summary is as follows:
The XXV Oscar Signorini Prize, created in 1984 in memory of the D'Ars magazine founder to support young artists (under 35), in 2008 was devoted to robotic art, for the first time in Italy. In the past the Prize often disclosed the new art forms in my country: for instance, in 1998 it was dedicated to net art and in 2005 to bioart. But robotic art and its challenges have a unique relevance here because they stand at the roots of the D'Ars magazine, since among the magazine's founders there was Silvio Ceccato, who contributed to introduce the cybernetics in Italy and published some articles in this magazine's early issues (a memory of Ceccato and his education, written by Pino Parini who was one of his collaborators, is published in the D'Ars pages concerning the Prize). So robotic art almost naturally originates from a continuity between the past and the future.
[Wilson - Border Patrol] My work will be featured in a forthcoming book by Stephen Wilson: "Border Patrol: Artists Working at the Frontiers of Science and Technology" published by Thames and Hudson.
[Sci-Q] My work recently seen (Jan 2009) on Discovery Channel's "Sci-Q" show.
[Stephen Wilson Interview - Ethology of Art & Science Collaborations] I've uploaded Garnet Hertz interviews Stephen Wilson (09-30-2002), a 13.6M MP3 file. We discuss a number of issues related to interdisciplinary arts practice, including art & science collaborations, artists producing knowlege, and research ethics boards and contemporary art practice.
[Dorkbot SoCal 32]
Dorkbot Socal 32 is on November 1st 2008 at World Power Systems Headquarters. Tom Jennings is declaring that it's time for a regime change in his studio, so he's selling mountains of his equipment. This isn't just ordinary stuff, though. It's a hand-picked selection of some of the finest and most obscure technologies from the Cold War and the history of computing: nixie tubes, antique computing, wind-up tape machines, transistors older than you, gyroscopes, flip-dot displays, nixie assemblies, one-plane numeric displays, radiation detectors, new (in 1950) aluminum project cabinets, weird knobs, dials, switches, old (nice!) radios, ancient (working!) oscilloscopes, bubble [magnetic] memory, tiny cathode ray tubes, weird instrumentation. Most things will be one dollar. Bring some cash and come on out.
[Snelgrove - Sept 15th 2008] I will be in Saskatoon, Canada from September 9th through 16th 2008, and will be giving a lecture on Monday, September 15th 2008 from noon until 1pm at the University of Saskatchewan in the Department of Art & Art History in the Snelgrove Gallery (Room 191, Murray Building). This is the university I did my undergrad degree at, and the talk will be "From Farm to DIY Culture: This lecture will provide an overview of Hertz's work, tracing a line between the farmyard scrap pile of his childhood in Saskatchewan and his current work and research in art that engages with and questions technology." Here's a map. The talk is also listed as an event on Facebook.
[Moscow International Film Festival] My work was featured at the Media Forum program of the 2008 Moscow International Film Festival in
Moscow, Russia (June 25 2008) and at the National Centre For Contemporary Arts in
Kaliningrad, Russia (July 2008). The show was titled "Evolution Haute Couture: Art and Science in the Post-Biological Age" and was curated by Dmitry Bulatov.
[Dorkbot SoCal 29]
Dorkbot Socal 29 is on May 29th 2008 at Machine Project. Hear the gut-wrenching tale of four plucky men and a crappy car who made a foolish fantasy into a foolish reality! Earlier this year, Make: magazine agreed to sponsor Jason Torchinsky in fielding an entry into the 2008 24 Hours of Lemons motor race: an endurance race for cars valued at $500 or less. Jason gathered the best people in the field of enough free time and some interest in racing a shitbox: Tom Jennings, Brett Doar, and Sloan Fader. A 1993 Ford Escort LX was purchased for $300, and the work began. In the end, The Make:Way car came in 33rd out of nearly 90 entries-- a far better result than ever hoped for. Come see what the team did, how they did it, and see the 33rd-place-winning car itself!
[HASTAC II] I was at HASTAC II May 22-24 2008 at University of California Irvine and University of California Los Angeles - the event focused on exploring the multiple ways in which place, movement, borders, and identities are being renegotiated and remapped by new locative technologies. HASTAC is the Humanities, Arts, Science, and Technology Advanced Collaboratory and is committed to new forms of collaboration across communities and disciplines fostered by creative uses of technology.
To engender discussion among participants from different departments who might not otherwise interact.
To discuss issues involved in pursuing research that crosses disciplinary boundaries or does not fit exclusively into an established discipline.
To explore possibilities for connections or collaborations between participants from different disciplinary backgrounds.
[Pedagogical Fellowship @ UCI 2008/09] I've been awarded a Pedagogical Fellowship through UC Irvine. This will include training incoming teaching assistants at UCI, and also includes workshops on course design, pedagogy, mentoring, job talks, tenure, etc. For an overview, see this video by Shaun Longstreet.
[Video Games at Art, Culture & Technology] For the second academic year, I am teaching discussion sections of Video Games at Art, Culture & Technology at University of California Irvine with Peter Krapp, Bill Tomlinson and Dan Frost. Students: you can find my 2007-2008 lecture notes at http://conceptlab.com/uci/us12a/, http://conceptlab.com/uci/us12b/, and http://conceptlab.com/uci/us12c/
[Photostereosynthesis: New Project Proposal] I have a freshly minted research proposal online for a new photography-based imaging/hardware project, tentatively titled Photostereosynthesis. No robots or animals. It's whitewall-gallery-ish and displayed without electricity. Here's the one sentence blurb:
Research and development of a custom microprocessor-based digital camera focus controller in the style of Louis Lumiere's 1920s-era layered photographic technology, Photostereosynthesis.
[McKenzie Wark] As a follow-up to Galloway, McKenzie Wark gave a guest lecture in US12C on Thursday, April 10, 2008 from
11:00 AM - 12:20 PM. He discussed GAM3R 7H30RY and 1. can we explore games as allegories for the world we live in? and
2. can there be a critical theory of games?
[Alex Galloway] Alex Galloway gave a guest lecture in US12C on Thursday, April 3, 2008 from
11:00 AM - 12:20 PM. His talk was titled "The Game of War." RSG is currently working on a new project: a computer-based version of "The Game of War," a board game designed and fabricated in 1978 by the French Situationist Guy Debord. During this talk, he discussed details of Guy Debord's wife, Alice Becker-Ho, legally threatening him.
[Dorkbot SoCal 28 - 1pm Sat April 5, 2008 @ Machine - Seeley, Lotan & Edwards + Make Magazine] Guest hosted by Thomas Edwards, former Dorkbot Seattle overlord. Presenters were Damon Seeley,
Thomas Edwards and Gilad Lotan. There was also be a presentation by the Make Magazine race car team to solicit projects for their car. See details at the Dorkbot SoCal website or via Facebook.
[Dorkbot SoCal 27 - Make:Way Meet-The-Car Event] This event happened on Saturday, March 29, 2008 from
4:00 PM - 5:00 PM at Tom's place. Make:Way is Make Magazine's entry into the 2008 24 Hours of LeMons race -- an endurance race where each car must be $500 or less. The Make:Way team will be transforming a $300 1993 Ford Escort LX into a screaming brute of a racecar. Come on out, or get more info at the Dorkbot SoCal website or via Facebook.
[At the Trailing Edge of New Media] As an offshoot of my paper "At the
Trailing Edge of New Media:
Interdisciplinary Arts Practice & Institutionalization" for CAA2008, I've been starting to interview people in the media arts community. This is partially in response to Geert Lovink's "In Search of the Cool Obscure" and Dietz & Cook's "Formerly New Media" (which I participated in).
[Book launch - Quebec City Feb 5th, Montréal Feb 13th 2008] Some older work of mine is included in the book "L'Image ramifiée: Le Photographique du Web" edited by Élène Tremblay with
writings by Thierry Bardini, Vera Frenkel, Arthur & Marilouise Kroker, Joanne Lalonde and Valerie Lamontagne. "Une vingtaine d'artistes et six auteurs issus du domaine des arts visuels, des communications et des sciences humaines proposent une analyse de la place occupée par la photographie dans l'art Web." The press, Éditions J'ai VU is holding two book launch parties - and although I won't be there - some other interesting folks will be. Here are the specs:
À Québec, le mardi 5 février 2008 á 17h
au CAFÉ L'ABRAHAM-MARTIN DE MÈDUSE 595 Saint-Vallier Est
À Montréal, le mercredi 13 février 2008 á 18h
á la LIBRAIRIE OLIVIERI DU MUSÈE D'ART CONTEMPORAIN 185 Sainte-Catherine Ouest
[CAA2008 - Texas] I will be presenting a paper titled "At the
Trailing Edge of New Media:
Interdisciplinary Arts Practice & Institutionalization" at CAA2008, the College Art Association's 96th Annual Conference in Dallas - Fort Worth Texas in February. The panel is Electronic and Emergent Media Art and Their Relationship to Culture, Society, Identity, and Politics
Wednesday, February 20, 2:30 PM-5:00 PM,
Dallas Ballroom D1, 1st Floor, Adam's Mark Hotel. This panel will be chaired by Max Kazemzadeh and will include
Laura Richard Janku,
Paul Slocum,
David Nunez, and
Golan Levin. I will also be participating in the Leonardo education forum on Thursday, February 21 from 12-2.
2007
[Doctoral Push] As of Fall 2007, I am focusing energy on completing my doctoral dissertation. Notes can be seen at http://www.conceptlab.com/notes/, http://www.conceptlab.com/change/ and logistics of this academic quest can be seen at http://www.conceptlab.com/uci/phd/. In terms of timeline, I'm hoping to be completed by Summer 2009. As part of this, I am currently researching mechanical/analog games built in the late 1970s that emulated digital games in a future/backward "steampunk" way: the old school reinventing itself as "new school".
[Roachbot Continues on and on...] I am still somewhat busy this fall peddling my Cockroach Controlled Mobile Robot, including the machine being demo'd to a crew of Bruckheimer-ites (don't ask) and a number of interviews in the popular press (Discovery Channel, etc.) - two film shoots / interviews are scheduled for November 2007. Also, an interview I did in Eindhoven NL last year with a French crew is now airing as part of some Science Channel show.
[Dorkbot SoCal 26 - LA Geek Dinner Blind Date] This event was planned with Heather Vescent and Mark Allen on Tuesday, January 15, 2008 from
8:00 PM - 11:30 PM and at Machine Project. See the invitation here
[Dorkbot SoCal 25 - Saturday Dec 1st 2007] Dorkbot SoCal 25 - Bullock (HDR Photography), Hoetzlein (Intelligent Things), Hertz Sr. (Supermileage Vehicles) - Machine Project, December 1st 2007, 1pm. For more info, see http://dorkbot.org/dorkbotsocal/
[Dorkbot SoCal 24 - Mister Jalopy - Oct 13th 2007] After a long summer slumber, Dorkbot SoCal is back on October 13th 2007 at 5pm with a special studio visit/event with Mister Jalopy of http://hooptyrides.blogspot.com/ and Make Magazine. This event took place at Mister Jalopy's secret studio hideout, and was limited to 30 people. There are several interesting guests coming out, including Douglas Repetto (founder of Dorkbot), Eliot Phillips (hackaday.com), Mark Frauenfelder (Boing Boing), and Coop (artist). As it turns out, the event was also covered by Wired and Boing Boing TV.
[UCSB Text Encoding Seminar - 19-21 Sept 2007] I was sponsored to attend the Text Encoding Seminar & Workshop at UC Santa Barbara from September 19-21, 2007. This seminar was led by Julia Flanders and Syd Bauman, and was hosted by the UC Transliteracies Project and the UCSB Early Modern Center, with
funding from the National Endowment for the Humanities. Thanks to Alan Liu for the invite.
[CBC Interview - 29 Aug 2007] I did an interview with CBC for a new program on CBC Radio One, titled Search Engine on 29 Aug 2007. This interview aired nationally in Canada on Thursday September 20th 2007 at 11:30am.
[PhD Advancement to Candidacy - 13 June 2007] I successfully advanced to candidacy in the Visual Studies PhD Program at UCI on June 13th 2007.
[GSFIR Panel 11 May 2007] I presented at the third annual UCI Graduate Student Forum on Interdisciplinary Research on May 11th 2007: CalIT2 Room 3008 at 1:30 pm. My lecture slides/videos are online: Thoughts on Early Cinema, Economic Models & the Humiliation of Interdisciplinarity. The talk starts with "The main point to realise is that all knowledge presents itself within a conceptual framework adapted to account for previous experience and that any such frame may prove too narrow to comprehend new experiences." (Niels Bohr, 1958). The other people on the panel / roundtable included Samantha Lane, Amanda Williams, and Michelle Cho.
[What I am generally doing with my life until Summer 2007] This winter I am doing my PhD exams, teaching discussions at UCI for "Computer Games as Art, Culture, and Technology" (with Peter Krapp, Bill Tomlinson, and Dan Frost), organizing Dorkbot SoCal, and doing a few shows. I will be working on a new studio-based project in Summer 2007.
[Rotterdam in April] I was in Rotterdam (Netherlands) between April 6th to 11th for The Dutch Electronic Art Festival: DEAF07... It was a good show and got to meet some old friends and make some new. I also got done the installation a day ahead of schedule and had the chance to take a quick trip to Paris.
[Dorkbot SoCal 22 - March 10] Dorkbot SoCal 22 was at Machine Project on Saturday March 10th at 1pm, and was on the theme of 3D/stereo imaging. Some of these devices had been informally demo'd already at previous events: see the PS2 Stereo Movie Viewer or another view of the "Steampunk viewfinder". Ray Zone will be presenting - I recently saw a talk he gave at USC, and it was top-notch. Check the Dorkbot SoCal website for more info...
COMPLETE: Installing Experiments in Galvanism in San Luis Obispo (California) Jan 12-14th. Exhibition titled "Emergent Reaction" w Casey Reas, S Penny, Peter Cho. Show runs January 19th to February 17th 2007 at the UAG.
COMPLETE: Opening in San Luis Obispo Jan 19th, although I won't be there. The opening can be viewed indirectly through my project, though. Lots of people (300+) came to the opening.
COMPLETE: Gave a talk at University of California Digital Arts Research Network "Epicenter" event on Jan 26-27th at UC Riverside. My lecture is during the "Social Considerations" panel between 2:30 - 4:30PM on Friday Jan 26th in Screening Room #335, 3rd floor.
My talk was entitled Theories of Media Change and how this relates to media arts practice. My UCDARnet slides are available here.
TORONTO INSTALL: Going to Toronto from Sunday Jan 28th to Monday Jan 29th to install for a show at InterAccess.
MONTREAL LECTURE: I am giving a public lecture in Montreal at Concordia University on Wed Jan 31 at 7pm: 1515 Ste. Catherine, Concordia EV Building, 5th Floor, Room 615, Visual Arts side. The poster for the lecture is here. The talk is organized by Concordia's IMCA folks in conjunction with Hexagram, CIAM, CDA, and UC Irvine. Here's a Google Map of the same location .
Please join us for a special opening reception on Friday February 2, 8:00 pm at InterAccess Electronic Media Arts Centre, 9 Ossington Avenue. Artist talks will take place prior to the reception at 7:00 pm. Live demonstrations of "Cockroach Controlled Mobile Robot #3" will take place at the opening reception, as well as on Saturday, February 3 from 12:00 to 5:00 pm.
I will be in Toronto from Thursday Feb 1st to Monday Feb 5th.
[Dorkbot SoCal 21 - Feb 3] Dorkbot SoCal 21 was the much-anticipated "Dorkbake" event at Machine Project on Saturday Feb 3rd.
[Dorkbot SoCal 20 - Jan 6] Dorkbot SoCal 20 was at Machine Project on Saturday Jan 6th at 1pm... and was a triple event: Bob Blackstock from Laminar Sciences gave a "Streaming birefringence" demo, some Open Hack socialization happened, and the "Dorkbake" Contest was announced. The Dorkbake winner of the contest will win a prize and be in Make Magazine. Check http://www.dorkbot.org/dorkbotsocal/ for details. Some recent Dorkbot SoCal pics on Flickr give an idea of what went on.
2006
[Dorkbot SoCal 19 - Dec 2] Dorkbot SoCal 19 was at Machine Project on Saturday December 2nd at 5:30pm... it was a packed launch party for the new issue of MAKE Magazine, with guest presentations by
Simon Penny and Mr Jalopy. Mr Jalopy's talk was especially good.
["Theories of Media Change" slides online] I gave a public lecture on Tuesday November 7th 2006 at Calit2, and uploaded my slides: Theories of Media Change: Graphing Revolutions in Telecommunications & Information Technology. This presentation uses a positioning statement of the institute - the California Institute for Telecommunications & Information Technology - as a reference point to discuss general theories of media change. Exponential models of growth, like Moore's Law (1965), are explained and questioned. Gartner's Hype Cycle Theory (2005) is then proposed as a model for articulating unrealistic expectations of new media. Paul Duguid's Futurological Tropes (1996) of transparency and supercession are introduced within the context of hype, and Hype Cycles are problematized as being consumer-product-centric. Lastly, McLuhan's Tetrads (1989) are introduced as a model for the analysis of media research & development.
[Vida 9.0 Win] I won honorable mention at Vida 9.0. Here's the call for participation:
"VIDA 9.0 is the eighth edition of an international competition created to reward excellence in artistic creativity in the fields of Artificial Life and related disciplines. We are looking for artistic projects that address the interaction between "synthetic" and "organic" life, as well as innovative projects that further develop the field of Artificial Life. In previous years prizes have been awarded to projects that included autonomous robots, avatars, recursive chaotic algorithms, knowbots, cellular automata, computer viruses, virtual ecologies that evolve with user participation, and works that highlight the social side of Artificial Life."
[Technological Slowness] In an attempt to be funny in 2000, I had bought a few domains and posted some content to them: slowsoftware.com and slowporn.com. I let these domains expire a while ago, but recently put the work back online. I'm not sure why, though. Warning: these are only one-line jokes that were funnier within the context of Apple's "Think Different" campaign and dialup internet access.
[Dorkbot SoCal 17 - Oct 7] Dorkbot SoCal 17 happened on Saturday October 7th at 4pm at Machine Project. This event featured Suzanne Stefanac, Allison de Fren, and Greg Elliott. It was good. I think the best part was when Greg was bouncing up and down on his toes.
[Discovery Channel / Science Channel] I did an extensive video shoot with a Toronto crew from Discovery Channel on Tuesday Oct 3rd 2006. I've been through this routine a few times, and Doug Crosbie (producer) and Jay Kemp (camera) seemed to do a way-above-average job. This will air in Canada on Discovery Channel and in the US of A on the Science Channel. This video is viewable on YouTube.
[YouTube Madness] About half a year ago in April, Jonah did an interview with me for Gizmodo, and he uploaded a video of the roachbot to YouTube. At the time I didn't give it a lot of contemplation - I had just sort of thought that it would be a cheap place to host the clip. For whatever reason, the video - that was never really intended for a big audience - has sort of gone berzerk on YouTube since then with 1600 comments (mostly dumb) and 849,509 views as of Sept 11th 2006 (as of Oct 15th, it's at 100K more, hovering just under a million).
[Aug 12th Dorkbot SoCal - Make Magazine Issue 7 release party] Dorkbot SoCal 16 is scheduled to happen on Aug 12th 2006 (Saturday) at 8pm at Machine Project. This was a special event presented by Dorkbot SoCal & Machine Project: Make Magazine's Issue 7 Release Party. Jed Berk talked about autonomous flocking behaviour in robotic blimps, Make editor and internet superstar Mark Frauenfelder introduced the new issue and chatted about general makery, and Make Issue 7 (Back Yard Biology) was be there for you to peruse and purchase, which includes an article on making a home mushroom growing lab by our friend Phil Ross.
[Canadian Party - Not at Gordon Biersch]
"The Consulate General of Canada and Habitat New Media Lab are throwing
a party in honour of Canadian excellence at ZeroOne/ISEA. We're
looking forward to celebrating with all the Canadian artists, curators
and attendees!" Info: Wednesday, August 9th, 8pm - 10pm, at a NEW location - notGordon Biersch Brewery. Find out the location for yourself. I've already put in my diplomatic request for Pilsner Beer (by Molson) and Old Dutch Ketchup Chips.
Got an 2006-2007 Emulex Fellowship from Calit2 (My studio/lab space is behind the small square windows of the live Calit2 UCI webcam). Thanks!
Dorkbot SoCal 15 was on Sunday, July 2nd 2006 at 1pm at Machine Project. This was another successful and packed "open hack deconstruction" event, with the entire event consisting of people ripping apart (and indirectly learning about) discarded technology.
Presented to Paul Dourish's research group at UCI on June 1st 2006 about my new work related to Dead Media and how this relates to the dynamics of media change and theory/history of information technology.
Gave a demo to the president and faculty of Orange Coast College on 15 March 2006.
I gave a lecture at UCSD's Interdisciplinary Computing and the Arts 2006 Lecture Series on April 27th 2006 from 6 to 8pm. This lecture series is organized by Brett Stalbaum of C5. Other speakers in the series include
Sabine Himmelsbach, Anne-Marie Schleiner / Luis Hernandez,
Miller Puckette, Achim Mohnè,
Heather Raikes, Steve Durie,
Rachel Clarke, and Sheldon Brown.
Dorkbot SoCal 13 was on Saturday, May 6th 2006 at 1pm at Machine Project. This event was "Open Hack" format, with people bring something to completely dissasemble - which was a really successful event. Tom Jennings and others were there. Bradley Pitts was visiting from the Rijksakademie in Amsterdam, and gave a talk about several of his projects, including his spacesuit-based work.
Dorkbot SoCal 12
was on Saturday, April 1st 2006 at 1pm at Machine Project. The theme of the event was "Visualizing the Invisible", and featured presentatations by Mark Daggett, Naomi Spellman / Brandon Stow, and Michael Lew. Mark Daggett, most well-known (perhaps) as being part of the Radical Software Group that won a Golden Nica at Ars Electronica 2002, presented "Balance Bar" - a browser extension programmed to allow any user to editorialize any web page anywhere on the Internet. Naomi Spellman & Brandon Stow from 34 North 118 West showed "Interpretive Engine for Various Places on Earth", a system that uses outdoor wireless network connections to design a custom-built narrative specific to geographical location, including factors like weather conditions, the physical environment, nearby locales, and historic events. Michael Lew presented an April Fool's joke that included someone collapsing to the ground and flailing around in a siezure: he's a media artist and research engineer that primarily works on expanding cinema, and has a background in electrical engineering, artificial intelligence, performance and filmmaking.
I will be in the 2nd edition of the DVD
Art et biotechnologies by Louise Poissant and Ernestine Daubner (published by UQAM). Submitted documentation of the roachbot on 01 March 2006, but not sure when the DVD is coming out.
Dorkbot SoCal 11 happened on Saturday, March 4th 2006 at 1pm. The "Open Hack" event had several folks bring out an array of interesting projects: it was a great event. I also gave a "how to solder" workshop, although it was really a collaborative demo significantly contributed to by Tom Jennings.
Gave guest lecture/demo in Lisa Naugle's class at UCI on Feb 27 at 1:30pm.
Was interviewed by Georgina Born from University of Cambridge (UK) on 23 February 2006. She is doing a sociology-based research project on the intersections of art, science & technology.
Attended "New Media, Technology and Humanities" at UCI on Feb 17th 2006. Manovich and Huhtamo gave good talks, with Erkki's "topoi" an interesting concept worth exploring... (a post-event overview can be seen here)
Gave a guest lecture/demo in Beatriz da Costa's EECS129 class at UCI on Feb 13th 2006.
Real-world-simulacra is stranger than fiction: the roachbot was demo'd to an advisor of Arnold Schwarzenegger's at Calit2 on Feb 9th 2006.
I have a 3 year contract to have lab/studio space in the freshly-built Calit2 building at UCI starting Feb 2006. The Media Arts lab is a 3000 square foot facility, and at this point I think I'm the only person occupying the space on a permanent basis. Thank-you to Lisa Naugle, Albert Yee and the folks at Calit2 for their positive attitude and support. The building can be seen via webcam - my studio space has small square bunker-style windows and is on the 2nd floor. (Calit2 UCI Floorplan)
I did an informal interview with Three D World Magazine (AU) on 06 Feb 2006. This included some of my thoughts on Ray Kurzweil.
I have been awarded some funding to work on the Transliteracies Project. People involved with this project include a bunch of folks: Kevin C. Almeroth, Bruce Bimber, Sue-Ellen Case, Sharon Daniel, Mark Goble, Judith Green, N. Katherine Hayles, Tobias Höllerer, Yunte Huang, Peter Krapp, George Legrady, Alan Liu, Peter Lyman, Mark Meadow, John Mohr, Christopher Newfield, Robert Nideffer, Lisa Parks, Carol Braun Pasternack, Mark Poster, Rita Raley, Ronald E. Rice, Mark Rose, Warren Sack, James Tobias, Matthew Turk, Noah Wardrip-Fruin and William B. Warner.
Dorkbot SoCal 10 happened on Feb 4th 2006 (1pm) in a packed-completely-full Machine Project. The topic for the event was http://hardware.processing.org, with an introduction by Casey Reas. Two physical computing initiatives related to Processing were presented: Osman Khan showed the Arduino project and Sean Dockray presented the Wiring project. In addition, two recent Arduino/Wiring projects developed at UCLA were demonstrated. Thanks to the presenters for a great show and to everyone that came out.
I was interviewed on 93.9 FM (KZLA) in regards to Dorkbot SoCal on Friday, February 2nd 2006.
Dorkbot SoCal 09 happened on Jan 7th 2006, 1pm as an "Open Hack" Event in where a number of people brought projects to show, demo, and get feedback on... as well as get tidbits of technical help. Mark Allen, Tom Jennings and I acted as informal hosts. The meeting concluded with a presentation by Jonah Brucker-Cohen who was visiting from NYC/Dublin. Press about this event was in the Thursday February 2nd 2006 issue of the L.A. Times.
2005
Roachbot #3 appeared in a documentary on TV Tokyo on November 28th 2005. The crew - including director Ryo Nishida - came from Japan to shoot the robot in action on October 29th 2006.
I presented demos of Cockroach Controlled Mobile Robot #3 in conjunction with
the IEEE International
Conference on Sensors on Tuesday November 1st 2005. The IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers) conference was at UCI, with demos occuring at the California Institute for Telecommunications and Information Technology.
I participated in the BioTech Art Workshop from October 10th to 14th 2005 with Symbiotica at UC Irvine. The description is as follows: "Artistic Director Oron Catts and key scientific collaborator Gary Cass from the Faculty of Natural and Agricultural Sciences at the University of Western Australia will run a five day intensive workshop where the tools of modern biology are demonstrated through artistic engagement, which in turn gives voice to the broader philosophical and ethical exploration into the extent of human intervention with other living things. The practical components of the workshop include DNA extraction and fingerprinting, genetic engineering, selective breeding, plant and animal tissue culture and basic tissue engineering techniques.
" My photos of the Symbiotica BioTech Art Workshop can now be seen at http://www.conceptlab.com/photos/symbiotica2005/.
I installed "Experiments in Galvanism: Frog w/ Implanted Webserver" at Banff's Walter Phillips Gallery. The project is available at http://conceptlab.com/frog/ until October 23, 2005. The project is part of "The Art Formerly Known As New Media", curated by Sarah Cook and Steve Dietz, which opened at the Walter Phillips Gallery (WPG) September 17 (2pm). "The Art Formerly Known As New Media" is an exhibition on the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the Banff New Media Institute. The exhibition includes works by Shu Lea Cheang, Francesca da Rimini, Sara Diamond, Garnet Hertz, irational.org, Michael Naimark, Greg Niemeyer, radioqualia (Honor Harger / Adam Hyde), Catherine Richards, Marek Walczak / Martin Wattenberg, and Maciej Wisniewski. The show will be producing a major catalogue. I also give an artist talk at 1 p.m on Saturday, September 17th.
I am doing doctoral research in the Visual Studies program at UCI (starting Fall 2005). I've been digging through a number of different areas and have started making notes of this process at http://www.conceptlab.com/uci/phd/ - although this is likely out of date.
Press about the roachbot has spread through the OC Register, OC Weekly, Associated Press, MSNBC, Make
Magazine (twice), Wired, and The New York Times (with the article
reprinted in a dozen other papers).
I helped out a bit in this year's Siggraph CyberFashion
show: I did
some demos in conjunction with the show last year, and got to know (and
be friends with) Janet Hansen and Isa Gordon. At one point, they asked
me to model... but luckily they didn't need me. I
also ran into some folks during the conference: Eddie Shanken, Cheryl
L'Hirondelle, Steve Dietz, Jonah Brucker-Cohen, Katherine Moriwaki and
others.
I have discontinued using my yahoo.com and vividworks.com email
addresses: my new email is my firstnamelastname@gmail.com (actually with
my first name - garnet - and last name - hertz - together as one
word).
Cockroach-Controlled
Mobile Robot was shown at ArtBots
2005 from July 15-17, 2005 in Dublin, Ireland. The ArtBots curators
for 2005 are: Douglas Repetto (Columbia University Computer Music
Center), Michael John Gorman (Stanford/The Ark), and Marie Redmond
(Trinity College Computer Science). The show was one of the best
show-type experiences I've ever had, and my machine was lucky enough to
win a prize as the audience's favorite project.
I presented a paper titled
"The Animal-Machine: Biorobotics, War
and Animalized Technologies" in the conference "Defense: Models,
Strategies, Media" at UCI, sponsored by UCI's Visual Studies, Humanities
Center, and Critical Theory Institute (7-9 March 2005). The talk was
essentially a survey of biomimetic weapons in a critical/cultural
context. Speakers at the conference include Etienne Balibar (UCI),
Wendy Hui Kyung Chun (Brown), Beatriz da Costa (UCI), James Der Derian
(Brown), Garnet Hertz (UCI), Eva Horn (Frankfurt/Oder), Natalie
Jeremijenko (Yale/UCSD), Julian Klein (Berlin), Peter Krapp (UCI),
Trevor Paglen (Berkeley), Claus Pias (Essen), Mark Poster (UCI),
Laurence Rickels (UCSB), Philipp Sarasin (Zurich), Felicity Scott (UCI),
Jens Schroeter (Siegen), Jennifer Terry (UCI), Eugene Thacker (Georgia
Tech), and Brigitte Weingart (Cologne).
Watch for Cockroach-Controlled Mobile Robot in an upcoming video
segment by Associated Press and an
upcoming story in Fader Magazine
(March 2005 issue, perhaps). There might be something in the O'Reiley
Press "Make" book/magazine. A friend that was out of the country during the
Christmas 2004 break saw the AP piece while watching TV in his
parent's house... in China.
Details of my Masters coursework etc. at UCI can be viewed at http://www.conceptlab.com/uci/
- watch the slow motion blow-by-blow drama. I don't think it's a
standard MFA program: look at the link and decide. My thesis-related
work can be seen at http://turing.ace.uci.edu/~ghertz/
("Control and Communication in the Animal and the Machine")
I don't quite understand why I'm still getting a lot of
traffic. During 2004, this domain saw 3.72 million page views per
month: that's around 120,000/day. (If I'd make a tenth of a cent per
page view, I'd earn about $45K/yr.)
Guest artist presentation at UCSD
in Ben Benjamin's ICAM101 / VIS140
class on 19 May
2004.
2003
Living in California pursuing graduate research under the auspices
of the interdisciplinary Arts/Computation/Engineering Graduate Program
at the University of California Irvine, supervised by Simon Penny.
Supported by UCI, the Fulbright Scholar Program, the Saskatchewan Arts
Board, and a Research Fellowship at the California Institute for
Telecommunications and Information Technology.
Fly was featured on
Slashdot on 04 March 2003, which resulted in a record day in some
respects: 1,773,829 hits - 34,963,157,475 bytes - 78,892 visitors in 24
hours. This didn't break the previous record of 2,203,241 hits and
1,097,900 pageviews the last time my work was featured on Slashdot (15
Mar 15 2002). (View the
stats...)
2002
Participating in ArtSci2002, New York City 06-08 December 2002.
Within this conference, I will be acting as a mentor to consult with
other scientists/artists regarding interdisciplinary collaborations.
For more information about this event, visit http://www.asci.org/artsci2002/
or for more information about ASCI, visit http://www.asci.org.
Presenting "Ethology of Art and Science Collaborations: Research
Ethics Boards in
the Context of Contemporary Art Practice" at Crossing Over: Negotiating
Specialization in an Interdisciplinary Culture. University of Regina,
Canada. October 25 - 27, 2002. For more information about this
conference, visit http://uregina.ca/crossing_over/
Presented at the Bridges II Consortium, October 4 to 6, 2002.
Location: Banff, Canada. Bridges is an international consortium for
the study and exploration of interdisciplinary collaborative processes
in art, culture, science and technology. (More consortium information:
Bridges II
Website, with Chat
and Forum.)
I co-presented this with T. E. S. Dahms from the Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of Regina, Canada.
Developing embedded webservers on miniature surface-mount
microprocessors, and am using it as a tool
to look the physical nature of digital activity and interactions. This
includes the
implanting of these servers into small physical objects, and configuring
the servers to be
able to trigger physical movement/activity in the physical objects.
This work is based on code and schematics from Frederic White's
"World's Smallest Webserver" webACE project. For my video documentation of this process, see World's Smallest Server.
Formerly Artist In Residence at Soil Digital Media Suite (Regina,
Canada) for a sixteen month term until July 1st 2002. During this time,
a new project Experiments
in Galvanism: Neutral Ground Webcasts is being produced with the support of the Canada
Council for the Arts, the Saskatchewan Arts Board and Soil Digital Media
Suite. This project included live webcasts every week
(Saturdays, 1pm to 3pm CST [GMT-6]).
Project managing a collaborative 3D realtime environment project
for artistic collaboration, funded by CANARIE (Canada's Advanced
Internet Development Organization), utilizing high speed networking
(CA*Net 3).
OutRun [current]
This project attempts to combine the real world and OutRun, an arcade driving game released by Sega in 1986. This project features a cabinet/car that actually drives. The screen, which is in front of the driver, renders the real world as the 1986 video game.
This project un-simulation the driving component of a video game, and explores the parallax between the physical world and GPS navigation.
Last updated December 2008.
Photostereosynthesis [current]
Research and development of a custom digital camera controller to acquire dimensional data in the style of Louis Lumiere's 1920s-era layered photographic technology, photostereosynthesis. Currently features six sketches and five proposals . Last updated October 2008.
Cockroach-Controlled Mobile Robot (Control and Communication in the Animal
and the Machine) [2004 -
2006]
A mobile robot system literally controlled by the bodily movements and
intelligence of a giant madagascan hissing cockroach. Includes a
feedback "VR" system in which the insect is able to interpret and react
to the robot's surroundings. Version 1 premiered at Siggraph 2004, version 2 premiered at ArtBots 2005, and version 3 premiered at Ars Electronica 2005.
Experiments in Galvanism: Frog with
Implanted Webserver [2003 -
2004]
A bionic/golemic/galvanic frog with a miniature networked computer node
and custom electronics within its body. Installed as part of "The
Uncanny: Experiments in Cyborg Culture" (Grenville) and at DEAF2007. Funded by the
Canada Council for the Arts, the Saskatchewan Arts Board, and Soil
Digital Media Suite.
Posthuman System #1: Cockroach with
Wireless Video [2003]
Rethinking "the posthuman" through a Madagascan hissing cockroach equipped with a miniature wireless videocamera, microphone and 2.4GHz transmitter.
Experiments in Galvanism: Neutral Ground Webcasts [2002]
A series of ten webcasts consisting of electro/biological experiments in the spirit of Luigi Galvani's concept of animal electricity, circa 1780.
Taking galvanism as a starting point, web-controllable physical avatars were built using nitinol, small-scale web servers, custom electronics and preserved specimens.
(Documentation updated October 2008.)
World's Smallest Server [2002]
Video documentation of building a webserver about the size of a match head. Supported by Soil Digital Media Suite and Neutral Ground Gallery & Artist Run Centre.
(Documentation updated October 2008.)
Fly (http://139.142.46.159)
[2001]
Fly with implanted webserver, as exhibited at the Mendel Art Gallery
(Canada) from June 1 to September 3rd, 2001.
Coredump [2000]
Telerobotic markmaking machine project, with the primary goal of outputting raw physical gestures actuated by viewers on the net.
Slow Software
[1999]
A dotcom business model in which a company's sole product line
consists of slow-running, inconvenient, sloppy-source, bloated software.
This freestyle-programming project is accepts source code
and executable submissions to be
distributed under this brand.
The Simulator
[1997]
HTML-based work of a banal 'interactive' day. Featured as an 'Easter
Egg' at ask.com, and seen
globally in the press: Cool Site of The Day, Yahoo! Pick of The Week,
ProjectCool's cool site
of the day, Microsoft Network's Pick-of-the-Day, CNN Headline News ,
International Design
Magazine, SPIN Magazine, Yahoo! Japan Magazine, The Web Magazine, The
Washington Post, etc.
Desktop [1997]
Desktop user interface as visual object. These images were part of
'DESKTOP.IS' organized by
Alexei Shulgin, a collaborative internet project which has since been analyzed by writers as a key
work in the history
of the "net.art movement." Seen in The New York Times, Artforum and Rachel Greene (2004).
Cathedral
[1997]
Documentation of a collaborative CDROM project between Garnet Hertz and
Mike Misanchuk. QuickTime VR-based, interactive video-pieces, and
sketches of digital space. Programmed in mTropolis. Conceptual themes: body / digital /
architecture.
Interface
[1995 - 1996]
Documentation archive of telerobotic webmachine project. Includes
writings on 'Reality Interface', 'Technological Correctness' and
telerobotics. Documents include machine control interface, process
information, and images of the web-controlled robot system.
(Documentation updated October 2008.)
Big URL [1995]
Documentation of a gallery installation consisting of a 16-foot-wide
lightbox, and a webcam and speaker controlled by custom software.
Emporium [1995]
Documentation of a gallery installation consisting of several hundred
TV-based images. Subject : advertisements with 1-800 numbers;
Media : xerox.
(Documentation updated October 2008.)
Luminous Experiment
[1995]
Documentation of a site-specific installation: a basement excavation
[jackhammered basement floor],
with dirt, ambient groundwater, and powered television parts.
(Documentation updated October 2008.)
TV + Beans [1995]
Powered television parts used in conjunction with growing organisms
[mung beans].
Documentation includes photos, video clips of the installation, and
interviews with the experiment's 'Control Group'.
(Documentation updated October 2008.)
Surrogate
[1995]
Influenced by Nam June Paik's "The Moon is the Oldest Television" (1965-67) this timelapsed VHS video explores the modern attraction to TV as a primal human hunger for light.
Information
Superstation [1994]
Hypertext, initially done as a text/Lynx-based piece, and later adapted with images to Mosaic and Netscape. Uses a pseudo-classified-ad / personal homepage format, explores linking and mailto: tags. "The details of my life lay bare to you at your computer terminal."
Speed/Growth
[1994]
Fast-paced and highly distorted, this VHS video explores the medium of television as a communication format that is biased to be a better communicator of speed than the concept of growth. This video is influenced by McLuhan's "Understanding Media" (1964) and Jerry Mander's "Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television" (1977).
E.A.T. Information Booth
[1994]
This project was built to provide information on Experiments in Art and Technology (1967, NY) by building a small booth that was in the style of the work being produced by members of the group in the 1960s. A telephone-booth-sized room had one side lined with mirror on wall, ceiling and floor with small lights positioned to have the appearance of an endless vertical wall of lights.
Garnet Hertz - Teaching Documents [2008]
My fields of expertise include network art, digital imaging, computer based installation, electronics, robotics, visual studies, and the history and theory of new media. My teaching experience includes studio production courses, computer programming, digital imaging, 3D environments, writing & English composition, and history & theory of electronic art. I am currently looking for interesting academic positions starting Fall 2009. Teaching related materials are as follows:
US12C: Computer Games as Art, Culture & Technology [Spring 2007 & Spring 2008]
University of California Irvine
Role: TA (Discussion Sections) with Krapp, Tomlinson & Frost. Overview: First year interdisciplinary writing and production course investigating computer games as artistic, cultural, and technological phenomena. Course includes the development of a team-built game project with an extensive design document.
US12B: Computer Games as Art, Culture & Technology [Winter 2007 & Winter 2008]
University of California Irvine
Role: TA (Discussion Sections) with Krapp, Tomlinson & Frost. Overview: First year interdisciplinary writing and production course with lectures covering art practice, 3D worlds, software engineering, 3D animation and modeling, HCI, music & sound, and game politics. Course includes two essay assignments and development of a team-built game project in Second Life.
US12A: Computer Games as Art, Culture & Technology [Fall 2006 & Fall 2007 & Fall 2008]
University of California Irvine
Role: TA (Discussion Sections) with Krapp, Tomlinson & Frost. Overview: First year interdisciplinary writing and production course with lectures covering the history of computer games, game mods, machinima, interactivity, and character design. Course includes two essay assignments and a team-built game project developed in Java.
Dorkbot SoCal 11: How to Solder Workshop [2006]
Machine Project, Los Angeles
Role: Instructor. Overview: In keeping with a Dorkbot/DIY mindset, this informal workshop taught individuals the basics of soldering electronics. Co-taught with Tom Jennings.
Film 208: Introduction to Digital Media [Fall 2002]
Department of Media Production & Studies, University of Regina
Role: Adjunct Lecturer. Overview: Production course for senior film and media studies students, providing instruction in Photoshop, HTML, and digital video. Used Manovich's "Language of New Media" as a conceptual framework for studio assignments.
HTML Code: Learn to Build the Web the Old Fashioned Way [2002]
Soil Digital Media Suite, Neutral Ground Gallery, Regina
Role: Instructor. Overview: Two week workshop on the fundamentals of web development, focusing on HTML code.
Desktop Publishing Using Adobe Photoshop [2000]
Saskatchewan Institute of Applied Science and Technology, Kelsey Campus
Role: Instructor. Overview: Digital imaging course, focusing on Adobe Photoshop.
Introduction to Adobe Photoshop [1997]
The Photographer's Gallery
Role: Instructor. Overview: Two week digital imaging workshop, focusing on Adobe Photoshop.
Guest Lectures [2000 - present]
Concordia University,
University of California San Diego,
University of California Irvine,
California State University Long Beach,
University of Saskatchewan,
University of Regina.
