Analog/Digital Curated by Samantha Mae Dorfman City Without Walls Gallery March 6 - April 16, 2003 EXTENDED THRU MAY 22nd ! City Without Walls One Gateway Center, Street Level Newark, NJ 07102-5311 Tel: (973) 622-1188 http://www.citywithoutwalls.com/ "Traditional" ideas of creating art combined with recent developments in technology make an interesting point of departure for this exhibition of visual art. Observe the counterpoint by the way current artists combine ideas, styles, media, content, and composition in their artmaking process. Please come to City Without Walls to see the work and guess which pieces are Analog and which are Digital. The viewer may be surprised and enchanted by how the artists are choosing to use digital technology, combining methods, or using "traditional" means to express their vision. Analog/Digital The past went that-a-way. When faced with a totally new situation, we tend always to attach ourselves to the objects, to the flavor of the most recent past. We look at the present through a rear-view mirror. We march backwards into the future. “The Medium is the Massage” Marshall McLuhan/Quentin Fiore 1967 If the show Analog/Digital was a game could the viewer guess which pieces were made using a computer and which were not? Visual artists will always explore new technologies to give themselves the advantage to convey what they see in reality or in their mind’s eye. Using advances from the invention of oil paint, perspective, photography, or inkjet printing, whichever technique most suits the visual creator’s sensibility will be pursued. The show Analog/Digital is divided into several curatorial groups based on media: 1.) Photography 2.) Painting 3.) Mixed-media 4.) Other Photography is the most widely used media in this show, especially as a intersection for digital and non-digital process for creating works of art. Interspersed in this collection of art are pieces created entirely by “traditional” media such as painting, collage, or photography as in works by Robin Ross, Jose Camancho, Carol Rosen, and Gary Petersen. These works are meant as counterpoints to provide reference to artists who express similar compositional techniques using digital means. Ideas such as abstraction, collage, and “found” objects are frequently incorporated into photography and digitally produced works. Some artists prefer to diminish the look of the digital medium by altering the “feel” of the piece to create a more “artistic or fine art” effect in their choice of paper, camera, or computer-based manipulation as in Art Paxton, Jay Seldin, and Liz Demaree’s work. Should it be obvious that the work of art was created on a computer or blend into historical notions of art production? Could this be a simulation of the conventional “look” of fine art? Other artists choose the opposite direction by creating a “synthetic” look while using paint and brush represented by Mike Childs and Kim Salermo’s art. Does digital art have a greater or lesser position in the heirchy of art history? Can fine artists and photographers create works of art using tools meant for graphic designers and illustrators? What about painters or sculptors who design their works using Computer Aided Design such as Peter Coe’s “painting”? These are some of the questions that Analog/Digital hopes to address. The subject matter of the works for this show seems to be of lesser importance to the media. However, this is not the case. Works were chosen to co-ordinate in media as well as content. The content selected by the artists displays a wide range from abstract to realistic depiction of the natural world, landscapes, emotional issues, socio-political subjects, and “virtual” or internal realities. Each subject handled by concise use of the selected medium, analog or digital. Conceptually, the analog or digital approach both lend themselves to expressing the artist’s inner world from re-discovered ordinary objects, such as Bill Westheimer’s photography, to surreal juxtapositions in content as in Matthew Barolo & Tabatha Tucker’s video, Leah Oates’ book art, and Susan Napack’s piece. The mastery exists in the selection of what is important to the artist and how to express it illustrated by Roger Tucker, Aileen Basis, Elizabeth Riley, and other works. In this way, the media becomes transparent to the content. This is, also, represented by the work of Hyungsub Shin who’s representations of insects are suggestive of computerized robotic structures while are actually constructed of kitchen utensils and umbrella parts. Pattern and design can be visualized and modified using current computer technology. Many artists choose to take advantage of the available technology to expand their aesthetic choices while keeping in mind basic knowledge of composition, technique, color, and form. While Patrick Schmidt’s work emphasizes the meaning of color and form, his works are created via “traditional” means; although they look as if they could have been designed using computer graphics software. Other artists choose to reject the magnitude of information and use a limited palette (so to speak), rejecting newer technical advances as in Lisa Ramsey’s photographs. Visual information and innovative ways of presenting it abound in the computer graphic design of the internet, television, film, newspapers and magazines, books, typography, architecture, and so on. It’s hard to imagine that visual thinkers would not be influenced by the influx of this widely circulating media. Technology also increases the potential productivity of artists and the variety of methods to deploy their art. Computer software and hardware, digital cameras, relatively inexpensive video editing software, scanners, the internet, archival inkjet printers combine with drawing, painting, photography, and sculpture to create contemporary systems of expressing and exploring visual thought.