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SXSW announces inaugural art program installations

South-By-South-Art

SXSW announces inaugural art program installations

Austin, Texas–based South by Southwest (SXSW) Conference and Festivals has announced five art installations to be exhibited in its inaugural SXSW Art Program in 2017. This year’s festivities will take place March 10 through March 19 in Austin. The installations will include work by both established and emerging artists, including Raum Industries, Refik Anadol, and Circus Family. In a press release announcing the featured artists, Hugh Forrest, chief programming officer at SXSW said, “Art and Design [have] always been central to the SXSW ethos, and we have quickly become a recognized platform for visual artists to showcase art installations and connect with filmmakers, musicians, and technologists. The Art Program is the first time we have formalized the program and sought leading artists to design specific installations that we know will resonate with SXSW audiences.” The 2017 slate of featured artists was selected as part of a collaboration between the SXSW Art Team and an external advisory board made up at least partially by art curators. See below for the 2017 SXSW art program’s selected artists.

  • Hyphen-Labs (Ashley Baccus-Clark, Carmen Aguilar y Wedge, Ece Tankal, and Nitzan Bartov) will showcase their NeuroSpeculative AfroFeminism NSAF Not Safe as Fuck art piece. The work is described in a press release as “a transmedia exploration told through a multi-layered possible future that transcends the constraints of the present using a roster of products thematically rooted in security, protection, and visibility.” The group is helmed by four women of color who, through their artwork, seek to use virtual reality to insert viewers into a “‘neurocosmetology lab’ where black women are the pioneers of brain optimization.”
  • Los Angeles-based installation artist Refik Anadol will showcase an artwork called Infinity that consists of an immersive environment that translates the viewer’s perception of reality into a “three-dimensional space of visualization.” Anadol’s work also includes large-scale LED installations, including the artist’s Convergence installation for the Gensler-designed Metropolis project currently under construction in Downtown Los Angeles. 
  • Artists Raum Industries will exhibit their interactive light exhibition Optic Obscura at SXSW this year. That artwork translates inputs from a user interface into a gridded surface made up of hundreds of optical fibers. The resulting pixelated image is used to illuminate the installation and its surroundings. 
  • Artists Circus Family’s work TRIPH creates an immersive “light experience” that is generated by the physical proximity of viewers. Sensors on the artwork translate nearby movement into sound and colors of varying intensities. 
  • Akinori Goto strikes a similar chord through their toki – series #02 work, an installation that depicts time in relation to the movement of a dancer. The dancer’s rhythms are projected onto a 3-D printed mesh sculpture.

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