New Media Exhibition opens March 22 at Myers School of Art

"Art transforms the way we see. Design transforms the way we interact. Technology transforms the way we live."; — Tony Samangy, assistant professor and exhibit curator

"Collider 3: Transform," the third installment of the New Media Exhibition Series at The University of Akron, opens March 22 and continues through April 16 at the Emily Davis Gallery in Folk Hall, 150 E. Exchange St. The opening reception is 5-8 p.m. on March 22, and special events are scheduled every Tuesday evening during the exhibition. The exhibition and all events are free and open to the public.

This exhibition features the work of UA Assistant Professor Eunsu Kang and other significant contributors to the new media field, including Haru Ji, Graham Wakefield, Philomène Longpré, Jonathan Harris, Sep Kamvar and Cleveland artist Chris Yanc.

The Collider series explores the influences and implications of new media within design practice and the fine arts. "Collider 3: Transform" addresses how technology shapes the essence of what it means to be human.

"The fusion of man and machine is constantly evolving and affecting the human experience, and the Collider series presents manifestations of this evolution," explains Tony Samangy, a UA assistant professor of graphic design and the co-curator of the Collider series with Rod Bengston, director of University Art Galleries at UA.

Special events

A public event will be featured every Tuesday night of the exhibition. During the opening reception on March 22, Samangy will speak at 7 p.m. about the creation of the exhibition series.

• March 29 at 7 p.m., a panel of UA New Media professors and artists will address potential careers and professional development issues in the new media field.

• April 5 at 7 p.m., there will be a public screening of footage and interviews collected during the Collider 3 installation.

• April 12 at 6:30 p.m., dancer Diana Garcia-Snyder will engage with artist Eunsu Kang’s work in a performance of "Shin’m," an interactive audiovisual environment exploring the relationship between the body and installation area. The dancer wears an interface and connects herself to the space. Her movements provoke changes in the swirling, projected lights as body, sound and lights dance, draw and transform each other. Later, participants can share the role of a performer in the "Shin'm" experience. At 7 p.m., following the dance performance, Ensu Kang will give a lecture about the formation of her work.

UA’s Emily Davis Gallery is open Mondays, Tuesdays, Fridays and Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Wednesdays and Thursdays from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. The gallery is closed Sundays and University holidays. For more information call 330-972-6030 or visit Collider Exhibit Series.

This exhibition is sponsored by UA's Myers School of Art; School of Dance, Theatre, and Arts Administration; and the Department of Computer Science.

'Collider 3: Transform' artists

• UA Assistant Professor Eunsu Kang presents Shin’m, an interactive audiovisual environment exploring the relationship between the body and installation area. The performer, Diana Garcia-Synder, wears an interface and connects herself to the space. Her movements provoke changes in the swirling, projected lights as body, sound, and lights dance, draw and transform each other.

• Haru Ji and Graham Wakefield developed Artificial Nature as an evolving art installation in which digital organisms consume, grow, metabolize, reproduce and respond to activities within an endless fluid environment. The human viewers are transformed by the space as their movements and actions influence the ecosystem as it unfolds. This innovative new media work has been featured in numerous exhibitions, including SIGGRAPH Asia (Yokohama, Japan, 2009).

• Philomène Longpré is an artist whose work establishes communication between the physical and virtual worlds. In Formica, a projected virtual character seeks to create a connection with participants as they enter the system's environment. Visitors transform and trigger new links or bonds with the virtual character as infrared sensors pick up their movements and polaroid sensors pinpoint their location. These interactions are visually expressed on the membrane, much like firing neurons weaving a tapestry of associations.

• Jonathan Harris and Sep Kamvar use a series of playful interfaces to transform intangible emotion into concrete visual representations. Since August 2005, We Feel Fine has been harvesting human feelings from a large number of weblogs. The result is an ever-changing database of several million human feelings that will be projected onto the Emily Davis Gallery walls.

• Chris Yanc brings his unique brand of interactive design to the Emily Davis Gallery. Yanc, based in Cleveland, participated in the first installment of the Collider exhibition series with an innovative multi-touch table. His installations directly engage visitors and invite them to transform their physical input into visual representations using custom software.

Media contact: Cyndee Snider, 330-972-5196 or cyndee@.uakron.edu.