Three Artists I Draw Inspiration From

Golan Levin

http://www.flong.com/storage/images/self/golan-levin-2-lg.jpg

Levin's website: http://www.flong.com/

Golan Levin is an artist and engineer hybrid. His work utilizes modern instruments, such as software, robotics and cognitive science. This is no surprise as he worked at MIT in academics in addition to being a researcher focusing on computer tech and software engineering. Levin's pieces can be considered performance art, engaging audiences in various ways and many times forcing their participation. 

He is pushing the boundaries of what is art. Levin is an artist that truly uses the tools of today. Many of his pieces focus on interactivity, using the full body to better explore an aesthetic experience. Two of his pieces that I found captivating focus on inverting spectatorship. Double Taker aka Snout is an eight foot robotic nose http://www.flong.com/projects/snout/. Snout is the robotic equivalent to Ten Second Tom from Fifty First Dates. He is continually shocked and surprised to see his audience members. The other piece I found entertaining to say the least is Opto-Isolator http://www.flong.com/projects/optoisolator/. This piece boils "gaze" down to its bare-bone components, an eye and blinking. The eye is programmed to incorporates familiar social behavior, such as becoming shy when you stare. This is just a really cool example of art looking back. 

Aaron Koblin

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Koblin's website: http://www.aaronkoblin.com/

Aaron Koblin is a media artist who works primarily with visualizing data sets and crowdsourcing. Currently he is employed as the Creative Director at the Data Art Team for Google. Much of his work focuses on GPS and other forms of locative technology to depict humanity. Some of his work has included music videos, such as Radiohead's House of Cards (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8nTFjVm9sTQBy) and The Johnny Cash Project (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3lp3RpC-60U). 

Those projects that look at and depict mass data sets are the ones I find particularly fascinating. Koblin captures the ebb and flow daily life in North America by looking at traffic patterns across the night sky http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ystkKXzt9Wk. You can literally see the East Coast come alive. Another piece that really gets at humanity is Koblins visualization of SMS messages in Amsterdam, one can aesthetically understand what it looks like for people to reach out and connect with technology http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=WKuSBbleYuE.

Theo Jansen

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Jansen's website: http://www.strandbeest.com/

Theo Jansen is a bit different from the other two artists I have discussed. Jansen has created children for himself. I don't mean this in a biblical sense, rather in the tool bench sense. His children are Strandbeests, who in habit the beaches. They are creations made from tubes that are powered from the wind. They are evolving through generations and becoming autonomous slowly but surly. 

Strandbeests can seem a bit off the beaten path as far as art is concerned, but truly these are masterpieces. This is a prime example of how computational art is not limited to the digital screen, it does not always have to include software and electronics. Instead, Jansen employs pneumatic computers and a pseudo genetic code which determines the next generation.