December 10,
2013
An exciting thing happened today: we launched our
new Art +
Technology Lab at LACMA. The Lab
is an experiment in bringing artists and technologists together to develop
projects that we plan to share with the public here at the museum. We also
issued our first
call for proposals. Artists and
collectives interested in pursuing projects that engage emerging technology are
invited to apply by January 27, 2014, for grants up to $50,000, plus in-kind
support from our advisory board and participating technology
companies.
We plan to fund a small number of projects in the
first year of the program. Several technology companies have joined the effort:
Accenture, NVIDIA, DAQRI, SpaceX, and Google are helping to make this project
possible. Our advisory board also includes independent artists and academics,
such as Dan Goods (visual strategist at Jet Propulsion Labs) and Ken Goldberg
(professor of industrial engineering and operations research at the University
of California, Berkeley).
Robert Irwin and James Turrell in the anechoic
chamber at the University of California, Los Angeles. The artists explored the
concept for an unrealized project with the Gannet Corporation as part of the
original Art and Technology program at LACMA. Photograph © Malcolm
Lubliner
This isn’t the first time LACMA has embarked on a
program to bring artists and technologists together. The Art and Technology
program at LACMA that ran from 1967 to 1971 is legendary, and included Andy
Warhol, Claes Oldenberg, James Turrell, Robert Irwin, and others. When we
launched our online Reading
Room a few years ago, the
Report
on the Art and Technology Program at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art,
1967–1971 quickly jumped to
the top of the list of popular out of print publications. The publication
includes some amazing documentation of the collaborations between artists and
industry, including several projects that failed to lead to a completed work of
art, but gave rise to innovations many years or even decades later.
The Lab is inspired by the history at LACMA, but
the program we’re launching now differs in some respects. Today, compared to the
late 1960s, the boundary between art and technology is much more fluid. We fully
expect to see participants in the program that move easily between both
disciplines. That makes aligning artists and technology developers all the more
exciting and fruitful. We also plan to reveal projects in progress through
regular presentations at LACMA, including talks with artists and demonstrations
of prototypes. Our commitment to exploring the nexus of art and technology is
long-term, and we look forward to building on the program over time.
The exterior entrance to the new Art + Technology
Lab at LACMA via the Director’s Round Table Garden at the east end of the museum
campus.
The Lab is housed in our newly remodeled Balch
Research Library. The County of
Los Angeles supported the renovation, which wraps up this month, with a grant
from their Productivity Investment Fund. Those of you familiar with the research
library will, we hope, be surprised and pleased by the transformation. We opened
up a wall of windows looking out on the park and gave the space an overhaul that
enables us to accommodate not only the new Lab program, but also more books and
space for our librarians to work with researchers.
For questions about the Art + Technology Lab, or to
find out about upcoming programs at LACMA, join our mailing list: lab@lacma.org.
Amy Heibel, Vice President,
Technology, Web and Digital Media
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