MEMBER SPOTLIGHT
October 10, 2022
This week we recognize Debra Swack, and her media and sound work focused on the interstice of humans and non-humans.
Swack’s work is a catalyst for change, innovation, and collaboration in helping to solve world problems. For example: ‘Bloom’ addresses plant consciousness; ‘Cloud Mapping Project’ addresses climate change, surveillance, artificial intelligence, machine learning and creativity (can machines create?); and ‘Animal Patterning Project’ addresses the history of genetically manipulating animals, environmental displacement through urbanization, and the rise of infectious diseases due to deforestation such as COVID. click on images for more information
Bloom (above) utilizes the research of evolutionary biology to present digital simulations of the sounds that plants communicate bio-acoustically through vibrations. The work was featured in the New York Academy of Science's fall 2017 magazine about scientific innovations for the next 100 years. It was also presented in Sound, Images and Data for Leonardo Electronic Almanac (MIT Press) at NYU, and for EvoS (Evolutionary Studies at SUNY Binghamton).
Cloud Mapping Project (below) addresses surveillance, artificial intelligence, machine learning and creativity (can machines create?). The Project was presented at the Pera Museum in Istanbul, the American Academy of Rome (where she was a visiting artist along with William Kentridge, Joan Tower, and Vincent Katz), and Banff Centre in Canada. At Banff, the work was the subject of a Fulbright eye-tracking workshop and an exhibition of related works under a Leighton Colony Residency. In 2019, Cloud Mapping Project was the subject of an interview by science journalist Clarissa Wright for NatureVolve.
Animal Patterning Project (below), is an ephemeral dance performance about our complex relationship with other-animals and simulates their return by projecting their likeness onto the urban environment they once inhabited. It includes the historical practice of taxidermy, our unique ability to genetically manipulate their bodies and skins for our own purposes, and the dilemma of displaced indigenous other-animals that urban development creates. The project was selected in 2021 for the online presentation and book Becoming Feral. It is a 2021 recipient of a City Arts grant from the NYC Dept of Cultural Affairs and New York Foundation of the Arts.
Debra Swack is a digital and sound artist who creates transformative participatory experiences about the most critical issues of our time. She received Fulbright grants from Banff Centre (2015) and Tel Aviv University (2018). Her writings have been published by MIT, and she was included in Art and Innovation at Xerox Parc (MIT, 1999). In 2019, she was selected by the New York Academy of Science, Pratt Institute and Guerrilla Science, to participate in Conveying Science Through Art, who believe that public engagement in science is critical to a well-functioning society. Called ‘an important work,’ by Margaret Morton (Ford Foundation), The mixed reality Monument Project, about heroes and the democratization of memorialization, was shortlisted by Creative Time/NEW INC at the New Museum in 2019 for an installation in Central Park. The project was a 2020 recipient of a Mellon Foundation grant and a 2018 Creative Engagement grant from the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council, and NYC Department of Cultural Affairs, in collaboration with Microsoft, the Siddhartha School, and the Rubin Foundation.
Featured Images (top to bottom): ©Debra Swack, Birdsongs, Sonic Fragments Sound art Festival, Princeton University, 2008; Bloom, 2017, featured at New York Academy of Sciences; Cloud Mapping, 2014, video edition of 10, featured in Fragile Rainbow at Williamsburg Art & Historical Center, May 2022; Animal Patterning, 2015, commissioned by Pratt Institute & the West Harlem Art Fund; below, portrait of the artist.
