LASER New York City: a Leonardo/ISAST In-Person Rendezvous Event

EVENT INFO

When: Sunday, October 13, 2024 - 3:00-6:00 pm ET

Where: LevyArts: 40 E 19 Street, #3R NYC

Registration link

Please register via the Leonardo website or rsvp on eklevy.nyc@gmail.com - Late admittance past 3:30 pm cannot be accommodated.

The NY LASER program is a series of lectures and presentations on art, science, and technology-related projects and is an affiliate of Leonardo/International Society for the Arts, Science and Technology (ISAST). Ellen K. Levy, PhD, artist, writer, and co-editor of the "Science and the Arts since 1750" Routledge, Taylor & Francis book series, and Patricia Olynyk, artist, writer, and Florence and Frank Bush Professor of Art at Washington University co-chair the NY LASER program to foster high-level dialogue on topics of leading interest to a network of artists, scientists, humanists, and scholars. Feature speakers include Erica Baum, Noah Chesnin, Toni Dove, and Ellen Pearlman.

SPEAKERS BIOS

Erica Baum lives and works in New York. She is well known for her varied photographic series capturing text and image in found printed material, from paperback books to library indexes and sewing patterns. She received her MFA from Yale University in 1994 and her BA in Anthropology from Barnard in 1984. Baum will present a selection of work from several ongoing series and discuss their various methods and practices.

Noah Chesnin, Director of Policy & Outreach at the Wildlife Conservation Society’s New York Aquarium, will share stories about the Hudson Canyon and describe how the aquarium has led the effort to nominate and now secure the designation of Hudson Canyon as a National Marine Sanctuary. He will also discuss his work on conservation engagement and policy advocacy efforts. Noah received his BA in humanities from Yale University and his Master of Environmental Management from the Nicholas School of the Environment at Duke University.

Toni Dove, considered a pioneer of interactive cinema, creates human operated instruments that tell stories. She is known for work that uses electronic media to create a narrative, often genre mashing, to examine the impact of technological change on consumer culture. Her disruptive practice, developed over years, has created media machines that blur the boundaries between performance and installation and fuse film, game, experimental theater, and artificial intelligence-based interaction. Dove will discuss her mixed reality installation driven by hybrid AI currently in development: Sunjammer Six: A Tale Told by a Solar Breeze.

Ellen Pearlman is a New York based media artist, curator, writer, critic, and Visiting Research Scholar at the New York University Tandon School of Engineering. She is also a Senior Research Assistant Professor at RISEBA University in Riga, Latvia, a Contributing Editor to Performance Arts Journal (PAJ), MIT Press, and a Lumen Prize selection in AI Moving Images. Ellen will discuss Language is Leaving Me (LILM) that focuses on epigenetic memory. LILM is a newly emerging artificial intelligence cinema driven by Large Language Models combined with performative human biometric measurements (skin, muscles). This cinematic-scale performance, a biometric opera incorporates different linguistic prompt scripts in Yiddish, Chinese, Tamil, and Xhosa, reinterpreting intergenerational memories, obliterating their inherent semiotic and semantic references.

SPONSORS

NY LASER is a series of lectures and presentations on art and science projects, in support of Leonardo/ISAST’s LEAF initiative (Leonardo Education and Art Forum). Former LEAF Chairs Ellen K. Levy and Patricia Olynyk co-organize these presentations for the Leonardo community and Washington University in St. Louis. 

The Leonardo/ISAST LASERs are a program of international gatherings that bring artists, scientists, humanists and technologists together for informal presentations, performances and conversations with the wider public. The mission of the LASERs is to encourage contribution to the cultural environment of a region by fostering interdisciplinary dialogue and opportunities for community building to over 40 cities around the world. To learn more about how our LASER Hosts and to visit a LASER near you please visit our website. @lasertalks

NY LASER is a series of lectures and presentations on art and science projects, in support of Leonardo/ISAST’s LEAF initiative (Leonardo Education and Art Forum). Former LEAF Chairs Ellen K. Levy and Patricia Olynyk co-organize these presentations on behalf of the Leonardo community and Washington University in St. Louis.

The Leonardo/ISAST LASERs are a program of international gatherings that bring artists, scientists, humanists and technologists together for informal presentations, performances and conversations with the wider public. The mission of the LASERs is to encourage contribution to the cultural environment of a region by fostering interdisciplinary dialogue and opportunities for community building to over 40 cities around the world. To learn more about how our LASER Hosts and to visit a LASER near you please visit our website. @lasertalks