Computer Aided

Computer Aided is an exhibition examining the impact technology has on current art making practices and contemporary culture. Photography, video, painting, code and algorithm art, and other “new” media are showcased. The exhibition addresses how new technologies allow individuals and smaller institutions to take part in cultural dialogs that are often exclusive to large influential institutions. This theme is reflected by the acquisition of art for the exhibition from s[edition], a website selling digital artworks by artists who are otherwise beyond the Masur’s means. To underpin this concept of hierarchy and increased ease of communication with technology, Computer Aided also features a variety of artists at different points in their careers who live and work throughout the United States and world. Computer Aided also explores how artists use technology as the basis for creating their art. The exhibiting artists are Keliy Anderson-Staley (AR), Joshua Chambers (LA), Harold Cohen (CA), Mat Collishaw (UK), Craig Damrauer (LA), Hasan Elahi (MD), Shepard Fairey (CA), Damien Hirst (UK), Jenny Holzer (NY), John Rodriguez (LA), Marni Shindelman & Nate Larson (GA & MD), Jes Schrom & Graham Simpson (IL), Kate Shannon (OH), and Bill Viola (CA). Additionally, Activision & Toys for Bob will present a gallery dedicated to their blockbuster video game Skylanders Giants. The artists’ interests include the mingling of historic and contemporary art-making processes, technological infrastructure, automated or repetitive processes, surveillance, code or algorithm art, mass production, interactivity, site specificity, craft, the act of viewing and interpreting images, and more. This diverse group of exhibiting artists, drawn together by their common interest in technology, allows museum visitors to take stock of newer art forms as well as evaluate technology’s potential impact on culture in broad terms.