iLRN2020 6th International Conference of the Immersive Learning Research Network

Kay Meseburg studied political sciences at the University of Potsdam, graduating with a Diplom. Parallel to his career in television, he has been involved since the late nineties in conceiving and implementing numerous award-winning online projects and building platforms.

He moved to ARTE in 2013, where he developed the platform ARTE Future and later joined the editorial board of the magazine SQUARE IDEE. Following the success of Polar Sea 360°, he continued exploring content from a 360° video and virtual reality perspective. Kay is since 2018 Head of Mission Innovation and works on the TV of after tomorrow which includes subjects such as data/AI, immersive media, eco-responsibility.

His numerous distinctions include three Grimme Online Awards, Deutscher Reporterpreis, two times Deutscher Wirtschaftsfilmpreis, a LEAD Award, and a French-German Journalism Award.

Kay is also Ambassador of Innovation at the IMZ in Vienna, cofounded by UNESCO; a visiting artistic lecturer at the Center of Collaborative Arts and Media at Yale University; and Ambassador of Innovation of the IMZ International Music + Media Centre.


About the iLRN 2020 Artist/Curator "Studio" Visits Program

Traditionally artists share their work with curators and collectors by bringing them to the studio and showing them what they are working on. This has always been a challenge for the digital artist because often the best place to experience the work is not in person but through a digital interface. With the coronavirus pandemic this is still a challenge for digital artists but now it is also a challenge to every artist and every curator that is trying to either show what they are making or see what is being made by others. Thinking about the new interfaces through which we are now communicating, our idea was to leverage the video conference model and ask artists and curators to show what it looks like, from their digital point of view, when they are making their work or when they are scouring the web to discover emerging practices. By sharing their screens, and walking us through their work and process, we get a clearer sense of what our new normal looks like, but we also discover, in this age of isolation, a new form of intimacy in which we see as another sees, navigating their virtual habitat as they experience it.

Organized and curated by Justin Berry (Yale University) and Johannes DeYoung (Carnegie Mellon University)

Nicholas O’Brien is an artist and researcher that makes video games, digital animations, and installations addressing civic history, urban infrastructure, and overlooked narratives of technology and labor. O'Brien has recently exhibited at Knockdown Center in Queens, LiMA Media Art Platform in Amsterdam, The Photographers Gallery in London as well as several online outlets like Keen On Magazine, Sedition, and The Creative Independent. As a past recipient of a Turbulence.org Commission funded by the NEA his work has also appeared or featured in ARTINFO, The Brooklyn Rail, DIS magazine, Frieze d/e, Art in America, The Atlantic, and The New York Times. He currently lives in Brooklyn and is Assistant Professor in 3D Design and Game Development at Stevens Institute of Technology.


About the iLRN 2020 Artist/Curator "Studio" Visits Program

Traditionally artists share their work with curators and collectors by bringing them to the studio and showing them what they are working on. This has always been a challenge for the digital artist because often the best place to experience the work is not in person but through a digital interface. With the coronavirus pandemic this is still a challenge for digital artists but now it is also a challenge to every artist and every curator that is trying to either show what they are making or see what is being made by others. Thinking about the new interfaces through which we are now communicating, our idea was to leverage the video conference model and ask artists and curators to show what it looks like, from their digital point of view, when they are making their work or when they are scouring the web to discover emerging practices. By sharing their screens, and walking us through their work and process, we get a clearer sense of what our new normal looks like, but we also discover, in this age of isolation, a new form of intimacy in which we see as another sees, navigating their virtual habitat as they experience it.

Organized and curated by Justin Berry (Yale University) and Johannes DeYoung (Carnegie Mellon University)

Valentina Zamfirescu received her BFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and her MFA from Yale University, where she received the Blended Reality Grant and the Center for Collaborative Arts and Media Graduate Fellowship. She is a co-founder and co-director of 4th Ward Project Space in Chicago. She’s exhibited at institutions and galleries including Essex Flowers, the International Museum of Surgical Science, Zhou B Art Center, Roots & Culture, and ACRE Exhibitions. Her work was included in the B3 Biennial of the Moving Image in Frankfurt, Germany.


About the iLRN 2020 Artist/Curator "Studio" Visits Program

Traditionally artists share their work with curators and collectors by bringing them to the studio and showing them what they are working on. This has always been a challenge for the digital artist because often the best place to experience the work is not in person but through a digital interface. With the coronavirus pandemic this is still a challenge for digital artists but now it is also a challenge to every artist and every curator that is trying to either show what they are making or see what is being made by others. Thinking about the new interfaces through which we are now communicating, our idea was to leverage the video conference model and ask artists and curators to show what it looks like, from their digital point of view, when they are making their work or when they are scouring the web to discover emerging practices. By sharing their screens, and walking us through their work and process, we get a clearer sense of what our new normal looks like, but we also discover, in this age of isolation, a new form of intimacy in which we see as another sees, navigating their virtual habitat as they experience it.

Organized and curated by Justin Berry (Yale University) and Johannes DeYoung (Carnegie Mellon University)

Annie Hui-Hsin Hsieh is a Taiwanese-Australian composer currently based in the United States. Her compositional interest focuses on immersive physical experiences and she often articulates sonic expressions in terms of choreography, phenomenology, and musical-social interactivity. Hsieh’s latest works delve into examinations of bodily presence, borders, and proximities through the lens of power dynamic, control, and gender politics. Her collaboration with flutist Kathryn Williams, Pixercise, for instance, is a work that addresses the cross sections between the female body, physical exercises, and the virtuosity in contemporary music performance.

Her music has been presented internationally at events including Huddersfield Festival of Contemporary Music, Metropolis New Music Festival, WasteLAnd Music Series (LA), Eavesdropping Symposium London, SEAMUS, Tectonic Festival (Adelaide), ISCM World Music Days, International Rostrum of Composers, Opera Memphis Pittsburgh Festival of New Music, and Bendigo International Festival of Exploratory Music. Some recent commissions include Symphony Services Australia, The Arts Centre Melbourne, Melbourne Symphony Orchestra, Adelaide Symphony Orchestra, Sydney Symphony Orchestra, Wien Modern, Foundation Royaumont, Red Fish Blue Fish, Quince Ensemble and ELISION Ensemble, among others.

She has received support from the 2017 APRA Art Music Fund, The Dorian Le Gallienne Composition Award, New Music USA, Australian Cultural Fund, Australian Council of the Arts grants, the National Cultural and Arts Foundation (Taiwan), and was recently a finalist for the Belegura Emerging Composer Award as part of the Melbourne Prize 2019.

Annie completed her doctoral studies at the University of California, San Diego, and is currently an Assistant Teaching Professor at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, USA.


About the iLRN 2020 Artist/Curator "Studio" Visits Program

Traditionally artists share their work with curators and collectors by bringing them to the studio and showing them what they are working on. This has always been a challenge for the digital artist because often the best place to experience the work is not in person but through a digital interface. With the coronavirus pandemic this is still a challenge for digital artists but now it is also a challenge to every artist and every curator that is trying to either show what they are making or see what is being made by others. Thinking about the new interfaces through which we are now communicating, our idea was to leverage the video conference model and ask artists and curators to show what it looks like, from their digital point of view, when they are making their work or when they are scouring the web to discover emerging practices. By sharing their screens, and walking us through their work and process, we get a clearer sense of what our new normal looks like, but we also discover, in this age of isolation, a new form of intimacy in which we see as another sees, navigating their virtual habitat as they experience it.

Organized and curated by Justin Berry (Yale University) and Johannes DeYoung (Carnegie Mellon University)

Monica Salazar and Anna Russ are the founders and publishers of Berlin Art Link magazine and founders and producers of MONA, a creative consulting and production company based in Berlin. In over a decade of realizing art-focused exhibitions, events, and video productions, Salazar and Russ have worked with leading museums, galleries, artists, universities, biennials and art fairs, as well as corporate and private clients around the globe.

In 2010, Salazar and Russ created Berlin Art Link Online Magazine, which offers a multi-faceted view of the art world through the stories of some of the most compelling and influential creatives and exhibitions around the globe. With an ever-growing audience and correspondents located in cities throughout North America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia, Berlin Art Link has served as a popular resource for discovering the best of visual art, design, music and film from a contemporary art perspective.

Through MONA, Russ and Salazar have bridged the gap between the art world and the public sphere to produce culturally dynamic media content and event productions. Recent selected MONA projects included organising art programming, media and event production for clients at AURORA 2018 (Dallas), the British Pavilion (Venice Art Biennale), Design Miami/, Frieze London and the Dhaka Art Summit.


About the iLRN 2020 Artist/Curator "Studio" Visits Program

Traditionally artists share their work with curators and collectors by bringing them to the studio and showing them what they are working on. This has always been a challenge for the digital artist because often the best place to experience the work is not in person but through a digital interface. With the coronavirus pandemic this is still a challenge for digital artists but now it is also a challenge to every artist and every curator that is trying to either show what they are making or see what is being made by others. Thinking about the new interfaces through which we are now communicating, our idea was to leverage the video conference model and ask artists and curators to show what it looks like, from their digital point of view, when they are making their work or when they are scouring the web to discover emerging practices. By sharing their screens, and walking us through their work and process, we get a clearer sense of what our new normal looks like, but we also discover, in this age of isolation, a new form of intimacy in which we see as another sees, navigating their virtual habitat as they experience it.

Organized and curated by Justin Berry (Yale University) and Johannes DeYoung (Carnegie Mellon University)

Alex M. Lee is a digital artist (b. 1982, South Korea) who utilizes 3D animation, video game engines, virtual/augmented/immersive reality platforms and the potential of simulation technologies in order to visualize and complicate our perception of time, space, and light - culling from concepts within science, science fiction, physics, and modernity. He received his BFA (2005) and MFA (2009) from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.

He is associate professor in the Digital Arts & Sciences Program at Clarkson University located in Potsdam, NY - a private science and engineering university located north of the Adirondack Mountains.

Lee has exhibited internationally as well as within the States. Selected exhibitions include: Mio Photo, Osaka, Japan; Daegu Art Factory, Daegu, Korea; The Gene Siskel Film Center, Chicago, Illinois; Eyebeam: Center for Art & Gallery DOS, Seoul, Korea; Museum of Contemporary Art, Montreal, QC.


About the iLRN 2020 Artist/Curator "Studio" Visits Program

Traditionally artists share their work with curators and collectors by bringing them to the studio and showing them what they are working on. This has always been a challenge for the digital artist because often the best place to experience the work is not in person but through a digital interface. With the coronavirus pandemic this is still a challenge for digital artists but now it is also a challenge to every artist and every curator that is trying to either show what they are making or see what is being made by others. Thinking about the new interfaces through which we are now communicating, our idea was to leverage the video conference model and ask artists and curators to show what it looks like, from their digital point of view, when they are making their work or when they are scouring the web to discover emerging practices. By sharing their screens, and walking us through their work and process, we get a clearer sense of what our new normal looks like, but we also discover, in this age of isolation, a new form of intimacy in which we see as another sees, navigating their virtual habitat as they experience it.

Organized and curated by Justin Berry (Yale University) and Johannes DeYoung (Carnegie Mellon University)

Phillip Birch lives and works in New York. His work utilizes animation, video game design, sculpture, and performance. Focusing on technology and history, Birch’s work traces a possible trajectory of human development. His work and research explore topics such as schizophrenia, autoimmune disease, body horror, Catholicism, and game theory. Birch has had recent exhibitions, performances and screenings at Reyes|Finn, Detroit, Jack Hanley, NY SculptureCenter, NY, Joan, Los Angeles, 47 Canal, NY, Essex Flowers, NY, The Loft: Servais Family Collection, Brussels, and MUMOK, Vienna. He has given lectures at Yale University and Parsons School of Design. His work is in the collection of the Whitney Museum of American Art.


About the iLRN 2020 Artist/Curator "Studio" Visits Program

Traditionally artists share their work with curators and collectors by bringing them to the studio and showing them what they are working on. This has always been a challenge for the digital artist because often the best place to experience the work is not in person but through a digital interface. With the coronavirus pandemic this is still a challenge for digital artists but now it is also a challenge to every artist and every curator that is trying to either show what they are making or see what is being made by others. Thinking about the new interfaces through which we are now communicating, our idea was to leverage the video conference model and ask artists and curators to show what it looks like, from their digital point of view, when they are making their work or when they are scouring the web to discover emerging practices. By sharing their screens, and walking us through their work and process, we get a clearer sense of what our new normal looks like, but we also discover, in this age of isolation, a new form of intimacy in which we see as another sees, navigating their virtual habitat as they experience it.

Organized and curated by Justin Berry (Yale University) and Johannes DeYoung (Carnegie Mellon University)

Johannes DeYoung is a multidisciplinary artist who works at the intersection of computational and material processes. DeYoung’s work has been exhibited at the B3 Biennale of the Moving Image, Frankfurt, Germany; Crush Curatorial, Robert Miller Gallery, Jeff Bailey Gallery, Eyebeam, and Tiger Strikes Asteroid, New York, NY; the Images Festival at the Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, Canada; Pallas Projects, Dublin, Ireland; and Hell Gallery, Melbourne, Australia. His work has been featured in The New York Times, The New York Post, The Huffington Post, and Dossier Journal.

DeYoung is co-founder of the periodic web journal Lookie-Lookie. He has served on the New Foundations Board of Study for time-based media at Purchase College, State University of New York; the Lyme Academy College of Fine Arts Contemporary Art Council; and Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts, as Digital Literacy Consultant. DeYoung is appointed Assistant Professor of Electronic and Time-Based Media at Carnegie Mellon University. He previously taught animation and moving-image courses at Yale University School of Art, where he was appointed Senior Critic and Director of the Center for Collaborative Arts and Media, and at the Yale School of Drama, where he was appointed Lecturer in Design. At Yale, he also served as Principal Investigator for the Blended Reality program in immersive media research. He received his MFA from the Cranbrook Academy of Art in 2006.


About the iLRN 2020 Artist/Curator "Studio" Visits Program

Traditionally artists share their work with curators and collectors by bringing them to the studio and showing them what they are working on. This has always been a challenge for the digital artist because often the best place to experience the work is not in person but through a digital interface. With the coronavirus pandemic this is still a challenge for digital artists but now it is also a challenge to every artist and every curator that is trying to either show what they are making or see what is being made by others. Thinking about the new interfaces through which we are now communicating, our idea was to leverage the video conference model and ask artists and curators to show what it looks like, from their digital point of view, when they are making their work or when they are scouring the web to discover emerging practices. By sharing their screens, and walking us through their work and process, we get a clearer sense of what our new normal looks like, but we also discover, in this age of isolation, a new form of intimacy in which we see as another sees, navigating their virtual habitat as they experience it.

Organized and curated by Justin Berry (Yale University) and Johannes DeYoung (Carnegie Mellon University)