So today on our show we had our friend Amanda Ghattas (look her up on Facebook, I'm sure she would love some friend requests) on, and the topic up for discussion was "inspiration". As we all know, inspiration can come from anywhere and the strangest things as we saw in the example we discussed on our show, Charlotte Gainsbourg's latest album IRM.
Gainsbourg, a French actress and singer known for her roles in films such as The Science of Sleep, I'm Not There and more recently Lars von Trier's Antichrist, suffered a cerebral hemorrhage in 2007 and needed to have an operation to repair the damage and then six months of MRI scanning of her brain. It would be the rhythmic sounds of the MRI machine that would inspire Gainsbourg's newest album and song IRM, which represents the French translation of MRI, "imageries par resonances magnetiqués". And who better to help Gainsbourg produce an album inspired by technology and digital sounds than recording artist Beck, who even lent his vocals to one of the songs on the album, Heaven Can Wait.
The discussion then turned to technology in general and how its inspiring a whole new generation of art. Our guest Amanda introduced us to interactive-media artist, Scott Snibbe who utilizes technology to allow museum goers to become parts of his artwork, like in the example Amanda talked about where the movement of museum patrons is tracked throughout the gallery in order to create an image of all the pathways in museum. We also talked about some sculptures by Wet Design that are interactive and very much grounded in new technology and engineering.
[Check out http://www.snibbeinteractive.com/ and wetdesign.com]
An important thing we discovered while talking about these art forms on the show is that it is just as important to embrace new technologies and new art forms as it is to hold on to the dying art forms. Embracing the "new" will give rise to new creativity and new innovations. And although people may argue that the internet and technology is overstimulating and desensitizing the youth of America, you cannot deny that new technology and the internet can ultimately lead to an entire new generation of engineered artwork and the spread of creativity and knowledge faster. In art there is a grand sense of community and camaraderie and the internet plays a large role in uniting the art community across vast distances.
Thanks so much for tuning in and logging on. Catcha later.
-K
