PARSONS EXPLORES ALTERNATIVE CREATIVE "HOTSPOTS" AT BEIJING DESIGN WEEKBeijing Exhibition Features Collaborative Work by Students from Parsons, |
NEW YORK, August 23, 2011—Parsons The New School for Design will present "BJDW ALT," an exhibition of work that responds to the alternative creative hotspots to be found in Beijing, as part of the new Beijing Design Week, taking place September 26-October 3, 2011. The exhibition will take place at one of the main festival venues, 751 D-Park in Beijing. Beijing Design Week is a series of exhibitions and public programs highlighting the city's thriving design culture. "BJDW ALT" is the result of a collaborative studio held this past June with students from Parsons, the China Central Academy of Fine Arts and Tsinghua University. The exhibition also will feature work from another collaborative project, "Weather Tunnel," which was recently on view as part of Translife, the International Triennial of New Media Art, at the National Art Museum of China. "Over the past several years, Parsons has built significant connections to the academic and design communities in China," said Sven Travis, dean of the School of Art, Media and Technology at Parsons. "This exhibition not only exemplifies the types of collaborative work that engage our students, but also our commitment to building a stronger presence in China to support its growing design sector." For "BJDW ALT," teams of students explored Beijing's Dongcheng District to uncover a variety of grassroots, international and community-centered creative spaces, and created site-specific design and new media art installations in response to these spaces. This resulted in a Big Urban Game where participants could take a tour of the hot spots and interact with the student installations. On view as part of the exhibition is a selection of these works, including "Virtual Beng-Beng," which simulates a trip to different locations around Beijing to convey how rapidly change occurs in this massive metropolis, and "Surface," an interactive installation that reduces the immense scale of Beijing into an intimate experience. "Weather Tunnel" is a series of installations created from environmental data collected from sensors that were deployed in a variety of geographically and geopolitically diverse locations around the world. The goal was to create works that respond both conceptually and formally to environmental and ecological crises. "Degree Day" enables participants to experience a twenty-four hour period of meteorological change across the surface of the earth in a twenty-four minute loop. "Electromechanical Solenoid Orchestra" performs melodies and rhythms dictated by real-time environmental data. "Replacement Life" responds to the human destruction of biodiversity through robots that thrive carbon dioxide, often thought to be one of the biggest contributing factors to environmental change. "Together, BJDW ALT and Weather Tunnel examine the dramatic changes that are happening both in Beijing and in major cities around the world from the perspective of young artists and designers," said Benjamin Bacon, Assistant Professor in the School of Art, Media and Technology at Parsons, who organized and will participate in the exhibition. "Through technology, these students are able to create innovative responses to what they see in their own community and globally." In addition to the exhibition, Bacon will lead a DIY workshop on creating a Weather Tunnel project, as well as participate in the AIGA China Tech Salon. For more information, please visit www.bjdw.org. |
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Parsons The New School for Design is one of the leading institutions for art and design education in the world. Based in New York but active around the world, the school offers undergraduate and graduate programs in the full spectrum of design disciplines. Critical thinking and collaboration are at the heart of a Parsons education. Parsons graduates are leaders in their respective fields, with a shared commitment to creatively and critically addressing the complexities of life in the 21st century. For more information, please visit www.newschool.edu/parsons. # # # |
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Media Contacts: Deborah Kirschner Kate McCormick |
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