Boston Globe reporter Cate McQuaid writes about a new exhibit at the MIT List Visual Arts Center that examines email spam. “Hadjithomas and Joreige, artist-filmmakers based in Lebanon, focus on the unseen and unexplored. E-mail scams fit the bill,” writes McQuaid. “The artists have been collecting them since the late 1990s, and have now archived and deconstructed more than 4,000.”
New York Times reporter Hilarie Sheets spotlights the artwork and collaborations developed through MIT's Center for Science, Art and Technology (CAST). Sheets writes that CAST, “revitalized an M.I.T. model…of bringing in artists to humanize technology and create more expansive-thinking scientists. M.I.T. is at the forefront of this cross-disciplinary movement.”
Writing for The Boston Globe, Sebastian Smee writes that 2015 “was a banner year for great artists and curators who just happened to be women.” In his article, Smee highlights the work of Prof. Emeritus Joan Jonas, who represented the U.S. at the Venice Biennale this year.
Boston Globe reporter Kevin Hartnett speaks with MIT conservator Jana Dambrogio about a collection of letters from 1689-1707. “It’s not like when you fold a letter three times and stick it in an envelope,” says Dambrogio. “When these things are folded, some areas of the rectangle could have 8 or 10 folds in one spot.”
“MIT professor emerita Joan Jonas, who represented the United States at the Venice Biennale, has been named the next visual arts mentor for the Rolex Mentor and Protégé Arts Initiative,” writes Meredith Goldstein for The Boston Globe. Jonas was named to the initiative along with five other artists.
LiveScience reporter Megan Gannon writes that MIT conservator Jana Dambrogio will virtually unfold a trove of unopened letterlocked notes from the 17th century. The researchers will use techniques like “3D X-ray microtomography to scan the letters and reconstruct the letterlocking strategies,” Gannon explains. “They'll also use scans to detect the ink and reconstruct the text inside.”
In this AP TV video, Prof. Tod Machover discusses the development of his latest work, “Symphony in D,” a piece about the city of Detroit. “I really wanted it to be a portrait of the city so I invited everybody in the city, anybody who wanted to, to collaborate,” says Machover.
AP reporter Mike Householder writes about Prof. Tod Machover’s “Symphony in D,” which features the sounds of everyday Detroit. "It somehow sounds like something that could only have been done here. And that makes me really happy," says Machover.
Writing for The Boston Globe, Nancy Shohet West highlights Prof. Erik Demaine and Martin Demaine’s paper sculptures, which are on display at the Concord Center for the Visual Arts. “We started getting interested a number of years ago in curve creases and what was possible mathematically,” explains Prof. Demaine. “We started making models and then turned those into sculpture.”
The New York Times’ Zachary Woolfe writes about Prof. Tod Machover’s work “Symphony in D,” the latest in his series of city symphonies. Woolfe writes that the piece is “an explosion of energy, found sounds, live-music snippets and reminiscences featuring spoken and played interpolations from a range of Detroit artists.”
New York Times reporter Eve Kahn writes about how Jana Dambrogio, a conservator at the MIT Libraries, is researching how letter writers kept their correspondence sealed and private, a process she refers to as “letterlocking.” “This is such a brand-new field of study,” Dambrogio relates.
Architect David Adjaye has been named the recipient of the 2016 Eugene McDermott Award in the Arts at MIT, writes Mark Shanahan for The Boston Globe. The prize “includes an artist residency at MIT next spring during which Adjaye will participate in four programs open to the public.”
The Rose Kennedy Greenway Conservancy, in partnership with MIT List Visual Arts Center, announced that conceptual artist Lawrence Weiner has been commissioned to paint the Greenway’s fourth temporary mural, reports Olga Khvan for Boston Magazine. “[Weiner] is known for his typographic works, such as his 2008 ‘Dead Center’ installation at MIT,” Khvan explains.
Casey Quackenbush reviews MIT visiting artist Anicka Yi’s new olfactory exhibition ‘Aliens and Alzheimers’ for The New York Observer. "Her exhibit is supposed to challenge the way we overlook our sense of smell in favor of taste and sight," writes Quackenbush.
Boston Globe reporter Eryn Carlson writes about MIT visiting artist Anicka Yi’s exhibition, “6,070,430K of Digital Spit,” on display at the List Visual Arts Center. Yi explains that she wants the exhibit, “to be a totally encompassing experience, engaging the senses of taste, sight, smell, hearing.”