John G. Hanhardt is an American author, art historian, and curator of film and media arts. [1] Hanhardt was the Consulting Senior Curator for Media Arts at the Smithsonian Museum of American Art, where he developed exhibitions, collections, and archives in film and the media arts. He is considered to be one of the leading scholars on video artist Nam June Paik. [1]
Hanhardt grew up in Rochester, New York. [2] He received his bachelor's degree from the University of Rochester in 1967, and his master's degree and additional graduate work (ABD) in cinema studies from New York University in 1970. [1]
Hanhardt has written many books and in 2019 came out with a new book,We Are in Open Circuits- Writings by Nam June Paik
Hanhardt's expansive curatorial practice spans three decades. Hanhardt began his career in the department of Film and Video at the Museum of Modern Art. He then went on to establish the first Film and Media Arts collection at the Walker Art Museum. Following his success at the Walker, Hanhardt was appointed Curator and Head of the Film and Video department at the Whitney Museum of American Art in 1974. [3] At the Whitney, Hanhardt was the director of the New American Film and Video Series which surveyed independent film and the emergence of video as an art form. He is also responsible for developing the museum's video art installation collection. [4] In 1996, Hanhardt was appointed Senior Curator of Film and Media Arts at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum where he developed “its international exhibition program, as well as its video installation art collection." [5] In 2006, he was appointed as the Consulting Senior Curator for Film and Media Arts and the Nam June Paik Art Center at the Smithsonian American Art Museum. [6]
In addition to his museum experience, Hanhardt has published, lectured, and taught extensively on film and media art. He has held adjunct teaching positions at Columbia University, Harvard University, the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the Rhode Island School of Design, Middlebury College, and Williams College. [7]
As a writer, critic, and editor, Hanhardt has been a contributor to numerous exhibition catalogues, journals, and other arts publications. [15] He has written and co-written several books on Korean American video artist Nam June Paik, some of which include The Worlds of Nam June Paik (2003), Nam June Paik: Global Groove (2004), and Nam June Paik: Global Visionary (2012). He is the editor of Video Culture: A Critical Investigation (1986).
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In 1993, Hanhardt was the recipient of the Peter Norton Family Foundation Curator's Grant for outstanding curatorial work. [7]
Video art is an art form which relies on using video technology as a visual and audio medium. Video art emerged during the late 1960s as new consumer video technology such as video tape recorders became available outside corporate broadcasting. Video art can take many forms: recordings that are broadcast; installations viewed in galleries or museums; works either streamed online, or distributed as video tapes, or on DVDs; and performances which may incorporate one or more television sets, video monitors, and projections, displaying live or recorded images and sounds.
Nam June Paik was a Korean artist. He worked with a variety of media and is considered to be the founder of video art. He is credited with the first use (1974) of the term "electronic super highway" to describe the future of telecommunications.
Laurence Gartel is an American artist, considered a pioneer of digital art. His biography is included in Who's Who, Who's Who in the East, Who's Who in America, Who's Who in American Art, and Who's Who in the World.
Eric David Kroll is an American photojournalist, fetish photographer, erotica historian, and book editor.
Shigeko Kubota was a Japanese video artist, sculptor and avant-garde performance artist, who mostly lived in New York City. She was one of the first artists to adopt the portable video camera Sony Portapak in 1970, likening it to a "new paintbrush." Kubota is known for constructing sculptural installations with a strong DIY aesthetic, which include sculptures with embedded monitors playing her original videos. She was a key member and influence on Fluxus, the international group of avant-garde artists centered on George Maciunas, having been involved with the group since witnessing John Cage perform in Tokyo in 1962 and subsequently moving to New York in 1964. She was closely associated with George Brecht, Jackson Mac Low, John Cage, Joe Jones, Nam June Paik, and Ay-O, among other members of Fluxus. Kubota was deemed "Vice Chairman" of the Fluxus Organization by Maciunas.
Matthew Russell Rolston is an American artist, photographer, director and creative director, known for his lighting techniques and detailed approach to art direction and design. Rolston has been identified throughout his career with the revival and modern expression of Hollywood glamour.
Maurice Berger was an American cultural historian, curator, and art critic, who served as a Research Professor and Chief Curator at the Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture, University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Berger was recognized for his interdisciplinary scholarship on race and visual culture in the United States.
Peter Campus, often styled as peter campus, is an American artist and a pioneer of new media and video art, known for his interactive video installations, single-channel video works, and photography. His work is held in the collections of numerous public institutions, including The Museum of Modern Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum, Hamburger Bahnhof - Museum für Gegenwart, Tate Modern, Museo Reina Sofía, Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Walker Art Center, and the Centre Georges Pompidou. The artist works on the south shore of Long Island.
Paul Garrin is an interdisciplinary artist and social entrepreneur whose work explores the social impact of technology and issues of media access, free speech, public/private space, and the digital divide. Starting as his assistant in 1981, Garrin eventually emerged as one of the most important collaborators of video art superstar Nam June Paik, working closely together from 1982 to 1996.
Expanded Cinema by Gene Youngblood (1970), the first book to consider video as an art form, was influential in establishing the field of media arts. In the book he argues that a new, expanded cinema is required for a new consciousness. He describes various types of filmmaking utilizing new technology, including film special effects, computer art, video art, multi-media environments and holography.
Deborah Kass is an American artist whose work explores the intersection of pop culture, art history, and the construction of self. Deborah Kass works in mixed media, and is most recognized for her paintings, prints, photography, sculptures and neon lighting installations. Kass's early work mimics and reworks signature styles of iconic male artists of the 20th century including Frank Stella, Andy Warhol, Jackson Pollock, and Ed Ruscha. Kass's technique of appropriation is a critical commentary on the intersection of social power relations, identity politics, and the historically dominant position of male artists in the art world.
Peggy Ahwesh is an American experimental filmmaker and video artist. She received her B.F.A. at Antioch College. A bricoleur who has created both narrative works and documentaries, some projects are scripted and others incorporate improvised performance. She makes use of sync sound, found footage, digital animation, and Pixelvision video. Her work is primarily an investigation of cultural identity and the role of the subject in various genres. Her interests include genre; women, sexuality and feminism; reenactment; and artists' books. Her works have been shown worldwide, including in San Francisco, New York, Barcelona, London, Toronto, Rotterdam, and Créteil, France. Starting in 1990, she has taught at Bard College as a Professor of Film and Electronic Arts. Her teaching interests include: experimental media, history of the non-fiction film, and women in film.
Yongwoo Lee is a South Korean art historian and curator based in Shanghai and Seoul. He is currently a professor at Tongji University and was previously the artistic director of the Shanghai International Art City Research Institute and a professor at the Academy of Fine Arts of Shanghai University.
Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI) is a nonprofit arts organization that is a resource for video and media art. An advocate of media art and artists since 1971, EAI's core program is the distribution and preservation of a collection of over 3,500 new and historical video works by artists. EAI has supported the creation, exhibition, distribution and preservation of video art, and more recently, digital art projects.
Margia Kramer is an American documentary visual artist, writer and activist living in New York. In the 1970s and 1980s, Kramer recontextualized primary texts in a series of pioneering, interdisciplinary multi-media installations, videotapes, self-published books, and writings that focused on feminist, civil rights, civil liberties, censorship, and surveillance issues.
Kota Ezawa is a Japanese-German American artist and arts educator. His artwork usually responds to current events from sources in the news, pop culture, and art history. Ever since his debut 2002 video animation of The Simpson Verdict, Ezawa has been known for his flattened style in works on paper, light-boxes, and videos. By flattening his pieces into more two-dimensional figures, he creates more focus on the re-contextualized historical events in his pieces.
Kambui Olujimi is a New York-based visual artist working across disciplines using installation, photography, performance, tapestry, works on paper, video, large sculptures and painting. His artwork reflects on public discourse, mythology, historical narrative, social practices, exchange, mediated cultures, resilience and autonomy.
John Sanborn is a key member of the second wave of American video artists that includes Bill Viola, Gary Hill, Dara Birnbaum and Tony Oursler. Sanborn's body of work spans the early days of experimental video art in the 1970s through the heyday of MTV music/videos and interactive art to digital media art of today.
The Andy Warhol Robot is an animatronic robot created by Andy Warhol in 1981, as a self-portrait.
Electronic Superhighway: Continental U.S., Alaska, Hawaii, commonly referred to as Electronic Superhighway, is an art installation created by Nam June Paik in 1995. Since 2006, the work has been on display in the Smithsonian American Art Museum (SAAM) in Washington, D.C. The large video artwork is composed of over 300 television sets, neon tubing, and 50 DVD players, which form a map of the United States. The map contains video clips that Paik associated with each state. Some of the states display images that are commonly associated with them, while others play video clips of people and scenes that are more thought-provoking.
Hanhardt's comments on the prominence of holographic art: