Sha Xin Wei
Role: Concept. Research and Design Lead.
Sha Xin Wei, Ph.D., is Professor and Director of the School of Arts, Media + Engineering at ASU in the Herberger . Sha also directs the Synthesis Center for responsive environments and improvisation with colleagues in AME and affiliate research centers.
From 2005-2013 Dr. Sha was the Canada Research Chair in media arts and sciences, and Associate Professor of Fine Arts at Concordia University in Montréal, Canada. From 2001 to 2013 he directed the Topological Media Lab, an atelier-laboratory for the study of gesture and materiality from computational and phenomenological perspectives. Dr. Sha's research concerns ethico-aesthetic improvisation, and a topological approach to morphogenesis and process philosophy. With the TML, Sha has created responsive environments for ethico-aesthetic improvisation.
Sha’s art research includes the TGarden responsive environments (Ars Electronica, Dutch Electronic Art Festival, MediaTerra Athens, SIGGRAPH), Hubbub speech-sensitive urban surfaces, Membrane calligraphic video, Softwear gestural sound instruments, the WYSIWYG gesture-sensitive sounding weaving, Ouija performance-installations, Cosmicomics Elektra, eSea Shanghai and the IL Y A video membrane, and Einsteins Dreams time-conditioning instruments. Sha collaborated with choreographer Michael Montanaro and the Blue Riders ensemble to create a stage work inspired by Shelley's Frankenstein, with experimental musicians, dancers and responsive media.
Sha co-founded the Sponge art group in San Francisco to build public experiments in phenomenology of performance. With Sponge and other artists, Sha has directed event/installations in prominent experimental art venues including Ars Electronica Austria, DEAF / V2 The Netherlands, MediaTerra Greece, Banff Canada, Future Physical United Kingdom, Elektra Montréal, and eArts Shanghai. He has also exhibited media installations at Postmasters Gallery New York and Suntrust Gallery Atlanta. These works have been recognized by awards from major cultural foundations such as the Daniel Langlois Foundation for Art, Science and Technology; the LEF Foundation; the Canada Fund for Innovation; the Creative Work Fund in New York; Future Physical UK; and the Rockefeller Foundation.
Dr. Sha’s particular areas of research include the realtime, continuous mapping of features extracted from gestural instruments (such as woven or non-woven fabrics) into parameters modulating the continuous synthesis of video, sound, and physical or software control systems. This technical work supports the expressive improvisation of gesture in dense, palpable fields of sound, video and structured light, and animated materials.
Sha Xin Wei was trained in mathematics at Harvard and Stanford Universities, and worked more than 12 years in the fields of scientific computation, mathematical modeling and the visualization of scientific data and geometric structures. In 1995, he extended his work to network media authoring systems and media theory coordinating a 3 year long workshop on interaction and computational media at Stanford. In 1997, he co-founded Pliant Research with colleagues from Xerox PARC and Apple Research Labs, dedicated to designing technologies that people and organizations can robustly reshape to meet evolving socio-economic needs.
MIT Press has recently published Dr. Sha's book, Poiesis, Enchantment, and Topological Matter.
http://concordia.academia.edu/XinWeiSha
http://topologicalmedialab.net
http://ame.asu.edu
Sha Xin Wei, Ph.D., is Professor and Director of the School of Arts, Media + Engineering at ASU in the Herberger . Sha also directs the Synthesis Center for responsive environments and improvisation with colleagues in AME and affiliate research centers.
From 2005-2013 Dr. Sha was the Canada Research Chair in media arts and sciences, and Associate Professor of Fine Arts at Concordia University in Montréal, Canada. From 2001 to 2013 he directed the Topological Media Lab, an atelier-laboratory for the study of gesture and materiality from computational and phenomenological perspectives. Dr. Sha's research concerns ethico-aesthetic improvisation, and a topological approach to morphogenesis and process philosophy. With the TML, Sha has created responsive environments for ethico-aesthetic improvisation.
Sha’s art research includes the TGarden responsive environments (Ars Electronica, Dutch Electronic Art Festival, MediaTerra Athens, SIGGRAPH), Hubbub speech-sensitive urban surfaces, Membrane calligraphic video, Softwear gestural sound instruments, the WYSIWYG gesture-sensitive sounding weaving, Ouija performance-installations, Cosmicomics Elektra, eSea Shanghai and the IL Y A video membrane, and Einsteins Dreams time-conditioning instruments. Sha collaborated with choreographer Michael Montanaro and the Blue Riders ensemble to create a stage work inspired by Shelley's Frankenstein, with experimental musicians, dancers and responsive media.
Sha co-founded the Sponge art group in San Francisco to build public experiments in phenomenology of performance. With Sponge and other artists, Sha has directed event/installations in prominent experimental art venues including Ars Electronica Austria, DEAF / V2 The Netherlands, MediaTerra Greece, Banff Canada, Future Physical United Kingdom, Elektra Montréal, and eArts Shanghai. He has also exhibited media installations at Postmasters Gallery New York and Suntrust Gallery Atlanta. These works have been recognized by awards from major cultural foundations such as the Daniel Langlois Foundation for Art, Science and Technology; the LEF Foundation; the Canada Fund for Innovation; the Creative Work Fund in New York; Future Physical UK; and the Rockefeller Foundation.
Dr. Sha’s particular areas of research include the realtime, continuous mapping of features extracted from gestural instruments (such as woven or non-woven fabrics) into parameters modulating the continuous synthesis of video, sound, and physical or software control systems. This technical work supports the expressive improvisation of gesture in dense, palpable fields of sound, video and structured light, and animated materials.
Sha Xin Wei was trained in mathematics at Harvard and Stanford Universities, and worked more than 12 years in the fields of scientific computation, mathematical modeling and the visualization of scientific data and geometric structures. In 1995, he extended his work to network media authoring systems and media theory coordinating a 3 year long workshop on interaction and computational media at Stanford. In 1997, he co-founded Pliant Research with colleagues from Xerox PARC and Apple Research Labs, dedicated to designing technologies that people and organizations can robustly reshape to meet evolving socio-economic needs.
MIT Press has recently published Dr. Sha's book, Poiesis, Enchantment, and Topological Matter.
http://concordia.academia.edu/XinWeiSha
http://topologicalmedialab.net
http://ame.asu.edu
Oana Suteu Khintirian
Role: Research on cultural, historical and symbolic affordances of paper. Visual and material design.
Oana Suteu Khinitirian is a filmmaker and media artist living between Montreal and Paris.
She is born in Bucharest were she studied multimedia at the Academy of Theatre and Film. Arriving in Montreal in 1995, she obtains a degree in fine arts from the Mel Hoppenheim Cinema School. She is currently finishing a Graduate Certificate in Design Art Practice at Concordia University, while collaborating with the Topological Media Lab in Hexagram.
Since 2001 she has developed installations, scene and screen based projects that deal with the dynamics of the human body and their interactions with natural and man built structures. She collaborated with such companies as O Vertigo Dance and it's internationally acclaimed choreographer Ginette Laurin, Cirque du Soleil, the Molinari Cords Quatuor and artist/composer Tim Brady and has been working at the National Filmboard of Canada for over a decade. Her works have shown in venues around the world with great reviews. She won several awards among which the CineDanceAward for Best Direction of a New Canadian Dance Film at Moving Pictures Festival of Dance on Film, Toronto, Best Canadian Film, International Art Film Festival, Montreal, Jury Prize at Golden Prague Festival, and has been nominated for Best Performing Arts Program at the Rose d’Or, Montreaux, Switzerland and for several Gemini Awards for Best Direction and Best Editing by the Canadian Film Academy.
She is currently working on a highly personal feature-length documentary entitled GoodBye Paper!(Adieu Papier!), a co-production with the National Filmboard of Canada with support from the Canada Arts Council and the Quebec Arts Council. The film is dealing with the disappearance of paper from our written exchanges and its impact on personal and collective memory. This exploration also stands at the base of the interactive installation Paper Threads, to be presented in April 2014 at the PHI Center, in Montreal.
http://www.khintirian.com
Oana Suteu Khinitirian is a filmmaker and media artist living between Montreal and Paris.
She is born in Bucharest were she studied multimedia at the Academy of Theatre and Film. Arriving in Montreal in 1995, she obtains a degree in fine arts from the Mel Hoppenheim Cinema School. She is currently finishing a Graduate Certificate in Design Art Practice at Concordia University, while collaborating with the Topological Media Lab in Hexagram.
Since 2001 she has developed installations, scene and screen based projects that deal with the dynamics of the human body and their interactions with natural and man built structures. She collaborated with such companies as O Vertigo Dance and it's internationally acclaimed choreographer Ginette Laurin, Cirque du Soleil, the Molinari Cords Quatuor and artist/composer Tim Brady and has been working at the National Filmboard of Canada for over a decade. Her works have shown in venues around the world with great reviews. She won several awards among which the CineDanceAward for Best Direction of a New Canadian Dance Film at Moving Pictures Festival of Dance on Film, Toronto, Best Canadian Film, International Art Film Festival, Montreal, Jury Prize at Golden Prague Festival, and has been nominated for Best Performing Arts Program at the Rose d’Or, Montreaux, Switzerland and for several Gemini Awards for Best Direction and Best Editing by the Canadian Film Academy.
She is currently working on a highly personal feature-length documentary entitled GoodBye Paper!(Adieu Papier!), a co-production with the National Filmboard of Canada with support from the Canada Arts Council and the Quebec Arts Council. The film is dealing with the disappearance of paper from our written exchanges and its impact on personal and collective memory. This exploration also stands at the base of the interactive installation Paper Threads, to be presented in April 2014 at the PHI Center, in Montreal.
http://www.khintirian.com
Navid Navab
Role: Sonic behaviour, sonifying gestures of manipulating paper, sound design; electronics prototyping, software instruments as platform.
Navid Navab is a Montreal based alkemist, composer/improvisor, programmer, and sound designer. A graduate of Ontario Royal Conservatory of Music, Concordia University’s Electroacoustics and Computational Arts program, and McGill Music Technology, he has been working for the past several years creating deeply expressive media instruments synthesizing research at IRCAM, CRIMMT, CNMAT, Topological Media Lab and Matralab. Interested in the poetics of gesture, materiality, and embodiment, his work explores the social lives of objects and the enrichment of their embedded performative qualities. Navid uses gestures, rhythms and vibrations from everyday life as basis for real-time sound generation, resulting in augmented acoustical-poetry that enchants improvisational and pedestrian movements.
Navid has collaborated with many great improvisers and artists including Jean Derome, Constantinople Ensemble, Lori Freedman, Vinny Golia, Pierre Tanguay, Coat Cooke, Rainer Weins, Rohan de Saram, Mei Han, Lan Tung , Bozzini Quartet, Blue Rider Ensemble, Zata Omm Dance Project, Mike Svoboda, Dhruba Ghosh. His investigations, which range from compositions to responsive architecture, urban interventions, theatrical interactive installations, and improv-based performances, have been presented at various festivals and events in many countries. Some venues include Canadian Center for Architecture, Festival du Nouveau Cinema, IRCAM Paris, Electric Eclectics Festival Meaford, Shanghai eArts Festival China, Ligeti Hall MUMUTH Austria, Gray Center Chicago, Mixology Festival at Roulette New York, Western Front Vancouver, CMS Theatre Cambridge UK, Timisoara Festival Romania, CCRMA Palo Alto, Box13 Houston, Prentis Hall New York, Festival international Montréal/Nouvelles Musiques, La Société des Arts Technologiques [SAT], Segal Centre for Performing Arts, Galleri Monopoli ChampLibre Montreal, les Territoires Gallery Montreal, La Grande Bibliotheque de Montreal, Agora Montreal, Fashion Night Out [FNO] New York, Pop Montreal, Goethe-Institut Montreal, McCord Museum.
http://navidnavab.net
Navid Navab is a Montreal based alkemist, composer/improvisor, programmer, and sound designer. A graduate of Ontario Royal Conservatory of Music, Concordia University’s Electroacoustics and Computational Arts program, and McGill Music Technology, he has been working for the past several years creating deeply expressive media instruments synthesizing research at IRCAM, CRIMMT, CNMAT, Topological Media Lab and Matralab. Interested in the poetics of gesture, materiality, and embodiment, his work explores the social lives of objects and the enrichment of their embedded performative qualities. Navid uses gestures, rhythms and vibrations from everyday life as basis for real-time sound generation, resulting in augmented acoustical-poetry that enchants improvisational and pedestrian movements.
Navid has collaborated with many great improvisers and artists including Jean Derome, Constantinople Ensemble, Lori Freedman, Vinny Golia, Pierre Tanguay, Coat Cooke, Rainer Weins, Rohan de Saram, Mei Han, Lan Tung , Bozzini Quartet, Blue Rider Ensemble, Zata Omm Dance Project, Mike Svoboda, Dhruba Ghosh. His investigations, which range from compositions to responsive architecture, urban interventions, theatrical interactive installations, and improv-based performances, have been presented at various festivals and events in many countries. Some venues include Canadian Center for Architecture, Festival du Nouveau Cinema, IRCAM Paris, Electric Eclectics Festival Meaford, Shanghai eArts Festival China, Ligeti Hall MUMUTH Austria, Gray Center Chicago, Mixology Festival at Roulette New York, Western Front Vancouver, CMS Theatre Cambridge UK, Timisoara Festival Romania, CCRMA Palo Alto, Box13 Houston, Prentis Hall New York, Festival international Montréal/Nouvelles Musiques, La Société des Arts Technologiques [SAT], Segal Centre for Performing Arts, Galleri Monopoli ChampLibre Montreal, les Territoires Gallery Montreal, La Grande Bibliotheque de Montreal, Agora Montreal, Fashion Night Out [FNO] New York, Pop Montreal, Goethe-Institut Montreal, McCord Museum.
http://navidnavab.net
Chris Peter Wood
Integrated platforms amalgamating custom handmade and specialty papers, embedded sensors and transducers, electronics, sound instruments.
CIID Intern from Queen Mary University London.
Chris Wood is a sound artist, designer and engineer interested in abstractions of and interventions in spaces and stories, brought to people through new interfaces. Currently a PhD student in the Media Arts Technology at Queen Mary, University of London., Chris' prior studies include an ABC diploma in Sound Arts and Design at London College of Communication, University of the Arts, MA in World Cinemas at University of Leeds, and a BA in Philosophy at University of Leeds.
Exhibitions: ʻmeatRAVEʼ, at Megapolis audio festival, The New School, New York City, 2013; ‘High Mountain Diallingʼ, curated by Wasted Spaces, New York City, 2013; ‘Kartel on Kartelʼ at Apiary Studios, London, 2012 / In Sonora Festival, Madrid. 2014; ʻThe Lines Beneath Your Feetʼ at Construction Gallery, London, 2012; ʻSouthernʼ at LYDea sonic arts event, the New Gallery, London, 2011.
Performances: ʻWith Your Back To The Seaʼ, (multichannel performance), Funchal, Madeira. 2013; ʻSom e Dançaʼ, Grutas de São Vicente cave, Madeira. 2013; ʻPractice Groundsʼ, Banff Park Museum, Canada, 2013; ʻWalking on Slow Screeʼ (multichannel performance), The Banff Centre, Canada, 2012 &Symposium on Acoustic Ecology, UK. 2013, ʻHidden Topographiesʼ (radio performance), Summer Club Radio, V22, London, 2012; ʻHackney Soundscapeʼ, The Red Gallery, London, 2011.
Podcast / Radio: ʻBetween Soundsʼ (soundscape), Osso / Stress.fm (Portugal), 2013; ʻA Short History of Acoustic Ecologyʼ (documentary), Basic.fm / Resonance FM (UK), 2013; ʻThe Banff Centre Podcastʼ (arts podcast), The Banff Centre (Canada), 2012-2013; ʻHeygate Heavenʼ (documentary), The New Statesman (UK), 2012; ʻScattershot: Estatesʼ (soundscape / reportage), NTS Radio (UK), 2012; ʻCosmopolinationʼ (documentary), Resonance FM (UK), 2011.
Sound Design / Music: Hackney Hear — contributed the majority of sound design to this GPS-driven smartphone app which guides the user through east London, triggering stories, poems and sound composition by location — Winner Prix Europa 2012; _scape: Chris designed the sound element for this multi-sensory narrative environment. The project is an object commissioned by Icelandair for their passengers to evoke the Icelandic countryside. The finished work incorporated sound, touch, smell and image, 2012; Magic in Modern London, developed layered sound environments for a smartphone app for the Wellcome Collection, to guide the listener to particular sites associated with the Magic in Modern London exhibition, 2012; London Sound Drops — provided commissioned music for a series of radio shorts for BBC World Service — Vignettes of audio from Londonʼs streets blended, 2012.
http://www.wordthecat.com
CIID Intern from Queen Mary University London.
Chris Wood is a sound artist, designer and engineer interested in abstractions of and interventions in spaces and stories, brought to people through new interfaces. Currently a PhD student in the Media Arts Technology at Queen Mary, University of London., Chris' prior studies include an ABC diploma in Sound Arts and Design at London College of Communication, University of the Arts, MA in World Cinemas at University of Leeds, and a BA in Philosophy at University of Leeds.
Exhibitions: ʻmeatRAVEʼ, at Megapolis audio festival, The New School, New York City, 2013; ‘High Mountain Diallingʼ, curated by Wasted Spaces, New York City, 2013; ‘Kartel on Kartelʼ at Apiary Studios, London, 2012 / In Sonora Festival, Madrid. 2014; ʻThe Lines Beneath Your Feetʼ at Construction Gallery, London, 2012; ʻSouthernʼ at LYDea sonic arts event, the New Gallery, London, 2011.
Performances: ʻWith Your Back To The Seaʼ, (multichannel performance), Funchal, Madeira. 2013; ʻSom e Dançaʼ, Grutas de São Vicente cave, Madeira. 2013; ʻPractice Groundsʼ, Banff Park Museum, Canada, 2013; ʻWalking on Slow Screeʼ (multichannel performance), The Banff Centre, Canada, 2012 &Symposium on Acoustic Ecology, UK. 2013, ʻHidden Topographiesʼ (radio performance), Summer Club Radio, V22, London, 2012; ʻHackney Soundscapeʼ, The Red Gallery, London, 2011.
Podcast / Radio: ʻBetween Soundsʼ (soundscape), Osso / Stress.fm (Portugal), 2013; ʻA Short History of Acoustic Ecologyʼ (documentary), Basic.fm / Resonance FM (UK), 2013; ʻThe Banff Centre Podcastʼ (arts podcast), The Banff Centre (Canada), 2012-2013; ʻHeygate Heavenʼ (documentary), The New Statesman (UK), 2012; ʻScattershot: Estatesʼ (soundscape / reportage), NTS Radio (UK), 2012; ʻCosmopolinationʼ (documentary), Resonance FM (UK), 2011.
Sound Design / Music: Hackney Hear — contributed the majority of sound design to this GPS-driven smartphone app which guides the user through east London, triggering stories, poems and sound composition by location — Winner Prix Europa 2012; _scape: Chris designed the sound element for this multi-sensory narrative environment. The project is an object commissioned by Icelandair for their passengers to evoke the Icelandic countryside. The finished work incorporated sound, touch, smell and image, 2012; Magic in Modern London, developed layered sound environments for a smartphone app for the Wellcome Collection, to guide the listener to particular sites associated with the Magic in Modern London exhibition, 2012; London Sound Drops — provided commissioned music for a series of radio shorts for BBC World Service — Vignettes of audio from Londonʼs streets blended, 2012.
http://www.wordthecat.com
Topological Media Lab, Concordia University, Montreal
Realtime responsive media software, modulated by movement and gesture and environmental activity. Lab space, studio space.
Synthesis Center, School of Arts, Media and Engineering, ASU
Electronics, custom or customizing sensor platforms, studio space