Margot Lovejoy
Encyclopedia
Margot Lovejoy is a digital artist and historian
of art
and technology
. She is Professor Emerita of Visual Arts at the State University of New York at Purchase
and author of the books "Digital Currents: Art in the Electronic Age" and "Postmodern Currents: Art and Artists in the Age of Electronic Media".
including those at the Alternative Museum; P.S.#1 Contemporary Art Center; Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art
; Queens Museum of Art
; Neuberger Museum of Art; Stamford Museum and the Islip Museum. Her work is in the collection of, among others, the Museum of Modern Art
; the Getty Institute; the Neuberger Museum.
Apart from authoring numerous essays in various journals, and catalogs, she has also been an invited speaker at conferences on art and technology internationally. Her website "Parthenia" has been archived by the Walker Art Center
as part of the pioneering adaweb.com site and her website "TURNS" was featured in the 2002 Whitney Museum Biennial. She has published several visual books: "Labyrinth" in 1991 and in 1995 "The Book of Plagues", "paradoxic mutations" and "manifestations".
, Jack Burnham
, and Gene Youngblood
by documenting the historical record of the relationship between technology and art as culminating in digital art
. Lovejoy recounts the early histories of electronic media for art making (video
, computer art
, the internet
) by providing a context for the works of major artists in each media, describing their projects, and discussing the issues and theoretical implications of each to create a foundation for understanding this developing field of digital art
.
In Digital Currents she explores the growing impact of digital
technologies on aesthetic experience and examines the major changes taking place in the role of the artist as social communicator. She demonstrates that just as the rise of photographic techniques in the mid-19th century shattered traditional views about representation
, so too have contemporary electronic
tools catalyzed new perspectives on art, affecting the way artists see, think, and work, and the ways in which their productions are distributed and communicated.
Historian
A historian is a person who studies and writes about the past and is regarded as an authority on it. Historians are concerned with the continuous, methodical narrative and research of past events as relating to the human race; as well as the study of all history in time. If the individual is...
of art
Art
Art is the product or process of deliberately arranging items in a way that influences and affects one or more of the senses, emotions, and intellect....
and technology
Technology
Technology is the making, usage, and knowledge of tools, machines, techniques, crafts, systems or methods of organization in order to solve a problem or perform a specific function. It can also refer to the collection of such tools, machinery, and procedures. The word technology comes ;...
. She is Professor Emerita of Visual Arts at the State University of New York at Purchase
State University of New York at Purchase
Purchase College, State University of New York, is a public four-year college located in Purchase, New York, United States. It is one of 13 comprehensive colleges in the State University of New York system...
and author of the books "Digital Currents: Art in the Electronic Age" and "Postmodern Currents: Art and Artists in the Age of Electronic Media".
Biography
Margot Lovejoy is recipient of a 1987 Guggenheim Fellowship and a 1994 Arts International Grant in India. Exhibited internationally, she has had many solo exhibitions in and around New York CityNew York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
including those at the Alternative Museum; P.S.#1 Contemporary Art Center; Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art
Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art
The Newhouse Center for Contemporary Art is an art museum in Staten Island, New York. It was founded in 1977 inside the architecturally significant Greek Revival buildings of Sailors Snug Harbor....
; Queens Museum of Art
Queens Museum of Art
The Queens Museum of Art is an art museum and educational center located in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park in the borough of Queens in New York City, United States.-Overview:...
; Neuberger Museum of Art; Stamford Museum and the Islip Museum. Her work is in the collection of, among others, the Museum of Modern Art
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...
; the Getty Institute; the Neuberger Museum.
Apart from authoring numerous essays in various journals, and catalogs, she has also been an invited speaker at conferences on art and technology internationally. Her website "Parthenia" has been archived by the Walker Art Center
Walker Art Center
The Walker Art Center is a contemporary art center in Minneapolis, Minnesota, United States. The Walker is considered one of the nation's "big five" museums for modern art along with the Museum of Modern Art, the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, the Guggenheim Museum and the Hirshhorn...
as part of the pioneering adaweb.com site and her website "TURNS" was featured in the 2002 Whitney Museum Biennial. She has published several visual books: "Labyrinth" in 1991 and in 1995 "The Book of Plagues", "paradoxic mutations" and "manifestations".
Digital Currents
In her best known historic work to date, Digital Currents: Art in the Electronic Age, Margot Lovejoy follows on the research of Frank PopperFrank Popper
Frank Popper is a historian of art and technology and Professor Emeritus of Aesthetics and the Science of Art at the University of Paris VIII. He has been decorated with the medal of the Légion d'honneur by the French Government...
, Jack Burnham
Jack Burnham
Jack Wesley Burnham Jr. is an American writer on art and technology, who taught art history at Northwestern University and the University of Maryland...
, and Gene Youngblood
Gene Youngblood
Gene Youngblood is a theorist of media arts and politics, and a respected scholar in the history and theory of alternative cinemas. His Expanded Cinema , the first book to consider video as an art form, was influential in establishing the field of media arts as a recognized artistic and scholarly...
by documenting the historical record of the relationship between technology and art as culminating in digital art
Digital art
Digital art is a general term for a range of artistic works and practices that use digital technology as an essential part of the creative and/or presentation process...
. Lovejoy recounts the early histories of electronic media for art making (video
Video
Video is the technology of electronically capturing, recording, processing, storing, transmitting, and reconstructing a sequence of still images representing scenes in motion.- History :...
, computer art
Computer art
Computer art is any art in which computers play a role in production or display of the artwork. Such art can be an image, sound, animation, video, CD-ROM, DVD-ROM, videogame, web site, algorithm, performance or gallery installation...
, the internet
Internet
The Internet is a global system of interconnected computer networks that use the standard Internet protocol suite to serve billions of users worldwide...
) by providing a context for the works of major artists in each media, describing their projects, and discussing the issues and theoretical implications of each to create a foundation for understanding this developing field of digital art
Digital art
Digital art is a general term for a range of artistic works and practices that use digital technology as an essential part of the creative and/or presentation process...
.
In Digital Currents she explores the growing impact of digital
Digital
A digital system is a data technology that uses discrete values. By contrast, non-digital systems use a continuous range of values to represent information...
technologies on aesthetic experience and examines the major changes taking place in the role of the artist as social communicator. She demonstrates that just as the rise of photographic techniques in the mid-19th century shattered traditional views about representation
Representation (arts)
Representation is the use of signs that stand in for and take the place of something else. It is through representation that people organize the world and reality through the act of naming its elements...
, so too have contemporary electronic
Electronics
Electronics is the branch of science, engineering and technology that deals with electrical circuits involving active electrical components such as vacuum tubes, transistors, diodes and integrated circuits, and associated passive interconnection technologies...
tools catalyzed new perspectives on art, affecting the way artists see, think, and work, and the ways in which their productions are distributed and communicated.