Curated by Marco Mancuso – Claudia D’Alonzo – Lev Manovich
Direct Digital was a new media art event presented by the cultural association Artegenti, which took place in Modena and Carpi (Italy), in the Ex-Ospedale Sant’Agostino and in Palazzo Pio, under the conception and artistic direction of Gilberto Caleffi. Direct Digital proposed not only an exhibition and a symposium entitled “From art to design and back” (curated by Marco Mancuso) but even a series of performances, workshops and screenings. Marco Mancuso and Claudia D’Alonzo curated also the whole catalogue of the exhibition entitled “The sing of the electric body”, with critical texts written by Mancuso, D’Alonzo and Lev Manovich and interviews to some of the most influential artists exhibited.
Interviews in the catalogue: Gina Czarnecki, Agostino Di Scipio, Gordon/Parreno, Heinrich Gresbeck, Golan Levin, Chris Levine, Rafael Lozano Hammer, Takahiro Matsuo, Kenichi Okada, Tony Oursler, Andy Warhol, Jin-Yo Mok.
The title of the Exhibition is based on a verse by Walt Whitman, rearranged by Ray Bradbury, dedicated to the relationship between art and new technologies applied to the fields of animation, video, music and design. The “digital” wants to stimulate a language commixture which is shown in a selection of artworks divided into two major sections, video art and interactive art, hosting some of the most relevant names of the contemporary artistic experimentation: Nam June Paik, Bill Viola, Andy Warhol, Douglas Gordon, Philippe Parreno, Sam Taylor-Wood, Tony Oursler, Chris Levine, Julian Opie, Gina Czarnecki, Heinrich Gresbeck, Golan Levin, Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, Takahiro Matsuo, Jin-Yo Mok, Kenichi Okada, Agostino Di Scipio, Mimmo Rotella.
The video art section puts together authors that come from different periods and spheres, comparing them through their works in order to find a common interest in time, memory, perception and duplication, elaborated through the electronic languages. The exhibition also includes a section dedicated to the relationship between interactive art and pop culture. Interactive art analyses the relation between human beings and technology, studies the relationships among the available technologies, combining them with human necessities and desires in the contest of everyday experience.
