Robin Peckham

Post Internet and Post Galleries. Conor Backman and The Reference Gallery

Robin Peckham
One of the founders of Reference Gallery, which could reasonably be called one of the best small-town galleries in the world, Conor Backman also happens to be a BFA student at Virginia Commonwealth University in Richmond, VA. Open since the fall of 2009, Reference has come to define the growing inertia in post-internet art with a constant flux between physical exhibitions, digital circulation, and distributed networks of attention.... READ MORE...
ArtArticlesDigimag - Issue 72, March 2012

A New Documentation. An Interview To Joao Vasco Paiva

Robin Peckham
João Vasco Paiva (n. 1979) is a Portuguese artist based in Hong Kong since 2006. He has taught at the City University of Hong Kong School of Creative Media and Hong Kong Art School/ RMIT University. With a background in painting and advanced training in media technology, his work is characterized by the appropriation of observed phenomena, mapping apparently random situations and presenting them in an aesthetically organized framework through video, audiovisual performance, recording, and installation... READ MORE...
ArticlesDigimag - Issue 69, November 2011

Certain Pleasure. Zhang Peili And Electronic Media

Robin Peckham
Zhang Peili is an enigmatic figure: while he is widely respected in China as a pioneering video artist and a progenitor of the use of electronic media in the wake of the 85 New Wave movement of the mid-1980s, his international reputation relies primarily on a small number of survey exhibitions motivated by multicultural agendas and staged amidst work of vastly divergent practical initiatives.... READ MORE...
ArtArticlesDigimag - Issue 66, July / August 2011

Cao Fei: Demolishing The Virtual. Rmb City And The Crisis Of Art-reality

Robin Peckham
Chinese artist Cao Fei formally launched her last major project, RMB City, almost two years ago in January 2009. Nearing the end of its predetermined lifespan, the Second Life platform should come to an end within the next several months. At this juncture I have been attempting to take the pulse of the virtual community as a whole, speaking with current and former collaborators on RMB City, collectors, writers, and other interested observers in order to figure out how to measure the success or failure of the digital metropolis. See below for a summary of the findings so far; next month in this space we will continue this survey with a debriefing on Chinese art in Second Life... READ MORE...
ArticlesDigimag - Issue 59, November 2010

Expecting Expectations. An Interview With Isaac Mao

Robin Peckham
Isaac Mao has been called the ultimate Chinese digital guru, maintaining interests in commerce, electronic communication, and, increasingly, network politics. He is broadly labelled a venture capitalist, blogger, software architect, entrepreneur, and researcher in learning and social technology, dividing his time between research, social work, business, and technology.... READ MORE...
ArtArticlesDigimag - Issue 58, October 2010

Aaajiao’s Software. Data Matter Conversion

Robin Peckham
Xu Wenkai, who uses the name Aaajiao in most exhibition and other public contexts, was born in Xi'an in 1984 and currently resides in Shanghai. His name is widely known within both art and tech circles in China, though mostly for his efforts at organizing and sharing information rather than as an artist per se. New media artist and computer visual programmer, he created in 2003 the online sound art platform: cornersound.com and in 2006 the english version of the we-make-money-not-art blog We Need Money Not Art. Without forgetting his collaborations with the Dorkbot network and with the 3S Media Center, center for academic research in art, media and technologies.... READ MORE...
ArticlesDigimag - Issue 57, September 2010

Deep Ambiguity. A Conversation With Ben Houge

Robin Peckham
Ben Houge is a composer and sound designer who, though trained in composition, has largely been employed in sound design for video games, for at least five years at the corporate Ubisoft (in addition to collaborations with Gearbox Software, Troika Games, Massive Entertainment, Escape Factory, Relic Entertainment and ArenaNet). In Shanghai, however, he is known as one of the few outsiders to truly penetrate local art and music cultures.... READ MORE...
ArticlesDigimag - Issue 55, June 2010Sound

Tortuous Visions Of Lu Yang. The Bioart In China

Robin Peckham
New media art in greater China, when it is present, tends toward the conservative: re-engineered video games, simplistically interactive video installations, and sound art are the norm. In a few corners, however, a new wave of artists is pushing this envelope and developing new strains of practice based particularly around the complementary poles of aesthetic coding and, most intriguingly, biological matter.... READ MORE...
ArticlesDigimag - Issue 52, March 2010Science