|
Server : Apache/2.4.62 System : FreeBSD fbsdweb2.web.rcn.net 14.1-RELEASE FreeBSD 14.1-RELEASE releng/14.1-n267679-10e31f0946d8 GENERIC amd64 User : www ( 80) PHP Version : 8.3.8 Disable Function : NONE Directory : /domains/ebon/bio/ |
Upload File : |
<!doctype html public "-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en"> <html> <head> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> <meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 81.2"> <meta name="GENERATOR" content="Mozilla/4.7 (Macintosh; I; PPC) [Netscape]"> <title>EBON FISHER - Commentaries</title> </head> <body text="#000000" bgcolor="#A5BEE8" link="#0000EE" vlink="#0099CC" alink="#66FFCC"> <blockquote> <br><font face="Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif"><font size=-1><a href="Ebon_Fisher_Bio.html">BIO</a><font color="#99CCCC"> .</font>|<font color="#99CCCC">.</font> <a href="Ebon_Fisher_resume2.html">RESUME</a><font color="#99CCCC"> .</font>|<font color="#99CCCC">.</font> <a href="Ebon_Fisher_People_Quotes.html">COMMENTARIES</a><font color="#99CCCC"> .</font>|<font color="#99CCCC">.</font> <a href="Ebon_Fisher_Media_Samples.html">PRESS</a><font color="#99CCCC"> .</font>|<font color="#99CCCC">.</font> <font color="#003366">EMAIL</font><font color="#99CCCC">.</font><a href="mailto:[email protected]">[email protected]</a></font></font> <br> <br> <br> <p><b><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><font size=+1>Commentaries on Ebon Fisher</font></font></font></i></b> <blockquote> </blockquote> <font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Dana Friis-Hansen</b>, Executive Director, Austin Museum of Art (quoted in 1987 while a curator at MIT):</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">Ebon Fisher is mining an individualized niche which encompasses scientific investigation, visual experimentation and civic involvement and awareness... An eclectic blend of ritualistic space, expressive music, crisp spoken facts, and primal images mix to create a rich and challenging experience which raises questions rather than provides answers. [Fisher's multimedia performance] Viscera explores creation mythologies by juxtaposing various plastic forms, drawn from both public communication and the arts, producing an open-ended, awe-inspiring consciousness.</font></font></i></blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Ruth Maleczech</b>, Director, Mabou Mines Theatre, New York City:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">It is very difficult in my experience for an artist in any medium to find her voice, her own most secret, most individual voice. To find a voice is to find a direction or to be found on a path towards a body of work. Ebon Fisher has his direction and his voice; he is moving inexorably towards a theater of science and humanity... In fact I felt so positively about Ebon Fisher's work that I contacted Nancy Graves who is one of our best painters and who was showing some of her work in the gallery after I left to try to get in touch with him at MIT. I thought she would have some good information for him and would especially appreciate his work.</font></font></i></blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>David Pescovitz</b>, Writer for Wired, Flash Art, Art Byte and Editor at Berklee College of Engineering</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">I have followed Professor Fisher's work for nearly a decade, since his pioneering media rituals in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. What first impressed me about Ebon was his insight into the evolution of media at the dawn of the digital age. Yet Ebon not only is able to map our culture's chaotic mediaspace and magically "connect the dots" with engaging theory, he's able to "play" in the space itself through his art and lifestyle. As I'm sure you know, it's rare to find someone who not only talks the talk but also walks the walk.</font></font></i> <p><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">As the Web was first woven, Ebon's digital art brought alive the concept of the "meme" as it applied to the datasphere. To this day, he continues his edgey explorations of the media and its multitude of messages. More recently though, his explorations of the notion of the virtual community have yielded novel theoretical and practical frameworks that provide essential keys to understanding how people (and information) interact both online and offline. After all, the intersections between the virtual and real have become the most fertile ground for artistic and philosophical experimentation and Ebon is leading the way to cultivate this uncharted territory.</font></font></i> <p><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">Clearly, Ebon Fisher is unrivaled in his professional qualifications... And personally, I cannot think of an individual whose love of teaching, learning, and creating digital media is expressed with more contagious enthusiasm. Ebon Fisher has my highest recommendation.</font></font></i></blockquote> <p><br><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Professor Jonathan Fineberg</b>, Art Historian, University of Illinois:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">I first met Ebon in 1990, when I organized a museum exhibition (I think the first museum exhibition) about the then young Williamsburg art community in Brooklyn. He was already far out in front of me, certainly, and in front of most of his peers in his prescient grasp of new media and its implications for culture. It was already evident that he also had a brilliant design sense and more creative energy - infectious creativity energy - than any human being I have ever known! He led me by the hand through the complex network of talent and neighborhood, community action and emerging media theory and had a great impact on my conception of that exhibition (the most heavily attended exhibition in the history of the Krannert Art Museum at the University of Illinois): I owe the success of it in no small part to him.</font></font></i> <p><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">I also spent some considerable amount of space on Ebon's work in that catalogue because it was so rich and interesting - in particular the "bionic codes" for human social interaction. The wild multimedia and kinetic environment he created - which grew out of his work at the Media Lab at MIT and his interest in science - was certainly the most popular site in a popular show... In the early nineties he was the nerve center of the Williamsburg scene and his work earned him a prominent place in my book on Art Since 1940: Strategies of Being (Abrams 2000).</font></font></i> <p><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">You will never find a more energetic and creatively generative teacher, colleague, artist. Ebon has the most generous spirit of any artist I've ever known: he loves to talk with people about art and culture, he reads a great deal, thinks interestingly, would be a fantastic force for energizing the work of students and colleagues in a university, and is genuinely seeking to encourage and share and promote the work of others.</font></font></i> <br> </blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Gregory Volk</b>, Writer/Curator, New York City:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">What is impressive about [Ebon Fisher's] "Viscera" is the central large-mindedness of the work. The work has a freshness and vitality which comes from the direct engagement of an active and original mind with a surrounding climate of ideas and culture... There are both care and faith in the center of this work, an understanding on the part of the artist that if an audience can be inspired to feel in more extreme ways, to see and experience more in the very process of the art, then the conditions of touching and change are already established. It is one thing in a time of perceived cultural drifting and personal alienation for art to bemoan the conditions of trouble. It is quite another, and substantially more difficult, to imagine what could be better, to evoke that which might help us. Mr. Fisher's is such an evocative art.</font></font></i></blockquote> <p><br><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Caroline Stone Keating</b>, Artist, Board Member of The Kitchen, New York:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">I have known Ebon Fisher and, with great interest, followed his career for more than 20 years. Having been on the Board of the Kitchen for more than 25 years, including a stint as its president, demonstrates my personal interest in the world of evolving art forms. Ebon Fisher's work has fascinated me for a long time. His art is stunningly beautiful, uniquely personal and has a strong element of humor. He is a visionary who has been able to realize a digital world that combines aesthetic concerns with philosophical ones. His explorations of the media, involving human interactions on and off line, in theory and in practice, reflect his deep humanitarian and intellectual concerns. A catalyst among his peers for years, he has created festivals and events concerning that place where art, performance, and media meet.</font></font></i> <p><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">On the interpersonal side, it is my opinion that Ebon Fisher works extremely well with people in both personal and professional settings. He is socially graceful, humorous, pragmatic, and terrifically intelligent. Thus he is able to find successful solutions to issues at hand. He is very patient; he is a person of immense clarity; he is a quiet and unassuming leader with considerable charisma; and, having been a participant in the creation of his field, he has a deep grasp of its ever-evolving subject matter.</font></font></i></blockquote> <p><br><font color="#314B66"><b><font face="Times">Dr. Gerald F. Gaull, M.D.</font></b>, <font face="Times">Director, The Center for Food and Nutrition Policy, Georgetown University:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">I'm writing to congratulate you on the special edition of the Wall Street Journal of Friday, May 20, 1994. It is without question the best overall summary of the biotechnology industry and its potential that I have read. [Ebon Fisher's diagrams] are literally the best I've ever seen.</font></font></i></blockquote> <p><br><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Michael Lane</b>, Publisher, Monk Magazine:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">Ebon Fisher's Bionic Codes are like whirling digital dervishes let loose in a psychic field unleashing jolts of energy while gently caressing my soul to a relative calm.</font></font></i></blockquote> <p><br><b><font color="#314B66">Professors Peter Feldstein, Steven Foster and Ron Cohen</font></b> <br><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">(From the 2<sup>nd</sup> year review, University of Iowa):</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">A large majority of the students were very satisfied with the instruction they were receiving. A great deal of Professor Fisher's time is devoted to keeping up with the technological advances of his medium. The rapid pace of change makes it necessary to perpetually learn new programs and relearn existing ones... The amount of exposure for Professor Fisher and his work, in light of the overwhelming amount of work required to keep the Digital Worlds lab running, is impressive. The inclusion in the Fineberg book [Art Since 1940: Strategies of Being] is of particular importance. It must also be noted that Professor Fisher is always ready to expand the dialogue about the creative possibilities of digital media... The courses he has developed have already generated a great deal of interest among students and faculty. He is very aware of the cutting edge of this medium and of its rapidly changing parameters, both technical and conceptual. He is also aware of the necessity to continually re-evaluate and adjust the course content to parallel these developments and has a well-defined plan for future projects and activities.</font></font></i></blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote> <br> <p><font color="#314B66">___________________________</font> <br><b><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><font size=+2>Student Comments</font></font></font></i></b></blockquote> <blockquote> <p><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Bhavya Lai</b>, MIT:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">I will not hesitate in saying that [Ebon Fisher's course at MITs Media Lab] "Creative Seeing" has completely revolutionized my way of seeing things. All the classes were so fascinating and interesting and I loved my classmates, TAs and professor.</font></font></i></blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Dylan Lorentz</b>, Hunter College:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">Coming from a bachelor's program at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, the possibilities of an Integrated Media Master's Program [at Hunter College] presents an intriquing and re-invigorating prospect. As of now, I'm enrolled in Ebon Fisher's course, Interactive Media Expressions, and the structure laid out by professor Fisher is not only satisfying, but also boundlessly motivating.</font></font></i></blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Christine Chen</b>, Hunter College:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">I personally enjoy taking this class because it allows me to become an active thinker. It enables me to think outside the confines of technology.</font></font></i></blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Marco Marcoccia</b>, MIT:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">About the class itself, I must say it truly was a godsend. In a school of incredibly intense math and technical learning, it was very welcome to have a class where we could direct our energies toward a more creative side of learning. Changing the environment allowed creative juices to flow more easily and input from outside sources provided a good judge of what we were up to. I fell in love with the anechoic chamber, and went back twice afterward with other people for hours at a time. I enjoyed the variety of projects we worked on. It will be too bad when Ebon does something like graduate because he will be greatly missed. The greatest thing I got from 4.901 was to show me that one can put great intelligence toward something other than science, and that inspired me to leave MIT and pursue a career in film at NYU.</font></font></i></blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Daniel Garcia</b>, MIT:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">Creative Seeing is the most FUN course in the Institute. They should make it a prerequisite for graduation. In addition to providing an introduction to different methods of electronic self-expression, the class size and the atmosphere is extremely conducive to the class unity frame of mind. I've made many good friends during the term, and learned a whole lot about computer graphic systems, Macintosh, holography, video and computer animation. Suggestion: how about a Creative Seeing II?</font></font></i></blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Krassimira Varbanova</b>, Hunter College:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">As a sixth element to my project, I have made an 8 minute documentary, containing interviews with people on the streets around the ground zero area, downtown Manhattan. The main question I asked people on the street obviously provoked them... I was surprised by the deeply involved answers I have received... I tried to talk with people from different races, social status and age... I enjoyed the class a lot and in addition to being a very good experience, I have learned many new things.</font></font></i></blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Yenny Coral</b>, Hunter College:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">I am a media major here at Hunter College. I have been very lucky to have participated in both of Professor Fisher's classes: Intro To Digital Media and Interactive Media. This being my last semester at Hunter College I found Professor Fisher's classes extremely helpful. Fisher's approach is quite dynamic because instead of focusing on the technicalities of the various software programs, the emphasis has always been on exploring your own creativity. Putting your mind before technology has always been a strict rule in both of these media classes.</font></font></i></blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Angelica Hogberg</b>, Hunter College:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">I love this class.</font></font></i></blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Brad Sagarin</b>, MIT:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">This course is fantastic!</font></font></i></blockquote> </blockquote> <blockquote><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66"><b>Erin La Cour</b>, Hunter College:</font></font> <blockquote><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">On the first day of class, Professor Fisher put me at ease when he announced that his course was going to be about creativity rather than simply learning the programs. He explained that he was more interested in our learning the functions and possibilities of the web and web design than our mastering the technical aspects. I think that this approach was very good at getting us all into the work. We were less concerned with being perfect, or grading based on programming, so we became more interested in creating than in obtaining As.</font></font></i> <p><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">His class was set up very nicely. Every meeting began with a lecture on topics ranging from design to current technological achievements, and then moved on to lab work. Since we had all been given a semester-long assignment to work on, everyone was constantly busy at their stations. Having class time to go over procedures and learn new ones was very beneficial, as was his personal instruction to those with project-specific questions.</font></font></i> <p><i><font face="Times"><font color="#314B66">As I stated before, I was nervous about taking Interactive Media, but Professor Fisher not only eased us into the process of creating a website, he made it fun and relevant to the world outside our classroom. He is certainly one of the most helpful and supportive professors I have had.</font></font></i> <br> <br> </blockquote> <font face="Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif"><font color="#29537D"><font size=+0>___________________________________________________________________________________________</font></font></font> <p><font face="Georgia, Times New Roman, Times, serif"><font size=-1><a href="Ebon_Fisher_Bio.html">BIO</a><font color="#A3B0DC">.</font><font color="#006666">|</font><font color="#A3B0DC">.</font><a href="Ebon_Fisher_resume2.html">RESUME</a><font color="#A3B0DC">.</font><font color="#006666">|</font><font color="#A3B0DC">.</font><a href="Ebon_Fisher_People_Quotes.html">COMMENTARIES</a><font color="#A3B0DC">.</font><font color="#006666">|</font><font color="#A3B0DC">.</font><a href="Ebon_Fisher_Media_Samples.html">PRESS</a><font color="#A3B0DC">.</font><font color="#006666">|</font><font color="#A3B0DC">.</font><font color="#184B81">EMAIL</font><font color="#A3B0DC">.</font><a href="mailto:[email protected]">[email protected]</a></font></font></blockquote> </body> </html>