Artist Statement

Me and Toni, we're like this (crossed index and middle fingers). Okay, I am referring to artist, Toni Dove, but I may have exaggerated on the connection. I did, however, have some email communication with her as she was kind enough to pass on her most current artist statement. (See previous post for full report.)

"A thread runs through all my work, - how do we make ourselves up? How do we think up who we are? How do the institutions around us shape how we think of ourselves? I'm interested in the history of automatons, robots and cyborgs, which are really dopplegangers, or doubles. They show us our deepest anxieties, what frightens us, what we love. The technologies around us affect us in ways we don't yet understand. What is the boundary between the computer and human touch, where does the body end? Our edges are blurry. I’m interested in the current mutations of cinema and how we inhabit media in a responsive or interactive sense. Can we occupy a character's point of view, see through someone else's eyes; walk around in the movie, be "in" the movie in a simulated physical sense? I always sit in the third row, so that tells you a lot.

Artists working with new technologies have the potential to make a fluctuating and confusing cultural landscape accessible to an audience. Emerging technologies that might otherwise be frightening because of the speed and scope of change they generate can be made coherent. Art that experiments with new technological syntax can help audiences make the shift from bystanders to participants in their own culture. I like working with something that is shaping the world I live in at this moment. It lets me participate in some small way in my own culture – and gives me some insight into forces changing my world. It’s also really fun to make these things and I work with a great team of people – it’s both a pleasure and an education."