Salon 33 // David Bloom, Lindsay Kokoska, Nina Sobell

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to our 33rd Textfreshism Virtual Salon. I am your host and moderator, Davonte Bradley. Joining me is Colin, who coined the term Textfreshism. Nina, David, and Lindsay are presenters for today, and our wonderful audience of other artists and art appreciators. It's going to be a great day, I think. We are, this is our last virtual salon for the year.

Unattributed

That's exciting. We've been at this for a full year now, or actually a little over a full year now, and we started during the pandemic of last year, and we're still in a pandemic, but it's okay. We're artists. We'll keep going. We'll keep creating. And, I don't know. Happy holidays. Happy holidays. Yes. I'm sorry. My wife had to remind me to let everyone know happy holidays, because we have a lot during this month at the end of the year. So many, actually. But if you are celebrating right now, happy holidays.

Unattributed

So if you are new here, the general structure for our salons is that we open with our presentations, our three presenters. Not entirely sure if we're going to have any new ones. We're going to do our format where we'll have a presenter, then Q&A, or just have all three presenters and then a Q&A. We do change things up sometimes, but if there is no preference, we'll still do, just have the presentation and then a Q&A session after that. And then next presentation, Q&A, presentation, Q&A. And there's a couple people, I think, that wanted to give a little bit, a little quick presentation, once the main presenters are over.

Unattributed

So, yeah. So we have that. I think Lee Schnaiberg is one of the, or no, not Lee. Okay. He's shaking his head at me. But yes, there are a couple of people that wanted to share a little bit about their craft and their work, some things that they're working on. Just a little tidbit. And then that'll be that.

Unattributed

Thank you for coming. Thank you for spending your afternoon slash evening with us, depending on what type of part of the world you're in. So now we do have some international folks that are here. And with that, I guess we'll get started with our first, our first presenter, David. Hello. Can you hear me? Yep, you have the floor.

Okay, I'm David Bloom. I'm located in Birmingham, Michigan, which is a suburb of Detroit. I'm a new artist. It's really cool to be here. I stumbled on technology. I'm a big fan of technology as a way of elevating and adding to and augmenting the work that I'm doing. There's not a huge body of work, but I will kind of take you through how I got to the whole technology thing and the project that involved technology and music. And then I'll talk a little bit about the Zip Us Up collaborative art project that we just completed in Birmingham. It was a national art project, a collaborative public art project with 40 artists. It was really interesting because we actually worked with 10 artists from around the country. So with that, let me share my screen.

David Bloom

To make sure I'm sharing sound. Okay, that's clicked. Can you guys see? Can you all see? Yep, we can see your screen. Okay. So this is kind of where... How do I move this out of the way? This is where my art as an adult started and my art's kind of based on connection and love and in the universe and vibration in the universe this is my first painting it's two hearts joined together and it's connected with the zipper and then the zipper opens there's men and women men's a man's suit fabric and a woman's dress fabric and then there's a painting behind it so that's kind of where things started this ended up going out to a show at the palace birdies art center I was really two years ago I was really excited about it and I like I spent like months working on this and this I did in a few days and I loved it so much and it was an accident.

David Bloom

It was supposed to be, this is, these color spectrums supposed to represent vibration in the universe from infrared or longer waved light to higher frequency, shorter wavelengths. And it was going to be colors all the way across. And I was in a hurry to finish, to submit this to and so I had put masking tape on everything and I pulled the tape up and I was going to do a second round of colors in between here and I liked it so much I said I'm done I don't want to add anything because I might wreck it I'm just happy so I and this is what it looks like and I'm going to do a second round of colors in between here and I'm going to do a second round of colors in between so much that I did another one and it wasn't as hard as one as much wasn't as much work to do as the other one and then I added a three-dimensional sine wave to it and I called this painting vibe because it was about vibration in the universe and it's that it's also an anacronym that needs something else and again it's a it's basically about vibration in the universe and this was my first take on like a month or two later I thought well gee if this painting is vibe and it's about vibrations then can I really can I make this thing vibrate so can we put and I have there's 10 colored stripes on here and I came up with the idea what if we put four bass guitar strings and six guitar strings on here which would get to 10 and could we do something so I knew a man named bob robert wilson who owns wilson violins he sells violins rents them repairs them and other stringed instruments I took it to him and he's as crazy as I am he also makes electric violins so he said well let's find out so we said well first we got to prototype it because if you're actually putting real strings on here it's under a lot of tension it can break things it can bend things so this is so we built that he built a prototype this is our this is our first prototype that he built there's a tuning machine on there we then morphed to we then went to a second prototype to look at the structure of it and that worked we then this is the prototype surrounding the painting.

David Bloom

This was a vibe was a 36 inch high by 48 inch wide work. So that's the prototype there. We then built he then built the basically it's basically the instrument part and it's a cocoon that the painting slides into. It slides in here and these are the tuning machines. Is what it looked like when the painting was inside we then we then painted it selected the paint for it and he had the idea of putting lights in and this is doing doing some construction work on it in his shop this is putting the strings on this is what the frame looks like and then we started experimenting with led light and putting it in here and you'll note that the led light it's not it's not a straight beam of light like you would or a bar like you would have like a neon like there are these dots and then here's the remote for the led light and this is the painting close to being finished on the easel at the shop this just shows you I mean these pieces here are designed to brace it so there was a lot of construction and engineering that went into this you'll also see this over here this wiring over here these are sound pickups that were custom made for the project we'd want I had originally wanted to use like electronic guitar pickups it was too hard to do so we decided to go with piezoelectric pickups which basically would basically pick up the vibrations and I found a company and I was trying to figure out which of their products to use because they had different ones.

David Bloom

It was K&K Sound in Oregon. I called them up and asked for some technical support and I told them what I was trying to do and I sent them photo and they said, well, send us some photos. So I sent them photos and some information and they said, no, you're not going to use what we have on the market. We're going to make something for you. So they actually made a custom pickup set consisting of three separate microphones to pick up the vibrations that are installed on the back of the painting. This is the painting with the light and then the frame and then the sound pickups there. And these actually, these pickups attach to the frame here, these cross beams that brace the painting.

David Bloom

We started when I talked about the LED light, I didn't like the bright dots. We wanted to smooth it out and make it look more like neon. So we experimented with a bunch of different materials and you can see this is one of our experiments. The other thing you'll also see is that the wood is going straight across the wood frame and we ended up putting in some frets at the top and the bottom here to protect the frame.

David Bloom

This is the painting again with, and you can see the dots that I wasn't particularly happy about. And then we started experimenting with putting some material in the gap here to smooth it out. And so that's why it looks like this here. So you can see that this is the Amplify. I went to a few amplifier stores, ended up experimenting with big amps, small amps. This is the amplifier I ended up getting. It's a $300 Yamaha Amplify. And you can adjust the sound on it. It's got different modes and it's portable. It's pretty cool. And I thought it went well with the project.

David Bloom

This is a bottom shot of the painting and it shows where the jack goes in to connect to the amplifier. It also comes with a radio receiver to remotely broadcast instead of using a cord if you want to do that. This is, these are the different microphone controls. So there's to control the sound from this side and this side because this side is higher frequency.

David Bloom

It's kind of like the left hand side of a piano and the right hand side. So the sound is more pronounced from this side because the notes are deeper. Sound is less pronounced here so it allows to adjust the sound coming from each side of it. And then that's the power switch. This is kind of what the painting looks like finished.

David Bloom

And you can see the frets that we put on the top and the bottom here. And these strings are all tunable. And that's kind of a side, kind of an angle view of it. And you can see the cord coming out. And interestingly, this, this was part of the painting before the sine wave. And so I used the red cord. So it kind of looks like the wave is continuing into the cord, which I think is kind of cool. So it kind of looks like the wave is continuing into the cord, which I think is kind of cool. And then this is my next iteration of VIBE. We're working on it now. It's going to have 48 guitar strings on it. It's going to have 24 in the bottom and 24 on the top. And then the strings will terminate in the middle. And if it comes out, I'm hoping it's kind of going to look like a suspension bridge. It'll be, hopefully it'll be cool if we can pull it off.

David Bloom

And then this is some experimentation that we did for Ben. And then this is some experimentation that we did for Ben. And we've been looking at this for a long time. And we've been looking at this for a long time. And we've been looking at this for a long time. And we've been looking at this for a long time. And we've been looking at this for a long time. And we've been looking at this for a long time. And we've been looking at this for a long time. And we've been looking at this for a long time.

David Bloom

And we've been looking at this for a long time. Clip. How many people can recognize what this is? Anybody recognize that? Goldfinger. Yeah, it's a James Bond thing. And there was, I borrowed, I didn't purchase it, but I borrowed a pedal to connect to the amplifier. So it was a loop pedal. So we could have sound in the background while this was played over. And this was played by a musician that getting his PhD and he works in the violin shop.

David Bloom

So that's kind of vibe. And then what I'm. Working on next. Then what I did was. I started last, last summer. Everybody remembers kind of how traumatic everything was with. With what happened with George Floyd and the whole election season, which was kind of horrible. So I wanted to do something to make a difference.

David Bloom

So I, I created this project called zip us up. And it's. It's a collaborative art project. And what we did is, and this kind of goes back to what I was doing before with the zippers. These are, these are zippers made by a Swiss manufacturer. Riri. We, we made up 40 panels of art, 40 canvases connected by zippers. This is 18 inches high. Most of the panels are 57 and a half inches long. One. One or two are shorter. And then a couple are 76 inches long. We picked through, through a cafe call for art. We chose 40 artists from around the country.

David Bloom

Chad Smith from the red hot chili peppers was one of our judges. Barbara Hellers, who's a director of the Detroit Institute of arts. David Chung, who is the director of the university of Michigan's master of fine arts program. We had a pastry chef and we had the architect for the library. We had the library involved. And so we had a very diverse panel. We had an African American art gallery owner. We had an artist from Syria is one of our judges and we put together a diverse project team and then a diverse panel of judges. And then we, we, we picked our 40 artists. We sent them, we made the canvas panels here in Michigan. Mr. Park volunteered to do all the sewing and didn't charge us. And worked over. The fourth of July weekend.

David Bloom

This is Laura host. Who's also an artist and an art teacher. And a gallery owner. And so you can see all the different canvas panels that, that, that we had made. We mailed them to the artists around the country. We had about 17 or 18 artists, Michigan. We had eight from California. We had one from Hawaii. They were from all over the country. This is one of the panels that came back. And then we, we gave. We told the artists that you can paint whatever you want, as long as it's not offensive. And we said, we told them that we wanted them to collaborate with the artists to the left and the right so that the paintings would connect. And it was kind of the idea was a unity through diversity and collaboration art project. So that's kind of the art. This, this painting here was painted by an Iraqi immigrant to the United States.

David Bloom

In it. He also painted a penny. And. You can't see it here. And it was a Lincoln penny and had 1776 on it. I nearly cried when, when I saw it to think that it turns out he's a Mason too. But just to think that an Iraqi immigrant would come here and he would be involved in this project about university. And then he would, you know, put the 1776 painting in there. I thought was incredible. This artist is up here. This artist is in Florida. And you can see how they collaborated. These paintings look amazing. And they look pretty seamless. And they were done by two different artists. And in two different places. This artist is in New Jersey and this is in Royal Oak. This one, and you can see how the paintings kind of connect.

David Bloom

This was installing the art and the library. Later on, we had another artist who said, let's put the artist names on there. So we, so she came over to the library and we put. We. She made panels out of the leftover canvas from the project. And painted the artist's name. So there's a panel in each window and then the artist's name is there and they're, and they're painted different colors.

David Bloom

This is kind of an overview of the project. It, it starts over here. It's 185 feet long. It wraps around the corner and then it goes wraps around this side. And then it goes into the courtyard here. With 40 panels of art. 40 is also. Interesting number. Cause it, it, it appears in the, in the bio. It's not the exact number. This is the side of the project that was used for the Bible quite a bit. The, you know, the 40 days of the flood, the 40 years in the desert. Jonah was in the whale for 40 days. So there's a significant. There's a significance there.

David Bloom

This is the, the South side. Of the project and you can see how the paintings connect with each other. That's another view. Another view of the South side. This is the corner. The first corner. Another shot of that. This is the East side. East side corner again. This is inside. So even if you're in the, the project was designed to be seen from the outside of the library. We didn't want it interfering with. The operation of the library, the light coming into the windows. So it, it basically from the bottom of this wall. Up to these posts and that's why it's 18 inches high. I mean, this is art. It's not just a painting. This is art in and of itself in the library with, with the different colors and the artists names going across.

David Bloom

This is the, this is the penny I was talking about before. And you can see how even on this side of it, I showed you the right side of the painting before even how, how this site connects with, with the artists that's over on the law. And this is another collaboration you can see going from the abstract into sea turtles and aquatic life.

David Bloom

This is the northeast corner, the north side, closer up of the north side here. And then this is the... Northwest side. I'm going into the courtyard. And I will show you guys the. The video here. You want to see it. Thank you. You Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much, David. Oh, and you already have a question. Yeah.

David Bloom

Marla? Would you mind unsharing your screen, David? Yeah, let me do that. Thank you. Thank you. So, David, I just wanted to ask if, number one, the end video, when you had close-ups and you could really see how each panel worked for the next one, that was really lovely. And the music was a nice enhancement. Did the artists have an opportunity to meet one another one way or another after the process was complete and the panels had been brought together? I'm just curious because I love the synergy between the panels, and it would be interesting to be a fly on the wall if they did have discussions.

David Bloom

So we had an opening here October 1st. And the project will be up through the end of May. And one of the artists actually traveled from California to the opening. And what was really cool is she zipped up the last panel for us when we were installing it. We finished installing it literally five minutes to 11. When was our opening ceremony? Wow. That's right. It was kind of a bear and a beast to get installed. A few of the artists knew each other. We had the artists write an essay about what it meant to be in the project. We didn't want somebody coming in the project that would be either too controversial, and we wanted to make sure the artists were going to collaborate.

David Bloom

Even so, some of the artists took to the collaboration like ducks to water. Others just wanted to do their own thing, and they still weren't getting the project. So we had to do it. We had to have several rounds of meetings with the artists to kind of convince them and say, hey, because there's prize money involved, too. The first prize is the best three-panel collaboration. And then the second and third of the prizes are the best individual panels. So kind of had to take the best collaboration that are one of the best ones that we saw and a few of them and say, hey, look at what some of your other artists are doing. You guys need to step up your game here. So.

David Bloom

So we had to encourage that to happen. In a couple of cases, we even encouraged the artists to meet. There was one artist that was a little older that was kind of set in her ways. And we ended up getting them to meet, and they were talking about paint. And I said, well, one of you lives in one part of town, and one of you lives in the other. Why don't you just take some paint over to the other artists? So they did. And then ended up improving it. And it ended up everybody that got pretty much everybody that got pushed came back and thanked us for pushing them. There was really only one artist that decided he wasn't going to collaborate with anybody. So the other people kind of painted around him. So it looks seamless.

David Bloom

So, yeah, it's mates. And there's a lot of emails going back and forth between the artists. So I think some people made some good friendships. And one other quick. Question being someone involved in lighting a lot. Did you end up what kind of material did you end up using to diffuse the light? Did you experiment with gels, lighting gels, or what do you decide on? Yes, it was a lighting. It's a lighting gel. And it was an opaque. It was an opaque gel.

David Bloom

And it's kind of it's kind of jammed in there. It's not it's not perfect. Yeah. And but it works. If we had to take it out and replace it, it would be a pain in the neck. But that's what we used. And we experimented with different materials and different channels to try and diffuse the light in a different way of installing it. This painting, the vibe, the painting was there and then the frame was built around it. The new one that we're doing, the paint, everything is integrated. So the design, it was designed, it's been designed for everything to fit together and for the lighting to be a part of it. So it's a totally it's not even a stretch canvas anymore. It's well, it's canvas on three, three wooden plywood boards.

David Bloom

So it's going to be a totally it's going to be a completely different construction. So we'll see how it works. Well, thank you for that question, Marlo. Did anyone else have any questions for David here? Yeah, I do. David, I'm really curious about your I'm really curious about your background. When I was reading before and at the beginning, you said that you came into art. And I'm wondering what it seems like you're bringing engineering and science into it. And I'm really curious about what are the elements, what your past and where you how you got here?

David Bloom

Well, I work at Ford in the automotive industry and purchasing. I did work for an automotive engineer. I'm not an engineer before that. I'm selling engineering services. And I'm very involved in our city government. I've been involved with our library, with the building of this building that this new addition and some other renovation. So when I saw this building going up, I said and I saw that wall there. I said, this looks like a painting canvas because I was new to art. So I took that. And the idea of the zipper and I combined everything. The I had met someone that I fell in love with. So and we were both into music and she taught me a lot about vibration. So.

David Bloom

So the idea of actually making this thing vibrate kind of came from that. That if that helps you. Yeah, I think it's a wonderful. I think it's really exciting where you're coming from. And. And what you bring to this is really is really exciting. And it shows a real uniqueness. Your work reminds me I kept on trying to remember the name. There's an artist up here in Canada who does a lot of stuff with lights and sound.

David Bloom

His name totally escapes me. He's an outsider. But I think it's really fantastic that you're blending all of these different aspects together. It's really exciting work. Thanks for the lighting. Didn't come. The idea of the lighting. Came from Mr. Wilson, who was who was working with me on this and who I went to for the violin stuff. So it's really been the work. The work is has been collaborative. Right. And it's been iterative, which is kind of cool.

David Bloom

It's really exciting. Thank you. All right. Thank you, Lee. Did anyone else have any further questions for David? Go on once. Go on twice. All right. I'm sure if anybody else has any questions, they'll come back to you after after the other presentations. Maybe they're saving it. I don't know. Sure. Could be ruminating. I hope I didn't go too long. I hope that I haven't done this before. So you're fine. And your presentation was great. Thanks. All right. Well, thank you so much for your presentation. It was great.

David Bloom

All right. All right. And next up, we have Lindsay. You still here?

Yes, I'm still here. Can you hear me? I have my earbuds in. I just want to make sure. Yeah, we can. Okay, cool. How are you? Let's go. Yep. I'm ready to go. I just want to say thanks to everyone for having me here. It's I don't know, really any of you. So it's kind of a pleasure to be included in your group. So I just want to say thank you. Glad to have you. Hey.

Lindsay Kokoska

All right. Let me just share this. So I'm going to present some of my work. I'm going to introduce myself first. I actually have an art name that I go by. I have gone by for the past, I would say six years. It's called Infinite Mantra. I'm a yoga teacher as well as an artist, as well as a teacher. And I was. I studied yoga. It was great business. I've done everything. I think if you're an artist, you pretty much do all kinds of things. So that's where really I am.

Lindsay Kokoska

So I'm not really going to read my artist bio. I'm just going to tell you. But it's there if anybody wants to see my presentation. I'm I can easily send the PDF if anybody wants to have a look at it. I kind of made like a deck for everyone to kind of check it out. So basically, I'm from Canada. I'm from Nova Scotia. I lived abroad most of my life and I started traveling and my travels kind of limited myself to doing my fine arts, which is, if you can see behind me, I used to do a lot of fine arts. So I started traveling, teaching, and I started with photography and I had a Y-com tablet and I had Photoshop. So my journeys from traditional art turned me to tech art, digital art in 2005, when I was living in South Korea as a teacher. It was so forward thinking and so fast paced that it really kind of pushed me into the digital age.

Lindsay Kokoska

And also I'm a techie. I think you call it a zennial. I'm between Gen X and the millennials. So I'm like, at age 10, I had computers and I was using Microsoft Paint. So, you know, I've always kind of been a digital artist because of where I kind of fit in that generational scheme. So once I, I also studied marketing and I have a master's in digital art and I'm actually a certified teacher as well as a yoga teacher. So I kind of, like I said, I'm a digital artist. So at the beginning, I'm, I've done everything. And I still, I just love art and I got into the NFT space. I think that's one of the reasons I found Techspressionism was from Giovanna because she and I met in the NFT space a few months ago. So my art is basically based on dreams and imagination and creativity. Like I said before, I'm a yoga teacher and meditation.

Lindsay Kokoska

And I'm really into. I'm really into like alchemy, spiritual aspects of, of everything. I would, I even go to, as far as saying, and I'm not, I'm not afraid of saying this anymore that I see visions of things. So I see a lot of things in my dreams and I immediately create them in my art. And that's what I love about digital art. I can just get it out there so quickly because I have these fast, fast flashes of visions, whether I'm doing it in a yoga practice or I see it in a dream. So I'm really excited to show you some of my work and I'm going to do that now. And I'm going to show you my progression from when I started in the NFT space to kind of my progression through the NFT space and then my future collections as I kind of mapped out. So I hope you all enjoy what I'm going to show you.

Lindsay Kokoska

So these are collections I have on foundation and I just have a three peak collection there. They're sold out. I started with. Can you see this little cursor here, the blue cursor? Yeah. Okay, great. So this is my very first piece. I call it Cosmic Coalition. I do digital. I think my style is surreal fantasy. I do digital collage and painting together. I just like take everything that I do and I just blend it together. So I want my, my, my visions to look, even if they're collage, I want them to look very real. So I take a lot of time to make sure everything is real. Everything is blended perfectly in there so you can't see cut lines and stuff. I just wanted to really fit the dream. So this is my very first piece that I minted back in February and it's one of my favourite pieces. It's kind of about the power of the Jaguar and how they're such mystical creatures.

Lindsay Kokoska

They're known well in like the Indigenous cultures of South America. Yeah. So there's a lot of spiritual symbolism in my work. There's pyramids. So you'll see a lot of repetitive elements within my work. And it's the way it is. That's how I want it to be. So that's this piece. The second piece is actually an ode to my stuffed animal as a child. I used to have a little jaguar. And this piece, I wish I could show you the animated version. It kind of breathes. It goes in and out. And it's kind of like you're watching a dream. And there's some animation in the background. It's actually in my bio. There's all kinds of links to my foundation piece where you can see this. But this would be me in my dream world of me and my stuffed animal as a child. So that was this.

Lindsay Kokoska

And I'm very much into space and astronomy. There was a movie back in the 90s called, oh, my God, I forget the name. It was. It was with Jodie Foster. I forget the name. It was such a good movie. But she wanted to go to another star system. But I've always been inspired by, like, does anybody know it? Contact. Yes. It was, like, my favorite movie. So it's still to date. Every space movie, like, I'm pretty much inspired by. So I would say that my art kind of turns into kind of concept work as I kind of progress onward.

Lindsay Kokoska

But, yeah, that's what this is. This is inspired by. And the background is actually from an old National Geographic magazine. So there's lots of cool little elements that I combined. This next piece I made for, like, International Women's Day. This woman here is Empress Theodora of the Byzantine Empire.

Lindsay Kokoska

And she was really pro-woman, pro-taking care of people and so on and so forth. So I really wanted to. I wanted to embody her power. So that was the goal of this piece here. And, yeah, there's lots of symbolism stars. I do a lot of sacred geometry just to kind of embody the most, like, divine elements of energy or a person or a being.

Lindsay Kokoska

So this is my known origin collection. You'll see it's slightly different. But I think you can still probably see my signatures in it. I use a lot of clouds. I use a lot of line work. So this was to embody earth. There's a little earth inside the flower. Hummingbirds represent, you know, good luck. So a lot of the things that I create are messages to people, even if they don't know they're getting the messages. They're just to show some kind of.

Lindsay Kokoska

I'll keep saying the word energy or imprint. So everybody might find or find something within the pieces that resonate. And it's supposed to be like that. So this one is definitely to represent the earth and the beauty that was found within earth. And this piece, ethereal garden, I made kind of based off of I had a lot of conversations during the time I was making this with friends about psychedelics.

Lindsay Kokoska

And about just plant medicine and meditation. And so this piece. This piece really embodies like that state of being when you. You kind of find your yourself, your higher self. So when you find your higher self, it's usually through nature. It's usually a lot pure. It's not. It's not contrived. So there's all these elements within nature inside of us. So I call that ethereal garden. And of course, I still have elements of the moon and cosmic elements. So. Super important. To me to add that. I joke around and tell you I'm from another galaxy. But. I don't care.

Lindsay Kokoska

This piece is called uncovered. I made this for. Actually, I didn't make it for. I had it ready. And then there was a. An exhibition in New York called Mask Ephemera. And I called this uncovered. And it suited well for the exhibition. The exhibition was for. Masks at different facades. So this is like uncovering of ourselves. So they go together as a collection in a way, because this is kind of within us and same here, except this is the face or the mask taken off, or it could be the mask over us, but usually it's whatever is within us that I try to portray in my work. So.

Lindsay Kokoska

Yeah. And then. I have more. I have another collection. That I did. I have a collection that I did on open seat. And these are additions that I've done. So some of them are still for sale. Some of them are gone. But I, if any of you know the book, the alchemist. By Paulo Coelho. It's my favorite book in the entire world. I actually taught several courses to children and. High school kids as well about. The book. And I dedicated.

Lindsay Kokoska

I do have more pieces to this collection, but I haven't. Minted them. But they're all representative. Of that book and what the book embodies. So. Everything I kind of do is just inspired by some. Sort of journey. And this book was like a big, big, very big impact on my life. So you have the alchemist here. He's actually walking through the desert. And just like the power that resonates in the sky.

Lindsay Kokoska

Here you have. Him. Going into the very end of the book where he finds the pyramids finds the treasures. That's where. It's. The end of the book would be. And then you have the watcher, the Bedouin watching over the people of the desert. And of course there's lots of cosmic elements. Within all of them.

Lindsay Kokoska

I have one more collection that's minted. And it's a pretty big collection. I meant it on maker's place. Most of them have to do. I called the, the, the collection cloud dreamers. And again, it's. Mostly about. You know, energy. And it's a little bit of a. It's a little bit of a. It's a little bit of a fantasy. It's very fantasy based.

Lindsay Kokoska

I mean, I, if I could, I would live in my art. Like I'm glad that it was in my head at least. I do like to escape. So it's very much escape as. This is in the Pilates. So you can see the star system. So I called it star seed. Just, you know, imagining yourself and the wonder of who you are and what's out there.

Lindsay Kokoska

That's what this represents. I really love this piece. This piece is called breakthrough. Actually made us when I was going through a really tough time. So I always believed the highs and the lows are always there to teach you something. So. The moment I actually made this, I broke through. So I first had called this breakdown to break through, but I just took the breakdown. Down so breakthrough is what I call this so you can see it's quite literal you she's breaking through herself you know breaking through limitless bound of bounds that you might have and this one's all in balance this is actually made for an astrological event that happened in September I believe it's called all in balance and there was a like a new moon at the time and you can see the moon phases I'm just showing the when I say all in balance there's like there's the scale here if you know Libra season it is a scale of up and down so I made that to represent this energy during that time I have two more in that specific kind of cloud dreamer collection a door of the clouds I made this with while I was listening to a singer on clubhouse one night her name's Tara Naomi I don't know if anyone knows her she's a folk singer but I was listening to her while she was singing and I ended up creating this and right now I have these two pieces exhibited in Hong Kong so it's nice to see them on screen somewhere in a gallery it's pretty cool but they're both again this one's representative of like a place when you walk if you're in the dream and you walk through this gate so it's again very like very fantasy based very you know spiritual so if you were floating in the dream that's kind of what I would like you to be and this is a woman letting go falling into the clouds releasing a lot of when you have a full moon it means the end of something or the we always assume like the full moon is like the full flower it's when everything is ready so it's time to let go and time time to kind of you know be present so this is what this piece embodies and I have two more pieces in the collection and they are cosmic dreamer and rebirth I've sold this one and this one is still available and they actually go together so it's a little bit disappointed that the collector didn't pick up both of them but they are two pieces that are both very different and they're both very different and they're both very different so I think it's quite quite literal what their meanings are it's just you know being free being being and also being released from any pain so I do have I'm just going to briefly go through some future collections I have just to show you a different range of my work I have some things that I haven't minted yet and you can still see them in the description box but I'm sort of the themes I love love the desert I lived in Morocco for a long time and the Middle East and so I have a kind of affinity for any of the any of the deserts and you can see there's always the cloud themes moon stars this piece is quite interesting I had a kind of idea of seeing what would it be like if you had that I don't know it's like a death near-death experience what it would be like or what if you were in a dream and you see yourself in a dream and you see yourself so this kind of like what was it like to be on the other side so I think that would be really cool because I often wonder what is it like to be somewhere else is there a mirror of ourselves somewhere I think there is but you know I can only see it in my mind so I just have to create it I have some more pieces I still I'm not sure where to mint these yet it's a it's a I have no idea what to do with half of the work I have at the moment because it's so expensive to put them on there but it's still something that I would love to try so that's why I put them all on the blockchain but I try to keep them all in a collection as I said I love the desert and I'd like to keep the themes together but these are really special to me just always crossing through breaking through something going into portals going into dreams there's sacred geometry so it's really part of my vibe I guess I have a lot of portrait work I'm doing I'd like to do portraits of people I actually recreated this for a client with her face in it so it was interesting to see I had a lot of people like this piece the healer so I'm hoping to mint these sort of portraits eventually in the new year and then I have some more cosmic pieces briefly show you them I also have some graphic work I am a graphic designer and I've done some graphic design work with graphic designer.

Lindsay Kokoska

So this looks a lot different from my work, but it's not different for me. I do have a lot of pieces that have graphic elements within them that you might have noticed. There's lots of sacred geometry or snakes within some of my work, but they're hidden. I'm thinking to release these quite soon, actually before the new year.

Lindsay Kokoska

And then I have some basic stuff from the moon phase, very, very basic, but actually sold these. I sell these as prints and an art shop. So I just thought, hey, I'd throw these in here just for fun. I have some lunation pieces of eclipses. I'm really into how eclipses are really, how they affect us. So I'm very into astrology. If I haven't said that, I really, really find it fascinating. And then I have a few more landscape escapes here just to show you the range of my work. I actually have a print of that behind me here. So yeah, I really love working with just the abstract collections.

Lindsay Kokoska

I don't want to take up too much time. Oh, I have these mudras. These are yoga mudras. Oh, and I have them duplicated. Of course I do, because I was doing this really fast. There's an extra one, but I really find it interesting meditation. So I did these a few years ago and yeah, it's probably going to put them in my collection. So I'm going to show you a few more of them. So I'm going to show you a few more of them up on the blockchain and then in the next few years. So that's it.

Lindsay Kokoska

All right. Thank you so much, Lindsay. I tried to do that fast, so I didn't take up too much time. You're fine. I think we're actually got some extra time now. So if there are any questions for Lindsay now, it'd be a great time to ask them either in the chat and I'll get to them, or you could unmute yourself or raise your hand and then unmute. Yourself either works.

Lindsay Kokoska

But let me just go through the chat real quick. I had a question. Yeah, sure. I'm new here. So, but I was wondering if you could, Lindsay, if you could pick one of yours and sort of walk us through your process a little bit, like pick one of your. Sure. I almost think I should maybe even show a process video, but I don't have one loaded.

Lindsay Kokoska

I should have had one ready. Well, basically, would you like me to share again? Yeah, you can share. Let's see. Okay. Let's go back to you. See. I'm going to actually talk about. This one here beyond the desert. What's interesting is. Okay. So I use. iPad pro. I use procreate, but I always will start with start and finish with Photoshop. So I start with Photoshop to clean all my elements. So I have the desert element underneath here and I'd have. I'd have to clean up everything. So these cloud layers that you see here. There's actually, I think.

Lindsay Kokoska

Not correct. I'm not going to be able to find it. I believe I have. About. 15 layers of these clouds. So it's an image of clouds. And I want it, as I said in the beginning, I'd like it to look like it's seamless. So I don't want it. Like I want the clouds to actually look. Like they're underneath or floating. And not just. Pieced in. So I use. I'll take the picture. Of the clouds and I will. Do duplicate the layer several times. And. I'll erase paint. If that makes sense. So instead of using a paintbrush. I'll use a procreate.

Lindsay Kokoska

The eraser brush, but I'm able to choose different brushes to kind of get the blending technique and I erase using. I paint using the eraser. So I like it's like subtractive painting. Really, if you know, like the old masters, how they would like paint the canvas. You know, the, the raw umber and then scrape oats. And then, so I do like kind of subtracted work. So that's how I do a lot of these pieces.

Lindsay Kokoska

For me, everything has to be super seamless. So it does like most of my work has like at least minimum 70 layers of work. The more basic. Layers. These are not basic at all. This I say with this piece probably only has about 20 layers. There's a. There's a background piece. An earth piece and then there's a cloud piece and then there's like lots of cloud layers to get that technique that is blended in. So it's not just a pasted on.

Lindsay Kokoska

But basically I start with research I research a lot because I do collage. I have to, you know, go through public domain images. Because I have to make sure everything is, you know, Copyright free to use or if it's my own work. I used to do a lot of photography myself. But just since the pandemic. It's not possible for me to go shoot or travel even to get these cool, you know, pictures so I can get lots of clouds photographing classes very easy, but not the rest. So, you know, sourcing images is the first step.

Lindsay Kokoska

And sometimes like I have to work really fast. Because if an idea comes in my head. I have to just throw it together and then I'll build on it might take me weeks, but I have to throw something together to make sure that I remember what that concept was in the beginning. Yeah, all of my techniques have that subtractive layered look. So there's always like a top layer and there's several layers going back if I had a perspective would be going back like that.

Lindsay Kokoska

This woman isn't actually here. She's from an old, old painting I found And this water isn't really there. I just put it there. So there's just, you know, it's me trying to come up with these concepts. So for example, I made this thinking of a water element water astrological element. And that's why there's an element of water here. And I believe I made this for Pisces. If you know Pisces are Pisces are water dreamers fish so dreamy symbolizes their dreams and then the water. Symbolizes their element. So I have my processes all about the concept concept and then bringing everything together. Technically, it's a lot of like layers cutting out things blending things painting.

Lindsay Kokoska

A paint all these like lines here little elements here if it's a person's face. I really love doing this type of work on the faces. That's really fun for me to kind of create like sort of this mask. For people I also love the movie Avatar. So if you know that movie. Obviously, we all know the movie Avatar. I always think about what if we were in those movies so Yeah, this is a really, really old painting back in here and I've taken all the elements out of the painting and cut them out and painted them back on top. So the base layer of the paintings there the man in the cloud, but the clouds, the man, the clouds and then Elements of the painting. Even I can't really see it, but there's a little be here is beach to technically be flat underneath them, but I've isolated to be taken him off and put him on top of him, but it's still in the same position where it would be on the canvas behind him.

Lindsay Kokoska

So it's just all about working with what I have and making it look 3D, even though it's 2D. I don't know. I have taught myself a lot of things I did go to I went to Toronto School of Art and when I did my Masters of Digital Art. It was mostly, you know, just learning You know Photoshop like learning the system, not necessarily learning my style. So my style has really developed since 2000 and I say 13 since I had my son. You know, when you're a mom and you're with a kid and there's a break. I spent most my time making art. So I was lucky to be able to do that. So, and he's pretty cool. So he's inspired me That's a long winded answer to that. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you.

Lindsay Kokoska

I think we got a solid insight into your process, at least, you didn't have a chance to actually like do it or show it, but I think we had a good idea. Thanks. I have a question about your choice of platforms, you know, is there some particular reason why you would mint one piece on one platform versus the other. And I've been also thinking about I'm on Facebook. I'm on the foundation right now, but I was thinking about moving to open sea for like still images versus time based work or, you know, I just was interested in why you selected the platforms that you meant on and if you think there's any particular differences.

Lindsay Kokoska

You know, among them. Well, for me, it was just a learning process in the beginning. So foundation. I started because I had an invitation right away at the beginning. And I just went, okay, didn't know anything. And I just started going, but it was expensive. It was really expensive. And I think in the total when you think about that last fee, even releasing The fee could be a potential fourth fee. There's three fees for sure there's a potential fourth fee if the collector doesn't release the work. I don't doesn't sit well with me at all, even though I've, you know, I've made enough to like mint again there, but I don't feel like spending my money on gas fees. I don't think anybody should be spending that much money on gas. So I thought about their collections and staying there. But it's just a lot.

Lindsay Kokoska

I have applied to super rare. I know it's a little bit harder. And I think they only take brands now and people who have like agents and there. I've heard some stories that it's really difficult to get on super rare, which is kind of a bummer. But on makers place was I wanted to make resources most recent place I put things on And I put that entire cloud dreamer collection because I wanted to finally put out something That was in one big collection. But again, I paid At least $100 to mint each one. And I still think that's a lot of money.

Lindsay Kokoska

Known origin. Still the same sort of thing. I wanted to try. It's like you just you get on and you try and I still think it's a slow moving platform. I don't see a lot of traction on that platform. And even with makers place you can't The first month they featured me. So I had a lot of people following me and I have, you know, I was obviously on the front page. So I think that's how my collector saw me there. And now it's pretty much crickets.

Lindsay Kokoska

I like and don't like open seat like my I have a collection on open scene. I'm considering minting a few pieces on open see those graphic black pieces that I showed at the end, the ones that are very different from my work because I don't mind releasing them because I sell them as Prince at the moment. So to me they're not They're okay to test with open see is great because of the gasless minting and I love it. I like that. But then I worry about the contract because it's a shared contract. So that's the only thing. And so moving forward. I'm holding back a little bit. I don't know where that's why I have all this work and I still haven't minted because I don't know where to put it. There's Some Bitcoin platforms coming out. There's Coinbase. There's some polygon, you know, so I'm really open to see what's happening.

Lindsay Kokoska

And I know there's been that FOMO to rush and mint, but I think it's I think we have to really I think we have to really Be careful and not to just spend our money and make profit. Let's get give out the people our profits for what, you know, That makes any sense. So I don't really have the best answer for that. But I think it's just experimentation and just doing what's best. That's cost effective to I don't think we should all be like spending money.

Lindsay Kokoska

With foundation. I saw I saw that they were like, you know, introduced collections recently. Do you know if that's Do you know if that's Similar to OpenSea where you admit a whole bunch of work at one time or is it basically you pay a gas to create the collection and every single piece you meant you also pay gas fees to add them to the collection. Yes. What I do know is one of the emails that I read was be aware that it's going to be more expensive to mint. So there's no there's not gonna be any gasless minting like that. So it's going to be if it costs you $100 to list. Are you going to pay $100 for minting? To list four pieces and $100 each, so $100 each to list and then $100 each to mint. That's crazy. I hope it's not like that. I should test it out, but you can only test it out when you're actually there looking at the gas.

Lindsay Kokoska

So how do you know? I guess it's good to ask other people, but I don't agree with that. They're already making a lot of money off of artists and they should be helping artists more, I think. And rant. That's fair. That's very fair. And the subject of NFTs and just how cost prohibitive it can be for a lot of artists, especially just starting out. Yeah.

Lindsay Kokoska

It's very there. It is. I don't know. I feel that is actually... It's a subject that we could probably go on and on and on about if we let ourselves get carried away with it. Yeah. Did anyone else have any other questions for Lindsay before we move on to our third presentation for this afternoon or this session?

Lindsay Kokoska

Or we'll circle back around to the after party if you're still sticking around. But with that, I guess, thank you so much for presenting, Lindsay. Thank you for your time.

Thank you. All right. And now, last but definitely not least, Nina. Are you ready to present? Oh, you're muted, by the way. Yes, I'm ready. I need to share my screen. Okay. And share the sound. And without further ado, I'm going to play... I'm going to screen the very last thing that I made for you. All right.

Nina Sobell

Share. Share sound. Where is share sound? It should be in the little bar where it says that you're sharing. Can you screen share it? Okay. I think it comes up. You might have to stop the share and then reshare. It comes up when you first click the share screen. There's a little checkbox. And then you have to check that and then hit the start.

Nina Sobell

Oh. Hello? Yep. We're still here. Okay. Gee. If you're not sharing a sound from the actual computer, like the videos, then you don't need to check the box if you're just sharing the sound. Oh, you are. I am. Okay. You might need to stop the share and then hit share screen again. And then there should be a checkbox on that prompt. And then you hit the start sharing after you check it.

Nina Sobell

You...... You are using enhanced encryption. Oh. Hmm. Dr. Top. Why would I be using............ Should I try to play it and see if the sound comes through? Yeah, go ahead and try. That's a good idea. Oh. Hmm. Yeah, that's the only thing I can do. You're going to have to take the test to see if you can see it. But you can't just...

Nina Sobell

You can't just have to take the test to see if you can see it. You can't just have to take the test to see if you can see it. You can't just have to take the test to see if you can see it. You can't just have to take the test to see if you can see it. You can't just have to take the test to see if you can see it.

Nina Sobell

Thing. Maybe she. Nina, I'm not sure, but you might have to go to play. Yeah, that button on the top left, right above the slide. That will play from the very start. Oh, right. But I'm not sure in this mode that you can play the video in keynote, having worked with someone recently. Here it goes. Oh, okay. Do you hear it?

Nina Sobell

Do you hear the sound? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, but that's the sound playing back on your local computer through your microphone. Yeah. Yeah. But I mean, we can still hear it. How will you do it? I think that'll probably work. Yeah. For the time being, I think this is as good as we're going to get for the moment.

Nina Sobell

At least hear some of it. You know what? You could export to a.mov. Or if you have the video in a folder somewhere, you could play it directly, too. You know, if you've selected the slide, you hit that play at the top. I'm going to play it from my photos. Thank you. Oh I'm sorry oh no worries happened to me many a time no worries to be an artist that works with technology it does not behave the way we want it to sometimes so it's like that if you take this section that you want to play and it'll go really quickly just go into keynote and click on those slides and then just export as movie a dot move and I think that would work and it happens quickly I wish I could be more assistance but I don't use a Mac do you see a share sound in the bottom left hand corner of your selection your share selection window what's that do you see a share sound in the bottom left hand corner of your button or icon no I don't bottom left the bottom left of your share move to bottom it says move to bottom so where you know I have an unmute there's a little up carrot arrow there unmute yeah okay the next to it's the up carrot and there should be if you tap that you'll see a whole lot more of that more options oh yeah I do okay so select speaker jumps in you should be able to output which one should I click on probably want to do on your share screen on share screen there's a share audio option under here audio settings yes you want to be able to talk over two at the same time yeah that's yeah you'd have to keep keep flipping between built-in and headphone and microphone.

Nina Sobell

But you could do jump to desktop audio up under the... To your right next to test speaker. Is the menu there? If you tap that, click that. Yeah. You don't have jump to desktop audio. So version. Yeah. There's options in the latest version of Zoom to jump to desktop audio or jump to desktop microphone, which allow you to switch back and forth between them.

Nina Sobell

Oh. Well, we tried. We tried. Maybe loading up. It's loading up. Maybe Oh, ah. You know, I was going to say maybe put this aside for a moment and go through your history. If you have a retrospective, that would be, I think, very interesting to see. Yes. I have a lot of the other stuff is easier to show.

Nina Sobell

Maybe switch to that for the moment. I think that would be good. Although, you know, Nita. I think you just hit play at the top. You've selected the slide. Yeah. Like that. It should play from the slide you selected. So just try it. That's what Ron suggested. Yeah. Yeah. Yes. It's not saying. Maybe you have to go play again and just select, you know, see what. What? Hold down play. Oh, yeah. Oh, good. Oh, stop.

Nina Sobell

Oh. Oh, out of there. Oh. Go back to play again. I think you have to be in play mode up to play the top. All right. Yeah. Maybe that play that might work. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Now. So I'm going to do a let's see. So I'm going to do a let's see. So I'm going to do a let's see. And then I'm going to do a let's see. And then I'm going to do a let's see. And then I'm going to do a let's see. And then I'm going to do a let's see. And then I'm going to do a let's see. And then I'm going to do a let's see. And then I'm going to do a let's see.

Nina Sobell

And then I'm going to do a let's see. And then I'm going to do a let's see. And then I'm going to do a let's see. I always paste a link into the chat. Maybe click it again, Nina. It might start now. It might take a second to load. So click that little arrow you're on again. See if it plays. Yeah, the one you were on. Just click it again, toggle it.

Nina Sobell

I don't know. No. Looks like it's not responding for some reason. I would maybe take just take your presentation from the top. OK. All right. Take the next one then, right? And I'll post this somehow later. I don't know what to do. That's a good idea. Yeah. Maybe work with Davo a little bit before and you do it again another time, you know, where you guys have kind of tested it out. Yeah. Yeah. Good idea. OK, let's try the next one. Do you want to start maybe from the very beginning, Nina? Just to go from the beginning. That was the beginning.

Nina Sobell

Oh, I see. They're nodding. I began at the end. I mean, I did it from the beginning. And then it was my whole history. And then it came back. And then it came back to my last work that I did, which at the very end. So I said, well, no, I think I'll do it in reverse. I'll start with what I did last and go back to the beginning.

Nina Sobell

So now, Nina, I know maybe I'm not understanding. But if you went up to the light blue at the very top and went to play and under play, see where it says arrange view. No, above that play. Go up further, higher. Keynote. Go over to play. Slide, format, arrange view, play. In the very top menu in that light blue, just go all the way across to where it says play. Oh, yeah. And if you hold that down and you say play slideshow, you can click through it with your arrow buttons till you get to where that might work. Maybe try it before we give this up for another time.

Nina Sobell

Just to see. Give it a second. And then maybe give it a minute. And just hit your back and your forward and backward keys. Maybe on your computer keyboard to advance or to play it. It'll go to the. Well, maybe go back now. Go back one and see if it'll play it. Give it a second. Or click on it or see if that, you know, as Nina was, Nina number two was helping you. Maybe, maybe it'll come up. Not sure why it's not playing.

Nina Sobell

Hmm. Oh, well. Trying to help. Happen. Well, yeah, I guess so. I'll post it next time or posted someplace. How about this one? So let's see if this one. Oh, how do we make this go away? You have to go back to play and be, I think you got out of play where we were before. Up in the top where you go to play and then underneath it says play slideshow. I don't think you're out of play. How do I, how do I get rid of this doc? This is.

Nina Sobell

Do you want to the, just the image to be the full screen? Do you do? Yeah. Can you see my screen now? Yeah, we could see it. Did you want to get rid of the presenter view? Like the text? This, this doc thing here. Yeah. I think if you just hit play, it'll, it'll go to the full screen. And then you can see the screen view of the image. And you wouldn't see the. Other stuff.

Nina Sobell

Yeah. The play button up. Oh. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Unseen unheard brings to light from darkness to metaphorical images of the invisible pervasive viruses and training our world. By exposing pictures of avoid and rendering these transformations perceptible a sequence of configurations emerges first sweeping the earth unfolding up to the sky and beyond. On into spatial trajectories, returning to Earth, blending with the human in hybrid form.

Nina Sobell

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. These are very low frequency sounds. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I think I just heard Nina saying what to do. But what did you say, Nina, what to do about the dot move? Can anybody hear me? Yeah, we're still here. Is Nina Yankowitz still there? Yes, she is currently muted though. Oh, what did you say Nina to do with the with the Okay, I was trying to unmute I'm sorry. I was saying that you, if you choose you, you go through your keynote and click on the ones that you want to show.

Nina Sobell

And there's also to the right it'll tell you how many seconds you want between it between each slide you then you can export it to a dot move and that might be easier to do maybe I mean I used to do that I don't I don't know what version you have of you know Okay, well, I'll move on and I'll send out the last one in another way.

Nina Sobell

Okay, Unseen, I changed, I went from the movie, I went from the stills to the movie and then back again. And I published this book of 24 pages, four columns each, four shots per column. And there's 24 pages and it comes in a book form. Yeah. These are deeply glitched images from the darkest of slides that reveal colors and forms with surreal qualities and magical connotations.

Nina Sobell

And it was all about the virus seeping into the world and unbeknownst to us. And before that, I was playing with animation and just playing around. Around and studying animation, studying ways in which to express myself. And this used to have sound, but I took the sound off. And there's a I was commissioned to do the video gray matters with music by Laura Ortman and I began to think of the origins of the universe of the smallest black speck of dust and how it might have formed by centrifugal force into our galaxy. It was through this contemplation and meditation that these images evolved.

Nina Sobell

And also thinking of the universal body part, mammals, things like that. Subtitles by the Amara.org community This was an investigation, a complete investigation. But it was in 2016 that I did this. So I hope to be able to still show you the new images. They're filled with discovery and such. Okay. I'm going to show you where you can find a mini retrospective on Nohio.

Nina Sobell

It's on Bjorn Magnolian's site. And it's called The Hindsight is 2020 and he's sponsoring this little mini retrospective. And there's a couple of ones that I wanted to show you from 2016 too. Okay. And all the sound is my own... Okay. So I'm going to start with the... Oh, set up professional audio in audio settings.

Nina Sobell

Okay. And showing you where I came from. I did a video called the investigation into the creative process I forced myself to talk while sculpting a model but when it came to time to concentrate on the details of her face I could no longer speak I wish this doc would go but so it was my realization that it's really hard to speak while you're making art unless you're a poet and whatever and this proved it I as I say I never looked at the model directly I only looked at the monitor and at with the clay on the monitor as it is now as you see it and then when I got to the details right here I couldn't speak anymore it was all non-verbal it's your right brain takes over when you're when you're creating and there you are now here enrico at the rico maresca gallery in new york alice sat here was a very early drone mobile data collection and surveillance project I wish I could get rid of this dog a surveillance project which enabled web visitors or passers-by to personally review personally view the interior of the code show curated by Roz Dimon our very own Roz Dimon at the rico maresca gallery its key component was a telerobotic camera alice's eye and alice's eye was mounted on a wireless rolling chair web users and what passers-by could control the telerobotic cameras movement remotely either by directing a personal directing a person riding around on her the web users sure were or via touch pads in the front window of the gallery through one web interface the touch pad surrounded a closed circuit monitor these touchpads were made out of even more low-psi respondent iranian sun webs and all of the technology wasove from the book of alice's position and what we were able to do with the red dev want to show you is that of the public from the room of the culture will be able to web viewers in real time.

Nina Sobell

Web participants could also point the camera at the rear view mirror on the handlebars, and that identified the face of anyone riding the chair to web viewers. So Bell and Hartsell, this is Emily Hartsell and I collaborated on Park Bench together at NYU Center for Advanced... And that's how this occurred.

Nina Sobell

Collaboration. Describe the piece as a passage between physical and cyberspace. We converge from website and street side, explore parallel spaces separated by glass and peer through the membrane at each other's representation. And then in 1999, we did Park Bench at Banff Center for the Arts. Web seances, web seance, brainwave drawings illustrates Park Bench. His commitment to address physical disconnectedness of the information age by creating network seances that connect physical and cyberspace via neural presence and meditation. The medium is truly the medium in these seances in which a web-based artificially intelligent chatterbot leads the seance. The website gives the audience a place on the web to join hands.

Nina Sobell

Keeps track of those present. And lets them know who else is there with them. And this was the eye of a person in Banff and the eye of a person in New York, Heather Wagner. And the more the globes showed up on the screen, the more participants were present, were seen. And in the interest of time, I'm going to...

Nina Sobell

Go to... This is another... I'm going to go to my first... This is silent conversation with Anne Bean and a seance in Paris in France between her on the boat in the English Channel and me and Anders Manson at the Chateau de Sous-Saint. And me and Anders Manson at the Chateau de Sous-Saint. This is Anne Bean's piece and she was making one minute drawings every five minutes, every four minutes before for an hour before the eclipse. And these are the drawings from the Chateau and from the English Channel and you can see how they are connected to each other. It was amazing. And if you go on this site in my site in Park Bench, you'll find this timeline and you'll find other ones just as amazing as that. And there was this... Article in the paper and these were conversations silent conversations we had in 1978 and we made drawings from our silent conversations and this is these are very early computer graphics of the combination of well I'll play the tape I'll play hopefully this movie Nina Sobell has been intrigued by the idea of being able to capture the emittance of electrical impulses by the brain and transposing them into a graphic image since 1973 she began to collaborate with systems engineer Michael Trivich on the monitor two people were able to see their physical as well as mental image they were able to create one composite brainwave drawing in real time Savelle was determined to devise a non-competitive creative environment geared to home TV viewers who could create an active rather than passive TV viewing experience and enhance their ability to communicate Dr.

Nina Sobell

Barry Sturman of the Sepulveda Veterans Administration Hospital in California offered access to equipment as the director of the neuropsychology lab he was most interested in the psycho-sociological aspects of the piece the electrodes were attached to the occipital region of the brain the visual cortex of two participants they sat comfortably in front of the monitor which displayed their faces and the superimposed composite brainwave information the real-time Lise-Chou pattern changed in accordance with the brainwave activity when both people put out the same brainwave it formed an irregular circular configuration non-verbal communication between the participants was the objective when one person was distracted it appeared as distortion horizontally or vertically depending upon the axis which displayed his or her brainwave pattern the results were averaged through a PDP-10 computer and proved that two people could influence each other's mind states non-verbally I'm going to just interrupt that because you can see that on my video I'm going to just interrupt that because you can see that on my video I'm going to just interrupt that because you can see that on my video this is a slide from Christina Albu's discussion of invisible entanglements art distant connections and biofeedback at Ars Electronica and the following is from an article in Camera Obscura Journal 2020 telepathic brainwave drawings when both people emitted the same brainwave simultaneously can you see my arrow I hope so it made a circular configuration and when they diverged the circle distorted horizontally or vertically depending on the neural frequency of individual participants so here they come together as a circle and then here's the horizontal or the vertical distortion and yeah!

Nina Sobell

And this was an excerpt from the brain art book edited by Nigel Nigel Nigel Anton Nigel I'm sorry I'm sorry Anton I know you're here and I thought of myself as an electronic medium and since I was born I was able to see the world as an electronic medium or something so when I was working with video I started to create an internal and external video portrait of two people dissolving images of their brainwave oscillations over their faces as their interaction was being simultaneously videotaped I invited participants to engage in telepathic communication as I began concentrating on expressing visually their synchronous and asynchronous brainwave patterns together with systems engineer Mike Trivich. We created one of the first visual interfaces for two people to communicate non-verbally.

Nina Sobell

And I think that it'll start from the beginning if I play it again. Yeah, no, okay. All right. I don't know whether to stop or to... The link between sophisticated EEG equipment and the Apple computer. After extensive testing, an environment was opened to the public at the Long Beach Museum of Art in the Artist and the Computer Show. A computer program was created by Kong Liu, which resembled an electroencephalogram.

Nina Sobell

Colors were keyed to each different mind state. The computer displayed an image showing previous brainwave activity as well as the brainwave activity as well as the immediate responses. This allowed the participants to view their deeper previous states as well as the current patterns, which were altered by the activity of looking at the screen.

Nina Sobell

Okay. And hopefully, tech... I'll stop sharing this right now. And another computer that was... This? Unless I can... Unless I can... I'll just try it and... I'll just try it and... I just sort of hope behind... Beyond... Beyond... Beyond... There it goes. There it goes. The sound is going. The sound is going. The image isn't going.

Nina Sobell

The sound is going. The image isn't going. I can't believe this. Ah. Ah. Oh. Ah. Gee. Well, it was wonderful anyway, Nina. Oh, hi. It was a valiant effort. Show that again another time. Yeah. Yeah. So, yeah. I'll answer any questions you might have. Nina, I have to show something to you. Look what I'm holding up.

Nina Sobell

This is something I own of Nina's, and I don't want to get off of what she's talking about, but she's pretty diverse in what she can do. This is like a beautiful golden sculpture of an eye on a mirror. I always think of them as like the Venus of Willendorf, like the earliest primordial image of womankind. And I love this little thing.

Nina Sobell

Anyway, thanks. Are you done sharing, Nina? Or did you want your screen to fill up? I was just thinking maybe it was on my desktop and I could just get it off of there. But... Oh. There it is. There it is. It's playing. All right. … It was the way. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Nina Sobell

That's all, folks. Hello? Oh, we're still here. We're just all on mute, but thank you. I'm glad you were able to actually get it working by the end of it. Thank you. I know it was a bit of a struggle. Yeah. Yeah. Can I see everybody again? I've stopped sharing my screen, right? Yeah. I could I could actually do that for you hold on one second okay all right okay we're back oh swell nice to see everybody again I'm very happy that you were able to see that roz who she just actually had to leave because she had a poetry meeting oh because taishi was a part of the piece ah yeah well she did say that she said your video is like paint and poetry which is part she had to go because of a poetry meeting so but thank you so much nina oh thank you I'm very happy you had a chance to see it yeah I am too all right unfortunately though we are actually right at our the end of our like regular scheduled recording time so but if anyone is willing to stick around after after give our little outro and talk with nina or ask her questions about our presentation feel free to do so but with that questions yes but since we are at the end of our scheduled recording time I will close things out here for the formal part of the presentation and I hope you enjoyed this salon thank you everyone so much for being here thank you so much for your time and your patience through some of the difficult parts that we had but it was all worth it I'd say and happy end of the year happy new year and we will see each other again next time I think what's our next mean day is january the third fourth third somewhere around there fourth fourth fourth yep all right anyway again happy holidays everyone and thank you so much for being here it's been a pleasure hi thank you everyone for presenting thank you thank you for bearing with me yeah and this is we'll be signing off unless colin has anything else to share by then I don't think I'll have anything else to share I'll come back here So I'm sorry if there was anyone that wanted to give a quick update that we kind of are out of time, but you're certainly welcome to hang out after we stop the recording.

Nina Sobell

Right. All right. I guess I'll close this out. Thank you Davo, as always for moderating and fingers crossed that you'll be able to, you know, keep going once you start your new gig. I'll make time. Awesome. Awesome. All right. All right. Well, signing out in five, four, three, two, one. And that's a wrap.