Articles about the MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology

In-depth coverage of the intersection of art, science and technology at MIT

News, interviews and stories about the work of the Center for Art, Science & Technology

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Connie Blaszczyck
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MIT Museum Presents North American Premiere of Groundbreaking Virtual Reality Experience The Enemy by Visiting Artist Karim Ben Khelifa.

CAST Announces 2017-18 Visiting Artists in Visual and Computational Arts

The MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology (CAST) is pleased to announce the 2017-18 Visiting Artists in visual and computational arts: Pedro Reyes, B. Stephen Carpenter II, Agnieszka Kurant, Diemut Strebe, Karim Ben Khelifa, Newton Harrison, Jason Levine and … Continued

Lou Harrison. Courtesy of the artist.

MIT’s Sounding Concert Series Is All About Coming Together

This fall sees the return of the MIT Sounding series—and, as usual, a penchant for border crossings and experimentation. The season kicks off on October 12 with a tribute concert to the influential composer Lou Harrison, who would have turned 100 … Continued

The Livable panel, (from left) Bettina Stoezer, Bill Maurer, Tal Danino, Claire Pentecost, and Rebecca Uchill (co-convener of the symposium). Credit: L. Barry Hetherington.

CAST’S “BEING MATERIAL” SYMPOSIUM HIGHLIGHTS THE CONVERGENCE OF BITS AND ATOMS

Twenty-two years ago Nicholas Negroponte, MIT Media Lab co-founder, predicted that “being digital” would lead to a future with fewer material constraints. “Being Material,” the MIT Center for Art, Science & Technology’s second biennial international symposium, used Negroponte’s Being Digital … Continued

Guillermo E. Brown. Bee Boy. Photo: Dekoit Pictures.

Bee Boy uplifts in the face of inequity’s sting

The word Ba, represented by a bee-sign in hieroglyphs, meant ‘soul,’ ‘honey’ and ‘bee’ to Ancient Egyptians. This ancient commingling of our fate with bees isn’t lost on MIT assistant professor of theater arts Charlotte Brathwaite, whose new project Bee … Continued

WEARABLE Panelist Hussein Chalayan’s Autumn/Winter Collection, 2007.

Leila Kinney Discusses “Being Material”

MIT’s Nicholas Negroponte predicted in 1995 that “being digital” would have us entering a realm increasingly unconstrained by the materiality of the world. Two decades later, our everyday lives are indeed ever more suffused by computation and calculation. But unwieldy … Continued

Grace Leslie. Courtesy of the artist.

Evan Ziporyn Discusses “Being Material”

NoteStream app in use at the Blackstar concert. Photo: Justin Knight.

The concert program gets a digital makeover fit for Bowie

When I was an art student in New York in 1999, David Bowie visited our school and offered to host images of our work on BowieNet, an ISP he had launched the previous year. Glimpsing Bowie was enough to blow … Continued

Luciana Souza and Guillermo Klein. Image credit: Souza (left) by Kim Fox and Klein (right) courtesy of the artist.

Luciana Souza and Guillermo Klein. Image credit: Souza (left) by Kim Fox and Klein (right). Photo: Courtesy of the artists.

With “Works on Hope,” Latin Jazz Luminaries Guillermo Klein and Luciana Souza Invite MIT Into Their Tribe

Back in the mid-90s, the Brazilian-born singer Luciana Souza, who was living in Boston at the time, would sometimes drive down to New York to sit in on a Monday night session at the legendary Smalls Jazz Club in Greenwich … Continued

Claire Pentecost, "Soil-erg". Materials: soil, paper, graphite, glass, gold leaf, wire and plants. Courtesy of the artist.

Rebecca Uchill Discusses “Being Material”

John Harbison. Photo: Tom Artin.

MIT Orchestra Plays Homage to the Mischief And Wit of Haydn and Harbison

The program for this year’s MIT Symphony Orchestra concert can be traced back to the day that John Harbison first encountered the music of Joseph Haydn. “I was a string player as a kid. I played violin, but I wanted … Continued

September 55 VR piece, installation view, Istanbul, 2016. Photo: Courtesy of Deniz Tortum.

VR through a long lens: Deniz Tortum lends historical perspective to a new medium

“The central story I was thinking about when developing the idea of ‘embodied montage’ [for my SM Thesis in Comparative Media Studies at MIT] was the myth of Orpheus. Eurydice dies and Orpheus goes back to hell to save her. … Continued

'Mytho? Lure of Wildness,' 2016. Photo: Paula Court.

Actor-Director-Physicist Adam Strandberg

Adam Strandberg graduated from MIT in 2014 with a degree in physics. While a student, he was in 20 theatrical productions, from David Mamet’s Speed-the-Plow to Martin McDonagh’s The Pillowman to William Shakespeare’s The Tempest. He received the Wiesner Student … Continued

Large round structures and lights in a field in the middle of a forest

Trevor Paglen, They Watch the Moon, 2010. Courtesy of the Artist.

Stefan Helmreich Discusses “Being Material”

Manu Prakash's "Foldscope," origami paper microscope.

Skylar Tibbits Discusses “Being Material”

Maya Beiser performs "Uncovered" during the 2015-16 MIT Sounding Series. Credit: Justin Knight.

Evan Ziporyn’s ‘Ambient Orchestra’ Honors Bowie With Blackstar Concert

PUBLIC PERFORMANCE Maya Beiser and the Ambient Orchestra perform David Bowie’s Blackstar March 3, 2017 / 7:30pm MIT Kresge Auditorium, W16 48 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, MA It has been just over a year since the news of David Bowie’s … Continued

duoJalal. Courtesy of the artists.

In duoJalal, A Real-Life Marriage Leads To A Musical One

The day the two members of duoJalal met in 1998 marked a convergence of musical worlds. Violist Kathryn Lockwood had launched a career in chamber music, while Yousif Sheronick excelled in a gamut-spanning array of percussive traditions, from Brazilian folk … Continued

Protein 13 (Postscript 2013) - The Power Plant. Photo: Courtesy of the artist.

Poetry to survive the end of civilization

The recent spike in sales of George Orwell’s 1984, which hit No. 1 on Amazon’s best-seller list last week, says something about our dystopian times. If the future gets bleaker, we’ll need literature that not only records civilization’s collapse, but … Continued

Going Off-Road with Mugaritz to Explore Creativity

Creativity according to Mugaritz and MIT “When you take the off-road and not the well-traveled road, it is much more painful, but it is exciting and it is worth it, even knowing that I am going to fail by trying … Continued

Nik Bärtsch's Mobile: Modul 8_11 live at EXIL, 2014. Credit: SRF, Swiss Television.

Minimalism Meets Funk In Nik Bärtsch’s MOBILE Ensemble

When he was young, the Swiss pianist and composer Nik Bärtsch was obsessed with rhythm. Once, when his father brought him along to a party, he spent the whole evening drumming on an ashtray. Nowadays he is apt to reach … Continued

"Hajanga," is the fourth and final single from Collier's debut album, 'In My Room'.

Behind the Artwork: Ben Bloomberg Creates Live Performance Systems for Virtuoso Multi-instrumentalist Jacob Collier

CAST Visiting Artist Jacob Collier is well known for his YouTube videos, which the 22-year-old musical phenom performs and produces in his bedroom in North London. Collier’s work has garnered praise from such jazz icons as Herbie Hancock and Quincy … Continued

"Don't You Know," an original song from Jacob's debut album 'In My Room'.

"Don't You Know," an original song from Jacob Collier's debut album 'In My Room'. Photo: courtesy of the artist.

Jazz Prodigy Jacob Collier Infuses Technology with Humanity at MIT

Explosively rhythmic music Jacob Collier is not like other YouTube stars. The English 22-year-old rose to fame with inventive video covers of popular songs like Michael Jackson’s “P.Y.T.” and Stevie Wonder’s “Isn’t She Lovely,” the arrangements rendered in dizzying multiplicity … Continued

Sumie Kaneko. Photo: Courtesy of the artist.

Sumie Kaneko and Gamelan Galak Tika Connect Japan, Bali and the Avant-Garde for MIT’s World Music Day

Sumie Kaneko, an Omnivourous Musician When the Japanese koto and shamisen player Sumie Kaneko was invited to perform with Gamelan Galak Tika for MIT’s World Music Day, she was elated. Kaneko—who holds a degree in traditional Japanese music from Tokyo … Continued

Nancy Holt, "Sun Tunnels." Photo: Jessica Varner.

Jessica Varner’s Notes from the Field: From the Outside Looking In

A jetty, concrete tunnels, salt lakes, small towns, and long drives. Day one on the Landscape Experience Field Trip proved as expansive and jam-packed as the itinerary proposed. By Jessica Varner Laying out a plan for a trip collapses time … Continued

Fradreck Mujuru playing the mbira. Courtesy mbira.org.

Fradreck Mujuru and Erica Azim Bring Zimbabwe’s National Instrument, The Mbira, To Cambridge

When Erica Azim and Fradreck Mujuru first met, in 1991, Mujuru was waiting tables in the Zimbabwean capital city of Harare and working as an instrument maker on the side. Azim was visiting the country as a student of that … Continued

Tomás Saraceno, Social Strings, 2015.

Experience: Culture, Cognition, and the Common Sense, words from the editors

The editors of Experience: Culture, Cognition, and the Common Sense, Caroline Jones, David Mather and Rebecca Uchill, describe the unusual material features, artistic interventions and intellectual provocations that make this book object something more than a typical codex. … Continued