Re-code
Participating Artists: Joshua Liebowitz & Xiao Meng
Curator: Naiyi Wang & Wenjie Sun
Producer: Wei Ming
Organizer: CAFA International
Joshua Liebowitz
Born in New Jersey, in 1980, is an American artist and poet, lives and works in New York City now. He holds a degree in BA English from Columbia University, his Additional Areas of Study includes Music Composition & Theory and Poetry.
His practice examines invisible information processes, technology and absurdist modes of being to come to grasp with digital and physical spaces and their related media. His works are recently exhibited at the AMAH Space (NY), the Pierog Gallery (NY), the Pioneer Works (NY) and the Flux Factory (NY).
Xiao Meng
Born in 1993, Beijing. She currently lives and works in Beijing and London. Xiao Meng attained her degree in Bachelor of Fine Arts at Goldsmiths, University of London in 2015.
Her work explores the essence of information or thinking presented by the media: language, text, images, etc. Xiao Meng's study focuses on the heterogeneity between the original process of thinking, and, as the representation of it, its expression. Being experimental to apply neuroscience and EEG in art practice, she is interested in the intersection between digital technology, science, and art. Her works are ranging from installation, video and on-site work. She has participated in various exhibitions such as June Show (London) and Goldsmiths Graduation show (London).
CAFA International
Since inception, CAFA International has been a vital resource to the development of contemporary art in China. The works of Ai Weiwei, He Yunchang, Wang Qingsong, Miao Xiaochun, Wang Huangsheng and other established artists have been exhibited in its gallery space in Caochangdi art district, Beijing.
Participating Artists: Joshua Liebowitz & Xiao Meng
Curator: Naiyi Wang & Wenjie Sun
Producer: Wei Ming
Organizer: CAFA International
Joshua Liebowitz
Born in New Jersey, in 1980, is an American artist and poet, lives and works in New York City now. He holds a degree in BA English from Columbia University, his Additional Areas of Study includes Music Composition & Theory and Poetry.
His practice examines invisible information processes, technology and absurdist modes of being to come to grasp with digital and physical spaces and their related media. His works are recently exhibited at the AMAH Space (NY), the Pierog Gallery (NY), the Pioneer Works (NY) and the Flux Factory (NY).
Xiao Meng
Born in 1993, Beijing. She currently lives and works in Beijing and London. Xiao Meng attained her degree in Bachelor of Fine Arts at Goldsmiths, University of London in 2015.
Her work explores the essence of information or thinking presented by the media: language, text, images, etc. Xiao Meng's study focuses on the heterogeneity between the original process of thinking, and, as the representation of it, its expression. Being experimental to apply neuroscience and EEG in art practice, she is interested in the intersection between digital technology, science, and art. Her works are ranging from installation, video and on-site work. She has participated in various exhibitions such as June Show (London) and Goldsmiths Graduation show (London).
CAFA International
Since inception, CAFA International has been a vital resource to the development of contemporary art in China. The works of Ai Weiwei, He Yunchang, Wang Qingsong, Miao Xiaochun, Wang Huangsheng and other established artists have been exhibited in its gallery space in Caochangdi art district, Beijing.
CAFA International presents Joshua Liebowitz and Xiao Meng's Twofold Exhibition Re-code from 20th August to 27th August, 2016. As the third exhibition of "Re-" curatorial project, Re-code is co-curated by Naiyi Wang and Wenjie Sun. The exhibitions are respectively named Joshua Leibowitz: Channel Corruptions and Xiao Meng: Thinking, in which the artist’s works are having dialogues with each other under the theme of Re-code.
Based on algorithm logic, an image is "written" with the language code in Joshua Leibowitz's Encrypt_Decrypt and Umbra v2, and the visual information is transferred and manipulated as data. His practice embraces "Generative Art" and "Big Data". It covers back-end (servers), front-end (interface) programming and the hardware/objects that based on Internet, and it also focuses on Generative Art, interactive installation, and dynamic sculpture, which using and processing the data by means of a cluster, machine learning, and genetic algorithm. His practice is also affected by the concept of "It from Bit": aesthetic objects that examine the ideas of simulation and representation through the hybridization of digital and physical forms.
Xiao Meng's study focuses on the heterogeneity between the original process of thinking, and, as the representation of it, its expression. Her works are ranging from installation, video and on-site work. In Thinking No.1, Xiao Meng utilizes an EEG device to detect her real-time brain activity at the exhibition site and displays a series of EEG recordings detected in the previous month with a few notes written simultaneously. In discussions of the relationship between the presentation and the original thinking in mind and questions what the essence of the work is and what thinking is. In Face, Xiao Meng waives the portrait image to reduce its function as a visual image/representation. At the meantime, by adopting the form of programming language, it explores into the inherent essence of the image/picture in digital context.
The Twofold Exhibition opens a dialogue: while Joshua Liebowitz turns noise into images and sculptures by coding and decoding, Xiao Meng makes the image taken by digital devices back to the state of data, and presents the process to the viewers in the form of programming language.
The exhibition reveals the artists' preference for "Data": On the basis of technology, Joshua Liebowitz has re-defined the process of making sculpture, which means he keeps emotions out of his practice, and has taken programming language & program logic instead; Xiao Meng has rejected the sensory languages such as visual image, text, etc. Through the inquiry for the authenticity of the media, she explores the essence of information. When the interaction between code and visual elements occurs, the boundaries that between reality and virtual, between media and essence will be blurred.
