Alex M. Lee, associate professor of digital arts and sciences at Clarkson University will exhibit his virtual reality project Fold (episode I) in Berlin, Germany on Thursday, April 18 at the Recontres Internationales New Festival of Cinema and Contemporary Art Paris/Berlin. In the ‘VR Lab’ segment of the festival, The Fold will be displayed alongside ten other virtual reality artworks that question our principles of reality, our daytime perceptions and our everyday representations. Alex will represent the USA in this lineup.
The Fold is a non-linear interactive movie and art game based on virtual reality that includes rooms with doors that contain a concept that folds into other rooms with doors. Inspired by Jorge Luis Borges’ short story ‘The Garden of Forking Paths’, this VR-based project ‘saved from the room’ highlights the similarities and differences of the techniques as it relates to Western (episode I) and Eastern (episode II) philosophy by including structuralist and surrealist literature, sentient bodies, metaphysics, mathematics, virtual object, Buddhism, Zen principles, Qi (氣), and problematizes the affirmation of its technique, results and technologies as anthropologically universal within the framework of VR, AI, 3D animation . , and video games.
During this event, Alex will show ‘episode I’ which includes five doors presented in virtual reality with the following names: Doors, Fold, Grid, Meridies and Cave. There will be a live stream on the Recontres Internationales Paris/Berlin website here: https://www.art-action.org/site/en/prog/22/berlin/prog_live.php
Lee says, My work is an investigation into the possibilities of digital imaging in an increasingly technical and automated world. Originally born out of aesthetic theory, my practice focuses on the creative use of artistry and immateriality within the digital image. He went on to say, “There is an additional phenomenological layer to some of my time-based works. The work uses cycle, slow tempo and relatively quiet effect. The separation of time from natural and endless repetition alludes to an abstraction of time and perception. The work’s connection to light flows with algorithms within the computer, which I manipulate to great effect. I play with the possibilities found in data representation and physics simulation in order to arrive at a new formal possibility. Often the work alludes to sublime or surreal notions within the context of the virtual, but playing against the notions of simulacra (artifice).
Lee is an artist who uses 3D animation, video game engines, virtual/augmented/immersive reality platforms, machine learning and the potential of simulation technologies in order to investigate contemporary modes of representation, artefacts and technical images – being derived from concepts within science, science. fiction, physics, philosophy and modernity. He received his BFA (2005) and MFA (2009) from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
Lee has exhibited internationally in North America, Europe and Asia. Featured exhibitions include: Trinity Square Video, Toronto, ON; Mio Photo, Osaka, Japan; Daegu Art Factory, Daegu, Korea; Eyebeam: Center for Art and Technology, New York, NY; LEV Festival, Madrid, Spain; Elektra Festival, Montreal, Canada. His work has been published in articles covering art, science and culture, including: Metaverse Creativity, Smithsonian Magazine, Routledge Press and Canadian Art.