the medium is the environment
Kevin Day

September 11 – October 12, 2024
InterAccess, Toronto ON

Opening Reception
Wednesday, September 11, 7 – 9pm
InterAccess

Artist Talk: clouds, carbon, and computational systems
Thursday, September 12, 6:30 – 8pm
Hybrid (InterAccess and Online)

Gallery Hours
September 11 – October 12
Tuesday – Saturday, 11am – 6pm
*Low sensory viewing available on Tuesdays

“There is no cloud, only someone else’s computer” – Free Software Foundation Europe

In our world of increasing abstraction, Kevin Day is looking to bring digital materiality to the forefront. From chemical processes to the polymer of pixels, and from underwater internet cables to displaced communities and exploited labourers, there is an inherent cost in the digital technologies we hold in our hands and pockets. Our data, Day reveals, is by no means immaterial.

the medium is the environment is a solo exhibition by Kevin Day exploring how the digital environment subjugates both human and natural environments through a data-driven video installation. A downward video projection explores the intersection of the human, the environment, and digital media, while fog is produced at a rate of data usage, serving as a proxy of carbon emission. The environmental impact of our digitized lives is materialized, rendered visible and tangible, inviting viewers to walk through an entanglement of the attention economy, digital labour, and data usage.

Please note: Fog machines are used in this exhibition, producing a non-toxic atmospheric effect with water and glycol. Low sensory viewing days, without any fog effects, are available on Tuesdays.

About the Artist

Kevin Day’s practice and research, encompassing sound, video, graph, web, and interactive media installations, examine contemporary art’s critical capacity in response to the current socio-political issues of digital culture, subverting the encoding, extraction, and exploitation by data colonialism and information capitalism. Informed by the philosophy of technology, critical theory, media studies, and digital materialism, his research and practice question the ubiquitous logic of framing the world through information, indicative of an information-based way of knowing, and resist the extraction and abstraction of algorithmic processes through an insistence on the presence of “noise” in the information-capital complex.

Day was born in Taipei, Taiwan. He received his MFA and PhD from the University of British Columbia and is currently based in Vancouver. He has exhibited at venues such as the Vancouver Art Gallery (Vancouver), Center for Creative Media (Hong Kong), Qubit (New York), Centre CLARK (Montreal), The New Gallery (Calgary), and University of Hamburg (Hamburg), and presented his research through the top international platforms for art and technology such as SIGGRAPH, ISEA, and Leonardo. His work had been generously funded by the Canada Council for the Arts and SSHRC. Currently, he teaches digital art in the UBC Bachelor of Media Studies program and the politics of algorithmic and information systems at the UBC School of Information.

Founded in 1983, InterAccess is a non-profit gallery, educational facility, production studio, festival, and registered charity dedicated to emerging practices in art and technology. Our programs support art forms that integrate technology, fostering and supporting the full cycle of art and artistic practice through education, production, and exhibition. InterAccess is regarded as a preeminent Canadian arts and technology centre.

Contact
950 Dupont St., Unit 1
Toronto ON M6H 1Z2
interaccess.org

Send questions regarding programming to: art@interaccess.org

Hours
Tuesday – Saturday, 11am – 6pm

Accessibility Information
We regret InterAccess does not have barrier-free access; we are currently working to improve the accessibility of all facilities. There are five steps up with handrails to the main entrance which has an automatic (push button) door. Inside all facilities are on the same level, including a single-user accessible washroom.

Image courtesy of the artist.