A virtual public program, fellowship, and experimental conference
October 2020 – January 2021
Blackwood Gallery, University of Toronto Mississauga

Guest Presenters: Adwoa Afful, Kristen Bos, Meredith Broussard, Anita Say Chan, Beth Coleman, Sonia Corrêa, T.L. Cowan & Jasmine Rault, Heather Dorries, Ellen Graham & John Kim, Rick Harp, Shalini Kantayya, Nora N. Khan, Kite, Sean Lee, Anita Li, Carol Linnitt, Esery Mondesir, Kristine Neglia, Pedro Neves Marques, Lindsay Nixon, Samantha Nock, Ogimaa Mikana Project (Susan Blight & Hayden King), Carmen Papalia, Mike Pepi, Karyn Pugliese, Nicky Recollet, Tiara Roxanne, Fallon Simard, jaye simpson, Caroline Sinders, Brett Story, Lewis Raven Wallace, Bianca Wylie.

Research Fellows: Emily Fitzpatrick, Cassandra Gemmell, Kat Germain, Parker Kay, Olivia Klevorn, Matthew Ledwidge, Jordan Loeppky-Kolesnik, Estraven Lupino-Smith, Matt Nish-Lapidus, Jennifer Su, Polina Teif, Pegah Vaezi

Program Respondents: D.T. Cochrane, Emily Doucet, Zinnia Naqvi, Aliya Pabani

Hosted by: Alison Cooley and Fraser McCallum, Blackwood Gallery

Shalini Kantayya, Coded Bias (video still), 2020. Courtesy 7th Empire Media.

Running with Concepts: The Mediatic Edition, the sixth edition of the Blackwood’s hybrid educational event, bridges recent and ongoing Blackwood programming and publishing on spectatorship, emerging technologies, and media ecologies. Interrogating the contexts, conditions, and forces that modulate, arbitrate, and disrupt knowledge-production and political action, The Mediatic Edition unfolds as an online durational event with a concurrent fellowship program taking place across October 2020–January 2021.

Participants bring expertise from emergent and established media disciplines whose methodologies shape artistic practice: newer movements in data sovereignty, data governance, and citizen science develop models for participation and engagement; social media users, meme-makers, and decolonial map-makers work within and against existing platforms to create counter-narratives; and critical journalists question the norms and epistemologies on which their discipline is founded. Research fellows present works on a range of topics: accessibility and translation; algorithmic tailoring; queer and feminist digital embodiment; peer-to-peer protocols and network decentralization; mapping and data visualization to artist-AI collaborations. Four program respondents follow the conference, documenting and sharing observations on the Blackwood website.

Across a durational online format, Running with Concepts: The Mediatic Edition asks: how can we intervene in and interrogate the conditions that mediate knowledge production and political action? What intersectional and cross-sectoral approaches to data and data ethics do we need now? How can artistic research engage with the interfaces and platforms that constitute our mediated environment? How can we better comprehend and work within our always-mediated conditions of spectatorship?

Kite, Pȟehíŋ Kiŋ Líla Akhíšoke. (Her Hair Was Heavy), performance at REDCAT, Los Angeles, November 10–11, 2019. Courtesy the artist.

FULL SCHEDULE:

Unfolding as a Fall Program (October 7–December 2, 2020) and a Winter Intensive (January 22–24, 2021), Running with Concepts: The Mediatic Edition comprises a series of public programs, screenings, workshops, and panel discussions.

All Running with Concepts programs are broadcast online, FREE and open to the public. Recordings are available for 72 hours following their release at blackwoodgallery.ca. Closed captioning is provided.

Select live workshops require pre-registration.

FALL PROGRAM

Coded Bias: Algorithms, Race, and Technology
October 7, 2020
Film Screening and Discussion
Meredith Broussard, Beth Coleman, Shalini Kantayya

Workshop: Elements of Technology Criticism
October 19, 2020
Workshop
Mike Pepi
Pre-registration required. Register on Eventbrite.

Public Presentations by Research Fellows
October 23, 2020
A Visual Vocabulary of Memory and Emotive Prediction: Matthew Ledwidge
Excessive Heat: Jordan Loeppky-Kolesnik

Journalism’s Myth of Objectivity: Accountability, Embodiment, and Neutrality
October 28, 2020
Panel Discussion
Rick Harp, Carol Linnitt, Karyn Pugliese, Lewis Raven Wallace. Moderated by Anita Li.

Documentary Practices: Power, Agency, and Representation
November 4, 2020
Film Screening and Discussion
Esery Mondesir, Brett Story
Haitian Trilogy and The Hottest August

Public Presentations by Research Fellows
November 18, 2020
The Offline Self and its Algorithmic Reflection: Olivia Klevorn
Mediated Natures: Estraven Lupino-Smith
Maps & Gaps: Polina Teif

A Mordida: Gender, Contagion, and Biopolitics
December 2, 2020
Film Screening and Discussion
Sonia Corrêa, Pedro Neves Marques

WINTER INTENSIVE (JANUARY 22–24, 2021)

Art and Social Media: Platforms, Activism, and Refusal
Panel Discussion
Samantha Nock, Fallon Simard, jaye simpson. Moderated by Lindsay Nixon.

Feminist Data Set
Workshop
Caroline Sinders, with respondents T.L. Cowan & Jasmine Rault.
Pre-registration required; registration opens in January 2021.

Public Presentations by Research Fellows
Visual Translation and the Amazing Broken Telephone Kaleidoscope: Kat Germain
Digital Camouflage: A Cyber-Feminist Survival Guide: Emily Fitzpatrick
Channel Surfing: Jennifer Su

(Counter-)Mapping
Multimedia Presentation and Discussion
Ogimaa Mikana Project (Susan Blight & Hayden King), Nicky Recollet. Moderated by Heather Dorries.

Data Governance, Ethics, and Sovereignty
Panel Discussion
Adwoa Afful, Nora N. Khan, Kristine Neglia, Bianca Wylie. Moderated by Tiara Roxanne.

Public Presentations by Research Fellows
Disease Narratives and the Visualization of Environment: Cassandra Gemmell
Confidence: Matt Nish-Lapidus

Levels of Access: Bandwidth, Translation, and Virtual Spaces
Panel Discussion
Anita Say Chan, Sean Lee, Carmen Papalia

Pȟehíŋ Kiŋ Líla Akhíšoke. (Her Hair Was Heavy)
Performance
Kite. Mediated by Kristen Bos.

Reading Open Data: Data Visualization, Citizen Science, and Collective Action
Workshop
Ellen Graham & John Kim
Pre-registration required; registration opens in January 2021.

Public Presentations by Research Fellows
Blockchain and Decentralization: Alternative Models for Artist-Run Culture: Parker Kay
Alternative Protocols: P2P and Data Infrastructures: Pegah Vaezi

FOR FULL PROJECT DESCRIPTIONS, VISIT OUR WEBSITE.

Follow the project on social media using the hashtag #RwCMediatic!

Blackwood Gallery
University of Toronto Mississauga
3359 Mississauga Road
Mississauga, ON L5L 1C6
905-828-3789
blackwoodgallery.ca
blackwood.gallery@utoronto.ca
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Please note: The Blackwood’s gallery spaces are currently closed to the public. All Running with Concepts: The Mediatic Edition events take place online at blackwoodgallery.ca.

Image Descriptions:
1) A Black woman holds a white mask in front of her face, facing a laptop and interactive mirror. Overlaid computer graphics map the facial geometry of the mask, and “Face Detected” appears as text in the bottom left-hand corner of the mirror.
2) An Indigenous woman performs, spotlit on a dark stage, with an abstract projection behind her. A long, extended braid, made up of hair and computer wire, is connected to her hair, which loops around her feet on the floor. She leans to one side in the midst of performing.