CURRENT NEWS Thurs June 25, 2009, 6-8 pm - The New School Where We Are Now Online Magazine Launch Editors: Marisa Jahn & Sofía Hernández Chong Cuy Contributors: Svetlana Boym, Rene Gabri, Joseph Grima, Ed Halter, Jill Magid, Dave Rankin & Marisa Jahn, Mary Anne Staniszewiski Web Design: Gregg Osofsky 7 pm: Performance/reading by Jill Magid and Eddie Vas The New School, Vera List Courtyard 66 West 12th Street, NYC Free http://www.wherewearenow.org Intimacy is often thought of in terms of as a feeling of rawness, confluence, and proximity. The space of intimacy often feels atemporal, privileging the safety of disclosure and heightened physiological, sexual, or affective response. But how does a geopolitical and micropolitical understanding of the conditions that frame intimacy questions notions of the body and self? The contributors to Issue #1 examine these questions from the perspectives of art, architecture, film, and law. In addition to these main contributions, WWAN invites public commentary on what it puts out. It also welcomes suggestions and listings about events, lectures, workshops, and public projects that pertain to art and politics in New York City. March 6, 7, 9 pm ­ 2 am at Eyebeam’s Mixer event (540 W. 21 b/w 10th and 11th Ave, NYC): ‘WOW Pod’ ­ a collaboration by Shada/Jahn & Cati Vaucelle Free 12 pm ­ 6 pm Sat March 6 For evening events (FYI, tix tend to run out): Advance tickets $15 per night/ $30 Weekend Pass (Fri. + Sat.). $20 per night at the door. Buy tix here: http://www.eyebeam.org/engage/mixer/mixer_0309.html Participating Artists: Taeyoon Choi + Cheon pyo Lee, Angela Co + Aeolab, Anakin Koenig, Chris Jordan, Caspar Stracke, The Institute for Faith-Based Technology, The Loud Objects, Di Mainstone, Not An Alternative, Mark Shepard with G. Doulas Barrett, Craig Shepard, Daniel Perlin, Al Laufeld and Jon Cohrs, Cati Vaucelle, Steve Shada, Marisa Jahn Event Summary: Two nights of performance and installations that will turn Eyebeam’s gallery into a temporary village of creatively engineered pavilions themed around the idea of utopia. Our Project Summary: The WOW Pod is an immersive architectural solution for the advanced WOW (World of Warcraft) player that provides and anticipates all life needs. Inside, the gamer finds him/herself comfortable seated in front of the computer screen with easy-to-reach water, pre-packaged food, and a toilet conveniently placed underneath his/her custom-built throne. When hungry, the gamer selects a food item (‘Crunchy Spider Surprise’, ‘Beer Basted Ribs’, etc.) and a seasoning pack. By scanning in the food items, the video game physically adjusts a hot plate to cook the item for the correct amount of time. The virtual character then jubilantly announces the status of the meal to both the gamer and the other individuals playing online: “Vorcon’s meal is about to be done!” “Better eat the ribs while they’re hot!” etc. When the food is ready, the system automatically puts the character in AFK (‘Away From Keyboard’) mode to provide the gamer a moment to eat. When the player resumes playing, he/she might just discover his/her character’s behavior is affected by the food consumed in real life — sluggish from overeating or alternately exuberant and energetic. The exterior of the WoW Pod mimics the look of authentic WOW architectural structures, whose swaths of flat, pixellated surfaces digitally recreate the built environment of an imagined past. But upon crossing the threshold and entering into the WOW Pod’s interior, the player finds the digitized look actually becomes the real life experience that World of Warcraft simulates. https://salsa.democracyinaction.org/o/528/t/8828/shop/shop.jsp?storefront_KEY=468 March 19 ­ Sept 13, 2009 at MIT Museum (Cambridge, MA): ‘Hollowed’ ­ exhibition by Shada/Jahn and collaboration with Cati Vaucelle ‘Hollowed’ is an exhibition of sculptures, photographs, drawings, and performances that harness the momentum of natural phenomena (wind, water, lightning) and rituals (courtship, online gaming, sports, meals). Using humor and craft, the works reveal the relations of desire/desperation, isolation/communion and sacred/empty. 'Thanksgiving Dinner in 5 Seconds' is a proposal for a meal cooked using a single bolt of lightning. The WOW (World of Warcraft) Pod is an immersive architectural solution for the advanced WOW player that provides and anticipates all life needs. A rowboat and instruction manual outfitted to prepare any suitor to woo with splendor and romance, Pleasurecraft is the perfect kit for a serenade. Drawing from the long-standing American tradition of cooking on a car engine, Commuter Cookout is a kit that enables the commuter to harness to cook gourmet meals while standing in traffic. As mutations of otherwise meaningful (or ‘hallowed’) traditions, ‘Hollowed’ questions the effect of fulfilling obligations to complete the self. April 13, 7-9 pm Mark Epstein Gallery, MIT Museum (Cambridge, MA) Designing for Extimacy and Fantasy-Fulfillment: Design Noir Utopias for the Online Gamer A panel discussion about the inducement of pleasure, fantasy fulfillment, and the mediation of intimacy in a socially-networked gaming paradigm such as World of Warcraft (WOW). Participants include Raimundas Malauskas (curator, Artists Space, NY); Visiting Scientist Jean Baptiste LaBrune (Media Lab); Laura Knott (Associate Curator, MIT Museum); MIT Gambit Lab researcher (TBA), and co-artists Marisa Jahn, Steve Shada, and Cati Vaucelle. 2009 at Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts (NYC): Pond is pleased to announce its participation as the inaugural curatorial fellows at The Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts. We will be curating an exhibition in June 2009 ­ details to come! Located in Midtown Manhattan, EFA is dedicated to providing artists across all disciplines with space, tools and a cooperative forum for the development of individual practice. EFA is a catalyst for cultural growth, stimulating new interactions between artists, creative communities, and the public. Should you be in NYC and looking for a studio, please know that they have Short Term Studios for visual artists and organizations available immediately. http://www.efa1.org 2009 ­ ‘Parks for People 24/7 — Calendar ’ (NYC/elsewhere): A Calendar about NYC’s Union Square Park published by Reverend Billy & The Church of Life After Shopping Art by Savitri D., Ian Hart, Marisa Jahn, Steve Lambert, Joan Linder, Alan Smart, Union Square Community Coalition With NYC Park Advocates; addtl contributions By Ryder Cooley, Jesse Goldstein, Chris Rubino A calendar about NYC’s Union Square published by Reverend Billy & The Church of Life After Shopping. Calendar design and creation: Marisa Jahn with Savitri D; Published by Reverend Billy & The Church of Life After Shopping available for $10 donation at www.revbilly.com or email me: hello {at} marisajahn.com http://www.revbilly.com/campaigns/actions/2009/01/parks-for-people-247-calendar-0 Reverend Billy takes on Michael Bloomberg in a 2009 run for mayor of NYC!!! http://www.revbilly.com/participate/forums/topic/632 RECENT January 27, 2009 (6:30 pm): RAPID RESPONSE: ADDRESSING THE ADDRESS Studio-X, 180 Varick Street, Suite 1610, New York, NY, 10014 www.arch.columbia.edu/studiox/ President-Elect Barack Obama's inauguration will initiate a new era, many believe, in US governance on domestic issues and leadership in global concerns. But how will this administration's new agenda address the world that architects and planners contend with and imagine? What do Obama's inaugural statements imply for urban issues? Designer and historian MABEL O. WILSON will lead this conversation--addressing the address--with artist MARISA JAHN, cultural critic ANDREW ROSS, architect REINHOLD MARTIN and political scientist DORIAN WARREN, touching on the environmental concerns of sprawl and new energy needs; the nation's ailing infrastructure; the spectacular fall of the housing market and potential new programs for homeownership and affordable housing; how new national monuments planned for Washington DC, New York City and elsewhere might address a culture that is increasingly transnational in its makeup; and 21st century racial politics of space made manifest in our cities and borders. Studio-X is a downtown studio for experimental design and research run by the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation of Columbia University. Wed Sept 24, 2008 at the Armory Bar Room as part of Red 76's "Battery Republic" project for the Democracy in America exhibition curated by Creative Time MARISA JAHN: I, Interloper: Espionage and the Contingency of Identity DAVE RANKIN, Lawyer for the National Lawyer’s Guild: Infiltrants, Informants ­ Gathering Information from the Other Interloper ­ def: someone who intrudes on the privacy or property of another without permission. In her recent work as an artist and activist, Jahn evidences a fascination with the process of surveillance, trespassing, and espionage. In I, Interloper Jahn discusses recent projects in which she both the subject and object of surveillance. Recently, she stalked her mailman, but was in turn stalked by the FBI Postal Division under the false allegation she was conducting a mail fraud ring with the postman. In her day job as a video journalist with a group called I-Witness Video, Jahn is involved in “probing police actions at mass demonstrations, revealing illegal police surveillance, and exposing official lies.” Perhaps not uncoincidentally, I-Witness was recently falsely accused by the police of holding people hostage in their office. To her midnight caller with a blocked ID, Jahn reads chapters from 1001 Arabian Nights over the telephone until the stalker hangs up. She begins reading where she left off when the ‘stalker’ calls again. Jahn cites several points of origin for this ongoing investigation in which the sense of difference instills a sense of being an outsider to participation ­ her childhood as a half-Chinese, half-Ecuadorian living in a very very white Dallas, Texas and the informal barriers faced by women in occupational advancement and professional settings. Detourning the sense of being an ‘outsider’ and making it a departure point for infiltrating and interloping, Jahn investigates the psychoanalytic and political dimensions of boundary crossing. Jahn’s work veers between light-hearted humor and dark violence to question notions of otherness (alterity) and the gender biases of espionage. Infiltrants, Informants ­ Gathering Information from the Other By Dave Rankin, Lawyer for the NYC Chapter of the National Lawyer’s Guild Did you know that of the 15 main coordinators for Welcoming Committee, a group of activists organizing forms of dissent at the Republican National Committee in Saint Paul-Minnesota 2008, two were paid informants to the FBI and one was a federal undercover agent? Dave Rankin, Executive Committee Member for the NYC Chapter of the National Lawyer’s Guild exposes this and other greatest hits about recent and past infiltration and government surveillance of activist groups in the 20th century. Sept 11, 2008 UPDATE from the Republican National Convention in Saint-Paul/Minneapolis In Aug an Sept, I traveled to the Democratic National Convention in Denver and the Republican National Convention in Saint Paul, MN to work as part of I-Witness, a video journalist collective. I am writing now to: (a) Share the update that I-Witness has drafted about the RNC 2008 (click to follow this link) (b) Point you towards a Report Back event on Tues Sept 16, 2008 at The Change You Want To See Gallery (c) Provide contact information. If you have footage, stills, audio, or other data taken during the DNC in Denver, CO, or the RNC in Minneapolis-Saint Paul, please contact I-Witness at 347-425-4224 or iwitness@iwitnessvideo.info I-Witness Video bridges legal collectives, civil rights activists, and video documentarians with the aim of protecting the right to dissent and speak freely. During and after the 2004 Republican National Convention, I-Witness helped worked with the NYC National Lawyer’s Guild to expose perjury and litigate civil lawsuits. July, 2008: Performance: SET by Marisa Jahn & Erik Carver at the Art Gallery of Knoxville (knoxville) Workshop, performance, exhibition ('SET'). Check out the review by Chris Buckner in the Knoxville Metrovoice entitled "The Rules of the Game: A new conceptual game makes its way to Knoxville" May 15 - June 30, 2008: Solo Exhibition - 'Mortise & Tenon' - Collaborations by Shada/Jahn' (Marnay-sur-Seine, France) Steve Shada and I will be artists in residence at Camac (www.camac.org) - the exhibition marks the end of our residency period and will showcase some new ('Pleasurecraft') and older projects ('Lifejacket' & 'Musical Instruments')... Saturday May 31, 2008, 12-7 pm: WORKSHOP & ONE EVENING INSTALLATION: 'Volume Drawings: Invisible Structures, Movement-Triggered Boundaries' at Western Front (Vancouver) FACILITATORS: Marisa Jahn, Max Goldfarb, Joanne Bristol Public Viewing & Reception: Saturday May 31, 2008, 5:30-7 pm ...A workshop and installation inspired by the notion of "kit bashing" in which a kit is appropriated or repurposed for an alternate use. Participants attending the workshop will solder and assemble a basic kit consisting of a trip-sensor and laser used in domestic and commercial surveillance (no prior electronics experience necessary). The group will subsequently experiment with this infrared drawing tool, its bearing on the body and movement, then build/choreograph a score of triggers and responses. Throughout this experiment, participants will experiment with sound, feedback, and delays in collaboration with a Vancouver-based electronic musician (TBA). The workshop culminates in an hour-long installation open to the public where the invisible architecture will be performed and experienced. April 25 - May 31, 2008: 'Kits for an Encounter' at Western Front (Vancouver) CURATED BY: Marisa Jahn & Candice Hopkins FEATURING: Azra Aksamija (AT),Steven Brekelmans (CAN), Limor Fried (US), Max Goldfarb (US), Janice Kerbel (UK), Lize Mogel (US), Vahida Ramujkic (ES), Noam Toran (UK), Judi Werthein (US/Argentina) ...An exhibition that examines artists' kits that instigate or trouble the notion of a (social) encounter. June, 2008: Writer in Residence at The Headlands (San Francisco) working on some books! June 5, 2008: 'Sizzlin in the Fastlane: A Manifold Cookset for the Gourmand Commuter' at Zero One (San Jose, CA) As part of the Future Farmers' Free Soil Bus Tour, featured at Zero One, Steve Shada and I will cook treats for bus riders, harvesting heat from the bus's engine...As Americans have discovered and re-discovered since the advent of the Model T, harnessing the heat from any commute makes great conditions for preparing a long stew, spicy hot pot, a tasty flan, or slow-baked caserole. The accompanying cookbook suggests recipes tailored to the length of your commute and foods local to the region. This project was formerly referred to as 'Commuter Cookout.' May 22 - June 22, 2008: Blackmarket Type " Print Shop at Articule gallery (Montreal) curated by Joseph del Pesco With posters by: A Constructed World, Brad Adkins, Amy Balkin, Paul Butler, Harrell Fletcher, Amy Franceschini, Jaime Gili, Sam Gould, Marc Horowitz, Marisa Jahn, Steve Lambert, New Beginnings, Giancarlo Norese, Derek Sullivan and window display by Jeff Ramsey Fall, 2008: 'Recipes for an Encounter' at Western Front (publisher: Western Front with Pond) EDITED BY: Marisa Jahn (Artist and Co-Director, Pond), Berin Golonu (Associate Curator, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts), & Candice Hopkins (Director, Western Front Exhibitions) 2007-2009: Artist in Residence at MIT Media Lab (Tangible Media Group) Spring 2009: Solo Exhibitions in collaboration with Steve Shada and others Samson Projects (Boston, MA) MIT Museum (Cambridge, MA) Jenny Jaskey Gallery (Philadelphia, PA) Spring 2009: 'ByProducts' (publisher: YYZ Books) Book edited by Joseph del Pesco & Marisa Jahn February 13-26, 2008 I'll be travelling to a small town called El Pital where they have just built a new library. This small village has never had a library, so they have no books. As an artist-in-resident for several weeks, I'll be working with people who live there to make experimental literature. 10/30/2007 click to read a review I wrote about "On Being an Exhibition" (at Artists Space, NYC) published/posted on Stretcher, the San Francisco critical art blog. 9/28/2007 Hello - I'm back on planet earth. Apart from my two-year stint of (delightful) academic madness in Cambridge, it's also been quite a frenetic summer. Upon graduating, the FBI knocked on my door, my newly turned-in Master's Thesis in hand. Someone had tipped them off that I was involved in a mail fraud ring with my mailman. Certainly this is not true - I only asked the mailman to tuck my letter in other people's mail so that I could feel my letter going all over the world. Through their interrogation, the 2 FBI officers revealed that they had had poured in detail over my thesis for clues. I was disappointed about their poor timing – I would have gladly given them my thesis a week earlier in order to enlist their services as readers on my thesis committee. All their long hours going to waste - I would have loved their feedback. And I've moved to New York where on various art, curating, and writing endeavors with various groups. Currently, I'm working with a wonderful organization called The Canary Project helping them to realize their curatorial vision. I will be commuting several times to Boston throughout the academic year to participate as an artist-in-resident in the Tangible Media Group led by Hiroshi Ishii at MIT's Media Lab. I am currently working on co-editing a book and organizing an exhibition called "ByProduct" with curator Joseph del Pesco. Published by YYZ Books and funded by the Canadian Council, this book will be released in 2009 with an accompanying exhibition (locations and venues pending). Click here to find a little more info.

CURRENT & ONGOING
01/15/10 - Companion (EFA, NYC)
01/26/10 - "Recipes" (Emily Carr, VAN)
01/28/10 - "Recipes" (SoEx, SF)
10/10/09 - "10 Sec 1 Bayt" (Tajikistan)
Winter 10 - Byproduct
ongoing - MIT Media Lab Residency
ongoing - EFA Fellowship NYC