1301PE is proud to announce that Diana Thater is one of four recipients for this year's LACMA Art + Technology Lab grants.
Many museums have been turning to technology to draw larger and younger audiences, devising various apps and interactive games. But less explored, at least in the context of major encyclopedic museums, is the art itself that is currently engaging with technology.
In 2013, the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) formed the Art + Technology Lab with the aim of supporting artists who are exploring "emerging technologies". The idea stemmed from the museum's first Art and Technology program in 1967, which, four four years, "paired artists with technology companies in Southern California". This time around the grant seems more geared toward nurturing artists' individual projects, providing monetary support (up to $50,000) and facilities to work in.
Four artist were selected out of the 430 applications received: Tahir Hemphill, Jen Liu, Sarah Rara, & Diana Thater.
Diana Thater, a San Francisco-born, Los Angeles-based artist, is tackling that most enticing and terrifying of futuristic subjects: robots. Through a video work titled "The Zeroth Law," Thater will reveal how "bio-inspired and biomimetic" robots "adapt the neurophysiology and behavior of their animal models." As Thater's recent exhibition at LACMA, The Sympathetic Imagination, illustrated, the artist has long been interested in animals and how they behave, producing videos that poetically show how bees speak and animals survive nuclear disasters.