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Using the Empire State Building’s architecture as a backdrop, New York based artist Mark Napier explores themes of power and permanence in an exhibition entitled “The Cyclops Series” at the Richard A. and Rissa W. Grossman Gallery in the Williams Visual Arts Building.
The exhibit will run Sept. 2-Oct. 28. Gallery hours are 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Tuesday through Saturday.
Napier authored the custom software that generated the digital images in the exhibit. Viewers will become part of the creative process by controlling a mouse to manipulate the imagery he has created.
There will be a reception for the artist 5-6:30 p.m. Sept. 14 in the Grossman Gallery. Napier also will serve a three-day residency on campus the week of Sept. 18 to give lectures, lead workshops, and meet with students. For more information, contact Jim Toia, director of the Grossman Gallery, at (610) 330-5577 or toiaj@lafayette.edu.
“Mark Napier’s work rests at the forefront of contemporary art,” says Toia. “Beyond video and installation, Napier enters our world through the most ubiquitous of platforms – the Internet and custom-designed software. He not only presents us with uninterrupted access to his work via the Internet, but also surrenders a degree of control to his audience through his custom-designed software. The viewer actuates the work and determines its shape, length, and design. This ‘co-authorship’ harks back to DADA, the Fluxus movement, and other experimental moments in art, while taking a firm foothold in this time of consumer-based multimedia interaction.”
Emily Gillespie ’07(Hammonton, N.J.), an art major, worked with Lew Minter, director of the media lab at the Williams Visual Arts Building, to help Napier produce medium- and large-scale prints for “The Cyclops Series.”
Napier has been creating artwork exclusively for the web since 1995. He combines his training as a painter with 15 years of expertise as a software developer to create software that addresses issues of authority, ownership, and territory in the virtual world.
A recipient of a New York Foundation of the Arts Fellowship and a grant from the Greenwall Foundation, Napier has been commissioned to create net artwork for the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Whitney Museum, Guggenheim, and Altoids.com. His work has been shown in the United States, Germany, Italy, Denmark, and South America.