[ISEA2004] Artists Statement: Chris Hart, Michael Galbincea & Art Jones – LIVE ROBOT LOVE!

Artists Statement

GEOPOLITICS OF MEDIA VJ Performance

The audiovisual spectacle Live Robot Love! interrogates themes concerning the current political climate and the coalescence of art, technology and the “future”. It weaves a loose narrative from found sound/video elements, global mass media (television broadcast, cartoons, news casts) and animation.

The performance’s theme centres around the fact that strategies of empire building – in particular the ‘American Century’ – are being played out in the arena of popular culture and global mass media. Simultaneously, the world is experiencing tectonic economic shifts (global trade agreements. Live Robot Love! draws sounds and images from a range of media including television (local live newscasts, cartoons, sci-fi, political debates), print (business pages, classifieds) and the internet (porn sites, online auctions) to create a montage of collisions, in order to generate discussion, and, we hope, to contribute to the various dialogues around politics, live art, and the future.

DJ/Composer Chris Hart’s densely layered narrative soundscape based on internet blogs, 1960’s lounge music, jazz, and other sources provides a tapestry of appropriated online personae and sampled sounds, through which an exploration of concepts of identity, love, technology, and contemporary politics emerges. VJ’s Michael Galbincea and Art Jones will then visually interpret this material via a collision of live video manipulations combining original motion graphics and 3D animation with sampled visual elements.

Crossing over the boundaries between fine art culture and pop culture, DJ and electronic composer Chris Hart together with video mixmasters Art Jones and Micheal Galbincea seek to create a space within the performance where fact and media irreverence mesh into one reality.

  • Chris Hart, composer, USA
  • Michael Galbincea, video mix master, USA
  • Art Jones, video mix master, USA