David Em
David Em | |
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 David Em at his "The Shape of the Universe" exhibition, 2011 | |
| Born | 1952 Los Angeles, California, USA |
| Nationality | American |
| Education | Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts American Film Institute |
| Known for | Digital art |
David Em (born 1952) is an American artist known for his "pioneering breakthroughs in computer image making".[1]
Life and work
David Em was born in Los Angeles and grew up in South America. He studied painting at the Pennsylvania Academy of the Fine Arts and film directing at the American Film Institute.
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Em created his first digital painting at the Xerox Palo Alto Research Center (Xerox PARC) in 1975 with SuperPaint, "the first complete digital paint system".[2]
In 1976, he designed an articulated 3D digital insect at Information International, Inc. (III) that could walk, jump, and fly, the first 3D character created by a fine artist.[3]
Em became the first artist to produce navigable virtual worlds in 1977 at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), where he was Artist in Residence from 1976 to 1988.[4] He also created digital art at the California Institute of Technology (1985 – 1988), and Apple Computer (1991).[5] Em has worked independently since the early 1990s.
Scope of work
Em's art spans multiple media, including virtual worlds, filmmaking, photography, and printmaking. He has also worked with live performance and theater.[6] Most of his creations exist outside of the mainstream art world.
He says he "makes pictures with electronic light” and "sculpts with memory instead of space.”[7] He also "evolves images that grow into and out of each other”.[8]
Stylistically, Em's art has connections to Surrealism, abstract painting, and experimental film. Gardner's Art Through the Ages describes his work as "futuristic geometric versions of Surrealistic dreamscapes in which the forms seem familiar and strange at the same time."[9]
Some of his early art created at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory incorporates deep-space themes. In the 1980s he produced light effects reminiscent of the French Impressionists,[10] and in the 1990s he introduced otherworldly lifeforms into his images. His current work relates to consciousness and the neurosciences.
His images have been exhibited and presented internationally, including at the Centre Pompidou, the Musee d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Harvard's Carpenter Center for the Visual Arts, MIT, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles, and the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences. According to the Digital Art Museum, "His piece Transjovian Pipeline (1979) became one of the most reproduced artworks in the 1980s."[11]
Em's art has also appeared in popular media, including the covers of Herbie Hancock's Future Shock, Sound-System, and Perfect Machine albums and an electronic version of William Gibson’s Neuromancer.
David Em is the first digital artist to have his working papers acquired by the Smithsonian Institution’s Archives of American Art.
Notes
- ^ Ross, David A. & Em, David, "The Art of David Em", Abrams, 1988
- ^ Perry, T. & Wallich, P.:"Inside the PARC: The Information Architects", Pages 68-69, "IEEE Spectrum", October 1985
- ^ Sorensen, P. "Computer Pictures", "David Em Modern Master" May 1988
- ^ Nelson, Ted "Creative Computing", "Report on Siggraph '81", March 1982
- ^ Haggerty, M. "IEEE Computer Graphics and Applications" page 4 "Computer Painting in a Different Light." Nov. 1992
- ^ Michie, Donald and Rory Johnston. “The Creative Computer”, Viking, 1984, pp. 139-140
- ^ Deken, Joseph “Computer Images: State of the Art,” , Stewart, Tabori, and Chang, 1983, page 133
- ^ Wands, Bruce. “Art of the Digital Age”, Thames and Hudson, 2006, page 48
- ^ Kleiner, Fred "Gardner's Art Through the Ages: A Global History," Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 2018
- ^ Trachtman, P. "Smithsonian Magazine" "Impressionist with a Computer" 1988.
- ^ https://dam.org/museum/artists_ui/artists/em-david/
Further reading
- Crowther, Paul (2019). Digital Art, Aesthetic Creation. New York and London: Routledge.
- Vacheron, Joel (2018). "Interview with David Em". Switzerland: IdPure Magazine #39.
{{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires|journal=(help) - Kleiner, Fred S.; Mamiya, Christin J. (2018). Gardner's Art Through the Ages (16th ed.). Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.
- Gardiner, Jeremy; Malone, Seamus; Lambert, Nick (February 24, 2009). "Interview with David Em". Computer Art & Technoculture. London.
- Zelanski, Paul; Fisher, Mary Pat (2007). The Art of Seeing (7th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Prentice Hall.
- Ross, David (1988). The Art of David Em. New York: Harry N. Abrams.
- Bradbury, Ray (1984). "Em Squared". David Em at OCCA (exhibition catalogue). Orange County Center for Contemporary Art.
