The Sputnik Observatory collects video interviews of many leading thinkers on a broad range of topics, and enables viewers to follow a stream-of-consciouness path through the themes that link the conversations together.

 
For example, cartoonist Scott McCloud talks about facial recognition:

 
which could lead to physicist Janna Levin discussing chaos and disorder:

 
and then to neuroscientist Edmund T. Rolls explaining how bacteria can decide who we get it on with:

Jonathan says:

The central premise of the Sputnik project is that everything is connected to everything else, and that topics and ideas that may seem fringe and even heretical to the mainstream world are in fact being investigated by leading thinkers working in fields as diverse as quantum physics, mathematics, neuroscience, biology, economics, architecture, digital art, video games, computer science and music. Sputnik is dedicated to bringing these crucial ideas from the fringes of thought out into the limelight, so that the world can begin to understand them….There are about 200 videos on the site today, and there will be thousands more added over the coming weeks, months, and years.

I could waste hours learning here…if i didn’t have freelance work to attend to. Back to it…

i’m showing a new version of elastotron at pecha kucha tonight, and then all summer as part of the exploratorium’s “reflections” show, from 19 june through 20 september.

we’re having a small opening friday night from 5:30-8:30pm. let me know if you want to come by, as the doors are not open to the public.

see you there!

ps, here’s the full description:

We’d like to invite you to spend some time at a new exhibition: Reflections, opening in the Seeing area one week from today. This special summer collection combines new and reimagined exhibits, art installations, and programs and special events. But more than a simple celebration of mirrors, Reflections was designed to present a range of perspectives on that most familiar and yet most provocative of images: our own visages—abstracted, distorted, fragmented, and multiplied. In addition to highlighting the science of bouncing beams of light, Reflections is about identity, expectation, technology, and our complex relationship with ourselves.

Reflections includes new takes on classic Exploratorium exhibits, but the project team has also created several unique and powerful experiences especially for this exhibition. In addition, the Seeing Gallery will house a set of intriguing interactive works from visiting artist Daniel Rozin. These experiences will be complemented by a series of programs and events exploring mirrors, optics, and the ephemeral nature of light. To learn more about the exhibition, visit www.exploratorium.edu/reflections.

elastotron will be shown LARGE at the Great Wall Of Oakland on friday, april 3rd, 2009.
please stop by, and join me after at Luka’s Taproom!

the Great Wall is an accompaniment to the monthly Art Murmur in oakland, so there will be plenty of other things happening in the area on the same night.

where: just west of grand and broadway, downtown oakland.
it’s a quick four blocks up broadway from the 19th st BART stop.

when: 7:30 – 10pm, afterparty at Luka’s

what: here’s a (low-res) sneak preview…

other artists showing tentatively include:
Lincoln Else – Learning to Fly
Colin Blackshear – Yosemite
Daniel Conrad – Afternoon of the Chimeras
Miguel Arzabe – John Muir TXT Msgs
Project Bandaloop – Montana