Kelc – LookingOutwards05

I had the pleasure of speaking with this wonderful woman so I thought I would do my LookingOutwards05 on

Salome Asega

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She is an artist and researcher from Brooklyn, NY apart of a duo called Candyfloss and has worked on many projects within the realm of interactive video-games, virtual reality simulations, and digital exploration.

At the VR Salon she facilitated a 3d drawing experience through the use of an Oculus headset and two game controllers. Users were able to bring their otherwise 2-d creations to life, changing the brush and color in real-time and creating marks in what looked like real space. What struck me about her piece in comparison to the others was heavy attention was paid to the quality of the graphics– the environment itself was convincing on its own, and the drawing technology was mesmerizing. One issue I saw detracting from the experience was the cord but otherwise the entire setup was pretty flawless.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BLUK44GAIkm/?taken-by=suhlomay

Iyapo Repository

http://iyaporepository.tumblr.com/

One collaborative project that really stuck with me is the Iyapo repository– a library / collection of physical and digital artifacts “created to reaffirm he future of peoples of African descent.” The pieces bring to life artifacts dealing with past, present, and future cultural endeavors of the African-American and African diasporic community. The character “Iyapo” comes from renowned sci-fi novelist Octavia Butler’s Little Blood, as well each piece addresses concepts of Afrofuturism from strikingly different yet related perspectives. The library tackles topics that range from the lack of diversity in science fiction and futurist media, as well as the crisis of documenting and eternalizing African-American culture and experiences.

Asega also participated in an event honoring Kara Walker’s A Subtlety in an attempt to amplify Walker’s message of heavy cultural significance as a collective experience. She was (is?) apart of a non-profit dedicated to connecting current digital artists just entering the New Media arts scene. She does a really incredible job of blending new media art and technology with her ideological / cultural identity.

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