Art & Technology #18: Art + Technology Initiative at LACMA

The ongoing art and technology projects in Los Angeles County Museum of Art (hereafter “LACMA”) are the most notable of the attempts to explore the relationship between art and technology. As a museum in Los Angeles, LACMA has embraced and studied various cultures in the Pacific regions. It is also exploring a new thread of convergence and combination of art and technology, which reflects the characteristic of its location adjacent to Silicon Valley and site of video technology industries.
LACMA’s Art + Technology Lab (hereafter “A+T Lab”), which has been on the way since 2013, exemplifies this effort. First operated by LACMA curator Maurice Tuchman from 1967 to 1971, the program was not a mere corporate sponsorship program, but one intended to broaden the public view on science and technology and pave the way for art combined with technology, by creating a venue of collaboration for artists and companies. In 2013, close to the 50th anniversary of the A&T Program, LACMA decided to reopen this channel for technology and art to meet, and established the A+T Lab at the Balch Research Library that was then renovated at LACMA.

In 1966, then LACMA curator Maurice Tuchman suggested A&T, the Art and Technology Program, which was planned and launched to enquire into the new relationship among art, companies, and technology, and to rethink the direction of the relationship by searching for and selecting artists who can have a productive influence on the industry.
Tuchman started to look for companies based in California that could provide financial or technical support for the artists. In 1967, 37 of 250 companies he had contacted were willing to participate, and 40 companies entrusted the museum to advance the support. Tuchman and the museum committee selected many artists in various scenes including American and European arts, music, and literature. Artists showed great interest in this project: they continued to apply for the program even after the artists for the project was officially announced.
After selecting the artists, Tuchman and his colleague, curator Jane Livingston, carefully matched the selected artists with participating companies so that this art support project would not to end up a mere sponsorship program. While actively preventing direct influence from the sponsor companies providing financial or technical support for the artists, they asked for the companies’ understanding by explaining the effect of exterior influence on creativity.

Currently, last year’s (Year 2) Art + Technology Grant artists Nonny de la Peña, Alex Rivera, Cayetano Ferrer, Jonathon Keats, Nana Oforiatta-Ayim, Matthew Shaw, and William Trossell of ScanLAB are working on their projects. They were selected for their proposals to LACMA on works that deal with technological issues today such as the Internet of Things, biological data, augmented reality, environment, and interaction between human and technology.
Suppose while everyone is running fast to techno music with a fast beat, a different tune interferes. It can be perceived as disturbance that slows down the pace, but also a factor that allows us to see the scenery we missed. As the speed goes up, the perspective becomes narrower. In some way, uneconomical or peculiar attempts can point out an important blind spot in the logics of development.
Furthermore, when companies and art that, move at different speeds, meet each other, another possibility we have been blind to could suddenly catch our eyes. In this society of technology-dependency, where we are overwhelmed by a deluge of technological innovations beyond our imaginings, the meeting of art and technology can have extraordinary meaning. This is what makes one look forward to the results of the program launched by the collaboration between LACMA, one of the institutions of art, and companies of the technology industry. ■ with ARTINPOST