This year's participants in Rhizome's Seven on Seven.
RHIZOME ANNOUNCES PARTICIPANTS AND DETAILS FOR THE TENTH EDITION OF SEVEN ON SEVEN AT THE NEW MUSEUM ON SATURDAY, MAY 19
Leaders in Art and Tech to Collaborate on New Creations
New York, NY…Rhizome and the New Museum are pleased to announce the tenth edition of the celebrated art-tech platform Seven on Seven. This annual event brings together leaders in art and technology for an extended creative collaboration, giving them a simple challenge: to “make something.” On Saturday, May 19, the collaborative duos will reveal their projects at Seven on Seven, hosted by Rhizome at the New Museum, Rhizome’s longtime affiliate and New York City's leading museum dedicated to contemporary art. Tickets to the conference are on sale today at rhizome.org/sevenonseven.
Organized by Michael Connor, Artistic Director, and Zachary Kaplan, Executive Director, the tenth edition of Seven on Seven takes place in a moment of broad public disillusionment with digital platforms and their impact on interpersonal communication and media culture. Against this backdrop, the collaborators rethink ways of communicating and organizing through technology, looking to evolving disciplines such as machine intelligence and blockchain governance while revisiting fundamental principles of digital culture.
“This year’s collaborations are marked by a new openness to technological, social, and political alternatives that might previously have seemed unrealistic,” notes Rhizome’s Artistic Director Michael Connor. “It’s a time to go back to first principles.”
Seven on Seven 2018 will feature:
Artist Petra Cortright & Carl Tashian, Engineer and Entrepreneur
Artist Sara Cwynar & Cierra Sherwin, Director of Color Product Development, Glossier
Artist and Nonfood cofounder Sean Raspet & Francis Tseng, Designer and Developer
Artist Tabita Rezaire & Kenric McDowell, Director, Google Artists and Machine Intelligence
Artist Avery Singer & Matt Liston, Founding Member and Ambassador, Gnosis
Artist Mika Tajima & Yasmin Green, R&D Director, Jigsaw at Alphabet Inc.
Artist Dena Yago & Yalda Mousavinia, Founder, Space Cooperative
Several special programs are planned to mark the tenth edition of Seven on Seven, including a publication designed by a team at Wieden+Kennedy, led by Richard Turley, Global Creative Director. Featuring contributions by Seven on Seven alumni, the publication will be distributed for free at the New Museum and other venues beginning May 19. An online exhibition featuring recent software from the program, “Real Artists Ship,” will be copresented by Rhizome and the New Museum as part of their ongoing digital series First Look. Finally, a pilot Seven on Seven outreach program funded in 2017 by Deutsche Bank Americas Foundation will bring an art-and-technology residency to fourth graders at Q317 in Queens in advance of the event.
“This year’s Seven on Seven is an opportunity to consider all that we’ve accomplished. Over ten editions, the program has done so much to make the argument that the fields of technology and art must learn from one another, in ways that acknowledge their points of overlap and their specificities,” said Zachary Kaplan, Rhizome’s Executive Director. “But at the same time, it’s an opportunity to think about the future. Critiques of technology’s effects have become increasingly mainstream; what sort of alternatives might be imagined as part of Seven on Seven over the next decade?”
“With its tenth edition, Seven on Seven builds upon its history of critical conversations at the crossroads of art and technology,” said Lisa Phillips, Toby Devan Lewis Director of the New Museum. “This year’s line-up promises to add important new voices, while retaining the vibrant spirit that has defined Seven on Seven.”
ABOUT SEVEN ON SEVEN
Founded by Rhizome in 2010, Seven on Seven forefronts the leading issues at the intersection of culture and technology, and animates them through its novel format. Seven leading artists are paired with seven visionary technologists and asked to “make something”: an artwork, a prototype, a provocation—whatever they imagine. What they create in their short time together premieres at the conference, yet its effects ripple beyond that day.
The first Seven on Seven featured teams including video artist Ryan Trecartin and Tumblr founder David Karp, who together created Riverthe.net, a dynamic video-sharing application that was later exhibited as part of the New Museum exhibition “Free.” The 2014 edition paired artist Kevin McCoy with technology leader Anil Dash, the founder of Monegraph, a blockchain-based provenance service that became a full-fledged start-up. The 2016 edition paired artist Miranda July and Postlight founder Paul Ford, who created an unforgettable portrait of that year's audience based on an investigation of each attendee’s social media footprint. Explore the archive: rhizome.org/sevenonseven
