2017 Media Arts MFA thesis exhibition:: Delete Me

There are many different forms of deletion. We rub a pink eraser on paper in a clod-handed imitation of handwriting; on a typewriter, deletion is mark-making (XXXX); with film, it’s a razor blade and a trash can. Deletion has always been work—that’s why there are editors. It’s a labor of reclaiming space, creating conditions to begin again. Beginning again means that we have, momentarily, invalidated our past work. We can try again, fail better. Now, when we virtually delete a phrase from a Google doc, it (and every past version) is saved in a labyrinth of forking paths, all existing forever behind the rhythm of an animated blinking vertical line: 

… “|, _, |, _, |, _, |, _” …

We generate data profiles when we navigate online spaces. Our story is written for us with our every move, creating an avatar of you. There are consequences to the existence of your digital double, ranging from the trivial to dire. Our online identities are, metaphorically speaking, the blocks of type in the printing press of rapidly evolving machine intelligence. Do you know the etymology of the word “stereotype”? It’s the process by which rather than spelling the word in type letters (“d” “e” “l” “e” “t” “e”), a single block would be cast (“delete”). 

Delete Me is an exhibition which features new work from the 2017 graduating MFA class of the UCLA Design Media Arts Department (DMA). Works span the genres of interactive installation, performance, sculpture, software, sound, print and video work. Exhibiting artists: Lander, Symrin Chawla, Matthew Doyle, David Ertel, Sanglim Han, Kate Hollenbach, Rui Hu, Yuehao Jiang, Alice Jung, Amanda Stojanov, Lee Tusman.

This event is free and open to the public

Toshio Iwai: 2017–18 UC Regents’ Lecturer for DMA
Toshio Iwai is a Japanese interactive media and installation artist who works in television, music performance, museum design, digital musical instrument design, and video games. In winter quarter 2017, Mr. Iwai will give a public lecture and a workshop for DMA’s undergraduate and MFA students. Check DMA’s website for dates. 

MFA in Media Arts
The MFA Program in Media Arts offers a rigorous environment for the sustained exploration of contemporary arts practice in the context of media and technology. Through technical and critical seminars, group critiques, and individual meetings with faculty, each student is challenged to question conventional ideas about art, technology, and new media while developing a critical awareness about his or her own work. During the first year, students focus on creating work for a solo-exhibition. The second year begins with a pre-MFA exhibition in UCLA’s New Wight gallery, and culminates in an MFA exhibition and written thesis document. Students are encouraged to take courses in other departments and programs and take full advantage of the resources UCLA provides as a leading research university.

The department’s world-renowned faculty includes Rebecca Allen, Johanna Drucker, Erkki Huhtamo, Willem Henri Lucas, Peter Lunenfeld, Lauren McCarthy, Rebeca Méndez, Christian Moeller, Casey Reas, Ramesh Srinivasan, Jennifer Steinkamp, Eddo Stern, and Victoria Vesna.

The Department of Design Media Arts
The Department of Design Media Arts (DMA) at UCLA cultivates a comprehensive, multidisciplinary approach to artistic practice that focuses experimentation and innovative thinking. We synthesize practice, history, and theory and hybridize technologies, discourses, and audiences. The results emerge in books, galleries, game consoles, installations, films, magazines, performances, public spaces, televisions, and websites. We strive to create socially and culturally relevant objects, experiences, and spaces.

DMA is also home to the UCLA Game Lab, an experimental research and development lab that fosters the production of computer games and game-related research; the Art|Sci Center, dedicated to pursuing and promoting the evolving “Third Culture” by facilitating collaborations between (media) arts and (bio/nano) sciences; the CounterForce Lab a research and fieldwork studio executing projects around the impacts of Anthropocene climate change; and the UCLA Arts Software Studio, a research group dedicated to the creation, distribution, performance, modification, and critique of software in the arts.

The department also boasts strong ties to the UCLA Digital Humanities program which aims to interpret the cultural and social impact of new media and information technologies and apply these technologies to answer cultural, social, historical, and philological questions.

The School of Arts and Architecture
The School of the Arts and Architecture at UCLA (UCLA Arts) is dedicated to training exceptional artists, performers, architects, and scholars who are enriched by a global view of the arts and prepared to serve as cultural leaders of the 21st century. Graduate degree programs are offered in the Departments of Architecture and Urban Design, Art, Design Media Arts, and World Arts and Cultures/Dance. The School’s unique curriculum interweaves work in performance, studio, and research studies, providing students with a solid creative, artistic, and intellectual foundation.

The University of California Los Angeles
One of the world’s premiere research universities, UCLA is also the most multicultural campus in the nation. Situated five miles from the Pacific Ocean and ten miles from downtown Los Angeles, the campus is within a short drive of mountains, beaches, lakes, and deserts. Students also have access to a wide range of campus services including a career planning center, a nationally recognized library system and a host of professional, social, and cultural organizations.