Aram Bartholl

Aram Bartholl

foto by Eva Paulsen 2011
Born Aram Bartholl
27 December 1972
Bremen, Germany
Nationality German
Education Berlin University of the Arts
Known for contemporary art, digital art, conceptual art

Aram Bartholl is a Berlin-based conceptual artist known for his examination of the relationship between the digital and physical world.[1]

Early life and education

Aram Bartholl graduated from Berlin University of the Arts in 2001 with an engineer's degree in architecture. His graduate thesis "Bits on Location" won the 2001 Browserday competition. During Bartholl's studies, he held a 9-month internship position at the Rotterdam-based architecture office MVRDV. From 1996 to 2000, Bartholl was part of the artist group "Freies Fach" which was known for its discourse on urban matters and for its public interventions [2]

Works

Map

Map by Aram Bartholl at the show Hello World, Kasseler Kunstverein2013

Beginning in 2006, Bartholl has created a public art installation called Map. Bartholl installs a large physical representation of the Google Maps pin in the exact location that Google Maps identifies as the enter of a city.[3][4] Locations thus far have included Taipei, Berlin, Arles, Tallinn and Kassel. Each sculpture remains in place for about three months, usually coinciding with a local art festival or exhibit.[5]

The series was designed to raise viewers' awareness of the increasing overlap between the virtual and the physical, and to highlight mapping services' influence on perceptions of location. Bartholl's physical representations of the Google Maps pin urges viewers to reevaluate the information given by digitized maps, the meaning of the “center” of a city, the politicization of boundaries, and other issues related to maps and the digital versus the physical world.[6]

Dead Drops

Dead Drops

Bartholl's 2010-2012 Dead Drops project set up an offline peer-to-peer file-sharing network at five public locations in New York using dead drops: USB sticks cemented into walls.[7]

Other

Exhibitions

Solo shows:

Group shows (selected):

2011

2010

2009

2008

2007

2006

2005

Reception

In Bartholl's play on video game adaptations, he connects the virtual and real world in a new way.[9][10]

Awards

In 2007 Bartholl received an honorable mention by the Transmediale for the piece "Random Screen" [11] and with the concept for the performance piece "Sociial" he won the 17th Video Art Award Bremen 2007 [12] For his Second Life related project "Sandbox Berlin" Bartholl received grants from the Cultural Department of the Senate of Berlin and in 2008 received the German Art Fund KUNSTFOND 10-month working grant.[13] In spring 2009 he was artist in residence at the V2 Institute for the Unstable Media residency program AIR and developed with help of the staff the "Tweet Bubble Series" during that period.

Representation

Aram Bartholl is represented by the gallery [DAM] Berlin | Frankfurt and xpo gallery Paris. Since February 2009 he is member of the Internet based Free Art and Technology Lab a.k.a. F.A.T. Lab founded by Evan Roth and James Powderly.

External links

References

  1. ↑ Chris Caeser (9 July 2009). "'World of Warcraft' exhibit may raise some brows". The Orange County Register. Retrieved 18 June 2014.
  2. ↑ Biographie 'Freies Fach'
  3. ↑ http://www.goethe.de/ins/ee/prj/gtw/aus/wer/bar/enindex.htm
  4. ↑ http://creative.arte.tv/fr/community/map-2006-2010
  5. ↑ http://datenform.de/blog/tag/map/
  6. ↑ http://www.datenform.de/mapeng.html
  7. ↑ "Dead Drops: Bizarre new artwork embeds USB sticks in buildings". Mail Online. 3 November 2010. Retrieved 3 March 2011.
  8. ↑ Aram Bartholl: Reply All exhibition + “The Speed Book,” Berlin in Wired (magazine) by Bruce Sterling, January 13, 2012
  9. ↑ Jonah Brucker-Cohen (29 September 2006). "Aram Bartholl Sees in FPS Mode". Gizmodo.com. Retrieved 18 June 2014.
  10. ↑ "Auteur Focus". Edge-Online.com. 22 August 2008. Retrieved 19 June 2014.
  11. ↑ Transmediale honorable mention
  12. ↑ Video Art Award Bremen 2007.
  13. ↑ Kunstfonds grant