Design and TX-ology
Although temperatures on the East Coast are on the rise, several New Schoolers have already headed south for warmer weather: South by Southwest (SXSW), that is. Four MFA Design and Technology students from Parsons The New School for Design and a professor from Eugene Lang College The New School for Liberal Arts are representing The New School in Austin, where they will present their work at the annual launching pad for all things film, music, and design.
Students Hirumi Nanayakkara, Tami Evnin, Nidhi Malhotra and Maya Weinstein will have work installed at the AMOA-Arthouse at the Jones Center for the duration of the festival (March 9th ‘ March 18th). Their project, #FEEDMixer, is the cen­terpiece interactive exhibit at #FEED, a festival-long event tasking artists and designers to make interesting use of the SXSW data stream. Visitors at the lobby desk command center, use #FEEDMixer to jam with their friends, mixing real-time SXSW audio and visual content clips and Twitter data curated through the Mass Relevance platform. The resulting mixes are broadcast to other viewers inside the venue and outside on the street.
And Caveh Zahedi, assistant professor of culture and media at Lang, premiered his controversial film The Sheikh and I, which documents his assignment to create a short film for the United Arab Emirates’ biennial celebration. The film follows Zahedi and his film crew as they attempt to make a film on the theme of art as a subversive act., After being instructed by the Biennial commission that he can do anything except make fun of the Sheik, who rules the country and finances the Biennial, Zahedi decides to do just that. The film, which was banned for blasphemy, is competing in the festival’s Documentary Competition.
For more on South by Southwest, visit www.sxsw.com.