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About

The next New Media Caucus Symposium will take place from September 30th-October 2nd 2022 at Virginia Tech and will focus on the theme of "Future Bodies."

The New Media Caucus (NMC) is an international non-profit association formed to promote the development and understanding of new media art. We represent and serve: artists, designers, practitioners, historians, theorists, educators, students, and scholars. Recognizing new media art to be inherently interdisciplinary, multimodal, and evolving, we support and advance a wide range of inquiry to catalyze further evolution of the field.

The NMC is committed to extending and sustaining the diversity of our community, board, and membership, to promote an environment of equality, inclusion, and respect for difference. We prioritize inclusion as an ongoing collaborative process of growth that we continually address, both within the Caucus and in our field.

Theme

Future Bodies will present a constellation of new interdisciplinary research and practice in new media that considers the role of bodies, broadly conceived, in our collective future.

As both material and metaphorical entities, bodies are at once subject to historical context and act as agents in forging new horizons of experience. Future Bodies will convene conversations around a set of interrelated questions about how bodies shape and intersect with art, technology, data, ecology, and history. We invite participants to explore how specific bodies, as sites of tension and contestation, are rendered, identified, and understood, and in turn, how they enable us to imagine and instantiate new futures inside and outside of established systems.

Location

Virginia Tech

Virginia Tech is a public land-grant research university located in Blacksburg, VA, nestled in the Appalachian Mountains of western Virginia. The symposium will be co-hosted by the School of Visual Arts, the Institute for Creativity, Arts, and Technology, and the Moss Arts Center.

Symposium events will take place at the Moss Arts Center, the Armory, Henderson Hall, and the Creativity and Innovation District Live Learn Community building, and the Lyric Theater.

Dates

The Future Bodies symposium will take place from September 30th-October 2nd 2022.


The keynote address will be on September 30th at 10am EST at the Lyric Theater in downtown Blacksburg. It will also be live-streamed.

Schedule

Click here for a downloadable schedule of the symposium.

Map

Exhibition

Participating Artists:

Keynote

micha cárdenas


Free and open to the public.


micha cárdenas, PhD, is an artist, and Associate Chair and Associate Professor of Performance, Play & Design, and Associate Professor of Critical Race & Ethnic Studies, at the University of California, Santa Cruz, where she directs the Critical Realities Studio. Her book Poetic Operations (Duke UP 2022) proposes algorithmic analysis as a method for developing a trans of color poetics. She is co-editor of the book series Queer/Trans/Digital at NYU Press, with Amanda Philips and Bo Ruberg. cárdenas’s co-authored books The Transreal: Political Aesthetics of Crossing Realities (2012) and Trans Desire / Affective Cyborgs (2010) were published by Atropos Press.

Keynote title: "Poetic Operations and Trans Ecologies"

Abstract:

In this talk, Dr. cárdenas will discuss her new book Poetic Operations (Duke 2022), as well as her augmented reality artwork about climate justice and her forthcoming book After Man: Fires, Oceans and Androids. In Poetic Operations, cárdenas considers contemporary digital media, artwork, and poetry in order to articulate trans of color strategies for safety and survival. Drawing on decolonial theory, women of color feminism, media theory, and queer of color critique, cárdenas develops a method she calls algorithmic analysis. In her forthcoming book After Man, cárdenas confronts the dual crises of climate change and COVID-19 which have prompted speculation on the end of humanity. Following on the thinking of Sylvia Wynter, cárdenas considers the end of humanism not from the privileged place of posthumanism but from a decolonial viewpoint that many of us never had the privilege to be considered human. She dwells in what comes after man, in contemporary art, science fiction and international art biennials.

This keynote address is made possible by UVA Arts & the UVA Office of the Provost and the Vice Provost for the Arts at the University of Virginia, with a contribution from the Virginia Tech Women and Minority Artists and Scholars Lecture Series.


Registration

REGISTRATION IS NOW CLOSED.

Registration Costs

$220 - In-person General Registration
$150 - In-person Non-Institutionally Supported, Underemployed or Experiencing Financial Hardship
$150 - Remote Everyone
$90 - In-person Full-time Student

The New Media Caucus (NMC) invites participants in the 2022 Future Bodies Symposium & Exhibition to apply for scholarships to offset the cost of attendance. Preference will be given to applicants with demonstrated need, as well as those who promote our mission of diversity and inclusivity.

Applications will be reviewed on a rolling basis beginning on July 1 and ending on July 15, 2022. Applicants must provide a 300 word (maximum) application statement and a short biography (100-200 words).

Applications are now closed. Decisions will be forthcoming by the end of July.

This opportunity is funded in part by the Institute for Society, Culture and Environment at Virginia Tech.

Submissions

The deadline for submissions for both the symposium sessions and the exhibition is midnight March 31, 2022. Submission types include: artworks, symposium panels, individual paper/research presentations, workshops, artist talks, and experimental presentations. To submit work, fill out the appropriate Google Form listed below. Please check the submission forms for detailed submission requirements.

Note that you may submit work to both the symposium and the exhibition.

Timeline

Full Call For Proposals (pdf download)

Submission Forms

Submissions have now closed.

Committee Members

Steering Committee: Co-Chairs: Jessye McDowell and Zachary Duer. Members: Nick Bontrager, Victoria Bradbury, Meredith Drum, Rebecca Forstater, Johanna Gosse, Mona Kasra, Mat Rappaport, and Chelsea Thompto

Exhibition Committee Members: Constanza Salazar, Jennifer Zaylea, Jessye McDowell, Meredith Drum, Mona Kasra, Nate King, Zachary Duer

Symposium Committee: Co-chairs: Chelsea Thompto, Johanna Gosse

Secondary Reviewers for Exhibition: Abishek Narula, Adam Eddy, Amanda Lechner, Blake Carrington, Caleb Flood, Caroline Voagen Nelson, Clint Sleeper, Chris Kojzar, Deb Sim, Dustin Dennis, Eden Unluata-Foley, Jonah Brucker-Cohen, Kim Lyle, KT Duffy, Lydia Moyer, Liz Flyntz, Mariam Eqbal, Peter Bussigel, Rachel Clarke, Rene Cepeda, Rebecca Forstater, Sam Blanchard, Tacie Jones, Thomas Tucker

Secondary Reviewers for Symposium: Adia Sykes, Alejandro T. Acierto, Helen Star, Jessye McDowell, Meredith Drum, Robert Derr

Scholarship Committee: Co-chairs: Jessye McDowell and Meredith Drum with review of applicants completed by Victoria Bradbury, Robert Derr, Rebecca Forstater, and Kim Lyle

Partners

Travel and Lodging

Wi-Fi

To access free WIFI on the Virginia Tech campus, either use an eduroam credential if your institution provides one, or login to the VT Guest Wireless by creating an account here.

Getting to Virgina Tech

By Air

Roanoke Regional Airport is the closest airport to Blacksburg. It is approximately a 40 minute drive from the airport to Blacksburg.

Bus to Blacksburg from ROA Airport

The Smart Way bus travels from the Roanoke Regional Airport to the Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg. The fare is $4.00 each way, payable in cash (the drivers do not carry change) at the time of boarding the bus.

Blacksburg Transit

While Blacksburg is a small town, there is a municipal bus system, Blacksburg Transit.

Blacksburg Area Hotels

Residence Inn

Hyatt Place

Parking for the Symposium

The most convenient parking location for symposium events is the North End Center Parking Garage. Visitors may park on levels 1 and 2 for a $6 daily charge paid at the garage. See the map below.

For additional options on campus, please see the Virginia Tech parking information for contactless visitor parking through ParkMobile.

For additional parking options in the town of Blacksburg, please see this guide to downtown Blacksburg parking.

Contact

For additional information, please inquire at: futurebodies@newmediacaucus.org