Nina Sobell

Profile Picture
Birthyear
1947
Currently based
New York City
Website
Www.ninasobell.com/
Ninasobell@gmail.com
About

Artist Statement: I am interested in exploring notions of transformation, energy transfer, bridging the conscious and unconscious realms, and rendering the invisible visible through action and reaction. The results manifest themselves either as an action or object, and continue to live through extensive documentation. I see my life's work as a series of explorations, where the data gathered is the fertilizer for a new crop of ingredients to develop, contemplate and play with. I play with the notion of playing. I see the processes of creation as an integral part of the work, as important as the result.
Bio:

CV
Education
BFA 1969 Tyler School of Art, Temple University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and Rome, Italy
MFA 1971 Cornell University, Ithaca, New York

Early Digital/Virtual /Interactive Shows
1971-Sequential Deconstruction and Re-creation of Objects an interactive closed circuit and time-lapse video installation, Sibley Hall, Cornell University MFA Thesis Show
1975 EEG Telemetry Environment, curated by James Harithas, with Paul Schimmel, ContemporaryArts Museum, Houston Texas was interactive brainwave drawing with a five-channel video installation
1982 The Artist and Computer Show, curated by Kathy Rae Huffman, with Kong Lu and the Cortical Mirror Makers, Long Beach Museum of Art, Long Beach, Ca. Participants made one color-keyed Brain Wave Drawing together dissolved on their faces simultaneously.
1992 Brain Wave Drawing interactive installation incorporating computer graphics and keyed sound, Emily Hartzell, IBVA, Masahiro Kahata Bronx River Art Gallery, NY
1994 Sculpture in the Making: an interactive streaming-performance. Web-participants directed the telerobotic webcam, by clicking around the image of an armature, indicating where I should apply clay to it. Collaboration with Emily Hartzell, ParkBench, a cyber performance collaborative team, Center for Advanced Technology, NYU http://www.cat.nyu.edu/parkbench/parkbench/3_16_95.html http://www.cat.nyu.edu/parkbench/about.html#alice
1995 Alice Sat Here: telerobotic installation, Web participants directed the moving camera by clicking around the image on their screens. Passersby could direct the same moving camera on Alice, by touching pads surrounding a monitor, with a webcam displaying their streaming faces on it, in the front window of the gallery Alice is a human driven telerobotic vehicle. Upon entering the gallery there was a monitor with a split screen, one side displaying the exterior webcam participants and the other the interior show. ParkBench collaboration,Emily Hartzell, Fred Hansen, Toto Paxia,Richard Wallace, David Bacon CODE Show , Ricco/Maresca Gallery, NY http://cat.nyu.edu/parkbench/alice/
1996 Art on the Web, ParkBench, Whitney Museum of American Art
Blast5, Time Curators: web/video cyber installation with Franklin Furnace performers, Sandra Gering Gallery with Emily Hartzell and at the CAT, NYU http://artnetweb.com/blast5/parkbench/
PORT, four-screen web projected remote cyberperformance between theCenter for Advanced Technology and the List Visual Arts Center Gallery, MIT with Emily Hartzell and Jesse Gilbert playing sax and introducing an audio server to ParkBench for the first time. http://www.cat.nyu.edu/parkbench/port/
Adrift, webperformance, Ars Electronica with Gilbert, Hartzell, Sobell, Thorington, Wolsak
1997 Dance in a Moving Mirror, streaming performance between RAT, Aix-en-Provence and ParkBench Studio at 11 Broadway NYC, with Emily Hartzell, Jesse Gilbert, Scott Rosenberg http://www.cat.nyu.edu/parkbench/rat/aixpb.html
1998 Ebb and Flow,brain streaming performance http://www.turbulence.org/Works/ebb/
1999 Streaming the Brain: a Laboratory, a web performances between the Walter Phillips Gallery, Banff Center for the Arts and the Marc Vose Studio, NYC with, Sonya Allin, Emily Hartzell, Marc Vose, Heather Wagner http://www.ninasobell.com/webseance/
2004 Synaesthesia, Thinking of You, Brainstreaming performance with Marek Kulbacki, RJ Fleck and Mike Trivich, Institute for Contemporary Art, London http://www.ninasobell.com/london/index.htm
2008 Not About: Is, Streaming the Studio, Location One Gallery, NY http://www.location1.org/nina-sobell/
2008 California Video Art, BrainWave Drawing Installation, curated by Glenn Phillips, Getty Museum of Art, Los Angeles
2009 tina b. Interactive cyberperformance, sculpture in the making, between Nina in New York Studio and participants in the The Prague Contemporary Art Festival, Vernon Gallery, Prague, Czech Republic

Solo Shows and Collaborations
2008 Internal Message Search solo show, Gallery Area 53, Vienna, Austria
2008 Not About: Is, solo show, Location One Gallery, NY
2006 Reap Video Collaboration, Anne Bean Matt's Gallery, London, UK, Video Documentary of Zambian Street Theater Group with Anne Bean
2001 Liwase,Video Documentary of Zambian Street Theater Group with Anne Bean
1998 Interactive Installations, 1974 - 1998, DAAD Studios, Berlin with Emily Hartzell
1998 Ebb and Flow, Web performance, Morton Studio, turbulence.org (J.Gilbert/S.Allin)

Group Shows and Collaborations
2019 Subliminal video, Mitte Media Festival, DNA Galerie, curator Tom Rotenberg, Berlin
From Last to First- Thirty Digital Shorts, Mitte Media Festival, DNA Galerie, curator Tom Rotenberg, for LKC, Berlin
Subliminal, Estirando El Tiempo, curator Elizabeth Ross, Museo del Metro, Mexico City
2018 Grey Matters, premiere collaboration with Laura Ortman, curated by Able Sun, IFP Dumbo and Projected on the Brooklyn Bridge, NY
Duo-Synth and Apache Violin live performance with Laura Ortman, Sarah Bernstein record release event, Wonders of Nature, Brooklyn, NY
Rivington School Show, ink drawing, curator Adriaan van der Plas, Adriaan van der Plas Gallery, NY
The LES Festival for the Arts Show, Family 1& 2 Drawings, curator, C. Radcliffe, Theater for the New City Gallery, NY
Digitally Derived, BrainWave Drawings, curated by Nancy Buchanan
organized by Minha Horvat, Maribor, Slovenia
Subliminal video, Estirando El Tiempo, curator, Elizabeth Ross, Museo de la Ciudad, Querétaro, Mexico
Subliminal video, Hysteria Online, curator Elizabeth Ross, Mexico City
2017 ParkBench, FACES: Gender, Art and Technology, co-curators Eva Ursprung and Kathy Rae Huffman, Schaumbad Freies Gallery, Graz, Austria
Glass Breaking Live performance, Optics: 0:1 curated and directed by Victoria Keddie, Roulette, Brooklyn
2016Subliminal premiere video collaboration with Laura Ortman composer, curator John Ensor Parker, IFP Dumbo and Projected on the Brooklyn Bridge
Trois - Synth, Violin and Bass with Laura Ortman and Lynea Smith, Trans Pecos, Brooklyn
2015 Views, WMAT video commissioned and curated by Leo Kuelbs, IFP, Brooklyn, NY
Views, WMAT LKC, Manhattan Bridge Projection, NY
Views, WMAT curated by Leo Kuelbs, Fata Morgana Gallery, Berlin
Form and Substance: Projection, Lighting and Mapping, WMAT, Art Basel Miami
Poet Transmit, WMAT video, curated by Victoria Keddie and Cat Tyc, St. Marks Church, NY and Wave Farm Radio www.wavefarm.org
2014 L.E.S. Scene Then and Now, curated by Shalom Neuman, Fusion Art Museum, NY
Drawings, curated by Anne Bean and Ezra Rubenstein, 80 Three Colt Street, London
72 -82 Acme Gallery Film by William Raban, Hackney Picture House, London
Performance Documentation of Acme Gallery, Whitechapel Gallery, London
Personae, Emily Harvey Foundation Gallery, Venice, Italy
S(he) is still Her(e), curated by Johnny Velardi, Rivington Music Studio, NY
2013 Not Only This: New Language Beckons Us, curated by Andrew Blackley, Fales Collection, Bobst Library, NYU
Corps et Ames, prints, Atelier Galerie MLC, Vains, France
2012 Papyri, curator Berty Skuber, Emily Harvey Foundation, Venice, Italy
Housework, Gender, Subjectivity: Cultures of Domesticity, curated by Molly Hankwitz, The Reynolds Gallery, University of the Pacific, Stockton, California
Another Vacant Space, curated by Adam Nankervis, Man Museum, Berlin
WBAI Art Auction, curated by James Wintner, Steven Kasher Gallery, NY, NY
2011 Into the Pot You Go! curator Carol Stakeanas, Pacific Standard Time, LACE, Los Angeles
2010 Glow, curated by Adam Nankervis, Z-Bar, Berlin, Germany A Feast for the Eyes, curated by Heike Epildauer, Bank Austria Kunst Forum, Vienna, Austria
2009 ArtFemTV, curated by Evelin Stermitz, Gallery Photon, Ljubljana, Slovenia tina b. The Prague Contemporary Art Festival,Vernon Gallery, Prague, Czech Republic
Way Out, Pavilhao, Lisbon, Portugal
2008 Waves-The Art of the Electromagnetic Society, Hartware Medien Kunstverein, Dortmund, Germany
Ca Video Show, Getty Museum, Los Angeles, California
2007 Evidence of Movement, Getty Research Institute, LA, Ca.
Cyber Feminism Past Forward, Austrian Association of Women Artists, Vienna
The Future of the History, Space Gallery, New York
Slapstick, curated by C. Eammons, Lora Reynolds Gallery, Austin, Texas
2006 KISSS. Whitechapel Gallery, London, UK/Sidney, Australia
2005 Art/ Sound, curated by J. Slater, Front Room Gallery , Brooklyn, NY
2004 Synaesthesia, Thinking of You, Institute of Contemporary Art, London
2002 Art/Women/California 1950-2000, San Jose Museum of Art, San Jose, Ca.
2000 Sharing a Shadow, Three Colt Gallery, London
1999 Streaming: A Laboratory, with E. Hartzell/ Sonya Allin, W. Phillips Gallery, Banff
Sunshine & Noir: Art in Los Angeles 1960-1997, UCLA at The Armand Hammer
Castello di Rivoli, Italy, Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, Louisiana MOMA, Denmark
1997 Dance in a Moving Mirror streaming with Hartzell/Gilbert, RAT, Aix-en-Provence
Adrift (web performance), Ars Electronica with Gilbert, Hartzell, Thorington, Wolsak
Pink Wink, New Image Art Gallery, Los Angeles
Pasarse de la Raya, Expoarte, Guadalajara, VI Feria Internacional de arte Contemporaneo
PORT, four-screen web projection performance, MIT List Visual Arts Center
Blast5, Time Curators and web/video installation (ParkBench), Sandra Gering Gallery
1996 Art on the Web (ParkBench), Whitney Museum of American Art
Language and Disorder: videotapes, New Langton Arts, San Francisco
1995 Alice Sat Here, telerobotic installation w/Hartzell in CODE, Ricco/Maresca Gallery, NYC
1993 LA Sampler 1970-1993, Hey, Baby Chicky! P.McCarthy curator, David Zwirner Gallery, NYC
Scratching the Belly of the Beast, Brainwave Drawings, Los Angeles Film Forum
1992 Installation: painting, sculpture, and 2 channels of video, Granary Books Gallery, NYC
Brainwave Drawing Installation, Bronx River Arts Center, Bronx, NY
1991 Drawings, Elston Fine Arts Gallery, New York, NY
Cori: Struggle for Life, video work, Speaking Out: Art Against AIDS, Museum of Modern Art, NY
1990 Cori: Struggle for Life, Video Against AIDS, Institute of Contemporary Art, London,
The Indomitable Spirit, video work, International Center for Photography, NY
Beyond Boundaries: Paintings, Black and White in Color Gallery, Bronx, NY


Bibliography
"Collision: Contemporary Artists Working in Houston, 1972-1985 by Pete Gershon" Pages 158-160 - Texas A&M University Press 2018
"Networked Projects in the Formative Years of the Internet: Nina Sobell - Work: 1977-1997" December, 2018 www.narrabase.net/Nina_Sobell.html
"A Feast for the Eyes/ Augenschmaus Vom Essen im Stilleben" by Heike Epildauer and Ingried Brugger,Prestel Verlag 2010 Berlin, Bank Austria Kunstforum
"tina b. Prague Contemporary Arts Festival" edited by Monika Burian,curated by Blanca de la Torre Garcia, Vernon Fine Art, Czech Republic 2009
"Nina Sobell at Gallery Area53" by Gesche Heumann, Art Magazine, Austellungkritik, 25.07.08
"California Video: Artists and Histories", edited by Glenn Phillips, Getty Research Institute; 2008
"Allure of the Raw: Ca Video" by Hollis Willis, Modern Painter, March 2008
"Interview with Nina Sobell" by Evelin Stermitz, published by Marisa Olson, Rhizome.org, August 21, 2007
http://rhizome.org/announce/view/49465
"Video Art": Michael Rush, Thames and Hudson, 2006
"Feedback": editors Horsfield /Hildebrand, Temple University Press, 2006
"Closed Circuit": by Slavko Kacunko, Logos Verlag, Berlin, Germany 2006
"Digital Art": , by Christiane Paul, Thames and Hudson, London
"Art/Women/California 1950-2000" editors Burgess/Salvioni, University of California Press and the San Jose Museum of Art (2002), p. 326.
"Streaming the Brain" by N. Sobell, MultiMedia, Artful Media ed. Doree Duncan Seligmann IEEE Computer Society, Vol. 9, No. 3 (July-September, 2002), p. 3—8.
"Info Arts-Intersections of Art, Science, and Technology" by S.Wilson, MIT Press (2002).
"Sculpting in Time and Space: Interactive Work" by Nina Sobell and Emily Hartzell, Leornardo, MIT Press, Vol.34, No.3 (2001).
"The Robot in the Garden" by Ken Goldberg, MIT Press (2000), p. 15.
"Going Virtual" by Martha Wilson, CAA Art Journal, Summer, 2000.
"Artful Media," by Kathy Brew, IEEE Multimedia, 1999.
"Women in Art and Technology" edited by Judy Malloy., MIT Press 1999
"A Brief History of Outrage: The 51 (or So) Greatest Avant-Garde Moments," by C. Carr, Village Voice, September 22, 1998.
"On Edge: The Heart of the Web," by C. Carr, Village Voice,Vol. 42, No. 25 (June 24, 1997), p.50.
"VirtuAlice," by Sobell and Hartzell, Ylem , Vol. 17, No. 9, (September/October, 1997), p. 5.
"Telepresence Art," by Eduardo Kac, Art Journal, College Art Association, 1997.
"Naked to the Bone",by Betty Ann Kevlis, Rutgers University Press, 1997.
"Postmodern Currents: Art and Artists in the Age of Electronic Media", by Margot Lovejoy, Prentice Hall, 1996 (second edition).
"ParkBench," interview with Doug Grunther, WDST Woodstock Radio, October, 1996.
"ParkBench Public Access Kiosks," Visual Proceedings, Siggraph '96.
"ParkBench Sculpting Performances," The Acid-free Paper (web journal), edited by Kevin Smith, Vol. 1, No. 4 (January, 1996), Net Culture section.
"Deviant Eyes, Deviant Bodies" by Chris Straayer, Columbia University Press, 1996
"The Buzz" by Sobell and Hartzell, TalkBack! journal on the Web, edited by Robert Atkins. Issue #1 (December, 1995). <http://math240.lehman.cuny.edu/talkback>
"Art Online" by Robert Atkins, Art in America, Vol. 83, No. 12 (December, 1995), p. 64.
"Technology: Do You Mind if I Sit Here?" by Kimberly Neuhaus, I.D.,Vol. 42, No. 2 (March-April, 1995), p. 24.
"ParkBench," Artists' Pages by Emily Hartzell and Nina Sobell, Felix: Landscape(s) Vol. 2, No.1 (1995), pp. 302-5.
Interactions, Vol. IV, No. 2, June, 1992.
Interactions, Vol. III, No. 1, April, 1991
Felix (review of EXHUMED & Video 1972-90), Vol. 1, No. 1 (Spring, 1991), p. 71-73.

Lectures
2007 IMHO with Heather Wagner, Location One, NY
2002 Artist Talk, SUNY Purchase, Department of Art, Purchase, New York
2001 Artist Talk, Computer Art Department, School of Visual Arts, New York
2000 Nina Sobell: Video Performances, NYU School of Food Sciences
1999 Artist Talk, Sony Wonder HD Theater and Technology Museum
1997 Human Factors and Ergonomics Society, Stevens Institute of Technology
Digital Landscapes of the Mind, London Institute
ISEA (International Society of Electronic Arts), Chicago Art Institute
Art Talk Art: Art, Anarchy, and the Web, Foundation for Art Resources, LA
LA Museum of Contemporary Art, Geffen Contemporary LA, Art Talks '97
Cornell University, Creativity Symposium
Art, Culture, and Technology, Teacher's College, Columbia University,
CHI '97 (Computer-Human Interaction), Atlanta
Central St. Martin's School of Art, London
1996 ParkBench, Artist's Presentation, Siggraph '96
1995 Art and Science Collaborations, Inc., Cooper Union Great Hall, New York
1993 Department of Fine Arts, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ
1991 The Slade, St. Martins, Newcastle, Brighton Poly, E. London Poly, Brunel University, Reading,
Collections
Archivo Storico delle Arti Contemporane; La Bienalle di Venezia, Italia; Museum of Modern Art, NY; Long Beach Museum of Art, Long Beach, CA; Whitney Museum of American Art; Banff Centre for the Arts, Canada; deSaisset, Museum of Art; Manchester Museum of Art, England; Reading University, England; Contemporary Arts Museum, Houston, TexasArts; Zentrum fur Kunst Und Medien Technologie, Karlsruhe, Montevideo, Amsterdam; Institute of Contemporary Art, London; Western Front Video, Vancouver; DIA Foundation; Cologne; Kramlich Video Collection; Blanton Library,Austin,Texas; RJ Fleck; Gunther Brodar and other private collections and academic institutions.

Professional Recognition and Appointments
2019 Foreword written for Brain Computer Interfaces for Artistic Expression, editor Anton Nijholt, Springer-Verlag GMbH publisher
2018 BrainWave Drawing History presentation, LASER Leonardo Art and Science Forum, in support of Leonardo/ISAST’s LEAF initiative, NY
Portrait commission, RJFleck Collection
2017 BrainWave Drawings History presentation Brain On Art conference, Valencia
2015-17 Video Commissions from LKCollection
2011 Artist-in-Residence, Emily Harvey Foundation, Venice, Italy
2010 BrainChat reached U. S. patent pending
2007-08 Artist-in-Residence,Location One, New York, NY
2005-06 Visiting Lecturer, Goldsmiths College, University of London UK
2002 Rockefeller Foundation Fellowship Nominee in Media Arts
2001 New York State Council for the Arts, Artist Fellowship
1999 Webby Award Nominee, ParkBench On-Line Collective
1998 Turbulence.org Commission, with S. Allin and J. Gilbert
1998 Ebb and Flow, Web performance, Morton Studio, turbulence.org (J.Gilbert/S.Allin)with support from the Greenwall Foundation
1998 Artist-in-Residence, Banff Centre for the Arts, Canada
1998 Interactive Installations, 1974 - 1998, DAAD Studios, Berlin with Emily Hartzell invited by David Medalla and Adam Nankervis
1994-98 Artist-in Residence, Center for Advanced Technology, Courant School of Computer Science, New York University
1991-93 Artist-in-Residence, Interactive Telecommunications Program, Tisch School of the Arts NYU








News
New York Acker Awards

I received a New York Acker Award in Video 2020

Brains and Games International Design Fiction Competition

Judge for the Brains and Games International Design Fiction Competition: computational art division, Cinematic Arts and Smart VR Center USC, Los Angeles.

Bibliography
DataViz