JAMES H. CONNOLLY


ARTIST TALK + E-WASTE DISCUSSION

This talk was delivered to Jefferson Pinder's Research Studio class at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago on March 4, 2014.









Cracked Ray Tube in "Discarded: The Afterlife of Everyday Electronics"

Cracked Ray Tube 2014 Installation

An installation of 17 modified cathode ray tube televisions and computer monitors, interfaced with a custom programmed network computer system, algorithmically generating audio and video content in realtime. Max/MSP and Jitter, "a family of interactive graphical dataflow programming environments for audio, video, and graphical processing" acts as the brains behind the system.

Full installation room

Full installation straight on












OBJECT+MATERIAL CULTURE-BASED ARTISTIC INVESTIGATIONS



An arrangement of object at the Roger Brown Study Collection, a space that displays a wide range of things "freed from the drudgery of being useful" (Benjamin, the Arcades Projects) to be evaluated aesthetically on an even playing field.









REAPPROPRIATING, CRITIQUING, AND INTERRUPTING PUBLIC SPACE



↑ CALL POLICE, screenprint, 2008

This screenpring was wheatpasted inpublic spaces of my hometown of Saginaw, MI. The monument depicted can by found on Ojibway Island, the man-made island that divides the east and west sides of the incredibly segregated city of Saginaw.











EXPLORING LATENT MATERIALITIES OF ANALOG AND DIGITAL CONSUMER DEVICES











PLANNED OBSOLESCENCE; E-WASTE AS A GROWING PART OF OUR MATERIAL PRESENT





Late 2007: the sale of LCD screens surpasses that of CRT, via engadget.com



↑ Taken from: Hertz, Garnet and Jussi Parikka. “Zombie Media: Circuit Bending Media Archaeology Into an Art Method.” Leonardo, Vo. 45, No. 5, 2012.









TRACKING ABANDONDED CATHODES

An ongoing series of photographs




















E-WASTE AS A RESOURCE FOR ARTISTIC REAPPROPRIATION AND INVESTIGATION



The Salvation Army at Fullerton and Ashland on November 6, 2010



Bringing VGA CRTs back from Chicago Laser & Computer Services in Lansing, IL, June 2013



A view of my studio/living room, September 2013





VGA pinout



VGA d-sub connectors with soldering terminals, image taken from my hardware hacking tutorial















.

CRT Video Synthesizer Experiment 03 from James Connolly on Vimeo.









THE SANDIN IMAGE PROCESSOR

















CRACKED RAY TUBE



Kyle Evans at the Salvation Army on Ashland & Fullerton, September 2010



Kyle's DIY analog video transmitter

















Nam June Paik



Nam June Paik, Magnet TV, 1965, Modified black-and-white television set and magnet, Whitney Museum of American Art, New York



The Paik/Abe Synthesizer, also known as the Wobbulator at the Experimental Television Center.



The Wobbulator demo from Blair Neal on Vimeo.









DIY Electromagnets







Placing electromagnets



Exploiting materialities through digitally synthesized electromagnetic waveforms: 60 Hz wobbulating visuals generated by high-frequency audio









Cracked Ray Tube Studio Recording from 2011





Cracked Ray Tube Shows

The nature of Cracked Ray Tube and the use of extensive customized hardware means that shows require road trips.



SXSW in Austin TX, March 2011



Guthman Musical Instrument Competition in Atlanta, GA and the Pilot Light in Knoxville, TN, February 2012



Vancouver New Music Festival, Vancouver 2012









HARDWARE HACKING TUTORIALS

















HYBRIDIZING ANALOG AND DIGITAL SYSTEMS: EXPLORING OBSOLETE ANALOG HARDWARE WITH DIGITAL TOOLS TO CREATE MEDIA EXPERIENCES THAT ARE GENUINELY NEW



Installation system schematic







Cracked Ray Tube 2014 installation detail: VGA video driven by high-frequency audio

.







INTERRUPTING ASSUMPTIONS AND UNDERMINING AESTHETICS OF "NEW" MEDIA






PROPRIETARY HARDWARE/BLACK BOXING





Cracked Ray Tube on But Does it Float
Cracked Ray Tube on the Creator's Project









questions, comments, etc.: jconno@saic.edu



I am a Chicago-based artist, educator, museum worker, and archivist. My videos, open-source tools, and real-time audio/video performances undermine the interfaces and break through the algorithms of digital and analog systems, examining hidden power structures and liberating latent aesthetic materialities in cathartic and captivating compositions.

I am an Adjunct Associate Professor in the department of Film, Video, New Media, and Animation at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and the Collection Manager of the Roger Brown Study Collection.


NEWS/EVENTS

2022

September 10, 2022, 8:30 pm CRT Flux Phaser/RGB.VGA.VOLT performance at The Latent Space for the "Control Signals" exhibition performance series, Chicago, IL

August 13, 2022, 8:30 pm CRT Flux Phaser/RGB.VGA.VOLT and Cracked Ray Tube performance at The Latent Space for the "Control Signals" exhibition performance series, Chicago, IL

August 6, 2022, 7:00 pm opening for "Control Signals" solo exhibition at The Latent Space, Chicago, IL

August 6 - September 10, 2022 "Control Signals" solo exhibition at The Latent Space, Chicago, IL

↓2021↓

↓2020↓

↓2019↓

↓2018↓

↓2017↓

↓2016↓

↓2015↓

↓2014↓

↓2013↓

↓2012↓

↓2011↓

↓2010↓


EXHIBITIONS