Update - Natalie Jeremijenko
Written on October 13, 2008
You might recall our brief discussion of Natalie Jeremijenko’s and Kate Rich’ s 1996 Suicide Box, attributed to the Bureau of Inverse Technology, which used computer vision techniques to videotape people committing suicide from the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco. Just this past Friday the Golden Gate Board of Directors voted 14-1 to construct a net to catch would-be jumpers. I heard this on the radio and a Google news search can give you more detail. This is timely because Natalie Jeremijenko is showing in the Biological Agents show right here at Gallery 400 on the UIC campus this week. The opening is Wednesday, October 15, 2008, 5-8pm.
Most of the media report the official numbers on the suicides; you may recall that the point of the piece was to record the actual numbers which were significantly higher. Turns out ethically-motivated art actually can have an effect on the public discourse, clocking in 12 years after the fact.
More on Natalie Jeremijenko can be culled from our class notes, recreated here for your convenience:
Natalie Jerimijenko, homepage
* 1996, SuicideBox (Bureau of Inverse Technology), (1:52 begins @:56)
* 2007, Fish Sensor (xDesign), (0:11)