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Mapping Time: Calit2's Gallery to Launch Exhibition October 4

San Diego, September 13, 2010  -- This fall the gallery@calit2 presents "Mapping Time," an exhibition by Calit2's Software Studies Initiative at UC San Diego. The lab is directed by Lev Manovich, UCSD Professor of Visual Arts and Calit2 researcher; its core participants are Calit2 postdoctoral researcher Jeremy Douglass, and William Huber (Ph.D. student in Visual Arts). In addition, undergraduate and graduate students and faculty from the departments of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Computer Science and Engineering, Communication, Visual Arts, and Calit2 participate in the lab's work (see box at right).

"Mapping Time" Exhibition Oct. 4- Dec. 10, 2010 By Lev Manovich, Jeremy Douglass and William Huber with Adelheid Heftberger, Agatha Man, Alex Avrorin, Bertrand Grandgeorge, Chanda L. Carey, Christa Lee, Colin Wheelock, Daniel Rehn, Devon Merill, Jia Gu, Kedar Reddy, Laura Hoeger, Nadia Xiangfei, Nichol Bernardo, Ong Kian Peng (aka Bin), Rachel Cody, Sergie Magdalin, So Yamaoka, Steven Mandiberg, Sunsern Cheamanunku, Tara Zepel, Victoria Azurin, Xiaoda Wang.

Since 2008, Software Studies Initiative has focused on the development of new methods and techniques for the analysis and visualization of visual and interactive media. The exhibition coincides with the lab releasing a number of open-source tools which are used to create all works in the exhibition. Over the summer 2010, Software Studies Initiative members had the unique opportunity to use the gallery@calit2 as a research laboratory, running analysis of one million Manga pages on gallery computers. The experiment will continue throughout the exhibition, with new results being computed and visualized every day.

The lab uses the term 'cultural analytics' to refer to its techniques for the analysis and visualization of large cultural data sets. As Lev Manovich notes, "It was my exposure to Calit2 in the first place - specifically the vision of a new scale of cyberinfrastructure and scientific research as manifested in the HIPerSpace supervisualization system and OptIPuter - which led me to begin thinking about cultural analytics back in 2005. It is therefore exciting to be able to share with the community the results of this work five years later."

For the "Mapping Time" exhibition, the concept is to render the "shapes" of cultural time. According to Manovich, "our goal is to demonstrate how we can visualize gradual changes over time at a number of scales - from a single minute of a video game play to  11 years of Naruto (most popular Manga title) to 130 years of the journal Science (1880-2010).” The exhibition includes visualizations of novels, video game play, web comics, Manga, motion graphics, feature films, and mass media publications presented via large-scale prints, animations and real-time generative projections.

"Mapping Time" is open to the public October 4 - December 10, 2010, 11am - 5pm, Monday - Friday. A panel discussion, moderated by Visual Arts faculty Benjamin Bratton, and an opening reception will be held on Friday, October 22, 2010. The exhibition will conclude with a film screening and closing reception on Friday, December 3, 2010.

Software Studies Initiative research is supported by Calit2, CRCA, UC San Diego, the National Endowment for the Humanities' Office of Digital Humanities, and National Science Foundation.

"Mapping Time" 
October 4 - December 10,  2010
11am - 5pm, Monday - Friday

Panel Discussion and Opening Reception  
Friday, October 22, 2010, 5pm-8pm

Film Screening and Closing Reception
Friday, December 3, 2010, 5pm-8pm

Gallery events are FREE and open to the public. 

Please RSVP to Trish Stone, Gallery Coordinator, tstone@ucsd.edu

Media Contacts

 Doug Ramsey, 858-822-5825, dramsey@ucsd.edu 

Related Links

Software Studies Initiative 
gallery@calit2 
Calit2