Karen ann Donnachie
₭₳ⱤɆ₦ ₳₦₦ ĐØ₦₦₳₵ⱧłɆ, PhD (b. 1970) is an electronic artist, publisher and speculative designer.
Winner of the 2024 Tokyo Type Directors' Club Grand Prize for "A Jagged Orbit" ~ a robotic self-reflexive drawing machine; winner of 2020 Robert Coover Award for Electronic Literature from ELO; winner of the 2020 Cornish Family Prize for Art and Design Publishing; winner of the Tokyo Type Director's Club Prize in 2019 and 2020 for Generative type and design.
From 1990 through 2010 Karen ann was based in Milan, Italy where, alongside her studio practice, and with her partner Andy Simionato, she co-founded and curated the award winning on- and off-line experimental art periodical This is (not) a Magazine (from 2002) and later the imprint Atomic Activity Books (from 2008), from which a number of artists’ books, exhibitions, networked projects and compendia of post-internet art have been published.
Karen ann’s work incorporates diverse fields of activity, from electronic, internet, generative and robotic art to editorial and documentary photography, to video, performance art, curatorial and networked robotic projects. Her editorial, commercial and artistic work has appeared in numerous publications, exhibitions, galleries and museums around the world including Milan's Design Triennial, PICA (Perth), ISEA (Sydney), and the recent Princeton Press publication "Come Together: The Rise of Cooperative Art & Design" among many others, and her scholarship on the selfie, post-photography and internet art has been published internationally.
Karen ann currently lectures in the Masters of Design, Innovation & Technology at the School of Design, RMIT University, and in design at VCA, University of Melbourne. "The Human Use of The Human Face: The Photographic Self-portrait in the Age of the Selfie", was a practice-led thesis articulated through speculative camera design, social media web apps and immersive installation for which she was awarded a PhD (Art) in 2017 from Curtin University.
Karen ann currently resides in Melbourne where she continues her electronic art and publishing practice.
Supervisors: Prof David Hawkins, Prof. Erik Champion, Prof Julian Goddard, Prof. Christopher Crouch, Prof. Paul Thomas, and Prof. Susanna Castledon
Winner of the 2024 Tokyo Type Directors' Club Grand Prize for "A Jagged Orbit" ~ a robotic self-reflexive drawing machine; winner of 2020 Robert Coover Award for Electronic Literature from ELO; winner of the 2020 Cornish Family Prize for Art and Design Publishing; winner of the Tokyo Type Director's Club Prize in 2019 and 2020 for Generative type and design.
From 1990 through 2010 Karen ann was based in Milan, Italy where, alongside her studio practice, and with her partner Andy Simionato, she co-founded and curated the award winning on- and off-line experimental art periodical This is (not) a Magazine (from 2002) and later the imprint Atomic Activity Books (from 2008), from which a number of artists’ books, exhibitions, networked projects and compendia of post-internet art have been published.
Karen ann’s work incorporates diverse fields of activity, from electronic, internet, generative and robotic art to editorial and documentary photography, to video, performance art, curatorial and networked robotic projects. Her editorial, commercial and artistic work has appeared in numerous publications, exhibitions, galleries and museums around the world including Milan's Design Triennial, PICA (Perth), ISEA (Sydney), and the recent Princeton Press publication "Come Together: The Rise of Cooperative Art & Design" among many others, and her scholarship on the selfie, post-photography and internet art has been published internationally.
Karen ann currently lectures in the Masters of Design, Innovation & Technology at the School of Design, RMIT University, and in design at VCA, University of Melbourne. "The Human Use of The Human Face: The Photographic Self-portrait in the Age of the Selfie", was a practice-led thesis articulated through speculative camera design, social media web apps and immersive installation for which she was awarded a PhD (Art) in 2017 from Curtin University.
Karen ann currently resides in Melbourne where she continues her electronic art and publishing practice.
Supervisors: Prof David Hawkins, Prof. Erik Champion, Prof Julian Goddard, Prof. Christopher Crouch, Prof. Paul Thomas, and Prof. Susanna Castledon
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Videos by Karen ann Donnachie
This web-based artwork automatically maps words as linguistic functions (e.g. nouns, verbs, adjectives, pronouns, etc.) and across a spectrum of sentiment from negative to positive. The page space is designed in real-time around these elements with a unique system of visual and auditory elements. We can turn off the type in order to focus on these elements.
We describe the resulting process as a form of ‘artificial illumination’ because it allows us to link medieval scribal practices with questions concerning emerging technologies such as A.I. and Machine Learning, bridging pre-literate and post-literate societies.
We believe that emerging technologies such as A.I. represent something other than a thing. Instead, they increasingly seem to be a part of a larger process that has the potential to shape the world it was tasked to merely observe and categorize. To paraphrase Buckminster Fuller, A.I. is not a noun, it increasingly seems a verb.
Papers & Chapters by Karen ann Donnachie
The book can be a tool for communication, reading, entertainment, or learning; an object and a status symbol.
The most recent shift, from print media to digital technology, began around the middle of the 20th century. It culminated in two of the most ambitious projects in the history of the book (at least if we believe the corporate hype): the mass-digitisation of books by Google and the mass-distribution of electronic books by Amazon.
The survival of bookshops and flourishing of libraries (in real life) defies predictions that the “end of the book” is near. But even the most militant bibliophile will acknowledge how digital technology has called the “idea” of the book into question, once again.
To explore the potential for human-machine collaboration in reading and writing, we built a machine that makes poetry from the pages of any printed book. Ultimately, this project attempts to imagine the future of the book itself.
We will begin by outlining how the reading-machine uses computer vision and Optical Character Recognition (OCR) in order to identify the text on any open book placed under its dual-cameras, we will then describe how the system leverages Machine Learning (ML) and Natural Language Processing (NLP) to uncover brief ‘poetic’ combinations of words on the page, which it preserves, while erasing all other words. Finally, we will describe how the reading-machine automatically searches for an illustration from the Google Image Archive to ‘illuminate’ the page according to the meanings of the remaining words.
Once every page in the book has been read, interpreted, and illuminated, the system automatically publishes the results using an Internet printing service, and the resulting volume is then added to The Library of Nonhuman Books. In this essay, we are primarily focusing on the design and functions of the reading-machine, and we will address the books it creates, and the implications of the literary and aesthetic outcomes these embody, more closely on another occasion.
ISBN 978 3 86335 831 0
These holes in between are in fact being filled, and at an unprecedented rate, with image data generated voluntarily and involuntarily by individuals as they move through real and electronic space. It is difficult to imagine life without being imaged.
The perception of a constant all-encompassing surveillance has
generated a collective 'horror vacui', the world imagined has been gradually displaced by the world imaged. When Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 and its 239 passengers vanished, millions of people joined the largest ever search party through satellite services such as Tomnod, and found nothing but whitecaps on waves. This article discusses how without an image to 'know' this event, we remain suspended, without resolution.
The tools at the service of the artists are the building blocks and languages of the very constructs themselves, so while the artist labours over the code his role, practically speaking, is arguably no different from a software professional or computer scientist, however it is the perspective and ephemeral concern of the artist that sets his activity apart. The interdisciplinarity of the artist’s practice remains fleeting – time and (Internet) space specific.
Beyond those who deliberately infiltrate the network, artists who exploit networked services (www, social media) in their artistic production as medium or channels of distribution are extending their practice into other dimensions, transposing, translating or extending their relative disciplines. Beyond whether this demands a redefinition of the disciplines themselves or requires attributing to these artists the label of interdisciplinary, this paper will demonsrate that the works being produced in post Internet environments and the practices established by netartists are outpacing our taxonomies.
This paper will present the work of an array of artists who’s work from in and around the Internet can serve as case studies for contemporary interdisciplinary methodologies as they work in in those ephemeral, fleeting, liminal spaces, occasionally re-wiring the circuitry that surrounds and contains us.
Red, wine and green. 24 Italian Graphic Designers
A cura di Giorgio Camuffo
Grafici: Enrico Bravi, Cristina Chiappini, Codesign, Convertino & Designers, Designwork, Dolcini Associati, Fsd/Fabrizio Schiavi, Alessandro Gori, Grafco3, Humm Design, Ldc/Gianni Sinni, Lifesaver, Massimo Pitis Design, Marco Morosini, Paolo Palma, Polystudio, Rauch Design, Studio Camuffo, Studio FM Milano, Studio Orange, Studio Tapiro, Matteo Vianello, Omar Vulpinari, Why Style
Testi: Giorgio Camuffo, Federica Palmarin, Ries Straver, Sergio Schito, Anna Vera, Massimo Vignello, Sergio Polano, Gillo Dorfles, Matteo Vianello, Alan Fletcher, Francesco Messina, Elisabetta Sgarbi, Andy Simionato, Karen Ann Donnachie
444 pp
PhD Thesis by Karen ann Donnachie
This multidisciplinary, practice explores the phenomenon of the selfie (understood as a networked, vernacular, photographic selfportrait) in order to propose a new critical understanding of its effect on wider photographic self-portrait practice, and photography in general.
Significantly, “The Human Use of the Human Face” depicts the selfie as more than a mere vernacular object or action and is not satisfied with the dismissal of the selfie as a direct remediation of the traditional self-portrait. Instead this thesis maps the complex, and sometimes controversial genre of amateur self-portraiture as it sits somewhere between performance, narcissism, social tic, intrinsic desire for self-projection and a possibly irrational quest for authenticity in the photographic image.
This practice-led research is articulated through the creation of original digital and electronic artworks including speculative camera design, social media web apps and immersive installation; through interviews with contemporary artists; and finally through the discussion of cultural, aesthetic and photographic theory. This research examines the privileged position the selfie holds inside a rapidly expanding and evolving social media ecology as it becomes both vehicle and tool, a symbol of personal, social, cultural and political identities. Along with the prevailing concerns surrounding the selfie and its reflection on contemporary society, this thesis inserts notions of human affect, connectedness, belonging and being human into the discussion concerning the motivations behind, and social consequences of, the selfie in three areas: first life, second life, and afterlife.
This thesis was presented in 2016 for my PhD (Art), awarded from the School of Design & Art, Curtin University, Western Australia, 2017.
Books by Karen ann Donnachie
-----------------------------------------
Handbook for the Graphic Arts
-----------------------------------------
NavaPress Milano
This web-based artwork automatically maps words as linguistic functions (e.g. nouns, verbs, adjectives, pronouns, etc.) and across a spectrum of sentiment from negative to positive. The page space is designed in real-time around these elements with a unique system of visual and auditory elements. We can turn off the type in order to focus on these elements.
We describe the resulting process as a form of ‘artificial illumination’ because it allows us to link medieval scribal practices with questions concerning emerging technologies such as A.I. and Machine Learning, bridging pre-literate and post-literate societies.
We believe that emerging technologies such as A.I. represent something other than a thing. Instead, they increasingly seem to be a part of a larger process that has the potential to shape the world it was tasked to merely observe and categorize. To paraphrase Buckminster Fuller, A.I. is not a noun, it increasingly seems a verb.
The book can be a tool for communication, reading, entertainment, or learning; an object and a status symbol.
The most recent shift, from print media to digital technology, began around the middle of the 20th century. It culminated in two of the most ambitious projects in the history of the book (at least if we believe the corporate hype): the mass-digitisation of books by Google and the mass-distribution of electronic books by Amazon.
The survival of bookshops and flourishing of libraries (in real life) defies predictions that the “end of the book” is near. But even the most militant bibliophile will acknowledge how digital technology has called the “idea” of the book into question, once again.
To explore the potential for human-machine collaboration in reading and writing, we built a machine that makes poetry from the pages of any printed book. Ultimately, this project attempts to imagine the future of the book itself.
We will begin by outlining how the reading-machine uses computer vision and Optical Character Recognition (OCR) in order to identify the text on any open book placed under its dual-cameras, we will then describe how the system leverages Machine Learning (ML) and Natural Language Processing (NLP) to uncover brief ‘poetic’ combinations of words on the page, which it preserves, while erasing all other words. Finally, we will describe how the reading-machine automatically searches for an illustration from the Google Image Archive to ‘illuminate’ the page according to the meanings of the remaining words.
Once every page in the book has been read, interpreted, and illuminated, the system automatically publishes the results using an Internet printing service, and the resulting volume is then added to The Library of Nonhuman Books. In this essay, we are primarily focusing on the design and functions of the reading-machine, and we will address the books it creates, and the implications of the literary and aesthetic outcomes these embody, more closely on another occasion.
ISBN 978 3 86335 831 0
These holes in between are in fact being filled, and at an unprecedented rate, with image data generated voluntarily and involuntarily by individuals as they move through real and electronic space. It is difficult to imagine life without being imaged.
The perception of a constant all-encompassing surveillance has
generated a collective 'horror vacui', the world imagined has been gradually displaced by the world imaged. When Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 and its 239 passengers vanished, millions of people joined the largest ever search party through satellite services such as Tomnod, and found nothing but whitecaps on waves. This article discusses how without an image to 'know' this event, we remain suspended, without resolution.
The tools at the service of the artists are the building blocks and languages of the very constructs themselves, so while the artist labours over the code his role, practically speaking, is arguably no different from a software professional or computer scientist, however it is the perspective and ephemeral concern of the artist that sets his activity apart. The interdisciplinarity of the artist’s practice remains fleeting – time and (Internet) space specific.
Beyond those who deliberately infiltrate the network, artists who exploit networked services (www, social media) in their artistic production as medium or channels of distribution are extending their practice into other dimensions, transposing, translating or extending their relative disciplines. Beyond whether this demands a redefinition of the disciplines themselves or requires attributing to these artists the label of interdisciplinary, this paper will demonsrate that the works being produced in post Internet environments and the practices established by netartists are outpacing our taxonomies.
This paper will present the work of an array of artists who’s work from in and around the Internet can serve as case studies for contemporary interdisciplinary methodologies as they work in in those ephemeral, fleeting, liminal spaces, occasionally re-wiring the circuitry that surrounds and contains us.
Red, wine and green. 24 Italian Graphic Designers
A cura di Giorgio Camuffo
Grafici: Enrico Bravi, Cristina Chiappini, Codesign, Convertino & Designers, Designwork, Dolcini Associati, Fsd/Fabrizio Schiavi, Alessandro Gori, Grafco3, Humm Design, Ldc/Gianni Sinni, Lifesaver, Massimo Pitis Design, Marco Morosini, Paolo Palma, Polystudio, Rauch Design, Studio Camuffo, Studio FM Milano, Studio Orange, Studio Tapiro, Matteo Vianello, Omar Vulpinari, Why Style
Testi: Giorgio Camuffo, Federica Palmarin, Ries Straver, Sergio Schito, Anna Vera, Massimo Vignello, Sergio Polano, Gillo Dorfles, Matteo Vianello, Alan Fletcher, Francesco Messina, Elisabetta Sgarbi, Andy Simionato, Karen Ann Donnachie
444 pp
This multidisciplinary, practice explores the phenomenon of the selfie (understood as a networked, vernacular, photographic selfportrait) in order to propose a new critical understanding of its effect on wider photographic self-portrait practice, and photography in general.
Significantly, “The Human Use of the Human Face” depicts the selfie as more than a mere vernacular object or action and is not satisfied with the dismissal of the selfie as a direct remediation of the traditional self-portrait. Instead this thesis maps the complex, and sometimes controversial genre of amateur self-portraiture as it sits somewhere between performance, narcissism, social tic, intrinsic desire for self-projection and a possibly irrational quest for authenticity in the photographic image.
This practice-led research is articulated through the creation of original digital and electronic artworks including speculative camera design, social media web apps and immersive installation; through interviews with contemporary artists; and finally through the discussion of cultural, aesthetic and photographic theory. This research examines the privileged position the selfie holds inside a rapidly expanding and evolving social media ecology as it becomes both vehicle and tool, a symbol of personal, social, cultural and political identities. Along with the prevailing concerns surrounding the selfie and its reflection on contemporary society, this thesis inserts notions of human affect, connectedness, belonging and being human into the discussion concerning the motivations behind, and social consequences of, the selfie in three areas: first life, second life, and afterlife.
This thesis was presented in 2016 for my PhD (Art), awarded from the School of Design & Art, Curtin University, Western Australia, 2017.
-----------------------------------------
Handbook for the Graphic Arts
-----------------------------------------
NavaPress Milano