Victoria Vesna (born 1959) is a professor and

digital media In mass communication, digital media is any media (communication), communication media that operates in conjunction with various encoded machine-readable data formats. Digital content can be created, viewed, distributed, modified, listened to, an ...

artist. She is known for her

feminist Feminism is a range of socio-political movements and ideology, ideologies that aim to define and establish the political, economic, personal, and social gender equality, equality of the sexes. Feminism holds the position that modern soci ...

video Video is an Electronics, electronic medium for the recording, copying, playback, broadcasting, and display of moving picture, moving image, visual Media (communication), media. Video was first developed for mechanical television systems, whi ...

computer A computer is a machine that can be Computer programming, programmed to automatically Execution (computing), carry out sequences of arithmetic or logical operations (''computation''). Modern digital electronic computers can perform generic set ...

and

internet art upright=1.3, "Simple Net Art Diagram", a 1997 work by Michael Sarff and Tim Whidden Internet art (also known as net art or web art) is a form of new media art distributed via the Internet. This form of art circumvents the traditional dominance o ...

and has been active since the early 1980s. Along with collaborator Jim Gimzewski she is thought to have created one of the first

interactive art Interactive art is a form of art that involves the spectator in a way that allows the art to achieve its purpose. Some interactive art installations achieve this by letting the observer walk through, over or around them; others ask the artist ...

works related to

nanotechnology Nanotechnology is the manipulation of matter with at least one dimension sized from 1 to 100 nanometers (nm). At this scale, commonly known as the nanoscale, surface area and quantum mechanical effects become important in describing propertie ...

(sometimes called

nanoart NanoArt is a novel art discipline related to science and technology. It depicts natural or synthetic structures with features sized at the nanometer scale, which are observed by electron microscopy, electron or scanning probe microscopy techniqu ...

) and defines her art practice as

experimental research An experiment is a procedure carried out to support or refute a hypothesis, or determine the efficacy or likelihood of something previously untried. Experiments provide insight into cause-and-effect by demonstrating what outcome occurs when ...

Early life and education

Victoria Vesna was born in

Washington, D.C. Washington, D.C., formally the District of Columbia and commonly known as Washington or D.C., is the capital city and federal district of the United States. The city is on the Potomac River, across from Virginia, and shares land borders with ...

, on June 9, 1959. She graduated from the High School of Art & Design in

New York City, New York New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on New York Harbor, one of the world's largest natural harb ...

, in 1976. She received a Fine Arts Diploma from the

University of Belgrade The University of Belgrade () is a public university, public research university in Belgrade, Serbia. It is the oldest and largest modern university in Serbia. Founded in 1808 as the Belgrade Higher School in revolutionary Serbia, by 1838 it me ...

Yugoslavia , common_name = Yugoslavia , life_span = 1918–19921941–1945: World War II in Yugoslavia#Axis invasion and dismemberment of Yugoslavia, Axis occupation , p1 = Kingdom of SerbiaSerbia , flag_p ...

in 1984. In 2000, she completed her Ph.D. at CAiiA (The Centre for Advanced Studies in Interactive Arts) at the

University of Wales The University of Wales () is a confederal university based in Cardiff, Wales. Founded by royal charter in 1893 as a federal university with three constituent colleges – Aberystwyth, Bangor and Cardiff – the university was the first universit ...

with a thesis entitled "Networked Public Spaces: An Investigation into Virtual Embodiment" in 2000.UCLA faculty profile
accessed December 2, 2017.

Career

Teaching

Victoria Vesna was the chair of the Department of Design Media Arts at the

UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture The UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture (UCLA Arts) is a professional school at the University of California, Los Angeles. Through its four degree-granting departments, it provides a range of course offerings and programs. Additionally, the ...

as well as director of UCLA's Art, Sci Center and the UC Digital Arts Research Network.

Awards

She received the ''Oscar Signorini'' award for best net artwork in 1998 and the CINE Golden Eagle award for best scientific documentary in 1986.

Artwork

Through creative research, she examines perception and identity shifts in connection with scientific innovation as well as examining bio and

through art. Exhibitions include Spaceship Earth at the Centre of Contemporary Art Znaki Czasu in

Toruń Toruń is a city on the Vistula River in north-central Poland and a World Heritage Sites of Poland, UNESCO World Heritage Site. Its population was 196,935 as of December 2021. Previously, it was the capital of the Toruń Voivodeship (1975–199 ...

(2011) and MORPHONANO at the Beall Center for Art and Technology,

Irvine, California Irvine () is a Planned community, planned city in central Orange County, California, United States, in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. It was named in 1888 for the landowner James Irvine. The Irvine Company started developing the area in the ...

(2012). ''Artweek'' reviewer Claudine Isé writes, “Vesna has created a number of Web-based works that examine the dichotomy between concepts of “virtual’ and ‘concrete.’ Her on-line projects include an upcoming electronic conference about the cultural production of death as well as a popular site called ''Bodies INCorporated'', which gives visitors an opportunity to design their own ‘cyber bodies’ from a selection of organic and synthetic textures, such as water, lava, chocolate, rubber or plastic.”

Author

In Christopher Hanson's review of her book ''Database aesthetics: Art in the age of information overflow,'' he says that Vesna provides an engaging collection of essays about changing aesthetics in interactive art and its relationship to the database.Christopher Hanson, review of ''Database Aesthetics'' in ''Discourse'' 29:1, Winter 2007, p. 189.
jstor.org; accessed December 2, 2017.

Personal life

Formerly married to

Bogdan Maglich Bogdan Cvete Maglić (anglicized Maglich, August 5, 1928 – November 25, 2017) was a Serbian-American experimental nuclear physicist and the leading advocate of a purported non-radioactive aneutronic fusion energy source. Maglich built four mo ...

, Vesna has two children by that marriage, which ended in divorce.

Works

lien A lien ( or ) is a form of security interest granted over an item of property to secure the payment of a debt or performance of some other obligation. The owner of the property, who grants the lien, is referred to as the ''lienee'' and the pers ...

Star Dust (since 2019) *Noise Aquarium (since 2016) *Brainstorming (since 2015) *''Bodies Corp 2.0'' (2015) *''Octopus Mandala Glow'' (2013), in collaboration with Ray Zimmerman, Dawn Faelnar, Mike Datz, Peter Rand, Steven Amrhein, and others *''ACOUSTIC NETWORKS OF BIRDS'' (2012), in collaboration with biologist Charles Taylor and physicist Takashi Ikegami *''Quantum Tunneling'' (2008) *''Water Bowls'' (2006) *''Mood Swings'' (2006) *''Datamining Bodies'' (2004) in collaboration with Gerald de Jong and David Beaudry *''Zero@wavefunction'' (2002) in collaboration with nanoscientist James Gimzewski *''Cell Ghosts'' (2001) *''Building a Community of People with No Time'' (2001) *''Datamining Bodies (1999)'' *''Bodies© InCorporated (1996)'' *''Virtual Concrete'' (1995) *''Nanomandala'' *''Another Day in Paradise'' (1992)

Publications

*''Database aesthetics: Art in the age of information overflow'' (2007), University Of Minnesota Press. *''Mel Chin-Provocative Eco-Art in Action'' Academic journal article from Art Journal, Vol. 65, No. 1. *''Toward a Third Culture: Being In Between'' Art and Electronic Media. Phaidon Press. 2008.

Exhibitions

Solo exhibitions

*MORPHONANO: Beall Center for Art and Technology, Irvine, California (2012)*Spaceship Earth: Centre of Contemporary Art Znaki Czasu in Torun (2011) *Hox Zodiac: Microwave International New Media Arts Festival ALCHEMY, School of Creative Media, City University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong.(2011) *Quantum Tunneling: Median Kunst Labor (Media Art Laboratory), Graz, Austria.(2008) *Cell Ghosts: Apeejay Media Gallery, New Delhi.(2005) *Zero@wavefunction: Biennale for Electronic Arts, Perth. John Curtin University of Technology, Perth, Australia. (2002)

Group exhibitions

* TechNoBody'','' Pelham Art Center, New York, NY (2015) * "Red Angel," Installation. Art & Science, Aperto '86,

Venice Biennale The Venice Biennale ( ; ) is an international cultural exhibition hosted annually in Venice, Italy. There are two main components of the festival, known as the Art Biennale () and the Venice Biennale of Architecture, Architecture Biennale (), ...

, Italy (1986)

References

External links

* Artist website: http://victoriavesna.com * Artist talk: http://vimeo.com/52159955 *Social Media **Facebook
https://www.facebook.com/vivesna/
**Instagram
https://www.instagram.com/victoriavesna/
**Twitter: https://twitter.com/vivesna {{DEFAULTSORT:Vesna, Victoria American people of Serbian descent Artists from Washington, D.C. American artists 1959 births Living people University of Belgrade alumni Alumni of the University of Wales UCLA School of the Arts and Architecture faculty Internet art American digital artists American installation artists