I am NOT a cult leader, and I don't believe in art. And I don't say this to annoy anybody, but to build a soft shell around the only thing I really do have which is a nervous system, seemingly.

In any case, I'm taking Ruth's suggestion to transcend my puny mind ...which leads me to that which I think is really pungent:

GOD is sleeping.

SCIENCE is sleeping.

ART is sleeping.

POP is sleeping.

What is awake is this perverse conflux of presences,

THIS CONFLUX,

In other words, culture is about presence, about meeting. It is the living experience of numerous organisms and mechanisms working in concert. It is not about "important" objects, "significant" films, "relevant" issues. It is about an active coming together into undefinable entities larger than ourselves. Culture is an ecology of circumstances and emotions. It cannot be defined, objectified, elevated, or demoded -only participated in. Hence the divinity in communal rituals -of any persuasion.

As a theoretical pillow for my swollen creative endeavours, cultural ecology is a bed of flowers. In that "culture" and "ecology" are terms from the very different worlds of art and science, we end up with a very kinky hybrid notion. This may not be so disturbing. Let us roll in that bed. Let us absorb terms from the sweat glands of every mental animal. Let us sink deep into the surrounding loam of metanutrients, inducing severe and continuous quasi-consciousness.

-Ebon Fisher-

"An artist like Ebon Fisher sees himself not as part of the art world but as part of something both much larger (the social, economic, political, ecological whole world) and more intimate (namely day to day existence in the neighborhood). His art expresses personality and emotion and yet he also seeks to transcend the insular topos of the bohemian artist..."

-Jonathan Fineberg, Art Historian, Univ. of Illinois, 1993

In 1981 Fisher started spraying diagrams of neurons in Pittsburgh. This lead to other graffiti in Pittsburgh, Cambridge, and Boston -molecular diffusion, cell division, human reproductive anatomy -all of which has lead him to other kinds of guerilla science in nightclubs, handouts, faxes, videos, and his current series of media rituals and Bionic Codes.

As an art student in 1981 he began studying computer programming, and to explore various methods of photomechanical reproduction -contorting and amplifying the diagram culture of scientists.

In order to understand the monkeys who generate "science," he went on to study media and meaning systems at MIT's Media Lab and the Center for Advanced Visual Studies. In 1985 he began teaching a course on the creative uses of media at the Media Lab on its very first semester, and continued the course for two years.

After receiving a Master of Science degree from MIT, Fisher took a job as a computer imaging specialist for the Eye Research Institute in Boston. Borrowing from the resources of the institute, he began to organize a multimedia rock ensemble, Nerve Circle. Comprised of computer graphics, slides of numerous animal eyes, a high-speed film projector, musicians and dancers, Nerve Circle concocted a series of performances on evolutionary themes. In 1988, due to a couple of loud performance events in his loft/theatre, Fisher was evicted by his landlord. (See photo, above, of the police shutting down a performance of "Evolution of the Grid.") Taking the eviction as an omen, Fisher decided to relocate to Brooklyn, New York.

Bionic Code for a "Media Compression"

Fisher landed in Williamsburg, Brooklyn, in 1989, just as it was beginning to stir into a creative dynamo. During the more innocent years of Williamsburg's creative explosion, he was able to find numerous participants and support structures for a variety of media experiments including "The Media Compression," "The Weird Thing Zone," "Human Suction/Reflection System," (718) SUBWIRE, and the "Web Jam." The "Web Jam" was the method behind 1993's churning multi-media collaboration, "Organism," attended by over 2,000 people and lasting 14 hours.

The four month incubation of "Organism" was nurtured by a number of very active Brooklyn artists: David Brody, Colin Crane, Daniel Carello, Karen Cormier, David Dienes, Robert Elmes, Ebon Fisher, Yvette Helin, Anna Hurwitz, Jeff Gompertz, Gustavo, Dan McKereghan, Jessica Nissen, Gene Pool, James Porter, Kevin Pyle, Megan Raddant, and Jon Rubin. Numerous others came later to flesh out the creature. (Send email for a full list of the 120 collaborators.)

"For 12 hours, more than 2,000 people pushed into an abandoned mustard factory to see the work of 120 artists, featuring everything from exploding watermelons to performers rapelling down silos."

-Melissa Rossi, NEWSWEEK

Bionic Code for a "Web Jam"

As a distillation of these media rituals and his earlier experiments with scientific languages, Fisher has now begun to focus on "Bionic Codes," and a virtual world called "The AlulA Dimension." It is in AlulA that many of these bionic structures are now growing.

Fisher's projects have appeared in Boston/Cambridge at The Rat, The Channel, Harvard, MIT, and The Institute for Contemporary Art; in Koln, Germany, at Kolnishcher Kunstverein (via "Blast"); at The Krannert Art Museum of the University of Illinois; and in New York at Keep Refridgerated, El Sensorium, The Limelight, The Kitchen, Gargoyle Mechanique, the Sandra Gering Gallery (via "Blast"), Exit Art, Test-Site, and Downtown Community TV. Fisher's codes, installations, and rituals have been discussed in The New York Press, New York Magazine, Wired, KGB Magazine, The Drama Review, Newsweek, and a recent Prentice Hall book, "Art Since 1940: Strategies of Being," by Jonathan Fineberg.

VENTINGS

©1995 Ebon Fisher
Signal Ebon: alula@interport.net

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