Simon Penny

Infobox scientist
name = Simon Penny

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image_size = 150px
birth_date = 1955
birth_place = Melbourne, Australia
nationality = Australian
field =
work_institutions = University of Florida
University of California, Irvine
alma_mater =
doctoral_advisor =
doctoral_students =
known_for =
prizes =

Simon Graeme Penny (born October 19 1955) is an Australian artist, theorist, curator and teacher in the field of Interactive Media Art. [ [http://studioart.arts.uci.edu/faculty/resident/penny.html University of California, Irvine] ]

Early life

Penny was born in Melbourne, Australia in 1955. He attended Newington College (1968-1973) [Newington College Register of Past Students 1863-1998 (Syd, 1999) pp 155 ] before receiving an undergraduate diploma in Fine Art from the South Australian School of Art in 1979. He then went on to get his graduate degree form the Sydney College of the Arts in 1982 after which he began focusing on electronic and time-based media. [Charlie Gere, "Art, Time and Technology: Histories of the Disappearing Body" (2005) Berg, p. 137]

Appointments

Penny has held positions as Lehrauftrag at City Art Institute, Sydney from 1984 to 1988, Professor at the University of Florida in 1989 and Professor at Carnegie Mellon University from 1993 to 2001. In addition to creating numerous artistic installations, he edited the anthology "Critical Issues in Electronic Media" (1995).

Exhibitions

Since the 1980’s Penny has been creating electronically sophisticated robotic installations, curating shows such as Machine Culture at Siggraph ’93, and writing about Digital Culture and Electronic Media Art. One of his most recent projects is a collaboration with Bill Vorn entitled “Bedlam,” which is described on the UCIrvine website as a “telerobotic/telematic interactive installation with machine vision, spatialised interactive sound and custom pneumatic robotics.” In 2001 he was awarded a grant from the Langlois Foundation (with Bill Vorn). Penny is currently working on an immersive interactive installation entitled “Body Electric” in collaboration with Dr. Malcolm McIver, Center for Neuromorphic Systems Engineering, CalTech and Art Center College of Design. [ [http://www.medienkunstnetz.de/artist/penny/biography/ Medien Kunstnetz] ]

Professorship

Penny is currently a Professor in the departments of Studio Art and Electrical Engieering and Computer Science at the University of California, Irvine, where he serves as Director of the Arts, Computation and Engineering (ACE) program.

Notable Works

* Body Electric (2006) - http://www.eng.uci.edu/node/182
* Fugitive II (2004) - http://www.acmi.net.au/fugitive.jsp
* Bedlam (2003)- http://billvorn.concordia.ca/robography/Bedlam.html
* Traces (1999) - http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/works/traces/Tracescode.html
* Petit Mal (1993) - http://www.ace.uci.edu/penny/works/petitmal/petitcode.html
* Big Father (1991-1992) - http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/works/bigfather/bigfathercode.html
* Pride of Our Young Nation (1990-1991) http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/works/pride/pridecode.html
* Lo Yo Yo (1988) - http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/works/loyoyo/loyoyocode.html
* Stupid Robot (1987) - http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/works/stupidrobot/stupidrobotcode.html

Essays

* [http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/texts/traces/ Traces: Wireless full body tracking in the CAVE]
* [http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/texts/Virtualisation.html The Virtualisation of Art Practice: Body Knowledge and the Engineering World View]
* [http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/texts/Kerstin_Chptr_Final.html Agents as Artworks and Agent Design as Artistic Practice]
* [http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/texts/Embodied_Cult_Agents.html Embodied Cultural Agents: at the intersection of Art, Robotics and Cognitive Science]
* [http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/texts/VR_Dia.html Virtual Reality as the End of the Enlightenment Project]
* [http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/texts/sci_am_Golem.html Why do we want our machines to seem alive?]
* [http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/texts/Artist_in_D'space.html Consumer Culture and the Technological Imperative: The Artist in Dataspace]
* [http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/texts/Darwin_Machine.html The Darwin Machine: Artificial Life and Interactive Art]
* [http://turing.ace.uci.edu/penny/texts/AtoD.html From A to D and back again: The emerging aesthetics of Interactive Art]

References

External links

* http://www.ace.uci.edu/
* http://www.eng.uci.edu/user/150
* http://today.uci.edu/Features/profile_detail.asp?key=119
* http://www.flickr.com/photos/nearnearfuture/95468533/
* http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aBkm9mUkRMM
* http://www.ri.cmu.edu/people/penny_simon.html
* http://www.ntticc.or.jp/pub/ic_mag/ic014/penny/penny_e.html
* http://marynowsky.wordpress.com/2006/03/06/simon-penny/
* http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0425/is_n3_v56/ai_20377586
* http://www.adaweb.com/context/events/moma/bbs5/penney.html
* http://cultronix.eserver.org/sommer/
* http://www.electronicbookreview.com/thread/firstperson/piezo
* http://mailman.thing.net/pipermail/idc/2006-March/000270.html