Impermanence | Metempsychosis is an augmented & immersive experience, exploring rebirth and the ever-increasing complex nature of reality—in tandem with technology.

This dual exhibit consists of a five-part animation, which advances through the developmental stages of an unknown species. Throughout the journey, the observer maintains an intimate gaze but is never fully permitted to see the organism in its entirety. Privy only to an isolated view, a sliver of the truth is revealed.

Overlaying the experience, an Augmented Reality (AR) filter is designed to be placed anywhere within the setting. Adding an additional layer of complexity, the AR component renders the augmented environment indistinguishable from the subject and the subject indistinguishable from the space.

Metempsychosis and its AR filter both act as philosophical allegories, as well as deliberate visual compositions. Through the use of lines, the animations reflect both the structure of the display panels as well as their urban landscape. While the use of scale, color & light, evoke a sense of depth & harmonious tension within the space. The pairing of AR alongside the animations, both activates and unifies the experience, fusing together the user with the art itself and the surrounding world.

Every day we rely on algorithms that solve complex problems and efficiently execute tasks. Some of the real-life examples are optimizing traffic lights or public transport schedules. In this project, data design studio CLEVER°FRANKE created a visual experience showing the multiple levels of decision-making driven by algorithms to showcase how an algorithm works.

CLEVER°FRANKE decides to visualize a complex algorithm that mimics nature and bridges abstract technology and the real world. They chose an Ant Colony Optimization (ACO) algorithm to bring their idea to life. The ACO algorithm imitates the behavior of ants seeking a path between their colony and food sources and is used to solve various optimization problems. 

The final result is a digital art installation that visualizes the complexity of a moving Ant Colony that tries to find the shortest route between natural resources, in this case, all the parks in Chicago. To have ants walk the streets of the city, CLEVER°FRANKE  created a high-resolution digital map. Using data from OpenStreetMaps, they color-coded places in each individual park or leisure area.

CLEVER°FRANKE’s visualization software ensured Ant Algorithm’s problem fit the layout and size of the 150 Media Stream perfectly and allowed for the different levels of problem-solving to be shown. To handle the incredibly high resolution of the video wall, they wrote custom software to run massive video files in parallel.

Click here to read more about the project.

Live performance by dancers from Deeply Rooted Dance Theater, Oct. 14th, 2022

Since our earliest human civilizations, we have recognized the power of color to move and affect us. As reflected in our natural environment our primal color associations remain and are deeply powerful, while others are relatively new and exciting. Color is a powerful communication tool and can be used to signal action, influence mood, and even influence physiological reactions. 

In an exciting new media project entitled Color in Motion, the Chicago Black Dance Legacy Project will feature Deeply Rooted Dance Theater in a dynamic physical exploration of color. Designed and choreographed through the creative lenses of award winning Director & Choreographer, Princess Mhoon, with special guest choreography by Nicole Clarke-Springer, Artistic Director of the Deeply Rooted Dance Theater. This creative team and dancers will take the viewer on a journey demonstrating the power of color in motion and the inspiring world in which we live.

LoVid’s Hugs on Tape series started as a series of animations for Instagram during winter 2021 at the height of the Covid shutdown. LoVid felt a sincere urge to connect with loved ones from around the world and create images of the body that represents closeness, emotional presence, and touch. Huggez-Vous is the first public art commission in the Hugs on Tape series produced for 150 Media Stream. This work includes animated spontaneous hugs by members of the 150 N Riverside building’s community. LoVid spent a day in June 2022 filming tenants and visitors hugging friends, colleagues, or strangers. Each animated hug was created with LoVid’s unique analog-digital process utilizing handmade audio/video synthesizers and digital animation software. All the patterns and colors in Huggez-Vous are made exclusively with hardware, analog synthesizers.

Huggez-Vous shines a light on the visceral need for physical contact in the pandemic era, filling up the screen with colorful human interactions that distribute bursts of joy.

“Campos / Temporales” is a computer-generated animation by artist Paul Hertz with music by composer Christopher Walczak. Hertz and Walczak developed the piece through a collaborative process. On September 30, 2022, a live concert dedicated to the artists’ mutual friend, late composer Stephen Dembski, features live music composed by Walczak for a quartet of improvising musicians: Eric Mandat on clarinet, Emily Rach Beisel on saxophone, Jason Roebke on bass, and Chris Butler on percussion, with electronic sound by Walczak.

In conjunction with the exhibition Forecast Form: Art in the Caribbean Diaspora, 1990s–Today at the MCA Chicago, 150 Media Stream is proud to present a new installation by Deborah Jack, one of the MCA exhibition artists. This installation is a brief meditation on power that exists in the quiet moments of the natural world. It investigates how altering our speed and proximity to nature can impact us. Deborah Jack uses flora and the sea as metaphors for trauma and healing. The power lies in the in-between spaces where the water meets the land and in the resistance of a petal.

“My work explores the relationship of the natural world to memory, personal and cultural. The hurricane, the sea, the shore, the land and the flora all play a role in creating memorials. In these narratives I’ve created a seasonal memorial. These works of mine are cycles of memory. The title to the installation for the 150 Media Stream is based on a quote from the poet Derek Walcott, “Break a vase, and the love that reassembles the fragments is stronger than that love which took its symmetry for granted when it was whole.” This was taken from his Nobel essay, Antilles: Fragments of Epic Memory. So in the title I was considering the notion heartbreak, that can be the aftermath of the fracture not as tragedy but as a place of wonder. How the Caribbean has transcended and shown how the archipelagic gives us an alternate world view. That the fragment is poetic and therefore expansive. The footage of the work was shot on the island of St. Martin on both the French and Dutch parts. It is a celebration of the poetic of the waves interacting with the shore. That the sea with its troubled history also feeds and nurtures. The flowers, a symbol of beauty and strength, are from the Grand Poinciana or the Flamboyant trees. They are known throughout the Caribbean region, but can also be found in Asia, Africa. The sea brought these seeds over in the hill of ships or perhaps in the braids of the enslaved. The poetic of this duality, the awful and the beautiful, is place of inspiration for my work.” —Deborah Jack