Aurora Universalis, an exhibition of installations.
http://www.interaccess.org/aurora

The Aurora Universalis intercultural telecommunications project, was
conceived in 1996 by Stephen Kovats, architect and media artist in
collaboration with Nina Czegledy, media artist and curator. A series of
various aurora events were planned and accordingly, in August 1997, a
remote test-transmission was conducted–via the Internet–by Stephen
Kovats from Rankin Inlet, Northwest Territories, to InterAccess
Electronic Media Arts Centre in Toronto. On August 29, 1998, the Goethe
Institute of Toronto hosted the Aurora Reflections panel, with the
participation of Stephen Kovats, film director (Picture of Light) Peter
Mettler, moderated by David Rokeby, media artist. Future plans include
wireless transmissions from the Canadian arctic with the participation
of Marko Peljhan of Macrolab.

Beginning January 30 through February 28, 1998, InterAccess Electronic
Media Arts Centre Toronto, presents Aurora, an exhibition of
installations dealing with electromagnetic interference. The show
includes works by Douglas Back, Paul Davies, Victoria Scott, Neil
Wiernik as well as Catherine Richards' "Curiosity Cabinet at the End of
the Millenium." "Charged Hearts," the multiuser web-site
(www.charged-hearts.net/) representing Richards most current
installation–on show between January 16-March 15, 1998 at The
Powerplant, Contemporary Art Gallery in Toronto–is exhibited as part of
the Aurora show at InterAccess. The exhibition is curated by Nina
Czegledy.

The Aurora Universalis exhibition highlights the relationship between
transcendental forces and the life of ordinary human beings. The themes
of the exhibition include: the role of repetition in human, natural, and
technological processes and actions; the cultural significance of the
detection of radioactivity; and the allure and possible danger of living
in an environment that is alive with information and seems to demand
constant connectivity.

Catherine Richards work explores the boundaries between body and
machine. In the closed circuit of her Cabinet, the participant/visitor
is supposedly shielded from magnetic interference, and becomes
"unplugged" from the "plugged-in" state of our contemporary
surroundings. In contrast, "Charged Hearts" in the Powerplant, invites
visitors/participants to become part in the electromagnetically charged
atmosphere. By walking on the glass and steel platform and touching one
of the bell jars containing a blown glass heart, a sensor is activated
and the glass object transmits a phosphorescent glow, simultaneously
sending the spectator's pulse data to a page on the Web. Thus, "Charged
Heart" and the "Curiosity Cabinet" installations compliment each
other–one by plugging the participant/visitor into the electromagnetic
atmosphere–the other by unplugging him/her.

"My work comes from the experience of growing up in North America,"
explained Catherine Richards in an interview (Now, January 22, 1998),
"the environment here has been so heavily influenced by Marshall McLuhan
and artists like Michael Snow, who legitimized the whole notion of
crossing media, that the relationship between the spectator and the
image is what defines art."

Close to one of the gallery walls "Black Body" Doug Back's
"whipper-snipper" installation shakes, shivers and reacts to the touch
of each visitor with a different speed and style. "'Black Body'," said
Doug Back, "acts as a mirror, reflecting the electromagnetic radiation
absorbed by the body. 'Imperfections' in our bodies make us less or more
of an antenna, the sculpture describes this signature."

"Just as Alaskan Inuit waved sharp knives to ward off the mysterious and
incomprehensible effects of the Aurora," commented Paul Davies of his
"Persistent Invisible Fields," "our culture grasps technological
instruments, in an attempt to understand the hidden nature of the
invisible. Our culture created the Radiation Survey Meter in a fashion
directly analogous to those same terrified Inuit, in an attempt to ward
off the mysterious and incomprehensible effects of invisible fields. We
collectively grasp the meter with ever-whitening knuckles, searching for
the unseen and unfelt danger of radiation." The radiation meter provided
by Paul Davies for the visitor tests the radiation sensitivity of each
(white) object of his display.

"My installation," said audio artist Neil Wiernik of "How to be an
amateur radio," "is about transmission of RF signals and about how the
environment and we as people interact with these signals. Do we transmit
these signals ourselves…is this all part of our evolving communication
methods…are there other forms of intelligent life on the earth or
otherwise who already communicate via RF signals. I am looking at my
project as a direct dialogue with the issues of naturally occuring RF
signals. Even though the installation is located physically in the
gallery it really is everywhere as sound and RF signals are located in
the atmosphere and travel throughout space to our ears and bodies. In a
sense we are actual RF receivers."

The website of the exhibition will be updated consistently. Please send
us our comments or inquiries.