Career Collaborator
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"A guy at work emailed me a picture of him and his wife, but over the wife's face is a picture of mine! Is that cute or creepy?" So begins the song "Cute or Creepy?" by Japanese artist Takuji Kogo. Under the auspices of *Candy Factory (the name of the gallery Kogo operated from 1998 to 2000 and the body through which he still mounts online projects), Cute or Creepy is also the title of Kojo's new collaborative project for this year's Kitakyushu Biennial 07--exploring the potentially cute and creepy terrain of surveillance and appropriation. Collaboration is the core of Kojo's practice and *Candy Factory's flexible iterations allow him to easily work with an international group of artists. For this project, Kojo collaborates with Jon Miller, Sean Snyder, Hiroyuki Hanada, and Young Hae Chang Heavy Industries, among others, creating a series of websites and songs reflecting *Candy Factory's aesthetic of animated photographs, overlaid text, and computer-generated audio. Fitting within this general framework, the personal style each participating artist brings to the formula resonates loudly, explicitly recognizing and celebrating influence and collaboration in the artistic process. Nothing creepy about that.