Mel Alexenberg

Mel Alexenberg is an artist who creates artworks at the interface between art, science, technology, and culture. His artworks explore interrelationships between digital age art and Jewish consciousness, space-time systems and electronic technologies, participatory art and community, high tech and high touch experiences, and responsive art in cyberspace and real space. He pioneered in using computers to make art in the 1960’s when he was a doctoral student at New York University. His artworks exploring digital technologies and global systems are in the collections of more than forty museums worldwide. Alexenberg is Council member of the Wolf Foundation that awards the Wolf Prizes to distinguished artists and scientists. He was head of the School of the Arts at Emuna College in Jerusalem, Israel, and was professor of art and education at Columbia University, Bar Ilan University, and Ariel University, head of the art department at Pratt Institute, research fellow at MIT Center for Advanced Visual Studies, and dean of visual arts at New World School of the Arts in Miami. He is the author of the books: ' Through a Bible Lens: Biblical Insights for Smartphone Photography and Social Media'The Future of Art in a Postdigital Age: From Hellenistic to Hebraic Consciousness' (Intellect Books/University of Chicago Press, 2011), 'Dialogic Art in a Digital World: Judaism and Contemporary Art' (in Hebrew), 'Aesthetic Experience in Creative Process', 'Light and Sight', and with Otto Piene, 'LightsOROT: Spiritual Dimensions of the Electronic Age'. He is Editor of 'Educating Artists for the Future: Learning at the Intersections of Art, Science, Technology, and Culture' (Intellect Books/University of Chicago Press, 2008), former Art Editor of 'The Visual Computer: International Journal of Computer Graphics', and author of numerous papers. Born and educated in New York, Alexenberg earned degrees at Queens College, Yeshiva University, and New York University (interdisciplinary doctorate in art, science, and psychology). He lives with his wife, artist Miriam Benjamin, in Ra'anana, Israel, where they enjoy their children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.