The window show: SIM SILENT SHOWCASE

SIM Silent Showcase
Exhibition Dates: Saturday, April 17, 2021 - Sunday, May 16, 2021

While the physical Boston Cyberarts Gallery interior remains closed due to COVID-19, we are organizing a series of art events and exhibitions to be seen from outside the gallery. "The Window Show" is an ever changing art exhibition in the Boston Cyberarts Gallery windows. Please visit here for special events and updates.

Opening on Saturday April 17th and running 24/7 through Sunday May 16th, Boston Cyberarts is pleased to present "SIM Silent Showcase", an installation of work by a collective of students in The Studio for Interrelated Media at Massachusetts College of Art & Design. These students have responded to the unprecedented challenge of a global pandemic by launching SIMtv - a concept, a context, a website, and an episodic venue for sharing SIM student and alumni art.

The order of the silent showcase was handpicked by the producers, Adine Raboy and Max Ryan, with color providing the narrative. This body of work is a compilation of undergraduate SIM students’ projects and art pieces with the purpose to inspire, connect, and engage.

This exhibit is one of the many events celebrating the Massachusetts College of Art and Design's Studio for Interrelated Media (SIM) 50th year. SIM is the oldest Bachelor of Fine Arts program in the country of its kind. The program has continuously evolved since its founding in 1970 while maintaining a dedication to self-governance alongside the exploration, combining and inventing of any expressive mediums we can find. The mission of the Studio for Interrelated Media is to conjure ambitious and unexpected experiences. It is to fail spectacularly, embrace chaos, invent new worlds, antagonize and enlighten, foster understanding and test limits. Every cohort shares the final challenge of redesigning the studio as a model for an alternative future. The SIM flies in the face of all that is Post Art - with humor, conflict, labor, and skill. To find out more about SIM's 50th celebration events visit here.

Artists included in the exhibition are: Hope Antonellis, Jacob Cabral, A’knesha Davis-Darkwah, Anthony Fader, Erica Gaeta, Ren Hawley, Amber Hayes, Avery Miner, Ja’Hari Ortega, Sonnae Peterson, Adine Raboy, Max Ryan, Jane Stevens, Zhiquan Wang

ARTIST STATEMENT FROM THE STUDENTS AT SIM:

"For months the students of SIM, at the Massachusetts College of Art and Design have powered through remote-learning and online collaboration to put on a show that embodies the experimental, concept-driven, and multimedia backbone of our program. Given the trials and tribulations we’ve faced throughout the pandemic, the yearning for physical experiences has become more heightened than ever. This showcase is a bridge between the digital world we’ve been limited to and the interactive one we all know so well. The artists of SIM faced the challenges of this time with out-of-the-box thinking that produced a collection of thoughtful, vibrant, and energetic work that has brought this show to life. Though the concept of each project ranges greatly, the intrinsic bind between all the work is our shared experience of creating within isolation."

"SIM Silent Showcase" is produced and edited by Adine Raboy and Max Ryan

About the Projects:

Hope Antonellis, Identity Loading - This piece has been a catharsis and reflection of various identities I have embodied throughout my life. Although the looks portrayed in this piece doesn’t encompass all of the identities, I’ve encountered within myself; this piece serves as a never-ending reflection of the countless people we become depending on who we meet, where we are, and what new discovery we find of ourselves. Each new person we encounter brings an entire experience of self that we hadn’t met before; and I wanted this piece to make space for the multiplicity of self. How shocking it is to have to re-introduce yourself to yourself in each passing day, week, month, and year. This concept is always going to be expanding, as we play with identity in the digital realm and think of self almost like an avatar. Constantly loading, constantly under construction, constantly growing. May we always make room for the innovation we can become and make of each other; there is no singularity even in defining the self. This piece is my first experimentation of this conversation, and definitely won’t be the last.

Jacob Cabral, Canary Color - Canary Colors is one iteration in a series exploring familiar landscapes presented unfamiliarly. A 3d render of the 12x16 textured painting allows the piece to get cast into a new space as a digital doppelgänger to the original. The curvature of thickly settled paint and acrylic mediums mimic those of mountains, valleys, and hillsides.

A’knesha Davis-Darkwah - collage work designed for Cyberarts windows - In celebration of the 50th anniversary of Studio for Interrelated Media otherwise known as SIM, students and alumni have spent the past few months revisiting the history behind the community and all of the amazing art that came with it. As a way to pay tribute to the major, I decided to make these collaged graphics/designs for this exhibition and our upcoming SIMBIG50 celebration. The pictures within the collaged graphics are all archived photos compiled over the last 50 years. The overall meaning behind these pieces is to express that this is sim, these are our spaces, this is our art, and this is who we are.

Anthony Fader, Bedtime - Every day I set a bedtime for myself, and every night I fail to meet it. The trials and tribulations the girl in this animation goes through are based on my real experiences, as I toss and turn in my bed, getting up every so often to try another crack at getting myself to go to sleep. I’ve done everything depicted here, besides booking a hotel room to see if an unfamiliar ceiling would do the trick. Who knows though, I might have to try that one sooner or later. If my insomnia is particularly bad, sometimes I decide to just work until I pass out. After I resolve to stay up, I’ll drink and energy drink, and almost immediately fall asleep. If there is a god, I’ve clearly upset him.

Erica Gaeta, Black Tourmaline - This piece is based off a short collection of poems entitled Black Tourmaline, which holds as both the theme for the piece and an important totem to the artist. A totem can be defined as a natural object, symbol, or being that one feels connected to on any level, and can represent our relationships with each other and with creation. Black tourmaline is a natural crystal sourced in many parts of the world, typically formed in pegmatites, deep voids underground. My mother initially introduced me to this particular crystal for protection, strength, and healing early on in life, along with different alternative healing practices. These ideas are something I held on to, adopted, and expanded upon as a part of my identity. To me black tourmaline is more than a physical material. It is also metaphysical, a representation of identity, childhood, nostalgia, and spiritual growth. I use it in the context of this video and poetry chapbook as a way to articulate traumas that I have experienced in the past year, explore vulnerability, my personal strength, and connection to nature.

Amber Hayes and Avery Miner, Moral Myopia - “Moral Myopia” seeks to address an age-old problem: the media’s indoctrination of young children. In this specific example, our goal was to focus on the indoctrination of children into war. This concept is brought to life through appropriated 1960s GI Joe commercials and appropriated war footage compiled and displayed on a 1970s tube television in front of a group of GI Joe action figures. The GI Joe figure is representative of a naive and replaceable soldier, a child absorbing violent propaganda in cartoons and toy commercials.

Ren Hawley, Untitled - This project is an exciting compilation of different characters and personas. Though they are seemingly independent to one another their movements and performance unite them. From makeup to costume design the complete transformations are what radiate the thrill of it all.

Ja’Hari Ortega, Foundry - Performance Video, 2:03 - I understand how to move, and I move freely. Despite the initial contrast in space and wardrobe, I bring the dance studio and the foundry together. Weight and weightlessness. Partners and solo. Crafts, techniques, histories, stereotypes, boundaries...broken, warped and intertwined. I bring my whole self into these spaces.

Sonnae Peterson, I AM FISH - Growing up on the ocean and many other bodies of water, I never realized how much it affected me until I moved away. The sense of calmness you get when being submerged, the adrenaline of fighting the strength of the river, or even just being able to sit next to the beautiful sounds of the crashing ocean waves while you’re illuminated by the moonlight, it’s all shaped me to be who I am. The longer I’ve been away from water, the more I feel how it’s affecting me. So, in a way, moving to the city made me feel like a fish out of water in more than just the figurative sense, but also the literal. More and more I find myself drawing baths just to be able to feel a sense of freedom, but of course a bathtub isn't the same. However, in the moment it always gives me fleeting moments of peace and happiness. I made this piece in an attempt to show my connection to the water, and how much joy it brings me. A way to remind myself who I am, that I am a fish. I crave the water; I crave to be swimming to be free of any constrictions. And that it calls me in a way that I know I can always return to.

Adine Raboy, New Vibrations - What I’ve known I no longer know in the same way. The time I spend with others in the spaces we gather is tediously intentional and it's limited to only a few. Yet, the beginning feeling of suffocation, anxiety, and fear prompted by the loss of spontaneity and community has made room for a new calm. The way our circumstance has stitched itself into something different for us all is the essence of this video piece. The simple observations of life have been significantly altered into a new lens. What is loved, appreciated, taken for granted has been challenged and pushed into the forefront of our considerations. I acknowledge that my body has survived this pandemic. I am blessed.

Max Ryan, Search - This piece draws on inspiration from the Michelangelo made piece, Creation of Adam. While my original concept of search was directed towards the idea of the self. The main objective was to capture an experiment of light, color, and form. With this experiment I became aware of elements that I was able to manipulate as seen within the piece. This was the beginning steps to a much larger world of creating immersive projector mapping visuals.

Jane Stevens, Window Two - I’ve always been fascinated by the way windows look at night. As the night falls, the light from inside spaces begins to spill out. Windows become previews into someone’s life. Opening curtains or shades is an act of inviting whoever passes by into your space. I believe that what happens within your home, or a closed space is inherently intimate - even an act as simple as washing the dishes.

Zhiquan Wang, Untitled - Two figures engage with one another, a clear frame, and a brick. Throughout the journey of their movements they explore different gestures with these items, attempting to address and filter out distractions of control and power. This becomes a means of uniting with their center and bringing acceptance of to their own temporality and powerlessness. Through their physical language they study the brick and create an intimacy that establishes a motif of both attachment and release of kinship.