Paula Gudmundson, Associate Professor of Flute, participated in the Minnesota Council of Nonprofits Conference December 2020. Ten years ago, flutist Paula Gudmundson and visual artist Laura Andrews started seeded the idea for the project now called Hartley. The name refers to Hartley Nature Center in Duluth, where the video footage for this video and sound piece was shot. Paula was working on musical improvisations, Laura was experimenting with digital video. Over time they began discussing ways to bring their ideas together. Musical ideas about manipulating, reacting to and layering sound, and visual ideas about movement through particular spaces and places. Hartley is the result of this collaboration and it is intended to affect the viewer both emotionally and spatially, appealing to the senses with an aim toward connection and transcendence. Credits: Laura Andrews (video); Paula Gudmundson (flute); Mark Ilaug (Sitar). Created at UMD MMAD/Viz Lab Interdisciplinary Residency.
Professor Paula Gudmundson
Digital Cove is a series of video games created by UMD student Charles McGregor that combined art, music, and science. Digital cove was showcased in the Tweed Museum of Art in May, 2018. McGregor worked with the Viz and MMAD labs, as well as with the SIVE lab, the Department of Art and Design, and the Swenson College of Science & Engineering. One of his games, "HyperDot" is now available on the Xbox store.
Screenshot of the game Chroma, part of the Digital Cove series
Manoomin is a permanent exhibit at Duluth's Children Museum that allows children to discover the Ojibwe language. Along with a free interactive app called Mikan, children can learn about the wild-rice harvest from an interactive video spoken in English and Ojibwe in the exhibit. Professor Joellyn Rock from Art and Design along with grad student Logan Sales from computer science worked together in the MMAD Lab to create this interactive exhibit.
A woman and her daughter sitting on a canoe in the Manoomin exhibit.
This installation plays the keys of a piano based on the movements and shapes of the clouds. A camera pointed at the sky captures video of the clouds. Custom software uses the video of the clouds in real-time to articulate a robotic device that presses the corresponding keys on the piano. The system is set in motion to function as if the clouds are pressing the keys on the piano as they move across the sky and change shape. The resulting sound is generated from the unique key patterns created by ethereal forms that build, sweep, fluctuate and dissipate in the sky.
Featured in Consciência Cibernética (Cybernetic Consciousness) a group exhibition at the Itaú Cultural, São Paulo in March 2019.
Piano in Weber Hall
This installation consists of a series of 42 x/y tilting mechanical devices connected to thin dried plant stalks installed in a gallery and a dried plant stalk connected to an accelerometer installed outdoors. When the wind blows it causes the stalk outside to sway. The accelerometer detects this movement transmitting the motion to the grouping of devices in the gallery. Therefore the stalks in the gallery space move in real-time and in unison based on the movement of the wind outside. This exhibit is supported by the Viz Lab.
Installation on view as part of "Les Faits du hasard," principle exhibition of Biennale Némo at Centquarte- Paris, France. December 9, 2017- March 4, 2018
Part of a group exhibition at the New Media Gallery, Vancouver, June - September 2019.
tele-present wind sculpture photograph
The dance conference attendees experienced motion capture technology and were able to see their dancing avatars take shape - and explored Virtual Reality as applied to dance. Lisa Fitzpatrick and Rebecca Katz-Harwood team-taught the workshop to an enthusiastic group of twenty dancers.
The workshop was part of "Moving Bodies", the 2017 American College Dance Association (ACDA) North-Central Conference at University of Minnesota Duluth. March 8- March 11, 2017
3D models of dancers for the dance conference