Article:

The Art of Mapping Statistics: Interview with George Legrady

George Legrady Studio is a research and production integrated studio for digital interactive installations with recent public projects currently being realized for the Rem Koolhaas Seattle Public Library (2005), the Richard Meier designed Siemens Headquarters in Munich (1999), Ebner Stolz Corporate Offices, Stuttgart (1999), the Los Angeles Metro Rail (2002, 2005), and numerous exhibitions in museums in the US, Canada and Europe. Emphasis is on a systematic approach to permanent embedded architectural works and interactive installations through the implementation of complex technologies for new forms of content, narratives and analysis. Legrady - since 2001 Professor of Interactive Media, with joint appointment in the Media Arts & Technology program and the department of Art, UC Santa Barbara - is one of the first generation of artists in the 1980's to integrate computer processes into his artistic work, producing pioneering prizewinning projects in the early 1990's such as the "Anecdoted Archive from the Cold War" (1993), "Slippery Traces" (1995), "Sensing Speaking Space" (2002), and more recently the internationally traveling "Pockets Full of Memories" (2001-2005). He has recently completed a commission, "Making Visible the Invisible" for the Rem Koolhaas designed Seattle Public Library, was featured in November at the Whitney Museum Artport (http://www.artport.whitney.org). Legrady exhibited worldwide and received numerous awards. Roberto Simanowski talked with George Legrady about his work Making Visible the Invisible, a commission by the Seattle Public Library for their new innovative building designed by Rem Koolhaas, about the revelation and beautification of data, about the negotiation between artist and engineer in mapping art, and about the future of art.