Seeing the invisible and making the invisible visible is what Fernanda D’Agostino seeks in her art practice. Her collaborations with Biomechanist Dr. Bret Tobalske and cinematographer Harry Dawson, Environmental Studies Professor John Reuter, and, more recently, with choreographers and programmers, revolve around revealing elements that we normally don’t see (but we can imagine) with our naked eyes. for instance, in Motion Studies, artist and scientist were united by the desire to expose new developments in our understanding of the physics of flight. however, this was not done by merely observing and documenting the flight of birds only, but by using DPIV to visualize the very fluid dynamics of air currents moved by the wings of birds. (click below to see the video documentation)
One of the elements that I find most fascinating in D’Agostino’s work (apart from her incredible ability to work collaboratively with the most disparate categories of science and scientists) is her desire to pick experiments that are predominantly demonstrated and repeated over and over again within the protected space of the lab and take them outside, in the wild. Motion Studies is exemplary: despite the potential difficulty in verifying the fluid dynamics outside of the lab, she chose to extend the collaboration to the field work. Admittedly, she argues, this is a privilege that she is well aware she as an artist can enjoy, because she has no specific obligations and protocols she is forced to follow.
In POOL, she explores another aspect of the invisible: memory. Two motion sensors and two distance sensors select, mix and control four video to recreate the juxtaposition of dreams, memories and stream of consciousness. (click below to see the video)
