Jae Minard works between documentary and speculative fiction. His films, which have been featured at Tribeca, Sundance, SXSW, the Museum of Modern Art, and on Netflix, examine the nature of being human in a world of accelerating change.
Archive (2013)
Archive is a documentary film by Jae Minard focused on the future on long-term digital storage, looking at the history of the Internet and attempts to archives its contents on a massive scale: from Archive.org’s Wayback Machine to Amazon’s dependence on digital memory and how we choose what collections of information, cultural artifacts, and artworks to preserve for future generations, as well as the risks of digital obsolescence from both a personal and global perspective.
The story is told through a series of vignettes featuring digital archivists and their collections; Minard has selected three segments for the screening, focusing on the Internet, Geocities, and Eyebeam’s recovery efforts.
The 13-minute documentary can be shown here
Internet Archive from Jae Minard on Vimeo.
Exhibition, Eyebeam Resurfaces: The Future of The Digital Archive, (January 8th – 12th, 2013)
Curated by Lindsay Howard and Jonathan “Jae” Minard
On October 30, 2012, Hurricane Sandy hit New York City, causing a record storm surge to sweep through Eyebeam, leaving behind three and a half feet of saltwater mixed with sewage and corrosives. In a single day, the flood claimed over $250,000 worth of equipment, computers, furniture, and books. Among the wreckage was Eyebeam’s archive of analog and digital media, chronicling the organization’s fifteen years of experimental art and technology. Through an emergency plea on social media, Eyebeam mobilized a team of digital media conservators and volunteers from the community to stabilize and preserve these artifacts.
Eyebeam Resurfaces: The Future of the Digital Archive is an examination of this community–led recovery effort, bringing together a lineup of lectures and workshops, a documentary film screening, and an exhibition of selected works salvaged from the collection. After reviewing over 1,500 recovered DVDs, VHS cassettes, Mini DVs, and digital storage media, curators Lindsay Howard and Jonathan Minard have selected the most unexpected, exciting, and rare materials from the archive to feature in a multi–channel exhibition. These selections include work by artists, programmers, and creative technologists, made during residencies and fellowships and featuring documentation of the creative process, historical footage of artists and former staff members, as well as fragments of completed artworks. These works showcase a range of mediums, from net art to interactive performance works, from immersive installations to video game art and theory – collectively marking major touchstones in Eyebeam’s history.
The exhibition celebrated the organization’s incredible history and recovery effort, while engaging in a critical conversation about long–term strategies for digital preservation, institutional memory, and disaster preparedness.
Works by such Eyebeam alumni as Cory Arcangel, Alexander Galloway, Isaac Julian, Golan Levin, Zach Lieberman, LoVid, Mariko Mori, and Tony Oursler were screened throughout the week.
On Thursday, January 10, from 7:00 pm–9:00 pm, Eyebeam hosted a fundraising event for its archival digitization effort, starting in early 2013. Experts from organizations, including AV Preserve, spoke on a range of topics related to digital preservation, as well as the influence of Eyebeam within the field of contemporary art. The fundraiser featured an exclusive preview of Jonathan Minard’s Archive, a documentary film that examines humanity’s dependence on digital memory. Tickets to the evening event were available for $25.00 on Brown Paper Tickets or purchased at the door. All tickets proceeds went to the organization’s recovery efforts.
Second Sight: An Exhibition of New Approaches to Video (March 7th to March 9th, 2014)
Eyebeam In Collaboration with Moving Image Art Fair
Held on March 7-9, 2014, at Eyebeam. The exhibition featured an Augmented Reality performance, “The Alices” by Claudia Hart, Eyebeam Alum.
In addition, participating artists presenting their new work included Julia Christensen, Katie Torn, Anton Marini, Wyatt Niehaus, Elisa Kreisinger, and Jae Minard. These works provided a glimpse into what the future holds for the moving image through immersive pieces, installation, video, and performance, from Eyebeam’s cutting-edge perspective.