Much of my work seeks to interact with video game hardware or aesthetics to create new works and reinterpret how how we may use a videogame system. I'm much less concerned with creating "games" but more interested towards the ways I might to use a videogame system as a medium or canvas, either by attempting to do something that the manufacturers did not, or circumventing "8-bit" sound or "8-bit" visuals into artistic interactives.
Selected Art Exhibitions & Sound Installations
This is a Poem (2023)
Concrete poetry and Text Art exhibition. "This is a Poem" is a contemporary exhibition of concrete poetry and text art, from a handful of Southern Alberta's active purveyors for the form, featuring the work of:
derek beaulieau, Kevin Stebner, Kyle Flemmer, Samantha Jones and, Katie O'Brien. Openning reception occurs April 8th at 3pm, where you will be able to meet and discuss the works with poets Kyle Flemmer, Kevin Stebner and Samantha Jones. Curated by Kevin Stebner.
Exhibition occurred through April 2023.
Allcapse (2022)
Typewriter art and & concrete poetry exhibition. ALLCAPSE was a duo art exhibition with Stebner and text artist and painter John Gerrard, each showing a selection of works. On Stebner's end, the exhibition consisted of various typewriter pieces produced during the 2020-2022 gap, including work seen in various small press chapbooks and publications, as well as wholly new and unseen works created for the exhibition.
Exhibition occurred June 10, 2022
PowerGrid (2017/18)
Manipulatable & interactive sound installation. PowerGrid is an elaborate midi-controlled dancefloor, consisting of pressure-sensitive plexi squares. Standing on one of the squares of the dancefloor illuminated a series of lights and triggers up one of the 16 channels of the song. Fully interactive, depending on which squares the audience stands, they will have created their own unique mix of the song.
Shown as a part of Beakerhead Festival, 2017 & 2018.
GreyScreen's "Glitch" (2016)
Interactive digital visual art installation. In many ways, the upgrade to my previous Switches Make Glitches project, the "Glitch" box consists of a circuit-bent Nintendo Entertainment System, in which the video chip is wired to a control box. The system would still function perfectly, but in a similar way to how one would patch a modular synth or a telephone swicth-board, the audience is able to patch their own sets of circuit bends, creating a unique series of glitch visuals.
Shown as a part of Beakerhead Festival, 2016.
Switches Make Glitches (2013)
Interactive digital visual art installation. Switches Makes Glitches consists of a circuit-bent Nintendo Entertainment System wired to a series of switches installed on the roof of the system. When flipped, these switches manipulate the video chip of the NES which send back the "wrong" chipset information, but produces unique and changing glitch visuals.
Shown as a part of GIRAF Animation Festival, 2013.
ROM-Hack (2013)
Digital visual art installation. The Rom-hack project saw the creation of 3 brand new Nintendo programs (games), visual/digital statements that ran on the actual NES hardware. Through fresh code, glitches or subversion of text, creates new visual pieces. The pieces themselves are written as new NES works, coded, re-inserted onto NES cartridges which are playable on actual Nintendo hardware, and thus “playable” by the viewing audience.
Click here for more info on the programs.
Shown as a part of the artist in residence program at the EPCOR Centre (Arts Commons), 2013.