Julia Burns is concerned with loss of control over digital information and privacy online. She examines these issues by considering the psychological aspects of surveillance and control, as well as the value of personal information to commercial third parties.
Burns portrays these digital themes using the analog and tactile mediums of performance, vintage technology, sculpture, and audience interaction.
Some of her works also include the technological mediums of web-enabled and interactive/immersive video.
The Right to Privacy is the right to think for one’s self, to consider one’s place in the world, and to make one’s own decisions.
In this solo show for Griffith Regional Art Gallery, Julia presents two artworks exploring this theme of public access to the private domain.
Exposed
In the main gallery, Julia presents a rare view of the backend of the gallery administration office.
Desks, files, and papers are on display. The administrators of the gallery busily send emails and answer phone calls.
There is order and disorder; the normal state of a working environment.
We see what we are not supposed to see.
The controlled view of the shop front, the website, the carefully composed and re-read email with signature, and the formal phone greeting, are not visible.
Instead we witness the backend office; the mess that we are not supposed to see. The gallery has lost control of the portrayal of itself. Everything is now exposed.
Drifting
An intimate look into a couple's private life
.
We see a young couple sleeping on a bed.
They drift between sleep and consciousness, lost in their own dreams and thoughts.
They appear on the wall like a still painting of real life.
We can hear their heartbeats and their breathing.
They live life on display in front of us, unaware of our judgmental presence.
After time, the young man on the bed becomes restless. He wakes up, leaving his partner asleep on the bed.
He walks across the room to look out the window. Lost in his thoughts, he contemplates on his life, on his relationship, and on himself.
He considers these things alone, in the privacy of the early morning.
The young woman on the bed wakes. She opens her eyes and looks back at the staring public.
She mirrors their expectations, urging the young man to return to the safety of her arms.
A look at the nature of third-party access and data mining on Facebook
Upcoming Performances, Youth Week 2010:
Bondi Beach,
Saturday 10 April, 12-4pm
Maroubra Beach, 15 April, 12-4pm
Newtown Plaza,
24-25 April, 12-4pm
Main Sponsor: Marrickville Art and Cultural Grant Youth Week Sponsor: Waverley and Randwick Councils
Special Thanks to:
Leigh Russell, Junktiques Recycled Furniture, Colin Winter and Harriet Birks
Cached Evidence
A man tries to destroy incriminating digital evidence.
His desperate obsession to recover his privacy
demonstrates our vulnerability to cached evidence online.
&
Public Access
Twitter Performance in Martin Place, Sydney CBD
A demonstration of the nature of 'followers' and privacy in public space
"The Tweeties" demo video
An intimate view into the real lives of tweeps
"The Tweeties" Installation Proposals
#1. With Interactive Dollhouse sculpture and large scale projections
#2. With mobile phone interaction capability
(Users log onto The Tweeties website using their mobile phones and control the
interactive video on-line and in the real space with the on-site video projections)
Blackberries can be made available on-site as well as access to free wi-fi for users.
Recipient of The Freedman Foundation Scholarship Award
In conjunction with the FUSE Videotage Residency Program, Hong Kong
July 2010
To develop a new work, 'Chinese Love Drama'
"The featured artwork will consist of a life-size cardboard recreation of a Chan Chan Teng (English-style Chinese Tea House) where viewers are served
tea and pineapple buns by a waitress who speaks Mandarin only. She wears hidden speakers that play classical Western music that reflects her emotions. Additional elements within the installation accentuate the waitress’s and the audience’s situation and their distance and empathy toward one another. Gradually the waitress falls into conversation with another waiter in the Tea House. They act out a miniature love drama, providing the non-Mandarin speaking audience with only their visual and audible emotions, and the hidden soundtrack, to guide them. Viewers who understand Mandarin will become unwitting narrators of the scene as they translate for their fellow audience, thus enhancing the experience.
"Public Access to the Private Domain" Masters of Science by Research
Creativity and Cognition Studios
School of Computer Science
The University of Technology, Sydney
Recipient of Marrickville Public Art Grant
Upcoming public art exhibition in Newtown Plaza, Newtown Sydney 10am - 3pm, Saturday and Sunday 24 & 25 April 2010
"Third Party Access" Performance for Youth Week 2010 Maroubra Beach
10am - 230pm, Thursday, April 15, 2010
"Third Party Access" Performance for Youth Week 2010 Bondi Beach
11 am -5 pm, Saturday, April 10, 2010
A critical live performance addressing issues of privacy on-line and the nature of third party access in social media such as Facebook.
"Privacy Online" Presentation at Dorkbot-nyc
Location One in Soho 7pm, Wednesday, November 4th, 2009 http://vimeo.com/7684896
ACM Creativity and Cognition 2009 Conference
Berkeley Art Museum and UC Berkeley
Demo and Publication: "Our House"
October 27-30, 2009
Exploring the theme of public access to privacy, "Our House" features an interactive sculptural representation of an apartment block and a screen displaying a dynamic Twitter-enabled video and micro-blogging program. http://portal.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=1640233.1640332
Solo Exhibition at Cleveland Street Theatre -the old Performance Space, Sydney
SELF-SURVEILLANCE AND CACHED EVIDENCE
Opening and Live Performance, September 16, 2009
Featuring three works that use surveillance technology and methods from the 1970's to examine contemporary issues of surveillance on the internet.
Twitter Performance (rose_burns)
Martin Place, Sydney 6 May 2009
Do 'followers' read with the same zest in the real world as they do in cyberspace?
What is it like to follow a stranger's blog entries, while standing in front of them?
Why do individuals increasingly publicize their private lives?
See Video Documentation: Twitter Performance in Martin Place
Exhibition at Osage Gallery
Hong Kong
FEIGNED INNOCENCE: We All Look
Curator: Iris Lo
May29 - June 28, 2009
Exhibition at beta_space
The Powerhouse Museum, Sydney
DRIFTING
Curator: Deborah Turnbull
February 2 - 28, 2009
Panel Member for "A Year in Dorkbot" at Electrofringe Festival
3 October, 2008
Directed and Produced "BioSonics" documentary film for artist, Dr Nigel Helyer
Screening at Western Plains Cultural Centre, Dubbo, Regional NSW
16 August - 28 September, 2008
Production Assistant for Pierre Huyghe's 24 hr installation of "A Forest of Lines"at The Sydney Opera House A feature of The Biennale of Sydney, 2008. Curated by Caroline Christov-Bakargiev.
9 July 2008, 24 hr installation
Artists Talk at The Powerhouse Museum with both virtual and live music 'jams'
7 July 2007, Saturday, 1130am - 130pm
beta_space exhibiting artist at AMP Innovation and Thought Leadership Festival
29 June, 2007
Exhibition at beta_space in conjunction with Creativity and Cognition Studios The Powerhouse Museum, Sydney THE MUSICIANS
Curator: Deborah Turnbull
June-August 2007
Exhibition at First Draft Gallery THE GAZE
116-118 Chalmers St Surry Hills
Opening Wednesday, March 14 2007 6-9 pm
Exhibition March 15-April 5
Studio Residency at First Draft Gallery Sydney, Australia
January-March 2007
An enhancement of the Interactive Film Project.
Demonstration of Interactive Film Project at ViSLAB
The University of Sydney, Australia. October 23, 2006
This project applied a film and software based interface to the tracking system orginally developed with the IT department of the University of Sydney.
Software developer, Ardrian Hardjono.
Camera operator and editing, Tudor Bucea.
(The Visualization and High-Performing Computing Laboratory)
Client for SOFT3300 Software Development Project
July-October 2006
Specifications: To develop an object detection and tracking system using various computer vision techniques. The installation required a computer system to detect an object (human) and to track it in a room. The space itself was partitioned by an invisible X-Y-Z grid in order to determine the viewer's positions and specific characteristics. Using this three dimensional view and image processing software, we were enabled to follow a selected individual as he/she moved throughout the room. The focus of this project was the development of a computer vision system to detect and track an object.
Students involved: Laura Ingram, Will Cannings, Kim Upton, Sam Thorogood, Kurt Gubi
Special Thanks to Dr Masahiro Takatsuka and Dr Judy Kay
