Photographer Nate Larson, a faculty member at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore, whose work is currently on view in the Laura Mesaros Gallery of WVU’s Creative Arts Center, will present a visiting artist lecture Thursday, Sept. 23.

The lecture begins at 5 p.m. in the Bloch Learning and Performance Hall (200A). A reception will follow at 6 p.m. at the galleries. Both events are free and open to the public.

Larson’s exhibition, titled “Mapping the Data Stream,” will be open through Oct. 8.

“Mapping the Data Stream” features three recent series of technologically enabled photographs by Larson. The newest series, “History Lessons,” is a photographic exploration of significant historic sites, coupled with references and messages to the site gathered from online social networks.

The second series, “Geolocation,” monitors public Twitter tweets and the associated Geotag information. Upon viewing a particularly compelling, poetic or personal Twitter update, Larson and his colleague Marni Shindelman traveled to the GPS coordinates and made a photograph to mark the location of the update in the real world and paired the image with the originating text.

The third series documents recent site-specific GPS drawings made by Larson and Shindelman and uses invisible technological threads to create virtual drawings and writings in urban landscapes.

Larson’s work with photographic media, artist books and narrative video has been widely exhibited across the United States and internationally. Numerous publications have reviewed and published his projects, including “Exposure,” “Art Papers,” “The New York Times” and “Afterimage.” He has received grants from the Ultimate Eye Foundation in California; Visual Studies Workshop in New York; the Banff Centre for the Arts in Alberta, Canada; the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and the Illinois Arts Council. Larson earned a Master of Fine Arts from the Ohio State University in 2002 and a Bachelor of Arts from Purdue University in 2000. He was recently elected to the Board of Directors for the Society for Photographic Education.

For more information, contact Robert Bridges, curator, at (304) 293-2312 or see Larson’s website at www.natelarson.com.

-WVU-

CONTACT: Charlene Lattea, College of Creative Arts
304-293-4359, Charlene.Lattea@mail.wvu.edu

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