Upstream Gallery is pleased to present the first solo exhibition by JODI with the gallery.
JODI - the art collective consisting of Joan Heemskerk (NL, 1968) and Dirk Paesmans (BE, 1965) - pioneered web-based art in the mid-1990s. Their work uses the widest possible variety of media and techniques, from installations, software and websites to performances and exhibitions. In a medium-specific way, they (de)construct and analyze the languages of new media: from visual aesthetics to interface elements, from codes and features to errors and viruses. They challenge the relationship between technology and users by subverting our expectations about the functionalities and conventions of the systems that we depend upon every day.
Paesmans and Heemskerk have a background in video art and photography respectively. Both attended CADRE, the electronic arts laboratory at San Jose State University in California; Dirk Paesmans also studied with Nam June Paik at the Kunstakademie in Dusseldorf. The duo works together since 1994.