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Meredith Drum

Meredith Drum

Affiliate Global Futures Scholar, Julie Ann Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory

mdrum@vt.edu

Titles

  • Affiliate Global Futures Scholar, Julie Ann Wrigley Global Futures Laboratory

Biography

Meredith Drum uses a range of new and old media to produce documentaries, experimental fictions, cinematic installations, walking tours, visually rich locative media, place-based public projects and community cookbooks. Her toolbox includes digital video; 8mm film; 2D and 3D computer animation; a range of printing processes, mobile technology and a variety of programming languages. Her artistic work is based in her wide-ranging research into cinema studies, feminism, urban planning, historical concepts of American wilderness, critical theory, Marxism, environmental justice, psychogeography, corporeality and visuality, place-based pedagogy, and somatic and haptic experiences across digital/non-digital spaces. Meredith exhibits her work nationally and internationally - in New York City, Dubai, Mexico City, Rio de Janeiro, Brighton (UK), Paris, Copenhagen, and Valencia (ES), among other cities. Her work has been supported by grants, fellowships and residencies that include the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council (2015); iLand (2015); the Wassaic Project (2014); NY State Council on the Arts and Wavefarm (2012); HASTAC at Duke University (2011); and the University of California Institute for Research in the Arts (2010). Her writing and video journalism has been published by Media-N Journal, 2012; AR(t) Magazine, 2013; and the NYTimes, 2008. She collaborates with NYC-based artist Rachel Stevens on the Oyster City Project - a constellation of projects and events that playfully reveal relationships between social, economic and ecological systems. Ongoing and past Oyster City initiatives include the following. In 2015 Oyster City was invited by the Lower Manhattan Cultural Council to participate in Paths to Pier 42 for which they compiled and produced Fish Stories Community Cookbook - a collection of seafood recipes, local histories, stories, drawings and ecological information contributed by people who live and work in the Lower East Side. The Oyster City app (2011-ongoing) is an AR walking tour and game, featuring 3D objects and text in real space visible with an iOS device, which highlights the history and future of oysters in NYC. Participating in Urban Backstage and Embodied Mapping (2015), supported by LMCC and iLand, Oyster City worked collaboratively with other artists, dancers, urban designers and architects, using place-based movement research models developed by Jennifer Monson, to engage residents in conversations about the future of the Lower East Side in relation to predicted flooding.

Education

  • MFA, Digital Arts and New Media, University of California-Santa Cruz, 2011
  • MA, English Literature, Middebury College, 2002
  • BA, English Literature, Guilford College, 1992

Expertise

Books

2015

Drum, M. and R. Stevens eds. 2015. Fish Stories Community Cookbook. Paths to Pier 42. New York. (link )

Creative Works

2016

Drum, M. 2016. Story Problems. The Wassaic Project: Appetite for Destruction. Maxon Mills, Wassaic, New York. (Digital animation)

2015

Drum, M. 2015. A-No. 1 Rides the 19. Deep End, Wassaic Project. Maxon Mills, Wassaic, New York. (Video essay)

Drum, M. 2015. Box Truckers Post-War Imagery. Happenland, Radiator Arts. Long Island City, Queens, New York, New York. (Digital animation)

Drum, M. 2015. Mar Sea Sol. Interdisciplinary Laboratory for Art, Nature and Dance. Orchard Beach, Pelham Bay Park, The Bronx, New York City.

2014

Drum, M. 2014. Countach Jordan. Kunsthalle Gallery, Galapagos Art Space. Brookyn, New York, New York. (Animation)

Drum, M. 2014. Countach Jordan Expanded. The Last Brucennial, Bruce High Quality Foundation, New York City. Chelsea, Manhattan, New York City. (Animation)

Drum, M. 2014. Louisiana Re-storied. ISEA, 20th International Symposium on Electronic Art. Al Fahidi Historic District, Dubai, United Arab Emirates. (Interactive cinema)

2013

Drum, M. 2013. Dead Horse, Old Trash, 2nd iteration. Filmambiente International Environmental Film Festival. Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. (Video essay)

Drum, M. 2013. Dead Horse, Old Trash, 2nd iteration. Film Society of Lincoln Center's Environmental Film Festival. Lincoln Center, New York, New York. (Video essay)

Drum, M. 2013. Oyster City, 3rd iteration. Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. Open Studios Building, 110 Governors Island, New York, New York. (Walking tour)

Drum, M. 2013. The Double. Terrestrial Transmissions, Ruffin Gallery. University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia. (Video fiction)

2012

Drum, M. 2012. Oyster City, 2nd iteration. i-Docs Interactive Documentary Symposium. Bristol, England. (Walking tour)

Drum, M. 2012. Pyrite. Scope Art Fair. Manhattan, New York, New York. (Reality mobile game)

Drum, M., M. Miller and P. Toews. 2012. Pyrite. Scope Art Fair. Miami, Florida. (Reality mobile game)

Drum, M. and R. Stevens. 2012. Desert Oyster. ISEA2012 Machine Wilderness, The 18th International Symposium of Electronic Arts. Albuquerque, New Mexico. (Walking tour)

2011

Drum, M. 2011. Dead Horse, Old Trash, 1st iteration. Shelia C. Johnson Design Center at Parsons, The New School. Manhattan, New York, New York. (Video essay)

Drum, M. 2011. Pyrite. Scope Art Fair. Miami, Florida. (Reality mobile game)