Artist Statement

Pedestrian is an art work for the Web which evokes the resonance of urban space through the experience of walking, and in an encounter with ordinary objects. A meditation on perception and place, Pedestrian explores the capacity of the commonplace to trigger memory and reverie. A walk through the City becomes the vehicle for a meditation on space, time and human interaction.

Pedestrian is composed of two regions: "The Reverie of Space" and "The Reverie of Objects". Each region provides a distinct visual and narrative experience through the interplay of text, [moving] images and sound. "Reverie of Space" explores the social dynamics of eye contact, muses about the fluid relationship of time and space, examines words as the visual background of urban culture, and celebrates the magic of night. "Reverie of Objects" investigates commodities and consumption, and the suprising transformation of humble or debased objects through reverie.

Each of these "urban fictions" reflects the experience of navigating a charged metropolitan space. The "urban fictions" of Pedestrian celebrate the complexity and unpredictibility of urban space and recreates that dynamism in virtual space. In its own cheerful chaos and diverse profusion, the Web is perhaps the ultimate City.

  Artist Biography

Annette Weintraub is an artist whose work explores the architectural environment as metaphor and investigates the dynamics of urban space.

Her art works for the Web (Pedestrian and Realms) have been presented under the auspices of Turbulence and artnetweb at SIGGRAPH (98) and ISEA (97), as well as at The Cooper Union, The Ricco/Maresca Gallery, and online at "Incomplete Dislocations" curated at the Centre for Art Tapes in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and the Zurich Museum of Design.

Her still images have been seen in "Technoseduction" at The Cooper Union (97), "Image Electronic" at the Euphrat Museum of Art (95) and "Metamorphoses: Photography in the Electronic Age" curated by the Aperture Foundation at the Museum at FIT (94), as well as at the Boston Computer Museum, Parsons School of Design and the Fine Arts Museum of Long Island.

Her work has appeared in Newsweek, The Boston Globe, Newsday and Leonardo. She was a 1991 recipient of the New York Foundation for the Arts grant, and recently received a Silver Award from I.D. Magazine in its Interactive Media Design Review for "Pedestrian" (98).

Annette Weintraub received her BFA from The Cooper Union and her MFA from the University of Pennsylvania. She is Professor of Art at The City College of New York, and Director of the Robinson Center for Graphic Arts and Communication Design."