Photodotes II: Workshop with Zenovia Toloudi
Wednesday, March 14, 1:30 – 3pm

In this hands-on workshop, the participants design and build new PHOTODOTES machines using tubular boxes and various materials that transfer and transform light through their bodies. The artifacts are kaleidoscopic inventions whose elements act as collectors, conductors, reflectors, and diffusers of light through the use of mirrors, optics, fibers, fabrics, plastics, and liquids.

Project Description:
For the Garden Lab Residency at Brant Gallery, Zenovia Toludi will conduct a ‘machinic’ installation, PHOTODOTES, that explores the manipulation of natural and artificial light in space, architectured to perform in 3 stages: collecting, transferring and emitting light. The experimentation discusses phenomena related to lack of light, like the lack of vitamin D, depression, women’s cycle patterns irregularities, and work separation from exterior conditions. By augmenting the individual and collective perceptual mechanism, PHOTODOTES emphasizes how light’s relation to energy and the survival leads to well-being of people. Project Blog: http://zitofos.blogspot.com/

Bio:
Zenovia Toloudi is an architect, artist, and curator, and currently a Research Affiliate at MIT Art, Culture and Technology. Examples of Zenovia’s work can be seen in Thessaloniki, where she designed and constructed The Cage pavilion, now part of AUTh’s sculptural museum permanent collection; and in Chicago, where she worked on The Wit, a hotel skyscraper as part of architecture firm KOO. Her sensorial urban interventions have been exhibited internationally at Venice Biennale, The Lab at Harvard, Athens Byzantine Museum, among other places. Zenovia has curated exhibitions at Harvard GSD, Boston Museum of Science and in Seoul; founded and organized Brain.Storms; co-organized Critical Digital Conferences and lectures for Art, Design and The Public Domain program at Harvard GSD; moderated panel discussions in collaboration with Ecological Urbanism, Harvard Kennedy School, Sun Publishers and MIT. She is a contributing editor at SHIFTBoston blog. Zenovia received her doctorate from Harvard GSD and architectural degrees from IIT, and AUTh. http://zenovia.net