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Chelsea Thompto, The Fog (still from work in progress), 2023. Commissioned for the San José Museum of Art. Image courtesy of the artist.
New Digital project Commissioned by the San José Museum of Art Debuts Online November 3, 2023
| WHAT: |
Chelsea Thompto: The Fog is a new interactive web experience that responds to the ecological and technological contexts of the Bay Area and Silicon Valley and invites us to imagine alternative, liberatory forms of embodiment. It explores the juncture between embodiment, visibility, and monstrosity through the figure of the fog. Thompto’s interest in monstrosity stems from the writings of the influential trans scholar and activist Susan Stryker. In an essay published in 1994, Stryker considers the affinities between her experience of gender as a trans woman and the stigmatization and existential dilemmas faced by the monster in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein (1818). Using the Bay Area’s iconic fog as a point of departure, Thompto’s interactive narrative will integrate literary and instructional texts with digitally constructed spaces, or acts. Each act will address a different dimension of fog: its impact on military strategy and logistics, its presence in horror narratives, and the potential of fog as an aspirational figure for trans embodiment. Thompto's poetic and researched explorations of trans embodiment, imaging technologies, and fog also has powerful implications in this time of profound climatic changes, including reductions in the Bay Area’s fog cover. Chelsea Thompto: The Fog is organized by Juan Omar Rodriguez, assistant curator. |
| WHERE:
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Thompto’s digital project will reside on the San José Museum of Art’s (SJMA) website and be accessible by desktop, laptop, and mobile devices. This artwork is the next iteration of SJMA’s ongoing Digital Projects series, a commissioning program. |
| WHEN: | November 3, 2023–Ongoing |
Chelsea Thompto
Artist, educator, writer, and curator Chelsea Thompto was born and raised in Iowa and has spent most of her life between the Midwest and California. Thompto earned an MFA in 4D Art and an MA in Gender and Women’s Studies from the University of Wisconsin in Madison in 2019, an MA in Sculpture from Sacramento State University in 2016, and a BFA in Sculpture from the University of Iowa in 2012. Her work has been in numerous exhibitions, including solo shows at the Neon Heater Gallery, Findlay, OH (2020); the Kohler Art Library, Madison, WI (2019); Able Contemporary, Paoli, WI (2019); Gallery 7, Madison, WI (2017); Library Annex Gallery, Sacramento, CA (2016); and the Robert Else Gallery, Sacramento, CA (2015), among others. Thompto serves on the editorial board of Media-N: Journal of the New Media Caucus and is a member of the ninth Art & Code cohort of the New Museum’s art, design, and technology incubator NEW INC. She is an Assistant Professor of Creative Technologies at Virginia Tech and previously taught Digital Media Art at San Jose State University (2020-23).
Support
Chelsea Thompto: The Fog is made possible by the SJMA Exhibitions Fund, with lead support from the Knight Foundation.
Operations and programs at the San José Museum of Art are made possible by principal support from SJMA’s Board of Trustees, a Cultural Affairs Grant from the City of San José, and the Lipman Family Foundation; by lead support from the Adobe Foundation, the California Arts Council, Brook Hartzell and Tad Freese, the Institute of Museums and Library Services, the Richard A. Karp Charitable Foundation, Tammy and Tom Kiely, Kimberly and Patrick Lin, Sally Lucas, Yvonne and Mike Nevens, the David and Lucile Packard Foundation, the Skyline Foundation, and the SJMA Director's Council and Council of 100; and with significant endowment support from the William Randolph Hearst Foundation and the San José Museum of Art Endowment Fund established by the Knight Foundation at the Silicon Valley Community Foundation.
SAN JOSE MUSEUM OF ART
The San José Museum of Art (SJMA) is a contemporary art museum dedicated to inclusivity, new thinking, and visionary ideas. Founded in 1969 by artists and community leaders, its dynamic exhibitions, collection, and programs resonate with defining characteristics of San José and the Silicon Valley—from its rich diversity to its hallmark innovative ethos. The Museum offers lifelong learning for school children and their educators, multigenerational families, creative adults, university students and faculty, and community groups. SJMA is committed to being a borderless museum, essential to creative life throughout the diverse communities of San José and beyond.
SJMA is located at 110 South Market Street in downtown San José, California. The Museum is open Thursday 4–9pm; Friday 11am–9pm; and Saturday–Sunday 11am–6pm, and select Monday holidays 11am–6pm. Admission is $15 for adults, $12 for seniors, and free to members, college students, youth and children ages 17 and under, and school teachers (with valid ID). Admission is free from 6–9pm on the first Friday of every month. For up-to-date information, call 408.271.6840 or visit SanJoseMuseumofArt.org.