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Project Descriptions

The Exploding Optic Incredible

January 18, 1990 | Media and Technology, Public Programs, Exhibitions
The Exploding Optic Incredible was an experiment in expanding the boundaries of art and music with science and technology. Ostensibly a multi-media rock concert as a fund raiser for Marshall Barnes' drug free creativity efforts, it took Andy Warhol's Exploding Plastic Inevitable concept of the 1960s into unchartered territory driven by Marshall's inspiration through discussions with Omni magazine's Dick Teresi and Pamela Weintraub and Gene Youngblood's book, Expanded Cinema. Marshall incorporated 1970s era slide and film projection light show effects, with dance lights, massive strobes, spotlights, and big screen video projection that showed customized and original video special effects while bands performed, and music videos in-between accompanied by lighting effects. The first multi-media rock concert of the 1990s, the January 18, 1990 event at the Newport Music Hall was also a test for the public's reaction to over stimulation through sight and sound, the results leading to exploration and ultimate creation of psychoactive entertainment technology later that year and the formation of new technological architectures for entertainment and learning that have yet to be presented but exist in design form.

Funders

Donor

TEAM MEMBERS

  • Marshall Barnes
    Principal Investigator
    Zang Skoul
  • Discipline: Art, music, and theater | Physics | Technology
    Audience: Adults | Museum/ISE Professionals
    Environment Type: Media and Technology | Public Programs | Public Events and Festivals | Theater Programs | Exhibitions

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