Reva Stone (born 1944) is a Canadian artist known for her
digital art
Digital art refers to any artistic work or practice that uses digital technology as part of the creative or presentation process, or more specifically computational art that uses and engages with digital media.
Since the 1960s, various names ...
works. Stone's work explores how technology changes the relationship between humans and our surroundings, and how those relationships have the potential to shape our future. She fuses the concepts of performance art, made popular in the 1960s, with digital imaging and other modern forms of expression. As one of the first women to be involved in the new media arts in Canada, her large-scale projects influenced many artists she mentored.
Early career
Stone graduated from the
University of Manitoba
The University of Manitoba (U of M, UManitoba, or UM) is a Canadian public research university in the province of Manitoba. In art school, she originally began as a painter, "but that didn't last long" (according to Stone). Many middle and late 20th century philosophers and artists whose work centers around the collision of art, science, and humanity inspired Stone. She began working on interactive pieces in 1989, after encouragement from Richard Dyck, a fellow Winnipeg, technologically-focused artist, and the piece ''Legacy'' was born. ''Legacy'', finished in 1993, is a child's room, one wall representing a stereotypical girl and the other representing a stereotypical boy, exploring gender roles of young children. The viewer can interact with the installation through a computer game that cries out "Come play with me," begging for human interaction.
Work
Since the early 1990s, Stone has focused almost exclusively on interactive, technologically based art forms, using technology to isolate and explore specific properties of the human experience. Notably, she has done work with "the misogynistic world of video games, the disciplinary effects of medical science, the stimulation of human intelligence and affect in robotics, and the visual modeling of protein molecules."
Her "most ambitious piece" (according to Robert Enright) is ''Imaginal Expression'', which appeared in a featured exhibition at the
Winnipeg Art Gallery
The Winnipeg Art Gallery (WAG) is an art museum in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Its permanent collection includes over 24,000 works from Canadian, Indigenous Canadian, and international artists. The museum also holds the world's largest collect ...
in 2004. In this piece, she shaped parts of her own body (hair, skin, fingers) into protein molecules projected as moving images on a 9' x 48' screen. Stone sees ''Imaginal Expression'' as a visual form of potential for "genetic re-mapping and re-engineering."
''Carnevale 3.0'', finished 2002, mirrors human consciousness by taking pictures of viewers in the gallery that are either stored or "forgotten" as a way to simulate human memory. The robot figure is inspired by a picture of Stone, herself, as a young girl. This choice was very intentional, according to Stone, and attempts to works against the "image of women in cyber culture."
''sentientBody'', 1998, uses Stone's own disembodied breathing matched with images of water and sand "to both realize and dematerialize the existence of the body" (according to Enright).
Stone has been featured in numerous solo exhibitions as well many group exhibitions. She is also featured in six public collections in Canada and private collections throughout Canada and the United States.
Awards and recognitions
Stone was inducted into the
Royal Canadian Academy of Arts
The Royal Canadian Academy of Arts (RCA) is a Canadian arts-related organization that was founded in 1880.
History 1880 to 1890
The title of Royal Canadian Academy of Arts was received from Queen Victoria on 16 July 1880. The Governor General ...
in 2007. ''Carnevale 3.0'' was recognized by ''Life 5.0, Art & Artificial Life International Competition'', Fundación Telefónica in Madrid, Spain with an honorable mention. In 2015, she received a
Governor General's Awards in Visual and Media Arts
The Governor General's Awards in Visual and Media Arts are annual awards for achievements in visual and media arts in Canada. Up to eight awards are presented annually with the prize amount is $25,000
Created in 2000 by then Governor General Adrie ...