Darsha Hewitt

Event(s):

34. Chaos Communication Congress

Language(s):

English

Track(s):

Art & Culture

Links:

www.darsha.org

Darsha Hewitt is a Canadian artist working in new media and sound. She is known for her examinations of communication technology in the domestic sphere and her use of DIY aesthetics and practices as an artistic method. She makes electromechanical sound installations, drawings, audio-visual works, how-to videos and experimental performances with handmade electronics. Through deconstruction and experimentation with failed and obsolete technology, her work demystifies hidden systems within machines as a way to trace-out structures of economy, power and control embedded throughout capitalist culture. Alongside her artistic practice, Darsha is presently a fellow at the Berlin Centre for Advanced Studies in Arts and Sciences (BAS) in the Graduate School at the Art University of Berlin and a Guest Professor in New Media and Sound Art at the Karlsruhe University of Art and Design. From 2015-16 she shared a joint guest professorship in New Media with Aram Bartholl at the Art University of Kassel. She is also a Lecturer in the Media Arts Environments Research Chair at the Bauhaus University Weimar. Her do-it-yourself electronics workshops are an integral part of her discipline and are presented internationally. Her work in this field was a subject in the Music, Digitization, Mediation: Towards Interdisciplinary Music Studies project based in the Faculty of Music at Oxford University. Darsha is a collaborating facilitator of the Music Makers Hack Lab with Create Digital Music. Recent presentations of her work include: Future Flux Festival (NL), Transmediale (DE), Asia Culture Center Gwangju (SK), Elektra Festival (CA), Resonate (RS), Spectrum (DE), Goethe Institute (CA), Halle14 (DE), Modern Art Oxford (UK), WRO Media Art Biennale (PL), FACT Liverpool (UK) and CTM Festival (DE). She has been awarded several commissions and production stipends from Canada, Germany and EU funded Programs such as The Canada Council for the Arts, le Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec, The Art and Civic Media program at the Innovation Incubator at Leuphana University of Lüneburg and an international prize from The Edith-Russ-Haus for Media Art (DE).