Multimedia Artist Mariko Mori to Give Presentation at the Digital Media Center for the Arts at Yale

Internationally recognized multimedia artist Mariko Mori will be speaking and demonstrating her work at the Digital Media Center for the Arts at Yale on October 27.

Japanese born artist Mariko Mori has risen to world prominence through her avant garde work with an eclectic assortment of media, much of it cutting edge. The materials, methods and technology she uses in her genre-defying art range from computer graphics, comic strips and virtual reality to clothing, performance and fragrance.

Drawing her inspiration from Western culture – classical and pop – and Japanese traditions, Mori has been described variously as “cross between geisha girl and Gidget,” “cyberchick” and Barbarella. She describes herself as “a child of Andy Warhol and a grandchild of Duchamp.”

“In contemporary art, expressions are changing to include many choices of media, not only painting, photography, photography as conceptual art, video, architectural sculpture, sculpture using costume or fashion,” Mori reflects on the multimedia revolution. “We are freer now to express in art. I like to express using new methods. Art is a common vocabulary among developed countries.”

Educated through high school in the traditional Japanese custom, Mori went on to study design at Tokyo’s Bunka Fashion College. During her time at college, she did part-time modeling, an experience that was to have a profound impact on her art. She moved to London in the late 1980s and in 1992 she took up residence in New York as an independent student at the Whitney Museum of American Art. In 1997, Mori was a prizewinner at the Venice Biennale. Her work has been exhibited widely, both nationally – from the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago – and internationally – including the Kunsthalle Nurnberg and the Artkin Museum of Modern Art, Ishoji, among many prestigious galleries and museums.

She lives and works in New York and Tokyo.

The Digital Media Center for the Arts at Yale was set up last year to encourage cross collaboration among the disciplines using new technology for artistic expression. The Center brings visiting artists to campus to inspire discussion and analysis of these new forms.

Mariko Mori’s presentation on Oct. 27 will be at 7 p.m. in Room 102, Linsly-Chittenden Hall, 61 High Street. A reception will follow at 8:30 p.m. at the DMCA , 149 York Street. The event and the reception are free and open to the public.