Contributors
Last name: ECHEVERRY
First Name: Santiago
Affiliation: The University of Tampa
E-mail: echeverry@ut.edu
Submission Details: Digital Volumetric Portraits / Volumetric Performance
Titles:  Patty Marvila E. Patétik

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Short Biography

       Santiago Echeverry is a Colombian-American New Media Artist and Professor, with a background in Video Art, Performance Art, Web Development, and Artivism. He started exhibiting in 1989, participating since then in some of the most important festivals in the world, and is now considered a pioneer in the field of Net Art and Queer Filmmaking in Latin America. In 1992, he graduated top of the inaugural class of the Universidad Nacional de Colombia’s Film and Television School. In 1995, he was awarded the prestigious Fulbright Grant to earn his Master's degree from the Interactive Telecommunications Program at NYU. He started his academic career in 1993, and is currently an Associate Professor and co-founder of the recently created Film, Animation and New Media Department at the University of Tampa. His research is focused on volumetric imaging, interactive web development, and creative coding. All his works and projects are available online at www.santi.tv

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Artist’s Statement​

       I grew up in Bogotá, Colombia, a city where the mafia was blowing up buildings, and murdering people with drugs and bombs; AIDS was killing my friends, and death squads were threatening my life for being openly gay. Instead of seeking cover, I became a very visible New Media artist promoting change in my surroundings through video art, documentaries, performances and artivism.

       I moved to New York in 1995 to get my Master's degree in Interactive Telecommunications just as the Internet was beginning to expand, and I immediately used the Web as a creative tool where all my art practice would come together, with a global perspective. The Internet has become the perfect tool to explore my passion for non-linear filmmaking, digital poetry, cyber-activism, creative code, photography, animation and interactive narration. I am using HTML5 / PHP / CSS3, Processing and video tools to produce my works, continuously exploring new open source software and hardware.

       With some emotional links still left in Colombia and now living permanently in the United States, my work has evolved into a study of how we perceive and recreate ourselves in a digital environment, inseparable from a political context. Aesthetically, I am interested in the dialog between low and high resolution, exploding the pixel grid to push the possibilities of volumetric images, both still and in motion, animated frame by frame.

       Inspired by Christopher Isherwood's books, I use the Kinect 3D sensor together with Processing 3.0 to capture in real time the spaces, looks and attitudes of LGBTQ communities around the world.