sponge/populations






contact sponge about	Trained in mathematics at Harvard and Stanford Universities, specializing in differential geometry. He taught mathematics in both traditional and experimental curricula at Stanford for five years (1979-1984). In the subsequent decade he worked in the fields of scientific computation, mathematical modeling, and the visualization of scientific data and of topological and geometric structures. After 1993, he extended his work to distributed media authoring systems, such as the MediaWeaver, and to a theoretical study of computational media. Sha served as Human-Computer Systems Architect for the University Information Resources, specializing in Mathematics and Scientific Computation, and was appointed as a visiting scholar at the Program in History and Philosophy of Science. He was the coordinator of the Stanford Humanities Center's Interactive Media Group, a research workshop designed to draw participants from literature, art, performance, science and philosophy together in an interdisciplinary study of interaction and media. In 1996, Sha co-founded Pliant Research, a group of computer scientists, philosophers and anthropologists dedicated to the design of socio-technical systems that are more supple, flexible and malleable according to the evolution of social desire. He has also worked as a consultant at Interval Research in the areas of unsupervised learning and vision. Sha formed Sponge with Chris Salter and Laura Farabough in 1997. More recently, Sha joined the Knexus research initiative on the study of the evolution of knowledge in networks, in exchange and in use. After obtaining an interdisciplinary Ph.D. at Stanford on differential geometric performance and the technologies of writing (in Mathematics, Computer Science, and History & Philosophy of Science), Sha joined the faculty of the School of Literature, Communication and Culture (LCC) at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta, working in critical studies of science, technology and media. He also serves as research faculty in the Graphics, Visualization and Usability Center in the College of Computing. He is the founding Director of the Topological Media Lab in the New Media Center in the LCC. His research interests include gesture and performance, topological media, differential geometry and critical/philosophical studies of technologies of visualization and responsive media. Recent projects include sponge-FoAM's TGarden TG2001 (Ars Electronica Linz and V2 Rotterdam) and Sauna 02, Enter multi-perspective video installation with Tirtza Even (Postmasters, New York 2001), TechnoPoetry Symposium (2002), Blink and Scripted Spaces (Eyedrum Festivals, 2002, Atlanta), and the Hubbub architectural speechpainting experiment. His current research includes a study of gesture and knowledge via the framework of responsive media spaces and wearable instruments using active fabric and wireless sensors; continuous state media choreography; speech technologies in urban space; critical and political economies of experimental media techno-science. email Sha Xin Wei Trained in economics, philosophy (Emory University), Ph.D. (theater+computer-generated sound-CCRMA), Stanford University 1997. Works as a director, composer, interaction designer and information architect in the USA and Europe. Researching/developing new performance models in relationship to computational technology, sound, architecture and media. Awarded Fulbright and Alexander von Humboldt "Bundeskanzler" grants for research/work in Germany between 1993-1995. Worked as assistant (stage) with Peter Stein (Salzburg Festival, 1994) and Frank Castorf (Volksbühne, Berlin 1994). Collaborations with William Forsythe and the Ballett Frankfurt (Eidos:Telos, 1995, Sleepers Guts, 1997) and Peter Sellars (Salzburg Festival, Royal Opera House-Covent Garden) and sound artists Sam Auinger and Bruce Odland (interaction design-E-Henge Earth Centre UK (1999) and Sounds From the Vaults, Field Museum-Chicago (1999)), Landesaustellung/Krieg und Gewalt-Burg Schlaingingen Austria (2000), Cloud Chamber-The Kitchen (1999) and Berliner Theorie (Berlin, 1997). Co-founded Sponge in 1997 (projects, m1 - Stanford University, 1997, m2 - The Lab/SF, 1998, m3 - Sauna/TGarden - San Francisco Electronic Music Festival 2000, SIGGRAPH 2000, Mediaterra Festival-Athens, Greece, DEAF 2000(Dutch Electronic Arts Festival), Ars Electronica 2001, V2/Rotterdam 2001). Co-founder of San Francisco Electronic Music Festival (1999) and advisory board member/consultant for Ground Zero: The Art and Technology Network of Silicon Valley. Independent projects with FoAM (GroWorld, Burningman Festival (2000) and Bubble (2000)). Recent online media essay commission for Crossfade (SFMOMA, Goethe Institut, SF, Walker Arts Center, ZKM) series. Current projects include Chronopolis, an interactive urban digital public artwork in collaboration with graphic designer Erik Adigard, teleopolis-guest curating for Exploratorium 2nd Wednesday series and Sauna 02. email Chris Salter Raised by wolves in the bomb shelters, flood washes, cotillions and riding stables of suburban LA, has always worked as an artist. She was co-founder/artistic director of Beggars Theater which evolved into Snake Theater. Snake grew too big too fast and instead of swallowing its own tail bit itself in two. She then took Nightfire and burned. Influenced by sources as diverse as Robert Morris, Bruce Nauman and Captain Beefheart, she is one of the pioneers in the genre of site specific performance and in the merge between video and performance. She was commissioned by the 1984 Olympic Arts festival in Los Angeles to develop a site-specific work, which resulted in the large-scale swimming pool spectacle Liquid Distance/Timed Approach. Her work, which has toured in the US, Europe and Japan, was fully underwritten from 1976-1991 by private and community philanthropy (San Francisco, Hewlett, Haas, Rockefeller and Flintridge Foundations) and by state and federal monies, including 10 years of continuous awards from the California Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts. In addition, she has received special fellowships including the Japan/UnitedStates Friendship Commission Fellowship (1987) and was a Fulbright Senior Scholar Lecture/Research Fellow in Cairo, Egypt 1994. With the collapse of the non-profit system, Laura’s company Nightfire evaporated as the dollars dwindled. Broke, unfettered, needing something to do, she knocked on the doors of Stanford University. When asked to provide a degree, a diploma or even a progress report, she opened both hands and showed that they were empty; the academics, shocked and amused by such advanced naiveté, promptly admitted her into the Ph.D. program in Drama. She formed sponge with Salter and Sha in 1996 in order to realize another model of making creative work. She is currently writing her dissertation on sponge’s working methods. email Laura Farabough

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