JASON EPPINK
Adventures in Urban Alchemy
Date: Saturday 9.19
Start Time: 2:00pm
Location: Rm. 204, Barney building
This workshop will serve as an introduction to the theory and practice of urban alchemy and a brainstorming stroll through the streets of the East Village.
Urban alchemy, the transmogrification of common public infrastructure into rare moments of unauthorized culture, combines the fields of street art, pranksterism, and culture jamming to realize imaginative reappropriations of existing urban structures and systems.
Practicing urban alchemist Jason Eppink will present a brief primer on the theory and practice of urban alchemy and lead a brainstorming stroll through the streets of the East Village.
Participants will work to develop a unique way of seeing city fixtures and processes as elements for potential transformations. The group will examine urban routines, municipal infrastructure, and street-side detritus to collectively brainstorm possible metamorphoses.
Jason Eppink was originally trained as a filmmaker in Los Angeles though he quickly realized following this path would have him running coffee for the next few years before doing anything mildly creative. And Jason doesn’t know the first thing about coffee. After hosting a long-running public access television show, finishing a few art films, and dabbling in viral video, he finally just gave in to this whole Art thing.
Informed by his years in film, as well as an interest in programming and the open source movement (where applicable, he distributes his own source code) Jason likes to engage the public with victimless pranks, street art, and interactive sculpture. As a result, much of his recent work falls somewhere in the gray area between art, prank, and activism. Really, Jason just likes to think he is a dude who is making things a little better.
When he’s not doing whatever it is you call what he’s doing, Jason serves as a curator at a museum in New York City that doesn’t want to be publicly associated with any of his mischief.
