BIO
Timothy Scaffidi is a visual artist working primarily in sculpture, reactive audio & video systems, and electronics. He holds a bachelors degree in Art as well as Computer Science and he is currently pursuing his MFA at University at Buffalo in the Visual Studies department with a concentration in Emerging Practices. He teaches Interactive Art and Algorithmic Art courses at UB as well as the Computer Art course at the New York State Summer School of the Arts for high school students.
STATEMENT
My work is an exploration of the hidden things lurking behind the scenes of our everyday existence. Everything leaves a trace, from the virtual to physical, microscopic to astronomical, well defined to chaotic. A trace is a direct abstraction of its real-world counterpart and presents us with new information about its source.
I am currently interested in of relationships over time; this includes human relationships to ourselves, to each other, to society, and between larger composite entities or virtual systems. Tracing the movement and interplay of these relationships over time yields beautifully complex results which can offer insight into the workings of the human macro-organism. I aim to reveal the hidden structures embedded within these environments: by better understanding the large scale of time and space, we may come to better understand our actions on a personal level.
My work often requires physical viewer participation in order to be fully experienced; the behavior of the viewer is just as important—if not more so—than the physical or virtual manifestations of the work. An interactive (reactive) experience should be able to grab one's attention and interest by engaging a will to play, learn, and explore.
First Shapes and Colors The young artist in his studio