Reva Stone: erasure

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Image courtesy of the artist.

Reva Stone, Falling, video still. 9:00 min.

Reva Stone: erasure

Reception: February 7, 4:30 – 6:30

Public Tour: March 14, 12:00

Hands-on workshop: March 5, 11:30 – 2:30, ARTlab Gallery Foyer

Winnipeg artist Reva Stone presents a series of three works, Falling, Atomic Bomb, and Erase, that critique how drone technologies are being integrated into society and how, recently, information about the destructive outcomes of their usage seems to be erased from public awareness.

"Since I began working on this installation in 2015, I began to notice that news items about drones, that once included collateral damage, changing nature of war, transgression of national boundaries have all but disappeared from media reportage – almost as if they have been erased."

Private citizens may see drones (unmanned aerial vehicles or uavs) as recreational devices – like remote-controlled toy airplanes; researchers may view them as a means of acquiring aerial photographs of sites otherwise too difficult access; and businesses may view them as a new means of parcel delivery.

However, unmanned aerial vehicles are also perfect for carrying out more nefarious objectives, such as spying or deadly airstrikes. These actions are often performed on behalf of governments, and may, intentionally or otherwise, involve innocent citizens.

Stone invites her audience to consider how the capabilities of such technology may be turned against citizens, and how governments might, and do, get away with employing them in the name of patriotism in ways that ultimately test the ethical and moral values of its citizenry. With news cycles moving so rapidly, the reports of deadly events quickly fall from memory, seemingly erased from public consciousness.

About the Artist

Reva Stone’s work is concerned with an examination of the mediation between our bodies and the technologies that are altering how we interact with the world. In new installation work, erasure, she is examining that liminal space between what we understand about ourselves and our culture and the intentional and unintentional processes of erasure that are occurring in today’s highly mediated representation of unmanned aerial vehicle (uav or drone) use.

She has received many awards, including the 2017 Distinguished Alumnae Award from the University of Manitoba, the 2015 Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts and an honorable mention from Life 5.0, Art & Artificial Life International Competition, Fundación Telefónica, Madrid, Spain. She has exhibited widely in Canada, the US and Europe, has presented at symposia and has been published in journals such as Second Nature: the International Journal of Creative Media.

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.