Gregory Zinman

While Nam June Paik (1932–2006) is probably the most well-known practitioner of video synthesis, he arrived at video art through an intense engagement with other art forms. Indeed, Paik’s background in painting, music, dance, and happenings formed the basis of his work in video, even as that work provided the seeds from which our contemporary mediascape emerged. This project will identify the ways in which Paik’s moving image art operated between media, and will determine how his art, in turn, has helped to shape America’s understanding of today’s global digital culture. In so doing, I hope to show how the rupture often associated with the shift from analog to digital form is, in fact, better understood as a continuum, linking ages-old intentions with cutting-edge technologies and tools. By connecting the contents of the Smithsonian American Art Museum’s newly-acquired Nam June Paik Archive with the institution’s rich collection of modern and contemporary art, as well as its recently acquired digital moving image art, I seek to expand the critical conversation about the significance of video art to consider its intermedial past, as well as its digital future.

As a postdoctoral fellow at the Smithsonian American Art Museum, I will use materials in the Paik Archive to investigate three principle subjects:

1) How Paik conceptualized his video art as an extension and elaboration of the possibilities of painting.

2) How to better contextualize Paik’s video art in relation to our current digital media and information culture, from the gallery and museum to online video and social networks.

3) How to detail the ways that Paik’s experience as an international citizen helped fashion a more globally aware American mediascape.

By recovering the range of forms, tools, and intentions that make up Paik’s creative and socially-conscious art, I seek to enlighten our awareness of the intersection of American art and media in the twentieth century, and enrich our understanding—and appreciation— of what is to come.