Extract from the French Encyclopedia ''Grand Larousse Universel''

("Great Universal Larousse'' ), supplement, page 242, Larousse Publishers, Paris.

"Fred Forest, French artist, (born in Mascara, today Mouaskar, Algeria, 1933).
Since his first video exhibit in Tours in 1969, he has worked at connecting, in his creation, social reality, communication phenomena and an imaginary dimension.

Forest is among the pioneers of Sociological Art as an initiator of a practice exploring actual video possibilities, but also other means like radio, television, written press, telephone, cable, telematics, robotics and luminous electronic newspapers.''

 

Curriculum Vitae

Fred FOREST, Ph.D.
Artist and University Professor


- Artist and author in Contemporary Art - Multimedia art - Web Art
- First artist to present and sell a numerical creation on Internet in 1996 : " Parcel-Web ".
- Ph.D. in Literature and Human Sciences, Sorbonne University, Paris, France,
1985. - Professor of Communication and Information Sciences at the University of Nice-Sophia Antipolis, Nice, France.
-Creator and facilitator, Fred Forest Workshop, Modern and Contemporary Art Museum, Nice, France. Fred FOREST creations, International actions and exhibitions

-1999 -Techno-Mariage on Internet with Sophie Lavaud

-1998 - Author of the book :

" After Contemporary Art - For an Art of the present time- Art at the time of Internet on the edge of the XXIst Century. "

To be published in April 1998. Publisher :

L'Harmattan, 7 rue Ecole Polytechnique, 75005 PARIS, FRANCE.
Tel. 01 40 46 79 22.

-1996 - " The Web Territory " : Creation on Internet, Imagina 96, Gallery Pierre Nouvion, Monaco.
-World first sale on Internet of the numerical creation Parcelle/Reseau Web ", Hotel Drouot, Paris.
- Silver Trophy, Art and Culture, F.A.U.S.T., Toulouse, France.
-1995 " From Casablanca to Locarno ", Multimedia action with National Swiss TV and Radio and Internet. First Price of the City of Locarno, Video-Festival of Locarno.
-1994 Personal exhibition, " The Square Meter Territory ", Gallery Donguy, France.
-1993 " The Miradors of Peace ", ex-Yugoslavian border.
-1992 " Fill in a container by phone ", A.R.S.L.A.B. Arts and Science Technology, Mole Antonelliana, Torino, Italy.
-1991 - " Artists and Light ", Center of Art and Technology, Reims, France
- " The Electronic Bible " , Center of Contemporary Art, La Base, Levallois, France
- Action : Fred Forest, President of Bulgarian TV.
- Exhibition : " Communication Machines ", City of Sciences and Industries, Paris , France.
-1990, Personal exhibition ,Gallery Jacqueline Rivolta, Lausanne, Switzerland.
-1989 - "Julia Margaret Cameron ", Media Action, Beaux-Arts Museum, Toulon, France.
- Personal exhibition , Gallery Jacqueline Felmann, Paris, France.
- " Telematic rituals ", Arctic Circle, URSS. - ¨Performance, Red Place, Moscow, URSS.
-1988 - Personal exhibition, Galerie Friedrich, Cologne, Germany.
- Video installation, Ludwig Museum, Cologne, Germany.
-1987 " Documenta VII ", Kassel, Germany.
-1986 XI World Congress of Sociology, New-Delhi, India.
-1985 Ph.D. in Literature, Sorbonne University, Paris. Presented with electronic systems, Louis Liard Auditorium, Paris.
-1984 -" The Technological Imaginary ", Sannio Benevento Museum, Italy.
- " Artcom ", Jerusalem and Haifa Museums, Israel. - " Electra ", Modern Art Museum, Paris, France.
-1982 - Personal exhibition, " Imagination workshop ", George Pompidou Center, Paris, France.
-1977 " Documenta VI ", Kassel, Germany.
-1976 Venice Biennial, Italy.
-1973 Communication Price, Sao-Paulo Biennial, Brazil.
-1972 - " Space Media " with the newspaper " Le Monde "; - " 60 seconds of interruption " on French National TV, Channel
- Press series ( written press, radio and TV) in France and abroad.
-1969 Interactive Video installation, Sainte Croix Gallery, Tours, France.

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Fred Forest Biography

Fred Forest is a pioneer in Contemporary Art , with an artistic practice in constant evolution. After being a painter and scketcher for the French newspapers ''Combat'' and ''Les Echos'', he devotes his career to research new modes of art creation with the opportunities offered by modern media technology .

Pioneer of video art in the sixties, he is the first artist to create in France, at that time, a set up called ''interactive environments''. He innovates again as a pioneer by conceiving several types of ''press experiences'' with a symbolic and critical intent. One can remember his ''white space'' in the ''Le Monde'' newspaper in 1972 and his memorable ''artistic square-meter'' media operation.... In 1973 he realizes several spectacular actions for the Sao-Paulo Biennial, for which he wins the Communication Prize and ...his arrest by the Military government. In his artistic practice, always a pioneer, he uses : the telephone, video, radio, TV, cable, computers, luminous electronic newspapers, robotics, telematic networks...As a matter of fact, he will be there again, as the first time ever, for the experimental networks of Velizy. Co-founder of the Sociological Art group in 1974, he graduates with a Ph.D. in Literature at Sorbonne University in 1984 with a research on Communication Esthetics. With Mario Costa , Professor of Esthetics at Palerno University, and Derrick de Kerchove, Director of the Marshall MacLuhan Program at the University of Toronto, he creates an International Research Group, with participants such as Roy Ascott, David Rokeby, Norman White...

He teaches Video filming at the National Art School of Cergy, and was appointed as permanent Professor of Communication and Information Sciences at the University of Nice Sophia Antipolis, where he directs an internationally known seminar on communication esthetics at the Modern Art and Contemporary Art Museum of Nice. He represented France at the Venice Biennial and at the Kassel Documenta. He has created several experimental TV and radio programs, like in Belgium, Switzerland, Brazil and France. In 1991, opposition parties in Bulgaria support Fred Forest as a candidate for the Direction of theBulgarian TV , with a ...utopic and interactive TV project. Other spectacular actions are put together by the artist ''The Electronic Bible'', the ''Peace Miradors'' at the Yugoslavian border, a multi-media action called ''From Locarno to Casablanca, ''Love reviewed and corrected'' on Internet. This pieces are symbolic creations ''works of art'' of our times, with an incredible media success, and showing that art today is not only in Museums, and not just a question of business and the elite !

The work of this artist makes us think about the principle of communication as well as communication codes, the way they can be diverted, the ideological, symbolic and esthetic values of communication. Making a complete break with the past, Fred Forest says : '' Art today needs to be reinvented ; new forms of Art must break through, instead of repeating obsolete models of the past.'' For him, the role of the artist is to bring out in a sensible way how the present practice of communication and the networks attached to it interact with our perception , imagination, and representation systems as a whole. He also thinks the artist must lead us to experiment this new environment called : CYBERSPACE Finally, Fred Forest sees the artist as the ''Initiator'', the one who was always there, yesterday as much as today, to make sense, to ask the important questions, and to introduce a spiritual dimension to life, a promised life that would otherwise be a ''shadow theater'', in a laboratory populated with ....electronic gadgets.

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