Quick Facts
ScorpioBiography
Eric Forman is a New York-based artist and designer best known for his signal blocking chandelier sculpture Dis/Connect (2021), his installation Heart Squared (2020) in collaboration with MODU, and his sound object TreeShell (2013). Dis/Connect was featured as one of Fast Company's 2021 World Changing Ideas. Heart Squared was selected by the Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum as the winner of the Times Square Heart 2020 Design Competition. Throughout February 2020, Heart Squared was seen by over 300,000 people a day. TreeShell was selected by the Museum of Modern Art Design Store for its 2013 “Destination: NYC” series.
Biography
Eric Forman received his B.A. from Vassar College in 1995, where he created his own course of study in “The Philosophical Ramifications of Computer Technology.” His studies culminated in a thesis titled “Virtual Reality: The Refiguring of Space, Real, and Subject”(1995), which investigated the conceptual impact of VR on media theory and philosophy. In the mid-1990s, he was one of the early members of Pseudo Programs, one of the world's original online streaming content services, where he worked on creating virtual environments for the early internet service provider Prodigy. Forman received his master's degree from ITP at Tisch School of the Arts (NYU) in 2002.
Eric Forman Studio was founded in 2003 and has produced primarily sculpture and installation art concerned with the intersection of technology and human, using “playful interaction to reveal issues of language, simulation, and perception.” In 2012, his studio became a founding member of New Lab at the Brooklyn Navy Yard.
Forman has also taught “Physical Computing” to artists and designers since 2003. He has taught at SIGGRAPH, RISD (Rhode Island School of Design) MFA Digital+Media, and SVA (School of Visual Arts) in New York City where he is currently the Head of Innovation in the MFA Interaction Design department.
Selected achievements
| Achievement | Location | Year |
|---|---|---|
| Fast Company World Changing Ideas Awards 2021 Honorable Mention | New York, NY | 2021 |
| Times Square Heart 2020 Design Winner | New York, NY | 2019 |
| Invited to present retrospective on career | University of Delaware Department of Art & Design | 2018 |
| Træna artist residency | Tenk Træna, Nordland, Norway | 2016 |
| Autodesk Pier 9 artist residency | San Francisco, CA | 2014-2015 |
| Jerome Fellowship and Franconia Sculpture Park artist residency | Shafer, MN | 2014 |
| Spotlight Series Visiting Artist lecture | University of the Arts, Philadelphia, PA Spring | 2013 |
| Selected for MoMA Design Destination: NYC collection | New York, NY and Tokyo, Japan | 2013 |
| Invited speaker for “Creativity and Innovation” panel | CreateTech, Brooklyn, NY | 2013 |
| Invited by New York City EDC to present artwork made locally with new technologies | NY Design Week, BMWi Ventures, New York, NY | 2012 |
| Invited to present work and participate in panel “Slowness: Responding to Acceleration” | ISEA (International Symposium on Electronic Art), Istanbul, Turkey | 2011 |
| Toyota HEYA Artist Innovation Grant | New York, NY | 2008 |
Selected exhibitions and works
| Work | Place | Year |
|---|---|---|
| Dis/Connect | New York, NY | 2021 |
| Heart Squared (with MODU) | Times Square, New York, NY | 2020 |
| UnBuilding | Citygroup Gallery, New York, NY and New Lab, Brooklyn, NY | 2019 |
| Un-Urban Experiment | DOGA (Design & Architecture Norway) | 2018 |
| Under Dytte Lyset [Under This Light] | Bodø Biennial, Norway | 2016 |
| Sculptural Light Installation | Motherboard New York, Brooklyn, NY | 2016 |
| Radiolarian | Sunsychronous orbit around Earth | 2015 |
| Auto-Surveillance Encounter II | Art Souterrain, Montreal, Canada | 2015 |
| Scale/Scape Light Panel series II | Autodesk Pier 9 Gallery, San Francisco, CA | 2015 |
| Radioscape | Franconia Sculpture Park, Shafer, MN | 2014 |
| Futur Absolu (with Stephan Breuer) | Château de Compiègne, Oise, France | 2013 |
| Consensual Navigation Shirt | Conflux Festival, New York, NY, part of “Test Dérive” curated by Seth Carnes | 2010 |
| Constrained Flight Structure | Solar One, New York, NY | 2010 |
| What the Rain has Seen | DUMBO Art Under the Bridge Festival, New York, NY | 2008 |
| Untitled (performance) | 24HrsNonStopArt, Tigh Fili Cultural Centre, Cork, Ireland | 2008 |
| Every Drop Counts (with Cynthia Lawson) | Exit Art, New York, NY | 2006 |
| Auto-Surveillance Encounter | Show & Tell Salon curated by Leejone Wong, New York, NY | 2004 |
| Autonomous Harmonizing Robotic Sculpture | The New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, NY | 2003 |
| branch/ing | Thomas Street Gallery, New York, NY | 2002 |
| Drop | ITP/Tisch, New York, NY | 2002 |
| TransLink | ITP/Tisch, New York, NY | 2001 |
| SoundBot | ITP/Tisch, New York, NY | 2000 |
Other professional work[36]
Eric Forman Studio also develops interactive technology for clients, most notably Marina Abromovic, Anthony McCall, Line Healthcare, Kate Spade, and The Living
