John Sturgeon
Professor, Emeritus
Cinematic Arts
sturgeon@umbc.edu
John Sturgeon is a digital media artist-poet, practicing in video, installation, performance, and interactive forms, with interests in tele-performative and streaming media collaborations. His major awards include a 1981, John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship for research in video art, and a 1988-89, Fulbright Scholar Abroad Award for Argentina & Uruguay, where he produced and lectured on video art. In addition, he received three National Endowment for the Arts, Individual Artists Fellowship Grants in video.
Sturgeon has exhibited and performed extensively both nationally and internationally, including solo commissions for the Museum of Modern Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art, a retrospective at ICA-Boston, International Symposium on Electronic Arts-Chicago, Ars Electronica, Austria, and the Biennale of Sydney. Notable video screenings include the Whitney Biennial and broadcasts on PBS. His artwork is represented in the collections of major museums worldwide.
Since the early 1970s, Sturgeon has consistently utilized emerging forms of electronic media to articulate a quest for a spiritual persona. His work explores the role of electronic media in the process of self-creation/discovery and community formation, while creating a unique space for the contemplation of these issues. Collaborations, performances, and installations often feature socio-political and/or environmental content.
Professor Sturgeon has been instrumental in designing and administrating innovative programs for electronic media, including Carnegie Mellon University, and co-founding the graduate program in Integrated Electronic Arts at Rensselaer (iEAR at R.P.I., NY). He has also served as Chair of Visual Arts at UMBC.
Professor Sturgeon holds a B.F.A. from University of Illinois and an M.F.A. from Cornell University.