FAX invites a multigenerational group of artists, as well as architects, designers, scientists and filmmakers, to conceive of the fax machine as a tool for thinking and drawing. Although the technology for transmitting printed images and texts over distance dates from the nineteenth century—a machine by Scottish mechanic Alexander Bain patented in 1843—it was the introduction of the modern fax through commercially available machines in the 1970s that turned facsimiles into a ubiquitous communications medium for international business.

Faxes sent to the initial showing of FAX at The Drawing Center, NY (April 17 - July 23, 2009, Opening: Thursday, April 16, 6-8 pm) will form the core of the exhibition, and will include seminal examples of early telecommunications art.

Here, reproducible yet erratic production via the fax machine displaces traditional notions of the hand‚ still commonly associated with the medium of drawing, and foreground the role of drawing as a generative process.

The exhibition is curated by João Ribas, curator of The Drawing Center, New York, and is accompanied by an illustrated catalogue co-published by iCI and The Drawing Center.

depiction on the left: Matt Sheridan Smith, Untitled (contrast test), 2008

Partial list of artists

Julieta Aranda
John Armleder
Tauba Auerbach
Fia Backström
Pierre Bismuth
Barbara Bloom
Mel Bochner
Tobias Buche
Ian Burns
Etienne Chambaud
Peter Coffin
Jan De Cock
Liz Deschenes
Helen Evans &
Heiko Hansen
Morgan Fischer
Aurélien Froment
Ryan Gander
Liam Gillick
Marissa Gonzalez
Joseph Grigely
Wade Guyton
Charline von Heyl
Eduardo Kac
Germaine Kruip
Glenn Ligon
Corey McCorkle
Josephine Meckseper
Simon Dybbroe Möller
Olivier Mosset
Warren Neidich
Olivier Mosset
Serge Onnen
Michalis Pichler
William Pope L.
Kay Rosen
Amanda Ross-Ho
Pamela Rosenkranz
Matt Sheridan Smith
Alexander Singh
Dexter Sinister
Josh Smith
Edward Tufte
Christopher Williams
Johannes Wohnseifer