w/ Carbon 12

w/ Blythe Projects, Los Angeles

w/ Carbon 12, Dubai

Carbon 12 booth

w/ Blythe Projects, Los Angeles

James Clar is a media artist whose work is a fusion of technology, popular culture, and visual information. His work explores the limitations of various communication mediums and its effect on the individual and society. Focusing on the visual arts, his work often controls and manipulates light - the common intersection of all visual mediums.

Clar studied film as an undergraduate at New York University focusing on 3D Animation, then continued on to his Masters at NYU's Interactive Telecommunications Program. It was here that he moved away from screen-based work and started working directly with light, creating sculptural lighting pieces. By developing his own systems with which to manipulate light, he discovered he could create unique visual displays, as well as circumvent the limitations of screen-based work, namely resolution and two-dimensionality.

While his early work dealt with analyzing how technology and media work, a move to the Middle East in 2007 has seen his focus shift to how technology and media affect. As an American living in Dubai, his art work has progressed towards deeper conceptual themes. These include nationalism, globalism, and popular culture in the age of mass information, and often analyzes the discrepancy in information between Western media and Middle Eastern media along with its effects on people.

2011

THE STATE: SOCIAL / ANTISOCIAL?, Traffic and The Third Line, Dubai

"WESTEND?", Museum on Seam, Jerusalem

Louis Vitton Gallery, Hong Kong

ART FUTURES, ART HK 11

Athr Gallery, Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

Art Dubai 2011, Dubai

I Don’t Need Your Money Honey All I Need is Love, Traffic, Dubai

2010

Art Asia, Miami

THE STATE, Traffic, Dubai

Armed, Abu Dhabi Art 2010, Abu Dhabi

"What goes around, comes around", Galerie Caprice Horn Berlin, Germany

SCOPE BASEL, Basel, Switzerland

'Acceleration', Art Dubai 2010, Dubai Spring

2009

"The Singular Suit", Somerset House, London Fall

"For Your Eyes Only", traffic, Dubai Spring

"My Name is Robot", Jam Jar, Dubai Spring

2008

Galerie Roger Tator, Festival of Light, Lyon Winter

"Cliche in a Box", traffic, Dubai

CHANEL Mobile Art, Tokyo Spring

2007

National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation, Tokyo Fall

Tiger Translate, New York March

Lab [AU], Brussels Jan