LRLX Bay Area Arts Map
SEASON 7, September 2020
Over the past six years, the Living Room Light Exchange has playfully explored a geography of art-enabling communities. Each third Tuesday of the month, LRLX has gathered in a new home, a new location, a different physical place to talk about digital space. From South San Francisco to Richmond, West Oakland to East Oakland, and many places in between LRLX has mapped a community of Bay Area critical and creative supporters. This is not inconsequential! As the landscape of independent art spaces in the Bay Area—and the exploratory perspectives that sustain them—continue to be dispersed across the region’s zip codes or suffocated out, finding new ways to build shared critical and playful dialogue is as prudent as ever. Through an open call, we have commissioned artist Judit Navratil to design a map representing the locations of each light exchange over the past six years.
This map can be experienced in virtual reality both far out and in detail, and in a Mozilla Hubs room.
Artist Statement
My practice is deeply rooted in mapping and topophilia. I use abstract maps to create a subjective language to record, share and connect memories. Given the honor to conceive the map of the locations of LRLX, I wove together fragments of the events and publications on a grounding grid of the Bay Area in virtual reality. This ambiguous realm allows us to experience the various layers of the history of this significant organization, and potentially to bridge some of our social distances. While we shift into this new reality, the essence of physical gatherings and embracing our local communities are more important than ever. I truly appreciate all the collective efforts to rewire and maintain our connections.