Jason Salavon (born 1970, Indianapolis, IN) is a new media artist noted for his use of custom computer software to manipulate and reconfigure preexisting media and data to create new visual works of art. Most recently, Salavon has explored the use of artificial intelligence and machine learning to create new works of art from existing datasets of visual images. This advance continues his multi-decade use of data and algorithms in the creation of visual art. Throughout his career, his work has unearthed unseen pattern, habit, and structure within our culture and daily life.
received a BA in art and computer science from the University of Texas at Austin (1993) and an MFA from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (1997). Working at the intersection of art, information technology, and daily life, Salavon assembles data-sets from mass-culture sources and, using self-authored software, reimagines them as visually arresting prints, videos, and new media installations.
Salavon has exhibited his work internationally for the last twenty years, including recent solo exhibitions at Mark Moore Gallery, Los Angeles, CA (2016); the Haggerty Museum of Art, Milwaukee, WI (2016); TAI Modern, Santa Fe, NM (2016); and the Public Trust, Dallas, TX (2016). In collaboration with Microsoft Research, where he was a Visiting Artist in 2014, he exhibited at the Seattle Art Museum, Seattle, WA (2015). His digital cave (2010), a special commission for the exhibition "Echoes of the Past: The Buddhist Cave Temples of Xiangtangshan", traveled to museums in San Diego, CA; Washington, D.C.; Dallas, TX; and Chicago, IL (2010-12).
His work is included in the public collections of The Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY; the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York, NY; the National Portrait Gallery, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C.; the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA; and the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.
Salavon lives and works in Chicago, IL, where he is Associate Professor in the Department of Visual Arts and the Computation Institute at the University of Chicago, IL.