Joseph Nechvatal (°1951, USA) makes computer-robotic
assisted paintings that allow the tradition of canvas painting to collide with
our present digital and technology-based culture. In this sense they create an
interface between the virtual and actual - what Nechvatal calls the
"viractual". His current viractual work stems from a computer virus
program developed by the artist in 1991. Working with electronic visual
information and computer-robotics since 1986, Nechvatal's featured paintings
translate intimate body images into basic pictorial units which the computer
virus mutates and transforms. Nechvatal's innovative work fuses drawing,
digital-photography, written language, and externalized computer code. The
results of this extensive process are acrylic paintings which engage the viewer
in what Johana Drucker has described as a form of "critical
pleasure".