Ryan Aasen

Hi, my name is Ryan Aasen. I'm an artist, photographer, researcher, and educator broadly interested in the intersecting politics and histories of media technology, privacy, and class structure. I was an MIT Transmedia Storytelling Initiative fellow, a Northern Lights.mn Art(ists) on the Verge fellow, and my work has been exhibited internationally. I have an MS in Art, Culture and Technology from MIT, and a BFA in Integrated Media from St. Cloud State University. My CV is here.

Let's talk:
ryan@ryanaasen.com
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Espejo Negro / Black Mirror is a an essay film and book about the industrialization of light from photography to solar panels.

and the common law in its eternal youth grows to meet the demands of society looks at the history of privacy in the United States, and its relationship to wealth, media technologies, and sexuality.

lonewolf is an ongoing nonlinear exploration and documentation of contemporary anxieties around ideas of surveillance, terrorism, and nationalism, and their relationship to the commons.

Privacy for the 99% (Surveillance for the Rest) is an ongoing manifesto on the function of privacy and its relationship to surveillance.

Butt Pirates is a semi-autobiographical essay about the effects of technology, geography, and class structure on sexual identites.

NSA is a multimedia installation mapping the intersecting politics of surveillance, national security, and sexuality.

Vigilant/What I Know is a video made from found photos of some of the people who helped build Facebook's facial recognition technology.

Homage to a Paper Degree was my undergraduate senior thesis project. A multi-media installation based around a series of performances, Homage to a Paper Degree explores the intersections of physical and digital spaces across distance, time, xenophobia, and truth.

Footprint uses consumer facial recognition technology in an attempt to find people and images deleted from social media.