Phil Morton

A visual performance using an image processor and digital keyboard at the Electronic Visualization Event II at the University of Illinois.

The Second Electronic Visualization Event took place at The University of Illinois Chicago Circle Campus in 1976. This documentation features Bob Snyder on EMU Synthesizer, Phil Morton on the Sandin Image Processor by Dan Sandin and Guenther Tetz on the GRASS (GRaphics Symbiosis System) by Tom DeFanti. In Morton's words these artists perform live realtime audio and video synthesis "using both analog and digital computers as 'visual instruments'..." Other artists credited with participation in the Electronic Visualization Events between 1975 and 1978 include Drew Browning, Larry Cuba, Barbara Latham, John Manning, Faramarz Rahbar, Ed Rankus, Michael Sterling, Barbara Sykes and Jane Veeder.

Electronic visual synthesis performance.

Video Synthesizer performance at the Electronic Visualization Event II at the University of Illinois.

A joint effort by numerous video artists of the time, starring dancer Rylin Harris.

Phil Morton's General Motors was created in 1976. Then based in Chicago, the late Phil Morton created this project as a playful and critical video response in conversation with a local General Motors dealership from whom he had purchased a van. Segments 'Colorful Colorado' and 'RYRAL' begin after the video-complaints cease. Produced at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (where Morton founded the Video Area), this work includes Dan Sandin and Tom DeFanti who collaboratively developed the early Video Art scene in Chicago.

A visual performance using an image processor and digital keyboard at the Electronic Visualization Event II at the University of Illinois.

The Second Electronic Visualization Event took place at The University of Illinois Chicago Circle Campus in 1976. This documentation features Bob Snyder on EMU Synthesizer, Phil Morton on the Sandin Image Processor by Dan Sandin and Guenther Tetz on the GRASS (GRaphics Symbiosis System) by Tom DeFanti. In Morton's words these artists perform live realtime audio and video synthesis "using both analog and digital computers as 'visual instruments'..." Other artists credited with participation in the Electronic Visualization Events between 1975 and 1978 include Drew Browning, Larry Cuba, Barbara Latham, John Manning, Faramarz Rahbar, Ed Rankus, Michael Sterling, Barbara Sykes and Jane Veeder.

Electronic visual synthesis performance.

Video Synthesizer performance at the Electronic Visualization Event II at the University of Illinois.

A joint effort by numerous video artists of the time, starring dancer Rylin Harris.

Phil Morton's General Motors was created in 1976. Then based in Chicago, the late Phil Morton created this project as a playful and critical video response in conversation with a local General Motors dealership from whom he had purchased a van. Segments 'Colorful Colorado' and 'RYRAL' begin after the video-complaints cease. Produced at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (where Morton founded the Video Area), this work includes Dan Sandin and Tom DeFanti who collaboratively developed the early Video Art scene in Chicago.

Between 1976 and 1982, Jane Veeder traveled the western mountains of the United States with Phil Morton. On these road trips the two would shoot video of their surroundings using a portable video recorder. Some of these video recordings of the western mountain terrain were used to produce the televised video piece known as Program #7. Program #7 was produced as a part of a larger group of videos known as The Electronic Visualization Center: A Television Research Satellite to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago. Program #7 was televised on Chicago Public Television as a part of a program which ran work by independent video creators. Program #7 was created using a Sandin Image Processor and a Bally Home Computer. Graphics generated using a Bally Home Computer would be overlaid overtop of the video recorded by Veeder and Morton using the Sandin Image Processor. The Sandin Image Processor would also be used to add varying patterns to the image.

phil morton + dan sandin

A quiet mediation on the sea (and what might lie beneath the surface?) from the late 70s.

“Program #9” by Jane Veeder and Phil Morton is a collaborative Video Art work from 1979. “Program #9” is from a series of videos produced by Morton and Veeder under the name “the Electronic Visualization Center a television research satellite to the School of the Art Institute of Chicago”. Veeder and Morton traveled the continental United States in a mobile Media Art lab built into a customized General Motors van engaging in “Videotape presentations, live Video and Computer Graphics performances, workshops, and/or any useful format of collaboration."

This is a example of early video art using the color capability of the Sandin Analogue Image Processor - the "Color IP".

Short experimental animation from a trio of talented knob-twiddlers.

Short experimental film by Phil Morton and Guenther Tetz.

13 minute video art piece by Phil Morton.

A short, psychedelic film by Phil Morton.

Short video art piece.

A short experimental film by Phil Morton.

(1972-1974)

Experimental video art by Phil Morton.

Phil Morton’s “SAIC Memo” video art work from 1981 features Timothy Leary, Jane Veeder and Jamie Fenton. The Sandin Image Processor, a patch-programmable analog computer optimized for realtime audio video processing and synthesis developed from 1971 - 1973, and The Bally Arcade Video Game System, a programable home video game console developed in 1974, are used to compute and process the material of this playful, critical and self-reflexive psychedelic cybernetic communication system.