Francesca da Rimini

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Francesca da Rimini was born in London in the year of the monkey, and works wherever her projects lead her, most recently basing herself in London, New York, Rome and her home town, Adelaide, Australia. She started writing in 1981; made her first Super 8 film in 1983; co-ordinated an art and technology pilot project (which evolved into the Australian Network for Art and Technology) in 1985; co-produced a documentary Bitter Surrender in 1989; worked in the computer industry in the 90s, and co-founded the seminal cyberfeminist art group VNS Matrix in 1991. Since 1995 she has focussed on her creative practice, leaving the world of paid employment. Immersing herself in the internet via various collaborations, she investigates the artistic potential of email dialogues, virtual communities and web narratives. Through a cross-fertilisation of these communication forms, she has created many personae, netspaces and texts, including, GashGirl and doll yoko.

da Rimini's contributions to the prolific VNS Matrix ('we are the virus of the new world disorder'; ‘Suck my code, baby!’), manifested through the group's multifarious projects including billboards, posters, cinema advertising, gallery installations, soundworks, texts, CD ROM artworks and computer game prototype. Artworks include A Cyberfeminist Manifesto for the 21st Century, All New Gen, Corpus Fantastica MOO, Spiral Space, Virtual Theme Parks and Bad Code. VNS exhibited and/or performed at key events in the international art and technology field including TISEA (Sydney 92), SIGGRAPH (Chicago 92), FISEA (Minneapolis 93), ISEA (Helsinki 94), YYZ (Toronto 95), Ars Electronica (Linz 96), and CyberCultures (Sydney 97). Works have been acquired by the Richard L Sandor collection (USA), Museum of Contemporary Art, Helsinki, and Griffith Artworks (AUS). As demystifying, critiquing and skilling in technology was a core element of their cyberfeminist project, the group gave numerous public presentations and educational workshops during the group’s nine year life.

In 1996 da Rimini collaborated with Josephine Starrs on White, a multi-lingual video exploration of madness. White has been exhibited at the Australian Centre for Photography, screened at numerous international festivals, webcasted by the New York based artist internet server The Thing, and acquired by Griffith Artworks, Queensland, Australia.

da Rimini occasionally works with the Australian Network for Art and Technology (ANAT), being its founding Executive Officer in 1988. In 1995/96 she curated VIROGENESIS, a cultural exchange involving multimedia artist Graham Harwood (UK), activist writer/publishers Matthew Fuller (UK) and Gomma (Italy), and sound artist/DJ Scanner (UK). She was a tutor at ANAT’s 1998 National Summer School, and Senior Tutor at the On-line On-track Summer School for Indigenous Artists.

Publications
Interviews
  • Matthew Fuller, "Interview: Francesca da Rimini", 2000. [1]
See also
Links