Video History Project

People

Jon Satrom

i discovered video while living in bismarck, nd, a conservative community of around 60,000. my friend and i stumbled upon the local community access station located in the basement of the public library. it immediately became the center of my universe.

i wanted to know how everything worked. i wasn't drawn to the shooting, writing or directing. i was, and am still, more interested in things like signal, noise, glitches, and sound, things that are intrinsic to the medium of video.

i moved to chicago and witnessed the 'digital video revolution' while attending the school of the art institute of chicago. the language of video had changed from my warm magnetic tape scuttling through decks to little bits shuffling through buffers. i quickly became dissatisfied with the one sided video editing programs and began to look under the hood. i realized that i could do more interesting things by integrating code writing within my work; artware utilizes a language that is intrinsic to computers. i am currently making artware along with net.art works.

i am also programming microchips and hacking electronic toys in an effort to find and exploit the languages inherent to the hardware. https://selectall.org

Cite this record

"Jon Satrom." Video History Project, Experimental Television Center, 2011. https://www.videohistoryproject.org/jon-satrom.

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Summary

Jon Satrom discovered video while living in Bismarck, ND, a conservative community of around 60,000; he and a friend found the local community access station in the basement of the public library and he became deeply involved. He moved to Chicago and, while attending the School of the Art Institute of Chicago, witnessed the 'digital video revolution' as video shifted from magnetic tape to digital buffers and grew dissatisfied with one-sided editing programs, prompting him to integrate code writing into his art. He makes artware and net.art, programs microchips and hacks electronic toys to explore hardware languages; website: http://selectall.org

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Last modified 18 June 2011

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