NY-Times - A Convention Briefing From the Department of Art

August 15, 2004

A Convention Briefing From the Department of Art
By EDWARD M. GOMEZ

S the carefully staged spectacle of the Republican National Convention rolls
into Madison Square Garden, the U.S. Department of Art & Technology will
present a media-focused, high-tech spectacle of its own uptown. The
multimedia installation, which opens for three weeks on Saturday at Luxe
Gallery (24 West 57th Street), is an ambitious undertaking for the
department, the stated goal of which is to promote the appreciation of the
role of the artist in society and advocates free expression for all
Americans.

Though it has an official look and name, the Department of Art & Technology
doesn't actually exist, of course. The imaginary entity is the creation of
Randall Packer, 51, a conceptual and new-media artist who runs a multimedia
arts program at American University in Washington. Since 2001, he has worked
with other artists to give tangible form to the decidedly fake agency's
policies and programs.

The department, which can be found on the Web at www.usdat.us, "blurs the
line between reality and fiction," he said. More recently Mr. Packer
established a mock political organization called the Experimental Party,
which "takes off the bureaucratic mask" to reveal the true intention of his
artistic initiatives, "which is to subvert the Republicans' propaganda by
countering it with our own techniques of media manipulation and illusion."

At Luxe, Mr. Packer will set up the "2004 Experimental Party National
(Un)Convention & (Dis)Information Center." Resembling some kind of
mission-control room, with floor-to-ceiling projections and surround sound,
the installation will offer viewers a "totally immersive experience," Mr.
Packer said. Tapping into his background in theater and performance art, he
has given the center a dramatic design.

Visitors will enter a darkened exhibition space in which video monitors will
display public-service announcements for the U.S.D.A.T., and wall
projections will show Mr. Packer, dressed as a Beltway bureaucrat, against
backdrops like the Lincoln and Jefferson Memorials, declaiming his agency's
"visionary aspirations."

Many works are Internet-based diversions which