SCV and HiPArt
The Scientific Computing and Visualization group has been collaborating with artists for over 25 years. Approximately eleven years ago, we received funding through the National Computational Science Alliance with which we could form the High Performance Computing in the Arts (HiPArt) project and design and build some infrastructure (a.k.a. DAFFIE) for supporting the creation of distributed virtual environments. Since then we have collaborated with a variety of artists primarily creating immersive virtual environments using SCV’s DAFFIE for the Display Wall and previously the ImmersaDesk. Extensions of these environments have included hooking up several distributed nodes with DAFFIE (ArtWorld, 1998), integrating physical kinetic sculptures to interact with the virtual environment (Spirited Ruins, 1999), and interacting from the Access Grid by drawing or navigating in the virtual environment (Tracer, 2001; Soft, Fluffy, and Virtual, 2001). We have shown HiPArt works at venues across the country as well as overseas.
Of note: the first two art installations on the Access Grid were during the Boston Cyberarts Festival in April 2001; Tracer by Deborah and Richard Cornell and Soft, Fluffy, and Virtual by Cindy Ludlam.
HiPArt is an outreach program coordinated by the Scientific Computing and Visualization group at Boston University fostering a collaboration between software developers and artists and making high performance computing, networking, and graphics resources available to the art community. HiPArt is supported by the Scientific Computing and Visualization group within the Information Services & Technology at Boston University.