When I first entered the Yale Center for Collaborative Arts and Media — CCAM — I didn’t know what to expect. The title alone was intriguing, begging me to come explore the creative world contained within its walls. Approaching the unassuming building located at 149 York St., I never could have anticipated what was on the inside. 

 

The ISOVIST Gallery, located just past the CCAM’s entrance, is a crisp, clean-cut room with white walls and paneled floors, which gives the artwork the spotlight, space to shine on its own and speak for itself. Various monitors and screens as well as displays entailing bright pops of color adorn the room — not what I pictured of a typical art gallery — which made me eager to learn more about the exhibition.  

 

After that initial sneak peek, I was warmly welcomed by the CCAM Interim Director Lauren Dubowski DRA ’14 ’23, who invited me into her office and began telling me all about the center as well as the various projects and initiatives taking place. 

 

“We think of CCAM as an arts-forward laboratory on campus,” she explained. “With our annual season of programming, our team brings together a community of artists, scientists, technologists, and more from Yale, New Haven and the larger world to collaborate and share their work in unique ways.” 

 

She put it perfectly: it was a laboratory. So many people from different backgrounds and areas of expertise were coming together to experiment with various art forms. A prime example is the “[HYPERTEXT] (HYPERLINK)” exhibition curated by Alvin Ashiatey ART ’22, a lecturer in graphic design at the School of Art — how appropriate that I got to hyperlink the name of the exhibition! For this show, Lauren “felt Alvin would be just the right person,” which is why she reached out to him to be the guest curator. 

 

Upon entering the gallery again, this time with Lauren, I felt as though I was entering a spa; serene music played lightly in the background, and my senses were equally confused and curious, working together to piece through this exhibition, this experience. 

 

Before making my way around the gallery to see all of the works, I had the chance to speak with Alvin and Saskia Globig ART ’25, one of the featured artists, about the exhibition and the entire process of getting it ready for presentation. 

 

“So honestly, when I was approached to do the exhibition, my immediate interest was around finding people that were interested in working with technology but with a totally different perspective,” Alvin told me. Posted on one of the gallery’s walls is a description of the installation, taking a deep dive into the overall theme and each of the individual pieces. The title was inspired by Octavia Butler’s notion of “primitive hypertext,” and “unfolds as an exhibition that dissolves linear narratives to embrace a multiplicity of connections.”

 

This was evident. Just taking a quick glance around the room, I saw various modes of technology, from video games to computer screens to cookware, yet it was unconventional, untraditional and nothing shy of creative. 

 

But Saskia’s piece really stood out to me. It’s a set of four monitors, three of which are staggered around each other, perched on a metallic table you’d expect to find at an old-school diner, while the other is located in the corner of the ceiling. In various spots around the table are five booklets containing bold-lettered words. At the time that I was there, the booklets displayed the words “are”, “you,” “find,” “still” and “it,” but the performers rotate them throughout the show. Titled “council motivation jogs,” Saskia’s piece is featured both as a live performance and recorded show. It incorporates cameras in and around CCAM, filming performers who hold the bold-lettered words. As Saskia described it, it’s like “musical chairs,” where the different performers pop up on the screens and “bump” each other off. The inspiration, Saskia says, came from commercials for ring cameras: “I found them really moving, actually, how much of somebody’s life could occur through that.” 

 

Saskia, a life-long dancer who now primarily specializes in graphic design artwork, decided to experiment with performance in this piece to incorporate that dancing component to this new form of artwork, allowing her to “bring physical connection into design.” 

 

I watched part of the pre-recorded show, relishing in her masterful incorporation and execution of performance, technology, and graphic design. However, I would be remiss if I did not mention the other brilliant works featured in the exhibition. Emily Velez Nelm’s ARC ’24 piece looks like a set of eyes, but upon further examination, I saw what appeared to be a nature-scape with a rising sun. Amy Fang’s ART ’26, “every hand” consists of two monitors, one displaying images and the other mini excerpts describing natural scenery. 

 

When I concluded my mini tour, I asked Alvin what he hoped guests would take away from his exhibition. “Somebody can come in and find their own ways through it, they can find connections, and be able to piece things together,” was his response. 

 

That was exactly the experience I had. The art pieces may have been “a constellation of disjointed works,” as Alvin puts it, but I was able to find my own meaning and connection in them. Amidst all of the technology, I noticed that nature was a common thread stringing all of these pieces together. This tension between digitization and natural scenery guided and informed most of my experience, but it will most likely differ for every guest who walks through the gallery. Alvin, along with the artists, give us the opportunity to derive our own meaning and connections within and between the pieces, explore the show through our own perspectives and find our own way through it. 

ANNA PAPAKIRK