{"id":1153,"date":"2019-08-15T21:27:36","date_gmt":"2019-08-15T21:27:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sites.bxmc.poly.edu\/~moeezosaleem\/IDMTest\/?p=1153"},"modified":"2025-11-12T17:28:33","modified_gmt":"2025-11-12T22:28:33","slug":"kathleen-mcdermott","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/idm.engineering.nyu.edu\/index.php\/kathleen-mcdermott\/","title":{"rendered":"Kathleen McDermott"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As an artist, Kathleen McDermott has created numerous absurdist wearable and robotic interfaces which she documents through video and performance and exhibits internationally. Completed projects have included a dress that produces a cloud of fog when the wearer is feeling stressed, and a mass of robots designed to take her houseplants into the sun. Her practice includes material experimentation using processes such as mold making, 3-D printing and laser cutting conductive materials, to expand the possibilities of soft interface design. Conceptually, she is interested in how concepts of identity, telepresence and care, informed by intersectional feminism, fashion, and media theory, can impact a broader dialogue about how technology will relate to our bodies in the future.<\/p>\n<p>McDermott is currently collaborating with a team of researchers across NYU and University of Colorado, to develop and test custom wearable hardware and curricular content for use in creative education contexts such as dance and theater, with the goal of broadening participation in STEM fields, particularly among underrepresented communities<\/p>\n<p><!-- Kathleen McDermott is an interdisciplinary artist and designer with a background in installation, prop-making and sculpture, currently based in Brooklyn, NY. She combines her knowledge of fabrication with open source hardware to build a language of absurdity that merges new media, design, performance, and video. She is interested in technologies that are not productive, robots badly suited to absurd purposes and electronic creations beyond her control. She received her BFA from Cornell University and her MFA in Creative Media from City University of Hong Kong. She is currently a Ph.D. candidate in Electronic Arts at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, and an Industry Assistant Professor at NYU Tandon. Her work has been featured in a range of major publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Huffington Post, Fast Company, and Dezeen, and has been exhibited internationally. In addition to her artistic practice, she is an advocate for accessible technology education, actively seeking opportunities to give workshops, and sharing tutorials for working with DIY electronics online at <a href=\"https:\/\/urbanarmor.org\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">https:\/\/urbanarmor.org\/<\/a>.--><\/p>\n<p><kbd>TOOLS + MEDIUMS OF PRODUCTION<\/kbd><br \/><small>Film\/Video, Wearables, Physical Computing, Digital Fabrication\/ Prototyping, Media Art, Performance, Solar and Renewable Energy, Product Design<\/small><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"col-sm\">\n<p><kbd>METHODS + APPROACHES<\/kbd><br \/><small>Digital Storytelling, Participatory Design, Speculative Design, Critical Design<\/p>\n<p><\/small><\/p>\n<p><kbd>TOPICS + THEMES<\/kbd><br \/><small>Media Studies, Gender Theory, Human Computer Interaction, Education, Cybernetic Theory, Posthumanism<\/small><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<div class=\"col-sm\">\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.kthartic.com\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Website<\/a><br \/>\n<a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/kit_the_robot\/\">Instagram<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As an artist, Kathleen McDermott has created numerous absurdist wearable and robotic interfaces which she documents through video and performance and exhibits internationally. Completed projects have included a dress that produces a cloud of fog when the wearer is feeling stressed, and a mass of robots designed to take her houseplants into the sun. Her [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":1622,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_eb_attr":"","_crdt_document":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[9,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1153","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-faculty","category-people"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/idm.engineering.nyu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1153","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/idm.engineering.nyu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/idm.engineering.nyu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idm.engineering.nyu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idm.engineering.nyu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1153"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/idm.engineering.nyu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1153\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1922,"href":"https:\/\/idm.engineering.nyu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1153\/revisions\/1922"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idm.engineering.nyu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1622"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/idm.engineering.nyu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1153"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idm.engineering.nyu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1153"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/idm.engineering.nyu.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1153"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}