Jess Westbrook

SOCIAL RESEARCH &&& CRITICAL DESIGN MFA + PHD + T1D post-human cyborg, associate professor / Founder Queering Futures Research Studio (data-driven speculation), Founder Identity Research Lab (computational social science), Chair Joyful Complexity at Design Research Society 2024 / Chair Queer(ing) Design at Design Research Society 2024 / into inclusive data, intersectionality, complexity, paradox, imagination, timeTravel( )... Westbrook (they/them) holds feminist, Queer, and transdisciplinary worldviews while studying lived experiences, presence, and forces at play in social landscapes, educational environments, and learning scenarios. Westbrook uses art, design, and mixed methods to negotiate, translate, and organize the joys and struggles of complexity, information, and understanding. Pushing beyond the boundaries and constraints of sequential "project" mode and mindset Westbrook continues to expand their perspectives and ways of being and is currently deeply involved in immersive, reflexive, lived experiences that transcend all things defined, established, and normalized. #realRealities "My positionality describes my personal vulnerabilities and contexts – my disabled body, my Queer mind, my creative activity, all of which are deeply intertwined." - Westbrook 2022 "Transdisciplinarity is described as a '21st century research attitude' (Davis & Sumara, 2008, p.35), combining 'transgression with problem solving' (Bernstein, 2015, p.11), that enables researchers and practitioners access to wicked problems and complex phenomena (Guimarães, et al 2019)." Westbrook is currently an Associate Professor in the School of Design, College of Computing and Digital Media (CDM) at DePaul University (2016) where they have taught courses across the curriculum areas including UxD/HCI, Graphic Design, Games, and Digital Communication Media Arts. Their educational philosophy integrates creativity, critical technical practice, self-determined learning, and progress theory. Prior to joining DePaul’s School of Design, Westbrook was a tenured Associate Professor of Contemporary Practices and Art and Technology Studies at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago (SAIC), Chicago, IL (2010-2016) where they also served as the Director of Technology Initiatives developing curriculum, courses, and technology workshops, while managing over 30 instructors and graduate teaching assistants in the Wired program. While at SAIC Westbrook was invited to be part of the planning and teaching faculty for the “Data as Art” initiative in partnership with Northwestern University Engineering faculty and students. Westbrook's first TT academic appointment was at The University of Tennessee at Chattanooga (UTC) where they held a joint appointment as an Assistant Professor in both Graphic Design and Photography and Media Art. While at UTC Westbrook was a founding board member and the treasurer of the Chattanooga chapter of AIGA. They spent their earliest career phase in web development and interactive design coding sites for Verio/NTT DOCOMO from its Baltimore/DC metro area office. In the past Westbrook Co-founded and Co-Directed Channel TWo or CH2 (2010-2020), an award-winning Chicago-based studio. CH2 operated as a speculative corporation and produced information experiences and critical playware. CH2 navigated luck, levels, and systems through the contexts of landscape, interactivity, data, and augmented reality, using the concept and value of trespassing since its inception. CH2 projects were exhibited/screened in museums and galleries, nationally and internationally, and were also featured in Leonardo MIT Press Journals, Motherboard Vice, The Creators Project, Art Papers, The Intercept, and Media-N. CH2 work is included in permanent collections at the Rose Goldsen Archive of New Media Art at Cornell University, and The Kinsey Institute. CH2 apps have been distributed through The App Store and Google Play. Awards and commissions include a 2019 Media Archeology Lab (MAL) Residency at the University of Colorado, the 2017-18 AIGA DEC Research Grant for coding education, a 2015 National Science Foundation Subaward for creative computation research, the 2014 SPACES R+D Award for AR (augmented reality) work including Unattended Vaporware and PolyCopRiotNode, a 2013 Sony Digital Media Academy Award for 3D and VR (virtual reality) work, a 2012 Rhizome.org Commission through the New Museum to launch the ARRAY Project and listserv, a 2011 Turbulence Net Art Commission through New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc., and a 2009 Terminal Net Art Commission. Way back in the 20th century Westbrook studied photography, early forms of digital media, and internet/web technologies. In 1998 they received an MFA in Photography from Tyler School of Art and Architecture, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA. In graduate school they held an RA/TA position (digital prepress for offset printing and film recording), won a university project completion grant, and worked as a photographer for the Department of Radiology at Einstein Medical Center in Philadelphia creating medical case studies for physicians. In 1996 they received a BFA in Photography from the University of Central Florida, Orlando, FL where they worked as a photographer and darkroom technician for the UCF Office of Instructional Resources and a digital editor at the Kodak Digital Imaging Processing Lab in the UCF Research Park. Working underneath a hospital and working underneath a library were formative experiences. Westbrook grew up in Orlando, FL immersed in all things simulacra, simulation, and spectacle, also formative. select research presentations: ACM AIES, AERA, AIGA, CAA, Center for Cognition and Neuroethics Mind and Brain Conference, Creativity Research Conference at Southern Oregon, Commiserate Chicago MADD Center University of Chicago, Dark Side of Digital UWM Center for 21st Century Studies and Center for Information Policy Research, Design Research Society, DiGRA, DrupalCon, FATE, FemTechNet, GLI.TC/H, HASTAC, IEEE VIS, ISEA, ITI Think Tank, MACAA, Mobility Shifts at The New School, Mozilla Foundation, New Media Caucus, New Security Paradigms Workshop (NSPW), Northwestern University Ordinary Media Symposium, Processing Chicago, School of the Art Institute of Chicago Here and Now Series, SPE, University of Wisconsin Chazen Museum of Art, University of Chicago Alternate Realities and Virtual Worlds Series select art/design exhibitions/screenings/features: Activatar iOS augmented reality January feature 2018 on iTunes; Apexart, New York, NY; Arebyte, London, United Kingdom; The Banff Centre, Banff, Alberta, CA; Block Museum, Evanston, IL; BronxArtSpace, New York, NY; Butler Museum of American Art, Youngstown, OH; Carnegie Museum of Art, Pittsburgh, PA; Contemporary Art Museum (CAM), Raleigh, NC; Critical Coding Cookbook; Cyberfeminist Index, curated Mindy Seu; Design Gallery, San Francisco State University, San Francisco, CA; Digital Arts Entertainment Lab (DAEL) Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA; Disobedient Electronics: Protest, curated Garnet Hertz; Gallery 400, Chicago, IL; Gene Siskel Film Center, Chicago, IL; GLI.TC/H 20111 READER[R0R]; Hyde Park Art Center, Chicago, IL; Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC; Hunter Museum of American Art, Chattanooga, TN; Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA; Miller Gallery, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA; MOCAD, Detroit, MI; Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago, IL; SPACES, Cleveland, OH; TypeForce 8, Chicago, IL; Ukrainian Institute of Modern Art, Chicago, IL; The Wrong Biennale