Dave Colangelo is an artist, educator, and researcher based in Toronto, Canada. He is a founding member of Public Visualization Studio (external link) . His work focuses on urban media environments as sites for critical and creative engagements with the city, public art, and information.
He is currently Associate Professor of Digital Creation and Communication in the School of Professional Communication at Toronto Metropolitan University (TMU) and Director, North America, of the Media Architecture Institute. He is also Co-Director of TMU Lights. Previously, he has held positions as Assistant Professor of Digital Media and Culture at Portland State University in the School of Film, Adjunct Professor at the Ontario College of Art and Design University in the Digital Futures MA/MDes/MFA program, and Professor and Academic Coordinator of the Bachelor of Digital Experience Design program in the School of Design at George Brown College.
His writing has appeared in the Journal of Visual Culture, Space and Culture, Leonardo, Public Art Dialogue, and the Journal of Curatorial Studies and in edited collections on Museum and Gallery Design and the History of Film Studies. He is the author of The Building as Screen: A History, Theory, and Practice of Massive Media (external link) (Amsterdam University Press, 2020).
His creative work (external link) has been exhibited at The Bentway in Toronto, and at Open Signal and the Portland Winter Light Festival in Portland, Oregon. Writings and presentations on these works have appeared at the Media Architecture Summit 2015 in Beijing, the 2013-14 Biennale of Architecture and Urbanism in Shenzhen/Hong Kong, the International Symposium for Electronic Art (ISEA) 2013 in Sydney, and ISEA 2011 in Istanbul.
Colangelo holds an MA in Cultural Studies and Interactive Media from Goldsmiths College, University of London and a PhD from the York-TMU Graduate Programme in Communication and Culture in Toronto.
Research Interests
I investigate the critical and creative potential of large-scale public projections, urban screens, and media architecture and the technical and social networks connected to them. I consider the role that these elements can play within practices of monumentality, public art, digital placemaking, and “smart cities” to address equity, diversity, and inclusion. I primarily use research-creation to create interdisciplinary opportunities for critical study, community engagement, experiential learning, city building, and collaborative creative practice.
Publications:
Fredericks, J., Caldwell, G.A., Tomitsch, M., Haeusler, M.H., Colangelo, D., et al. (2023). Media Architecture Compendium Vol. 2: Concepts, Methods, Practice. Stuttgart: Avedition.
Colangelo, D., P. Davila, I. Men. (2023). “Receipts and Receipts NB: Critical Experiments in Mediated Testimony.” Interactive Film & Media Journal 3 (1, Winter 2023): 82:89.
Colangelo D., and Z. Melzer. (2022). “On Emptiness: Spacing in Media Architecture.” In The Routledge Companion to Media and the City, edited by Brenden Kredell, Erica Stein, and Germaine Halegoua. Routledge: 154-166.
Colangelo D., and Z. Melzer. (2021). On the foundations of empty spaces: Distancing in media architecture. Kredell B., Stein E., and G. Halegoua eds. The Routledge Companion to Media and the City.
Colangelo, D. (2020). The building as screen: A history, theory, and practice of massive media. Amsterdam University Press.
Colangelo, D. (2019). We Live Here: Media Architecture as Critical Spatial Practice. Space and Culture, Journal Article, 120633121984380.
Colangelo, D. (2018). Hitchcock, Film Studies, And New Media: The Impact Of Technology On The Analysis Of Film. In S. Hidalgo & A. Gaudreault (Eds.), Technology and Film Scholarship (Vol. 1–Book, Section, pp. 127–148). Amsterdam University Press.
Colangelo, D. (2018). Cities as exhibition spaces: Illuminated infrastructure in the smart city. In S. MacLeod, T. Austin, J. Hale, & O. H. Hing-Kay (Eds.), The Future of Museum and Gallery Design (1st ed., Vol. 1–Book, Section, pp. 59–70). Routledge.
Dávila, P., Colangelo, D., Chan, M., & Tu, R. (2017). Expressive Cartography, Boundary Objects and the Aesthetics of Public Visualization. Leonardo (Oxford), 50(5), 509–510.
Colangelo, D. (2017). Book Review: Ingrid Hoelzl and Rémi Marie, Softimage: Towards a New Theory of the Digital Image. Journal of Visual Culture, 16(1), 118–121.