12:00: Celebrating 10 years of Explore Rochester
1:00: Visual Studies Workshop enters a new era
It has been 15 years since Instagram was released to the world, and its effects on modern culture are undeniable — from photography and retail to politics and the Age of the Influencer. In 2014, local creatives Steve Carter and Justin Dusett founded Explore Rochester, an Instagram-based project that would grow in ways they say they never imagined. Almost every week for the last decade, the account has featured more than 500 contributors who submit a series of photos and accompanying captions showing Rochester through their eyes. It’s all culminating in a curated exhibit, “Explore Rochester @ 10: A Decade of People and Places,” which runs at Rochester Contemporary Art Center through May 10. CITY Magazine editor Leah Stacy sits down with the founders (and a few of their weekly contributors) to reflect on the “lore” of Explore Rochester — and what’s next. Our guests:
- Steve Carter, co-founder of Explore Rochester and head of marketing for CineStill Film
- Justin Dusett, co-founder of Explore Rochester and creative director for Neon Wave
- Olivia Prinzi, founder of Kinda Secret and contributor for Explore Rochester Year 2, Week 2
- Mike McGinnis, senior customer success manager at Slate and contributor for Explore Rochester Year 11, Week 10
Then in our second hour, for nearly 50 years, Visual Studies Workshop (VSW) has been a fixture of the Neighborhood of the Arts. But this month, the media arts organization begins a new chapter in a new location. VSW reopens at 36 King Street, in Rochester’s Susan B. Anthony neighborhood, with a new exhibition called SEQUENCEBREAK//. It captures the contemporary spirit of the nonprofit, which began as an indie school run by artists and has recently taken to spotlight the rise of video games as experimental media art. Staff from VSW join guest host and CITY Magazine arts reporter Patrick Hosken to discuss VSW’s storied history and what to expect from its next era. Our guests:
- Nilson Carroll, assistant curator and preservation specialist at Visual Studies Workshop and curator for SEQUENCEBREAK//
- Hernease Davis, assistant curator and residency coordinator at Visual Studies Workshop
- Jessica Johnston, executive director at Visual Studies Workshop
- Tara Merenda Nelson, curator at Visual Studies Workshop and managing editor of VSW Press
*Note: "Connections" is livestreamed each day on the WXXI News YouTube channel. Watch here.
