throwntogetherness presented screenings in Philadelphia, PA and Portland, OR, co-organized by local new media collectives Mobile Projection Unit (Sarah Turner and Fernanda D’Agostino, joined by Ariella Tai and Jaleesa Johnston, Portland) and Lino Kino (Michael Ipsen, Emilie P. Slater, Boothe Carlson, Erin Gordon, & Saskia Globig), in dialogue with curator and artist Jaleesa Johnston and writer, curator, and art historian, Laurel V. McLaughlin.

During the pandemic, the collectives speculated upon commonalities in new media practices from Philadelphia and Portland—the DIY spirit, emphasis on ritual (whether formal, spiritual, or everyday), and new media experimentality—and proposed a bicoastal collaboration. The screenings exhibit works that emerged prior to and during the experience of the 2020 global COVID-19 pandemic.

Despite new media’s mobile nature, practitioners create works from, of, and with sites, registering the affect of a place just as much as its geographical expanse. In turn, the works disclose relational negotiations of space-time, or what feminist geographer Doreen Massey qualifies as “throwntogetherness,” or complex “negotiations of space-time.” From various space-times, the participating artists negotiate the physical, temporal, and psychic valences of place-being and place-making—translating their speculations through the lenses of new media.

throwntogetherness is supported by a 2021 Sachs Program for Arts Innovation Project Grant and the Ford Family Foundation.