Luc Courchesne


Luc Courchesne is a Canadian artist and academic known for his work in interactive art.

Life

Luc Courchesne was born May 20, 1952 in Saint-Léonard-d'Aston, Quebec. He received a bachelor's degree in design from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design in 1974. In the 1980s, he received a Master of Science degree in visual studies from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Courschene was a member of the MIT Media Lab at its inception in 1985.
Courschene was a professor of industrial design at the Université de Montréal.

Work

Courschene is known for his interactive video installations and environments. In his early works such as Family Portrait and Portrait One, the viewer interacts with the a human image programmed to engage in a lifelike conversation with the viewer. His later work Landscape One surrounds the viewer with a 360 degree immersive and interactive video projection of a park.
On September 11, 2001, while he was on assignment in New York City for the "Québec–NewYork" cultural event, Mr. Courchesne happened to be videotaping the smoldering North Tower of the World Trade Center as the second plane hit the South Tower. The 23-minute video of his experience on that fateful day is available on CBC/Radio-Canada archives .

Collections

Courchesne's work is included in the permanent collection of the National Gallery of Canada.

Awards

In 1997, his installation Paysage no. 1 won the Grand Prize of the first biennale of the NTT InterCommunication Center in Tokyo. In 1999 Courschene received an honorary mention in the category of "Interactive Art" of the Prix Ars Electronica in Linz.