Jill Taffet
Jill Taffet's innovative artworks seamlessly merge traditional artistic techniques with cutting-edge technologies, offering immersive experiences that delve into the complexities of human perception, particularly the perception of vision, and the creation of visual continuity and motion. Through a combination of still images and dynamic elements, Taffet keenly involves the viewer as an active participant in her art. Inspired by science and the natural world her augmented reality, video projection and animated objects feature fluid transformations of biomorphic forms, inviting viewers on a journey of wonder and discovery.
b. 1956, New York, NY, Lives and works in Siesta Key, FL
Jill Taffet earned her BFA at the Cooper Union for the Advancement of Art & Science in New York, studying under the mentorship of renowned artist and experimental animator Robert Breer.
Following graduation, Taffet embarked on a successful career as a motion artist in both New York and Los Angeles, where she garnered awards for her groundbreaking animation and new media projects for television networks. Transitioning her focus in the mid-2000s, she redirected her attention to her personal artistic endeavors and teaching. In 2013, she pursued further education, obtaining an MFA degree in New Genres from the San Francisco Art Institute, studying under the guidance of esteemed media artist Lynn Hershman Leeson.
Since then, Taffet has been deeply involved in creating immersive and time-based artworks, showcasing her creations both nationally and internationally. Currently, she serves as faculty at the Ringling College of Art & Design.
“Jill Taffet is a time-based artist who draws inspiration from science and the natural world.Taffet’s augmented reality, motion paintings, and animated gifs demonstrate her unique visual lexicon. Hand-drawn biomorphic forms shift, transform, appear, and re-appear, thus creating a sense of wonderment for the viewer. Universal Common Ancestors, a recent work, incorporates a found arched window frame. In place of glass panes, Taffet’s animations fill the space. Her Technicolor palette is reminiscent of stained glass and encourages the viewer to engage with the work as an interactive and contemplative object.”
-Joanna Robotham, Curator of Modern & Contemporary Art, Tampa Museum of Contemporary Art, Exhibition Catalog, Skyway 20/21
"Jill Taffet's moving projections also invoke a mood somewhere between a scientific mapping of the cosmos and the intimate quirky spaces of the inner mind. Her abstract digital projection Cosmic Ancestry uses light and sound to invoke the ever changing and dynamic aspect of the cosmos reframed into a spatial installation. The personal and phenomenological nature of her work seems to suggest the ways in which forces of nature are ultimately experienced as intimate and subjective encounters by each individual."
-Tobias Wofford, Assistant Professor Art History, Santa Clara College, CA. Exhibition Catalog, Interrupting Entropy: Selections From The Betlach Collection