On Monday, RPI announced Johannes Goebel, esteemed curator and prominent composer of electronic music, as the new artistic director of the Experimental Media and Performing Arts Center.
Goebel’s impressive resume mirrors exactly what we’re looking for in an artistic director,” explained President Jackson.
Goebel is the founding director of Germany’s Institute of Music and Acoustics, which is recognized as a forum for the international exchange, combining art with research in science, art, politics, and finance.
Tasked to develop a vision for EMPAC, Goebel intends to initially complete some personal goals. The first goal is to get to know RPI, its culture, and its existing curricular and extracurricular activities. He then hopes to explore the surrounding capital region as a whole, as well as to attend festivities and celebrations that occur annually at the area colleges.
In designing a plan for EMPAC, Goebel intends to go in “concentric circles” by exploring New York, Boston, and Montreal. Goebel also spoke of an artist and scientist resident program, to be housed in EMPAC, which will invite students to RPI to complete their theses. Goebel hopes that the program will create an extension from RPI into the art world, bringing new energy onto campus. When residents leave and show their completed works produced at RPI, a new focus will be brought to the arts department as well as to the Institute as a whole.
Goebel believes RPI will soon be known as an institute of interdisciplinary learning and technology.
Goebel intends to challenge students in order to “not give you more of the same, but more of the other.” He stressed that students must be eager to learn something different and must be open to questions that may not have answers.
Goebel is very confident in his ability to develop a great program and to “open up the heads of everyone involved in RPI.”
