ACADEMIA

SWITCH, a new art for public television project being syndicated throughout Massachusetts and other states, easily finds programming on channels serving over 70,000 households and generated over 22,000 impressions on its recent web announcement. The irony is, SWITCH is produced in Holyoke, a city with a newly elected visionary Mayor, Alex Morse, but without a dedicated public access television channel.

In a 7 minute documentary about the Holyoke TV Artists on SWITCH, produced by Artist Organized Art, the show’s producer, Denis Luzuriaga, tells us about having a hit public TV show that also tells the world about Holyoke:

“Holyoke doesn’t have a public access channel so it would be great if we could show SWITCH in Holyoke, where it was created. Holyoke is the most exciting city for collaboration in projects. Artists, business people and politicians all attend. Holyoke will house computers, powered by hydro-electricity, among the most powerful in the world. It’s also great for location shooting. We want artists from other parts of the world to come get involved in Holyoke. Local public access television is the way to start. ‘Think-globally-act-locally,’ very much applies to SWITCH.”

The City of Holyoke is home to a growing cultural community becoming a source of employment and income in the region. It is bound by a diverse area, encompassing college towns, former industrial cities, suburbs and rural communities. As a knowledge corridor, it is linked by the Connecticut River, and Interstates I90 & I91. Planned intercity rail service will increase ridership 231% by 2015, creating 1000’s of jobs.

Near Boston, Hartford, New York City and Bradley International Airport, Holyoke is a hub for a rich exchange of culture, innovation, and highly educated talent. Its creative economy produces and distributes cultural goods, services, and intellectual property. This provides access to a broad, diverse, cultural workforce via freelancers and small business.

Now, through a visionary mashup of the arts, high performance computing and high speed rail, as new Mayor Alex Morse promised at his inauguration, Holyoke is to be reborn as a digital city. Creative Director of SWITCH, Jessica Higgins imagines how intercity culture would relate to intermedia art on SWITCH and Holyoke's missing public access channel:

“With SWITCH, putting artists in everyone’s living room can happen. Viewers need only to switch on the television and they’re in. I would love to see intermedia and Nam June Paik’s vision of having art in everyday life.. being able to turn on the television and see a short performance piece refresh people’s everyday life in a way that’s special and mysterious and experimental.”

New England’s first 90,300-square-foot Massachusetts Green High Performance Computing Center (MGHPCC) is under construction in The City of Holyoke. Massachusetts has designated Holyoke as a Growth District. SWITCH has released its 9th episode to thousands of public television viewers. Let’s hope for its homecoming broadcast on public access TV in the new digital city, Holyoke Massachusetts.