John Craig Freeman is an artist with over three decades of experience using emerging technologies to invent new forms of large-scale public work at sites where the forces of globalization are impacting the lives of individuals in local communities. With his work, Freeman expands the notion of ‘public’ by exploring how digital technology and mobile networks are transforming our sense of place.
Freeman was a founding member of the international artists collective Manifest.AR, pioneering augmented reality art since 2010. He has produced work and exhibited around the world including in London, Mexico City, Calgary, Havana, Kaliningrad, Warsaw, Zurich, Belfast, Venice, Istanbul, Copenhagen, Milano, Sydney, Singapore, Liverpool, Coimbra, Basel, Paris, and across America as well as Beijing, Xi’an, Singapore, and Hong Kong.
Freeman received a BA from the University of California, San Diego in 1986 and an MFA from the University of Colorado, Boulder in 1990. After serving five years as an Assistant Professor at the University of Florida, followed by three years as an Associate Professor at UMass Lowell, Freeman joined the faculty of Emerson College in Boston in 2002 as an Associate Professor of Art and Technology. He was tenured in 2007 and promoted to the rank of Professor in 2013.
While at OpenDocLab, Freeman is working on Climate Change Migration Stories, a project using new forms of augmented-reality storytelling techniques to transport viewers to the U.S./Mexico border.