Draft:Joshua Thorson

Joshua Thorson is a New York based artist and video projections designer.

Early career
Thorson graduated from the University of Minnesota with a BA in Cultural Studies and Film Studies and received an MFA in Film/Video from the Milton Avery Graduate School of the Arts at Bard College in 2006. While at Bard, his video World Contact premiered at the Museum of Modern Art for their 2005 Premieres programming. In 2006, his video Rock and a Hard Place premiered at Rotterdam International Film Festival. His 2008 video, UFO Days, premiered at the Museum of Modern Art's Doc Fortnight. In 2009 his MIX NYC curatorial project Perspectacle screened at the New Museum.

Video Projections
Since 2008, he has created original video projections for theater. His collaborators include director Daniel Fish and performance artist Kyle deCamp. Urban Renewal, his 2010-2013 project with deCamp, premiered at Crossing the Line Festival in New York and the Fondation D'entreprise Hermès New Settings Festival in Paris in 2013. In 2015, he created the projections for Daniel Fish's production of Rodgers and Hammerstein's Oklahoma! at Bard Summerscape. In 2018, St. Ann's Warehouse mounted an off-Broadway production and the show moved to Broadway in 2019 for a run at Circle in the Square. Thorson received an Obie Award Special Citation along with the rest of the creative team for the St. Ann's production and he was nominated for a Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Projections for his work on Broadway. In 2022, the show moved to the Young Vic in London for an off-West End production. In 2023, the final iteration of Fish's Oklahoma! had its West End run at Wyndham's Theatre. Thorson received a What's On Stage Award for Best Video Design for his work on the London productions.

In addition to his work in theater, Thorson co-edited Merce Cunningham Dance Company films with Charles Atlas, notably on Ocean in 2010.

Teaching
In 2013, he completed a Ph.D. in Electronic Art at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY. He is currently an Associate Professor of Fine Art Photo in the School of Photographic Arts and Sciences at Rochester Institute of Technology.