Ant Farm: Pneu Tools

College dropouts, technical malfunctions, and hippie inclinations fueled the operations of the Bay Area collective Ant Farm (1968-1978).

In the present time, we require media literacy when reading the news, scrolling social media, and, still, watching TV. Ant Farm foresaw this need, and found that the experimental adoption and transmission of intimidating technologies was itself a counter-cultural act and radical form of curriculum.

Ultimately taking shape as a year-long road trip, Truckstop Network (1970/1971) connected counter-cultural nomads of the 1970s through new media, performance, and printed matter. Transforming their Chevy C10 into the Media Van (1970), Ant Farm founders Chip Lord, Curtis Schreier, and Doug Michels brought developing technologies to college students across the United States as part of their “Truckin’ University” lecture tour. With help from Ant Farm members, Doug Hurr and Hudson Marquez, they expanded the media network with Sony Portapak cameras, capturing footage that counteracted mainstream, broadcast television. On each campus, their lectures turned into overnight performances, as the group deployed their ICE-9 (1971) inflatable habitat, slept in the structure, and served group meals from their trailer. Recording each part, they collectively constructed a video archive geared toward circulation. 

Exhibiting video documentation, ephemera, and archival correspondence, Ant Farm: Pneu Tools creates a visual narrative of the collective’s preparation and execution of Truckstop Network. This exhibition centers the college tour as emblematic of the collective’s collapse of practical teaching methods with artistic intervention, a prescient recognition and response to the necessity of media literacy in an era of rapid technological development.

SELECTED ARTWORKS IN THE EXHIBITION