Govy

Govy (born 12 April 1981 as Angélique Adrianna Govy) is a French artist diagnosed on the autism spectrum in 2013, and is an advocate for the neurodiversity movement. Their career began after their interactive art piece Photographic Diary in 2000 to 2001. Govy's work, including under the work names "Kennedy James" and "Jimmy Owenns", has been exhibited internationally at the Zendai MoMA of Shanghai, Triennale Design Museum of Milan, Wiels Contemporary Art Center of Brussels,Casoria Contemporary Art Museum of Naples, Rosario Museum of Contemporary Art of Santa Fe (Argentina) and Nuit Blanche of Paris. They are the recipient of three A' Design awards and two Videoformes awards.

Early work

Neurodiversity paradigm
Philosophy Bodily autonomy Disability rights movement Independent living movement Self-advocacy
Organizations Aspies For Freedom Autism Network International Autistic Self Advocacy Network National Autistic Society
Events Autism Acceptance Day & Month Autism History Month Autistic Pride Day Autscape Disability Day of Mourning Weird Pride Day
Issues Ableism Anti-autism All in a Row Applied behavior analysis Augmentative and alternative communication Autism-friendly Autism Speaks Communication Shutdown Community integration Controversies in autism Deinstitutionalisation Disability-selective abortion Double empathy problem Ethical challenges to autism treatment Eugenics Facilitated communication Filicide Inclusion in education Inclusion as a right Judge Rotenberg Educational Center Ole Ivar Lovaas Social model of disability Societal and cultural aspects of autism Universal Design for Learning
People Alex Plank Ari Ne'eman Damian Milton Daniel Lightwing Devon Price Donna Williams govy Jim Sinclair John Elder Robison Judy Singer Julia Bascom Lydia Brown Mel Baggs Michelle Dawson Morénike Giwa Onaiwu Morton Ann Gernsbacher Roy Richard Grinker Shain Neumeier Stephen Shore Steve Silberman Temple Grandin William Davenport
Films Citizen Autistic Loving Lampposts Neurotypical
Criticism Pro-cure perspective National Council on Severe Autism Matthew Belmonte Manuel Casanova Jill Escher Michael Fitzpatrick Bruce Hall Thomas A. McKean David Miedzianik Jonathan Mitchell Jonathan Shestack Alison Singer
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Before debuting their visual work with photography, govy performed in a few theater, video pieces, and films, but then decided to focus on writing. In 1999, they published the first book on the internet that actually looked like a real book, which would be published in 2001 under the title Mes Cendres Nues by French publisher IDLivre. Their early writing is also part of the French poetry anthology Les Nouveaux Poètes Français et Francophones, published by Edition Huguet in 2004.

Visual art

Govy is best known for their interactive art piece Photographic Diary (2000–2001) in which they took series of photographs every day during a year and the series of Shibari installationsSerial Bondage (2006–2013) which incorporates their fascination with Japanese rituals and aesthetics.

In 2000, they started the interactive piece where they photographed their daily life during one year without interruption. This early piece launched their career as a visual artist as it was one of the first interactive pieces on the Internet at the time and created before the fashion of photographic diaries via blogs would start spreading worldwide in 2004. It could be considered an art piece very much about growing up on the Autism spectrum and struggling with a personal quest of identity or it could be seen as a work on the notions about the splitting of the perception, narration or psyche, and the search for identity. This work has received two awards and has been exhibited internationally in art galleries and museums and was featured in the book Taschen’s 1000 Favorite Websites.

Since 2015, govy has been focusing more on science and space art projects. They are mostly working on the concept of spacetime (or the 4th dimension) and a "specific individual human life in the bigger picture of the universe" with the "SpaceTime Coordinates" projects, which use data from NASA JPL to generate personalised art pieces.

Govy is the recipient of three A' Design awards and two Videoformes awards. Their work has been exhibited internationally at the Zendai MoMA of Shanghai, Triennale Design Museum of Milan, Wiels Contemporary Art Center of Brussels,Casoria Contemporary Art Museum of Naples, Rosario Museum of Contemporary Art of Santa Fe (Argentina) and Nuit Blanche of Paris. Their first design piece, the "Yozakura sake set" (designed under Their workname Kennedy James) was available at the MoMA design store in NYC and Tokyo.

Pseudonyms

From 2001 until 2008, they used the artist name "Jimmy Owenns" with the tagline "Artist Without a Sexual Identity". In 2008, they adopted their second artist name "Kennedy James" and moved to New York City with an artist visa. Since 2015, they has used the name "govy", their French family name.

Muse

In 2011, a photograph of their face was used to launch the storytelling website Cowbird, with the first story published "1000 Words" written by Scott Thrift.

The City and Horses pop band wrote the song "My Strange Ways" about their relationship in 2013.

External links

• dontstareatthesun.com Official Website
• govy.fr Archived 2016-11-03 at the Wayback Machine