His long collaboration with optics scientist John Forkner began with a mirror, light and sound installation for the Art and Technology exhibition at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art in 1971.
Whitman was one of the co-founders of Experiments in Art and Technology along with engineers Billy Klüver and Fred Waldhauer and artist Robert Rauschenberg - a project to provide contemporary artists with access to new technology as it developed in research institutions and laboratories.