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electrolobby | Virus in Fur
In contrast to an “exhibition space” that is intentionally set up in keeping with the tradition of a festival just as much as it emerges on its own within that event’s timeframe (and subordinates even its own connectivity to the point of view of the exemplary piece), the electrolobby establishes a—temporary—“living space.” As a spin-off of openX and enhanced to include, among other features, the Kitchen, it exemplifies the processes at the basis of projects whose essence is connectivity. For this type of implementation/realization that creates its own framework of action and presentation, the electrolobby is a proving ground and an open domain for artists and their audience. At the same time, for the Ars Electronica Festival, it is a space in which to experiment with a potentially new tradition of mediating the encounter with art.
Surrounded by workstations, the Kitchen is the centerpiece of this year’s electrolobby in the Brucknerhaus—and this both literally with respect to its physical location as well as in the figurative sense whereby, at most private social get-togethers, the kitchen, as the place where primary emphasis is placed on corporeal well-being, also ends up being the site where the most interesting conversations take place. The electrolobby-Kitchen provides the setting for informal exchange among participants about their work and issues raised at the festival symposia as well as for project presentations, coding, processing workshops, and much more.
And, for the first time this year, the electrolobby will also have a remote auxiliary venue in the form of the Code Arena in the Stadtwerkstadt. Four hour-long evening theme programs will feature a series of three-minute “short project presentations” and a moderated discussion followed by an audience vote.
If close scrutiny of the electrolobby project would tend to suggest that it has assumed its place at the festival more in evolutionary fashion than as an upshot of a predetermined concept, then this at least confirms the fact that the idea for the development of a “generative” format sketched out for openX in 1997 has achieved critical mass, and gives rise to the expectation of potential viral characteristics.
ELECTROLOBBY PARTICIPANTS
processing is a programming language, a graphical programming environment, an instructional user interface and, at the same time, a designer community. Workshops and demonstrations display the potential of Processing, which enables users—even those with no programming skills—to create dynamic screen designs with a high level of sophistication. Every piece of software developed thereby is made available at www.proce55ing.net to the community, which thus develops into an artistic, open source network.
Processing is an open project initiated by Casey Reas and Ben Fry. Participants onsite at the 2003 Ars Electronica electrolobby will be: Casey Reas (USA), Ben Fry (USA), Amit Pitaru (USA), Carlos Rocha (COL / USA), Hernado Barragan (COL / I), Golan Levin (USA), Lia (A), Marius Watz (FIN / D), Schoenerwissen (D), Juha Huuskonen (FIN)
www.proce55ing.netLeCielEstBleu The Paris-based collective named “LeCielEstBleu”—represented at the Ars Electronica Festival by two of its founding members, director Frédéric Durieu and Kristine Malden—will display its work consisting of algorithmic poetry, interactivity, and dynamically composed music from the LeCielEstBleu experimental, interactive website.
www.lecielestbleu.comThe demoscene “The demoscene” can be described as a digital underground art form. Worldwide, “the demoscene” consists of an estimated 15,000 active “sceners” who produce a large amount of coded art called “demos.” Every year, many demos are released as freeware on different computer platforms that show off the technological and artistic skills of their producers. For the sceners, the demoscene as a cultural phenomenon is a digital youth movement that copes with code, symbols, and digital communication as well as many different styles of artistic expression.
The winners and nominees of this year’s “scene.org awards” held at the “breakpoint digital underground arts festival 2003” will be put on public exhibit. Different projects and products from the demoscene will be presented and discussed.
”The demoscene” will be represented by individuals covering different aspects of the
scene:
Ekkehard “sTEELER“ Brüggemann (D): http://breakpoint.untergrund.net
Matti “Melwyn” Palosuo (SF): http://awards.scene.org
Markus “Droid” Pasula (SF): http://www.helsinki.fi/~mpasula/
Dierk “Chaos” Ohlerich (D): http://www.theproduct.dekuda.org kuda.org is a non-profit organization of Serbian artists, theorists, media activists and researchers in the field of ICT (information and communication technologies). It explores critical approaches to (mis)using ICT and emphasizes creative rethinking in enhancing network society. kuda.org is a content-providing platform for new cultural practices, media art production and social layout.
kuda.org will be represented by Kristian Lukic, Zoran Pantetic, and Branka Curcic. http://www.kuda.orgPure Data Connections In PureDataConnections, several PCs are interlinked by means of PureData in such a way that the result is a single machine that can broadcast multi-channel audio and video within a defined space and, while going about this operation, alter the machine code. In the initial machine configuration, data from the Internet become messages (UDO), messages become sounds (Automata), and sounds become images (Inak), whereby there is feedback into the space (ImpulseResponse).
PureDataConnections is another live experiment with a data space and codes for multimedia installations.
Artists: REMI = Michael Pinter (A) + Renate Oblak (A),
Algorithmics = Winfried Ritsch (A), Pi = Martin Pichlmaier (A)
http://algo.mur.at/pd/ars03
ARS ELECTRONICA ELECTROLOBBY KITCHEN PARTICIPANTS
Communication Grill Chang-Tei”
Kou Sueda & Koji Ishii “Communication Grill Chang-Tei” is an electric cooker for making Yakiniku (Japanese-style barbecue). Nowadays, we have the Internet and mobile phones, so we can communicate with people anytime, anywhere. But “connecting” people is full of surprises. This installation aims to make people think about the meaning of communication, and is a device for creating compelling and unexpected situations.
http://www.iik.jp/~cgc/contents/conceptEN.htmlCodePlay @Ume CodePlay@Ume brings together various code-oriented projects developed by students and faculty at the University of Maine (USA). These projects include: ALICE (an AI that monitors web health), The Pool (a virtual community for distributed creativity), Breakdown (a cultural-code-busting game prototype), and Internet2@UMe (a broad-band protocol for connecting university artists, researchers and faculty). These “open” projects approach code as tool, content, meme, and structure, and invite active participation by Ars visitors.
http://newmedia.umaine.edu/codeplay/DIVE The DIVE book/CD-ROM expands the world of digital abundance and edifies the legitimate free exchange of ideas, software, projects, and shared online resources. The publication presents documentation of the Kingdom of Piracy project; it provides an introduction into the world of free software, free networks, and collaborative online activities; further, it includes some free software including dynebolic, the bootable GNU / Linux platform for streaming media.
http://kop.fact.co.uk/DIVE/Roy Ascott (UK): Telematic Embrace Long before the emergence of e-mail and chat rooms, Roy Ascott had coined the term “telematic art” as well as begun investigating how computer networks function as artistic media and how this networked communication also changed the interrelationship among artists, art works and their audience. Roy Ascott presents his latest book entitled Telematic Embrace, a collection of illustrative essays written since the ‘60s that synthesize a wide range of cultural and artistic theories.
Roy Ascott: Telematic Embrace. Visionary Theories of Art, Technologies, and Consciousness, Edited and with an Essay by Edward A. Shranken, The University of California Press 2003MagNet MagNet is a network developed to support critical debate and resource sharing among independent print/web magazines in the field of electronic culture. Building on the strong editorial traditions of each partner, it is building infrastructure and knowledge exchange systems by which distribution, subscription, translation and editorial content can be improved within the network as a whole. Currently, MagNet is made up of nine magazines and five affiliated organizations, all of which are creatively engaged with the field of electronic culture. Through its publications, MagNet aims to help define this field as one of new and varied cultural forms, and to offer a potentially public space for the negotiation of cultural values.
By promoting the diversity of specific cultures and media content, MagNet seeks to simultaneously harness and critique current trends of globalization.
Slavo Krekovic (SK, 3⁄4 Review), Alessandro Ludovico (I, Neural), Georg
Schöllhammer (A, springerin) and Simon Worthington & Pauline van Mourik
Broekman (UK, mute) on MagNet.Eugene Thacker (USA): Biomedia University of Minnesota Press, “Electronic Mediations” series
Biomedia is a book about the future of the intersection of molecular biology and computer science. Adopting a media studies approach to biology, Biomedia is a critical analysis of research fields that explores the relationships between biologies and technologies, between genetic “codes” and computer “codes.” In doing so Biomedia looks beyond the familiar examples of cloning, genetic engineering and gene therapy, all of which are predicated on the centrality of DNA or genes. Instead, it looks to emerging fields in the intermediary zone between bioscience and computer science, a zone in which “life” is often understood as “information.”
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