The final panel, TOPIA, is specifically about the world in 25 years. It will present scenarios around a wide variety of topics relating to art, technology, and society. It is intended to be detailed, inventive, and audacious.

15:00 - 15:10 Introduction

15:10 – 15:30 Nadja Maurer (D)
studies Cultural Studies at the University of Hamburg, with special emphasis on cultural anthropology, media psychology and law. Her interests are transcultural phenomena, media structures of communication.

15:30 – 15:50 Gerhard Dirmoser (A)
Systems analyst specializing in geographical information systems. Studies in network form on cybernetic aesthetics, structuralism, art in context, design gestures, mapping issues etc. Study on the 25-year history of Ars Electronica.

15:50 – 16:10 Joan Shigekawa (USA)
Associate Director for Creativity & Culture at the Rockefeller Foundation. Founding director of the Arts Program at the Nathan Cummings Foundation in NY. Arts advisor for a broad range of projects in the visual, performing and media arts.

16:10 – 16:40 Break

16:40 – 17:00 Derrick de Kerckhove (CDN)
Director of the McLuhan Program in Culture & Technology, Professor in the Department of French at the University of Toronto. Part of the Media Watch research team and the CRTC Public Hearing Committee.

17:00 – 17.20 Stewart Brand (USA)
Participated in Doug Engelbart’s famous demonstration of “Augmented Human Intellect” in 1969. Editor and publisher of the Whole Earth Catalog. Co-founder of The Long Now Foundation to build a 10,000-year Clock and co-founder of the All Species Inventory to document all of life on earth in 25 years.

17:20 – 18:00 Discussion

Moderator: Nadja Maurer (D)

back