When Cybernetics Meet Aesthetics is the title of a conference that will bring the revaluation of cybernetics to bear as a potentially decisive contribution to the dialog focused on the necessary redefinition of the status of media art. Can the ever-more-blatant contrasts between the “two cultures” attain convergence in artistic work with media? Can the modern-day “art of complexity” of simulating social networks, natural systems of rules, and the dynamics of feedback effects at work in the economy be understood as cybernetic processes? Which current prospects are opened up by reviewing the theory and practice of the cybernetic art of the 1950s and ‘60s?

10.30 - 13.00
Claus Pias (DE/AT)
Stefan Rieger (DE)
Cornelius Borck (DE/CA)

14.30- 18.00
Barbara Büscher (DE)
Margit Rosen (DE)
Edward A. Shanken (US)
Jasia Reichardt (UK)

Moderation: Dieter Daniels (AT/DE)

Organizer: Ludwig Boltzmann Institute Media.Art.Research. in cooperation with the University of Vienna’s Department of Philosophy
Concept: Prof. Dieter Daniels in cooperation with Prof. Claus Pias (University of Vienna)

Award-winning artists will discuss their work at the Prix Forums.

The Make-it-Simple-workshops will highlight this year’s e-lobby kitchen. Concepts and results that emerge from the workshops will be presented and thrashed out.
Special thanks to Ö1

The urban domain is being infrastructurally upgraded into a multimedia environment as digitization makes its physical mark on the cityscape itself.

Pixelspaces is the series of symposia staged annually by the Ars Electronica Futurelab. They take up the latest trends and scrutinize them from the perspective of a media laboratory. At this year’s installment entitled Goblin City, participants will present projects and approaches at the nexus of media, art and public space.

The trend towards simplicity is reflected not only in information technology and design; it’s also manifested by an ever-more-fervent longing for tranquility amidst the commotion all around us and a conception of the simple life that all too often becomes a cliché-ridden pastoral idyll. Back to nature, the new spirituality, and buzzwords like cocooning and neo-Biedermeier are examples of people’s efforts to demarcate realms for a retreat inwards.

Agenda:

Update on the Inter-Society for the Electronic Arts (ISEA)
Nina Czegledy, chair, ISEA Board

Update on ISEA2006: August, 2006, San Jose, California, USA
Introducing the ISEA2008 hosts

At which venues of artistic production does art enter into a dialog with media, science and technology? What can these locations tell us about the unique aspects of working in media art? How are they connected to various scientific, academic, military, economic and other contexts? What is the source of the legitimacy ascribed nowadays to the existence of a separate discourse and special institutions dedicated to media art? What are the specific features of these places, and where might their future lie?

The media world’s complexity as well as the density of its information offerings have increased exponentially due to the emergence of new network media like weblogs and wikis. Simultaneously, “old” analog technologies like community radio & TV are themselves undergoing a renaissance as instruments that explicitly perform public service functions and thus produce “public value.” These developments have put pressure on public broadcasting systems to justify their status as recipients of financing from mandatory subscriber fees.

A simple life. Mankind’s constant search for simplicity is unavoidably connected with the boredom that rears its ugly head as soon as this wish is fulfilled and complexity once again begins flaunting its charms. This dialectic of simplicity and complexity has harried human beings in all areas of life. Thus, in order to even be able to deal with the world of the computer, we have to just accept a degree of complexity that we are unable to definitively grasp.
A stellar lineup of speakers will elaborate on the many different aspects of simplicity—and complexity no doubt as well. How do we live? How will we be living? What do we fear? What do we yearn for? Together, we’ll organize, reduce and synthesize a catalog of knowledge upon this podium of trust, and hope that, as a result, everyone taking part will be able to make his/her own choice of a path to simplicity or complexity.
This fall, John Maeda will be publishing a book that deals with “The Laws of Simplicity.” For two years in Maeda’s simplicity blog (http://weblogs.media. mit.edu/SIMPLICITY), the contents of this publication have been at the focal point of a public discussion that will now flow into the Simplicity Symposium, whereby one area of particular emphasis will no doubt be the issue of appropriate design strategies to allow simplicity and complexity to converge.

SIMPLICITY is a complex issue to which there is no single, simple answer. We live in an increasingly complex technological world in which nothing functions the way it actually should and which, at the end of the day, fills us all with longing for a certain simplicity. Nevertheless, isn’t it ironic that when we’re faced with the choice between more or less, we’re practically genetically programmed to want more. “Do you prefer the bigger cookie or the smaller one?” or “Would you rather have the computer with 10 processors or with just one?” The answer is really simple, isn’t it?
At SIMPLICITY, Ars Electronica’s theme symposium, we want to jointly reflect about the meaning of simplicity (and thus of complexity too) in politics, life, art and technology. Expect more than you’ve ever imagined, and even less.

Upgrade! was founded in 1999 in New York by Yael Kanarek as a regular get-together of artists and curators working in the field of New Media. It has since developed into an international network that is held together by a shared interest in art and technology, and by members’ efforts to bridge gaps between cultures. Upgrade! attaches great importance to localization and reflects state-of-the-art creative developments via cutting-edge technology.