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Launched: Prix Ars Electronica 2007
The 2007 Prix Ars Electronica is underway. March 7 is the deadline for submitting entries; to do so, log on to prixars.aec.at. The 21st installment of the world’s largest media arts competition features some important changes.
First off, a few very attractive numbers. The 2007 Prix Ars Electronica winners will be honored with six Golden Nica statuettes and a total of 122,500 euros in prize money donated by Telekom Austria and voestalpine. Other outstanding works will be singled out for recognition with 12 Awards of Distinction, up to 12 Honorary Mentions per category, [the next idea] Art and Technology Grant, and an award from Linz’s Ludwig Boltzmann Institute in the Media.Art.Research category. Juries made up of experts from around the world will convene April 19-22. The winners will be notified by the end of May.
Since 1987, the Prix Ars Electronica has been the most important and most successful international showcase of excellence for digital media at the interface of art, technology and society. Equally wide-ranging is the spectrum of participants—from world-renowned artists (Karlheinz Stockhausen, Lynn Hershman, Toshio Iwai / Ryuichi Sakamoto, Chris Cunningham / Aphex Twin) and Oscar winners (John Lasseter, Chris Landreth) to young people blazing new trails in creativity (Graffiti Research Lab).
The organizers are the Ars Electronica Center Linz and the ORF – Austrian Broadcasting Company’s Upper Austria Regional Studio. Cooperating partners are the Brucknerhaus Linz and the O.K. Center for Contemporary Art. The Prix Ars Electronica is supported by the City of Linz and the Province of Upper Austria. Lead sponsors are Telekom Austria and voestalpine; additional sponsors are KulturKontakt Austria, Pöstlingberg Schlössl, Casinos Austria, Sony DADC, Sony DEC, Linz AG and Spring Global Mail.
All essential information about the 21st edition of the Prix Ars Electronica, the individual categories and rules governing entries is available online at prixars.aec.at. Please address inquiries to info@prixars.aec.at.
The 2007 Prix Ars Electronica – Two New Categories
The 2007 Prix Ars Electronica is inviting entries in a total of eight categories—two more than last year. This reflects the ongoing diversification of digital media art, and also the fact that the Prix Ars Electronica has never stopped growing along with it. The most visible indications of this are the two new categories, Hybrid Art and Media.Art.Research, as well as the integration of Net Vision into the Digital Communities category.
Hybrid Art is for hybrid, transdisciplinary projects. The essential element is the blending and interweaving of different media and genres into new forms of artistic expression. For many artists, it’s become a matter of course to transgress boundaries: they conduct research, pursue an active commitment to social and political causes, or engage with pop culture, and it’s now time to formally acknowledge this development. Hybrid Art is designed to expand the scope of the Prix Ars Electronica categories of long standing and thus to create latitude for new and unexpected forms of creativity.
Media.Art.Research, in turn, focuses on scholarly work in art history and media studies. This year's theme is net-based artforms. The prizewinning work will be honored with an award from Linz’s Ludwig Boltzmann Institute.
The Ludwig Boltzmann Institute Media.Art.Research was established by the Ludwig Boltzmann Society in 2005. It will pursue its mission for seven years under the aegis of the Ars Electronica Center, the Linz University of Art and the Lentos Museum of Art.
On the basis of the extensive holding of the Ars Electronica Archive, the institute is doing scholarly work in the fields of media art and media theory.
The 2007 Prix Ars Electronica – The Categories in Detail
COMPUTER ANIMATION / FILM / VFX
A component of the Prix Ars Electronica since Day 1, this category provides a forum for independent artistic and scientific works as well as commercial high-end productions in the film, advertising and entertainment industries. Prime considerations are a work’s artistic originality and technical quality.
INTERACTIVE ART
From installations to performances to Internet projects—the scope of the Interactive Art category is enormous. Central importance is attributed to the artistic quality of the design and development of the interaction; moreover, judges are looking for a harmonious dialog between, on one hand, the content level and, on the other, the principles of interaction and the interfaces used to get that content across. Sociopolitical relevance also comes into play.
DIGITAL MUSICS
All sorts of digital sound productions can be submitted to the Digital Musics category. Regardless of the work’s genre or the medium utilized, primary attention is paid to its aesthetic quality, originality, conceptual standard, the innovativeness of its expression, as well as the form and quality of the presentation.
HYBRID ART
Efforts to cross borders between disciplines, remixes and mash-ups of different genres and forms of artistic expression characterize the essence of much work being done today in digital art. A transdisciplinary approach is inherent in such artworks and does much to explain their leading-edge appeal; at the same time, it make it nearly impossible to classify or categorize them, which is why Hybrid Art has now been set up as an extremely broadly-conceived Prix category in its own right.
DIGITAL COMMUNITIES
Access to information, overcoming spatial, social, linguistic and cultural barriers, participation in sociopolitical policymaking processes—all of these concerns are on Digital Communities’ agenda. The mission is to strengthen civil society and nurture a vibrant democracy. The Digital Communities category focuses attention on the artistic and political potential of digital networking.
u19 – freestyle computing
In 1998, Ars Electronica launched Austria's largest computer competition for young people. The range of potential entries encompasses anything designed or executed by computer: animated films, graphics, drawings, sounds, games, software or hardware applications, and websites.
[the next idea] Art and Technology Grant
Thinking tomorrow’s ideas today—that’s what [the next idea] Art and Technology Grant wants to motivate up-and-coming artists to do. The target group: 19- to 27-year-olds with a not-yet-realized concept at the thematic nexus of art and technology. The winner receives a 7,500-euro grant and an invitation to spend a semester as scientific assistant and artist-in-residence at the Ars Electronica Futurelab.
Media.Art.Research Award
For the first time in conjunction with this year’s Prix Ars Electronica, the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute will be honoring outstanding theoretical works on the subject of digital art. For one thing, this is meant to formally acknowledge the research currently being done in art history and media studies, but an equally important aim is to further the ongoing discourse about scholarly methods, hypotheses and standards. It is above all media art’s pluralism—its quality of resisting any once-and-for-all categorization—that necessitates an intensive scientific encounter with and analysis of it. This is precisely why the Media.Art.Research Award will continue in the future to support the scholarly process of coming to terms with forms of media art that have not yet gotten established in art museums and/or in the commercial art world. The 2007 theme is net-based artforms.
With queries, please contact:
Christopher Ruckerbauer
christopher.ruckerbauer@aec.at
Tel. ++43-732-7272-38
Contact for entrants:
Iris Mayr
info@prixars.aec.at
Tel. ++43-732-7272-74
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