Source: Emiko Ogawa

The Opening Event of the 2009 Ars Electronica Festival

Thu3.9.

beginning at 10 AM on Hauptplatz

beginning at 7 PM on the Maindeck of the Ars Electronica Center

Since June 17, 2009, Linz’s Main Square has served as the Base Camp of “80+1 A JOURNEY AROUND THE WORLD,” a project sponsored jointly by Ars Electronica, voestalpine and Linz09. Ars Electronica 2009—“Human Nature”—and 80+1 will encounter one another for the first time on September 3, 2009 at the opening of this year’s 30th anniversary festival in what promises to be a very fortuitous convergence!

As soon as the sun dips below the horizon, the illumination of the cityscape will get switched down a notch or two in line with the watchwords “Lights Out. Starlight.” In cooperation with the ORF – Austrian Broadcasting Company’s Upper Austria Regional Studio, we’re calling upon Linzers to turn off the lights in their homes from 10 PM to 12 Midnight, and come and do some stargazing on Hauptplatz. Amateur astronomers will make their telescopes and their knowledge of the heavens available to visitors.
A great lineup of music and performances will kick off at 7 PM on the Maindeck of the Ars Electronica Center.

Program:

Beginning at 10 AM Hauptplatz
Bring us a star bearing your own personal wish for the future!
An essential element of the “80+1 A JOURNEY AROUND THE WORLD” project is peering into the future. In conjunction with “Starry Starry Night,” we’ll be collecting your fondest hopes and desires on a “wish tree” at www.80plus1.org and sending them out into the world.

Beginning at 10 AM Hauptplatz
Exhibition of the Rolling Stars and Planets

10 AM-3 PM Hauptplatz
Austrian Space Forum (ÖWF) Workshops for Young People
ÖWF experts will show you how to build model rockets that can then be launched from the banks of the Danube.

10 AM-6 PM Hauptplatz
Astronaut Trainer from the Children & Youth Service

10 AM-6 PM Hauptplatz
ÖWF Workshops for Young People
Take a test drive in the Dignity Rover, a vehicle used in the space program. Youngsters can try on space suits and experience what it’s like to be an astronaut.

10 AM-6 PM Hauptplatz
COSMOS – An Advanced Scientific Repository for Science Teaching and Learning
Would you like to find out more about the COSMOS website www.cosmos-project.eu? Then pay a visit to the project’s information stand, where staffers will be on hand to answer your questions one-on-one.

12 Noon-6 PM 80+1 Base Camp
Global Window Live
Get linked up LIVE to the whole wide world! Plus: incredible films, links and info about astronomy, space exploration, stars and the cosmos.

3-4 PM Hauptplatz
Trip through the Solar System
Join the ÖWF’s Gernot Grömer on a journey through our solar system and then come along on an Austro-Mars expedition.

4-5 PM Hauptplatz
LIVE remote hookup to Franz Kerschbaum of the University of Vienna’s Department of Astronomy
Franz Kerschbaum provides insights into, among other subjects, the history of astronomy, the birth and death of stars, and the future of our Sun in conversation with ÖWF’s Dietmar Hager and Gernot Grömer.

5-5:45 PM Hauptplatz
LIVE remote hookup to the ESO
We establish contact with the ESO’s Yuri Beletsky.

6:30-7 PM Hauptplatz
Light Pollution
Astronomy expert Dietmar Hager provides interesting information and insights about light pollution and astrophotography.

7-8 PM Hauptplatz
Future Talk alfresco
on the subject of exploration with Franz Viehböck, Austria’s first astronaut, geneticist Josef Penninger and American mathematician John L. Casti; moderated by AEC artistic director Gerfried Stocker

7-9 PM Kirche Urfahr
Klanghimmel and Speeds of Time

8-9 PM Maindeck
Futuristic Sound-Performance – Felix Kubin
The artist Felix Kubin works against the gravitation: Electroacoustic Pop – Noise and rhythm.

8-9 PM Hauptplatz
Stellar Music: Nordwest featuring Louis Nostitz, Ali Andress and Flo Muigg
World premiere of Thomas Nordwest’s “Sternenmusik” featuring Louis Nostitz, Ali Andress and Flo Muigg.

9 -10 PM Hauptplatz
Sternenstunde: Astrology with Gerda Rogers
What does the zodiac portend for Linzers’ future?

10-11 PM Maindeck
InterSidera – TeZ
World premiere of “InterSidera,” a sound performance composed especially for this event by media artist TeZ.

10 PM-12 Midnight Hauptplatz
“Lights Out – Starlight” / A Battery of Telescopes for Stargazing
A one-of-a-kind experience awaits stargazers—amateur astronomers will make available their telescopes and also provide expert explanations of the constellations and the cosmos. Special highlight: the new telescope of the Petrinum parochial high school’s observatory.

10 PM-12 Midnight Hauptplatz
Performance of Rolling Stars & Planets
The Ladies First Ladies modern dance group from BiondekBühne Baden and the SlowForward performance group present “Breath of the Universe” and “The Birth of the World,” thereby conjuring up the stars and constellations on the Nibelungen Bridge.

10 PM-12 Midnight Hauptplatz
Stellar Myths
Stirring accounts of the fairytale creatures that populate the night sky, the heroic sagas of Andromeda, Perseus & Co. and the mythical beasts of the heavens.

12 Midnight Stadtwerkstatt, Café Strom
Ars Electronica Nightline
Numorai live, Sonic Death Monkey, DJ Malvin Elektronik

www.80plus1.org

Important Traffic & Public Transportation Information
9 PM to 1 AM: Hauptplatz closed to all traffic

80+1, Ars Electronica, voesalpine, Linz09, ORF OÖ, LinzAG , Österreichisches Weltraum Forum (ÖWF), Linzer Astronomische Gemeinschaft (LAG), Stadt Linz.

Special thanks to voestalpine, Linz09, ORF OÖ, LinzAG, Magistrat der Stadt Linz, Österreichisches Weltraum Forum (ÖWF), Linzer Astronomische Gemeinschaft (LAG), Bischöfliches Gymnasium Petrinum, Teleskop-Sternwartenzentrum Linz, Stargazer-Observatory, Teleskop-Service Ransburg GmbH, Dietmar Hager, Lajos Santos, Gerda Rogers, Franz Viehböck, Elisabeth Ledersberger-Lehoczky, „Ladies First Ladies” Modern-Dance-Gruppe von der BiondekBühne Baden und „SlowForward” Performace-Gruppe, Wiener Arbeitsgemeinschaft für Astronomie, Astrofreunde Oberes Mühlviertel, sowie allen Teilnehmer beim Teleskopwald, Cosmos – An Advanced Scientific Repository for Science Teaching and Learning, Österreichische Versuchsender Verband (ÖVSV), Kinder- und Jugendservice der Stadt Linz, Werner Prödl, City Ring, Wirtschaftskammer Linz, Jindrak, Stadtgärten Linz, Anrainer und Gewerbetreibenden des Hauptplatzes.

All the target-group-specific offerings that make up this year’s program designed to mediate visitors encounters with festival content having to do with the “Human Nature” theme focus on a concept invented by Paul Crutzen: the Anthropocene Age, a time in which we human beings exert ever-greater influence on our planet, assume what is tantamount to control over it, and thus have more and more influence on society and our natural environment. Achievements in genetic engineering and biotechnology emerge from the depths of the laboratory and are changing our everyday life as well as the entire spectrum of forms of artistic expression. Many questions remain open and some problems still haven’t been cleared up, but cloning and experimentation goes on, boldly and unabated. Plus, to mark the 30th anniversary of the Ars Electronica Festival, we’ll also be taking a few retrospective looks at comparable projects, ideas, exhibitions and personalities of the past. And doing so while we continue to peer far into the future. The key issue: What will this new human-engendered nature look like and what undreamt-of possibilities and niches exist for us human beings within it?

See all events of we guide you 2009

Sat 5.9.

3:00 PM Hauptplatz – Die Prophezeiung

9:00 PM Donaupark Linz – Die Arche

Fabulous creatures traverse the city and transform it into a biotope full of wonders—all of them betokening impending catastrophe and rescue.
Linz is being flooded in 2009. The Klangwolke (Cloud of Sound) follows the river all the way back to humankind’s most ancient narratives. Watery deluges, floods of information, waves of human beings. During the hours leading up to the climax, the sights and sounds of warning are unmistakable. Would it behoove Linz, the city astride the Danube, to cleanse itself? Serious and absurd prophesies collide head on. Over the course of the day, wondrous creatures stream through the cityscape; animals and mythical beings pull the public in their wake. At nightfall, the scenery in front of the Brucknerhaus will be the site of a drama at the nexus of demise and salvation.

Konzeption, Co-Regie & Live-Video: Airan Berg
Konzeption, Co-Regie, Texte & Visuals: Martina Winkel
Konzeption, Kreaturendesign & Co-Regie: Roger Titley
Komposition: Dick van der Harst
Produktion: Susanne Tiefenbacher
Produktionsassistenz: Karin Imlinger
Marketing: Barbara Hinterleitner
Schauspiel: Andrea Eckert, Wolfram Berger
Dirigent: Martin Fuchsberger
Musik:
Studierende der Anton Bruckner Privatuniversität/ Klasse Blechbläser unter der Leitung von Bernhard Bär sowie Klasse der Schlagwerker unter der Leitung von Leonhard Schmidinger
sowie Ensemble von Dick van der Harst (Belgien):
Kurt Budé, Berlinde Daman, Lander Gyselinck, Jouni Isoherranen, Wim Konink, Bart Maris, Sebastian Matthyssens, Jean-Phillippe Poncin, Dirk Proost, Gilles Répond

Die Klangwolke ist eine Produktion des Brucknerhaus Linz / LIVA und des ORF OÖ in Kooperation mit Linz 2009 Kulturhauptstadt Europas.

Foto: Agnes Miesenberger

We 2.9. –  Tue 8.9. 2009
6.00 – 10.00 PM

Grand Hotel Cafe zum Rothen Krebsen, Obere Donaulände 11, 4020 Linz

fabriqueee / Institut für erweiterte Kunst
http://www.roterkrebs.net/

Loudly and with high-impact visuals, the arrival of a new age is proclaimed and future worlds spoken of with a certainty as if the good old art of fortune-telling had been revived and declared to be a genuine science. Nostradamus and the whole host of sibyls seem to have risen again, just to make sure nothing is left up to free interpretation. Outfitted with diplomas, the latest technology and plenty of cash, they paint a picture of the past, present and future of mankind. Our successes, our setbacks, our bodies, our environment – all depending on the prevailing taste and the client. Fascinated and strangely fatalistic, we stand by and watch our destiny unfolding before us.

The “fabriqueee” doesn’t quite trust all this, and focuses its attention instead on a somewhat outmoded, at once ordinary and uncanny human (self)-awareness machine, in which certainty and delusion have always gone hand in hand: the mirror.

Based on this approach the group’s members develop along modular lines various individual projects – from installations to apparatus, from sculptures and objects to animation and visualizations – to finally generate in the “Grand Cafe zum Rothen Krebsen” a playful space that promises everything, except for any certainty or seemingly secure insights.

Every night during the week of the Ars Electronica Festival, “fabriqueee,” in association with the “Institut für erweiterte Kunst,” will offer visitors the opportunity to explore the world “Inside the Disco Ball.” What’s left is right, what’s up is down.

“fabriqueee” is made up of Jakob Breitwieser, Fabian Krenn, Matthias Lindner, Pamela Litzlbauer, Agnes Miesenberger, Sandra Li Lian Obwegeser and Joseph Reitsberger; students at the Art University of Linz, Department of Experimental Design.

80+1 Basecamp, Hauptplatz

80+1 idea & concept: Ars Electronica Linz, voestalpine AG, Linz09
Ein Projekt für Linz 2009 Kulturhauptstadt Europas
www.80plus1.org

Inspired by Jules Verne’s world-famous classic, “80+1” takes you along on a virtual ‘round-the world journey via satellite hook-up and fiber optic cable. The itinerary includes 20 destinations, places where the future is being invented, mastered or, perhaps, thwarted. Thus, 20 issues of key importance to our future are up for discussion; the contributions to it take artistic, scientific and journalistic approaches to these issues. But beyond this wideranging confrontation with global themes, “80+1” will also delve into our own personal takes on and relations to the future, our hopes and our fears.

See all projects of 80+1

Quelle: Blast Theory

Fri 4.9. – Mon 7.9.

Deutsch & English

Starting point & tickets: 80+1-Basecamp, Hauptplatz

START: every 15 minutes between 7 pm and 10 pm

from 16 years on

The number of participants is limited

A production by Blast Theory, coproduced by the Mixed Reality Lab. Presented by Linz09 in cooperation with Ars Electronica. Funded by the British Council Austria.

http://www.blasttheory.co.uk

“Rider Spoke” is a work for cyclists combining theatre with game play and state of the art technology. It invites the audience to cycle through the streets of the city, equipped with a handheld computer. Using wi-fi technology, they search for a hiding place and record a short message there. And then they search for the hiding places of others. The audience can take part either on their own bike or borrow one supplied by Blast Theory.

“Rider Spoke” continues Blast Theory’s fascination with how games and new communication technologies are creating new social spaces. It poses further questions about where theatre may be sited and what form it may take. It invites the public to be co-authors of the piece and a visible manifestation of it as they cycle through the city. It locates the venue precisely in its local context and invites the audience to explore that context for its emotional and intellectual resonances.

Sa 5.9.
10:00 – 00:00

Hauptplatz

The Japan Media Arts Festival has been an annual event in Tokyo since 1997 and awards prizes for creative works in the fields of art, entertainment, animation and manga.

“JAPAN GAME” focuses on the entertainment aspect of Japanese media arts by showcasing selected game-related works honored by the 2009 Japan Media Arts Festival. All the games in the areas of sports, music, adventure, etc. are playable. Every evening, game tournaments will be held on a large-format screen. We hope audiences will enjoy these forms of artistic expression and, at the same time, recognize the games’ similarities to media art.

The Japan Media Arts Festival has two aims. One is to designate new cultural frameworks and values in accordance with the changes occurring nowadays that make it imperative to avoid persistently clinging to existing cultural hierarchies. Accordingly, we appreciate not only media art but also animation, manga and entertaining works such as games.

Secondly, we are helping new forms of expression and culture to take root and grown along with the progress of digital communications techniques and technology. Some observers might maintain that new culture is disconnected from traditional culture, but the Japan Media Arts Festival has tried to bridge the gap. We think that this activity helps to nurture originality in a new field of culture.

See all projects of Japan Media Art Festival