The Prix Ars Electronica is the world’s highest endowed competition in the digital arts. Prizes are awarded in seven categories. The CyberArts 2012 exhibition features works honored in Hybrid Art, Interactive Art, Digital Musics & Sound Art, and Computer Animation, as well as the recipient of the Prix Ars Electronica Collide@CERN Residency Award.

bacterial radio

Joe Davis (US)
Golden Nica Hybrid Art

Joe Davis (US) is dedicated to the ideals of the Enlightenment and art that seeks to disseminate knowledge. “bacterial radio,” his 2011 project developed out of a circuit and two bacterial cultures with the help of molecular biological technology, is meant to encourage people to use knowledge on their own in order to be independent of industrial products, as well as to understand and master the exotic technologies we use in everyday life.

Memopol-2

Timo Toots (EE)
Golden Nica Interactive Art

Timo Toots’ Memopol-2 installation impressively demonstrates what links among databanks mean for each and every one of us. After scanning a user’s ID, Memopol-2 combs Austrian and international databanks as well as the internet to harvest data about the user. This information is then displayed on a large screen to show all the stuff to be had out there.

Rear Window Loop

Jeff Desom (LU)
Golden Nica Computer Animation

Alfred Hitchcock’s “Rear Window” (1953) is a classic much admired by film buffs, especially for its camera work that set the standard for excellence. Never before have these famous images been used in a time-lapse video. “Rear Window Loop” is based exclusively on original film material. It condenses Hitchcock’s masterpiece into twenty breathtaking minutes of footage meticulously edited and processed solely with After Effects and Photoshop.

The Free Universal Construction Kit

Golan Levin (US), Shawn Sims (US)
Award of Distinction Hybrid Art

“Free Universal Construction Kit” is a grassroots project that offers an assortment of adapters that make it possible to build stuff by combining pieces from 10 well-know construction kits (Lego, Fischertechnik, etc.) It’s thus an intentional provocation of toy manufacturers. The pieces can be downloaded free of charge from various internet file-sharing sites in the form of 3D models and produced at home using equipment like the Makerbot open-source 3D printer.

MOON GOOSE ANALOGUE: Lunar Migration Bird Facility

Agnes Meyer-Brandis (DE)
Award of Distinction Hybrid Art

The works of Agnes Meyer-Brandis (DE) always combine poetry and science. Here, she takes up where The Man in the Moone (1603), Bishop Francis Godwin’s tale about a goose-powered lunar expedition, left off. She raised 11 of these big birds, named them after astronauts and established herself as crew chief. Then she trained them to fly, launched missions, and put them up in quarters modeled on the Moon itself just like the facility real astronauts use for training purposes.

Solar Sinter Project

Markus Kayser (DE)
Award of Distinction Interactive Art

In the desert, there’s a surfeit of (solar) energy and raw materials (sand). Markus Kayser (DE) combines natural energy and natural materials with clever, sophisticated production technology to turn out glass objects with a 3D printer.

It’s a jungle in here

Isobel Knowles (AU), Van Sowerwine (AU) with Matthew Gingold (AU)
Award of Distinction Interactive Art

Part psychodrama, part multimedia wonder, “It’s a jungle in here” is an astounding encounter with the fragile rules that are operative in the public sphere. A picturesque viewing booth offers room for two people to watch the screening of a stop-motion animated film starring paper figures. The faces of two of the characters are those of the two viewers (photographed by webcam), who are thus inserted into three interactive narratives about atrociously antisocial behavior and aggression aboard a suburban train.

#tweetscapes – a HEAVYLISTENING experience

Tarik Barri (NL), Anselm Venezian Nehls (DE)

“#tweetscapes” by UdK students Barri (NL) and Nehls (DE) transforms all German-language tweets into abstract sounds—as real-time sonification of what’s happening in the German Twitter scene and as an interactive, collective composition by German-speaking Twitter users. The tweets are made audible according to a strict set of rules, whereby an algorithm generates a characteristic sound for any conceivable topic.

The Body is a Big Place

Peta Clancy (AU), Helen Pynor (AU)
Honorary Mention Hybrid Art

“The Body is a Big Place” is a large-scale work of bioart that employs video projections, a perfusion apparatus that provides blood to a heart while it’s outside the body, and an acoustically active water landscape to investigate the process of organ transplantation as well as transition in the grey area between life and death.

2.6g 329m/s

Jailia Essaidi (NL)
Honorary Mention Hybrid Art

The specifications 2.6g 329m/s refer to the weight and speed of a small-caliber slug that a bullet-proof vest has to be able to withstand. Since organically produced spider silk is stronger than steel, bullets should bounce off of it too—provided it’s been woven correctly.

Jalila Essaïdi (NL) subjects this idea to trial by fire with a fabric that’s a blend of spider silk and human skin yielded by transgenic goats.

The Great Work of the Metal Lover

Adam Brown (US)
Honorary Mention Hybrid Art

“The Great Work of the Metal Lover” is a work at the nexus of art, science and alchemy that uses modern microbiological procedures in a new approach to transforming elements. Bringing together a highly-specialized, metal-tolerant bacteria with an artificial atmosphere enclosed in a customized alchemical bio-reactor produces gold.

Searching for the Ubiquitous Genetically Engineered Machine

ArtScienceBangalore (IN)
Honorary Mention Hybrid Art

In the field of synthetic biology, organic building blocks are used as abstractions or models for the production of standardized, functional living parts. “Searching for the Ubiquitous Genetically Engineered Machine” demonstrates a potential alternative application of organic building blocks—testing biodiversity in soil samples. To this end, ArtScienceBangalore (IN) makes available a free tool to laypeople interested in getting actively involved in applied science.

Ideogenetic Machine

Nova Jiang (NZ)
Honorary Mention Interactive Art

Visitors to this interactive installation become comic strip characters. An algorithm transforms a photographic portrait of the user into a stick figure. With the help of facial recognition software, empty speech bubbles are automatically applied. In accordance with a series of rules derived from the compositional decisions of a human cartoonist, the software generates non-repetitive creations. Users can e-mail the finished comics as a PDF and fill in the speech bubbles with home-brew dialog.

Dream Water Wonderland

Hörner/Antlfinger (DE)
Honorary Mention Hybrid Art

Two nuclear industry facilities in Germany have come to epitomize the end of technological feasibility fantasies: the breeder reactor in Kalkar that never went into operation and the Asse II nuclear waste disposal site. “Dream Water Wonderland,” an installation consisting of two Plexiglas cubes, a 1970s-vintage turntable and an audiovisual work, refers to these two places in translating the legacy of the nuclear industry into a dream world.

Occupy George

Ivan Cash (US), Andy Dao (US)
Honorary Mention Interactive Art

“Occupy George” puts US dollar notes stamped with fact-based info-graphics into circulation as a way to inform the public, bill by bill, about America’s horrendous economic inequality and the gap between rich and poor that’s yawning wider by the day.

MAQUILA REGION 4

Amor Munoz (MX)
Honorary Mention Hybrid Art

“Maquila Región 4” (MR4) is a mobile factory that migrates through Mexico’s most impoverished regions, hiring laborers at the US minimum wage ($7/hour as compared to 60 cents, the going rate south of the border). In MR4, they embroider electronic circuits with conductive thread and apply a code to it. When it’s decoded—for example, with a smartphone—a website detailing the production history pops up. It contains the worker’s name, the location and date of production, and how long it took. There’s also room self-expression such as dedications and videos.

Cross Coordinates (MX-US)

Ivan Abreu (MX)
Honorary Mention Interactive Art

The fragile equilibrium of life on the Mexico-US border is the name of this demanding game for two players. Its uncommon dynamics are impressive indeed. The only way to win is via collaboration and seeking reconciliation with one’s opponent. The game is played with a special spirit (bubble) level that the players have to bring into balance. Following an experimental phase in settings such as an exhibition, the game was continued online.

ADM8

RYBN (FR)
Honorary Mention Interactive Art

On May 6, 2010 at 2:40 PM, the Dow Jones Index fell 900 points in less than 20 minutes due to miscalculations by computerized high-volume trading funds. The loss is estimated to have been a trillion dollars. To attack the forces of finance on the battlefield of their latest and most complex developments, RYBN.ORG constructed its own trading robot in the form of open-source software designed to speculate on the financial markets. This autonomous program place orders to buy and sell securities and predict imminent market movements.

Energy Parasites

Eric Paulos (US)
Honorary Mention Interactive Art

These handmade objects enable the user to tap small amounts of energy for his/her own use at various public places. With no further ado with respect to the origins or ownership of the energy thus obtained, these artifacts variously rechannel the extracted energy or store it for later use. Both malicious and useful, they call into question concepts of energy ownership.

Protei

Protei (UK)
Honorary Mention Hybrid Art

Protei, a fleet of sail-powered drones designed to fight pollution of the seas, is currently under construction. The production alliance’s mission is to develop an affordable open-source vehicle that can sail semi-autonomously against the wind and capture oil slicks being driven by the wind. It’s meant to be hurricane-proof, self-righting, inflatable, indestructible, low-priced and easy to set up so it can be deployed quickly in case of a crisis.

UN RESEAU TRANSLUCIDE

Prue Lang (AU)
Honorary Mention Hybrid Art

This 100% energy-independent stage play substantially rethinks conventional forms of theatrical production. Smart costumes make it possible to harvest, as it were, the energy generated by the dancers during the performance. To do so, the production employs devices to convert the kinetic energy of the dancers’ movements into electricity to run the sound system. The lighting is fed with current directly from a bicycle powered by the dancers themselves.

Following each performance, there’s a discussion with the audience about sustainable development and how art can set an example for creative innovation.

Crackle-canvas #1

Tom Verbruggen (NL)
Honorary Mention Digital Musics & Sound Art

“Crackle-canvas” is what Tom Verbruggen (NL) calls a picture that produces sound. Each of his artworks consists of a circuit board, loudspeakers, controller knobs, switches, wooden frames and a projection screen, and has a tonal character all its own. Via cable, it can also be linked up to other images and react to them. “Crackle-canvas” will be presented in the context of a performance after which festivalgoers will have the opportunity to play with the pictures.

Game Border

Jun Fujiki (JP)
Honorary Mention Hybrid Art

“Game Border” is a challenging game. It imparts the feeling of jumping from one game device to another and thus breaking down the borders of the hardware. It also calls upon players to interconnect the various games as seamlessly as possible. In doing so, the point is to go beyond not only physical limits but social and perceptual ones as well.

BETWEEN | YOU | AND | ME

Anke Eckardt (DE)
Honorary Mention Digital Musics & Sound Art

Physically modeling sound like a sculpture is the basic idea that inspired Anke Eckardt (DE). Between | You | And | Me is a wall of sound and light that defines an architectural space. Two thin light membranes form a visible frame filled with sound. Loudspeakers aimed at extreme angles broadcast sound textures of breaking glass. Nevertheless, all of this can be perceived only if installation visitors approach the wall and interact with it.

Versuch unter Kreisen

Julius von Bismarck (DE)

An installation visitor entering the space in which “Versuch unter Kreisen” (Experiment among Circles) by Collide@CERN prizewinner Bismarck (DE) is installed initially notices nothing unusual. Suddenly, things start to move. The suspended lamps begin to swing—slowly at first, gradually working up momentum—as if the whole building were being rocked. Each light obeys a particular choreography, whereby the mathematically computed cyclical motions were inspired by wave patterns.