DEADLINE for application: 5 February 2013

MASTERCLASS LEADERS: Tony Conrad, Goodiepal, CM von Hausswolff & Mike Harding, Trevor Paglen, Steina & Woody Vasulka

In collaboration with the Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, STEIM, Muziekgebouw aan ’t IJ and EYE, Sonic Acts will host a series of masterclasses as part of this year’s festival – The Dark Universe.

The masterclasses provide a unique opportunity for artists, musicians and other creative professionals to work with five internationally renowned artists. In a concentrated and intimate setting, participants will gain insight into the artists’ concepts, work processes, and methods of composition, production and research through hands-on workshops, discussions, and seminars.

TO PARTICIPATE
The masterclasses are aimed at professional artists, musicians, composers, film makers, academics and advanced students. Deadline for applications is 5 February. Please send a biography and a short motivation outlining why you would like to take part in a specific masterclass to: masterclass@sonicacts.com.
Attending multiple classes is possible. Late or incomplete applications will not be considered. You will be informed about the result of your application by 10 February. A detailed schedule as well as more information about the preparation for the masterclass will be sent to successful applicants with this notification.

FEE
There is a fee of € 35,00 to participate per masterclass. Catering will be provided. Masterclass participants will receive reduced admission for the festival (professional accreditation for € 65,00).

DATES & LOCATIONS
The masterclasses take place at Stedelijk Museum, STEIM, Muziekgebouw aan ’t IJ and EYE in Amsterdam
18–19 February: Goodiepal
18–21 February: CM von Hausswolff & Mike Harding
19 February: Tony Conrad
19–20 February: Steina & Woody Vasulka
24 February: Trevor Paglen

ABOUT THE MASTERS AND THE MASTERCLASSES
Tony Conrad (US) is an avant-garde video artist, experimental filmmaker, musician/composer, sound artist, teacher and writer. A pioneering force behind the evolution of minimalism, Conrad introduced the idea of Eternal Music, a droning, mesmerising performance idiom which employed long durations, amplification and precise pitch to explore new worlds of sound. Conrad’s masterclass will be an extended lecture performance about his work, artistic concepts and thoughts, touching on both his film work (The Flicker), and drone music.

Goodiepal (Gæoudjiparl) (FO/DK) is a controversial musician and composer of his own kind of radical computer music. He declared intellectual war against the stupidity in modern computer music and media art when he quit his job at the Royal Academy of Music in Aarhus. He performs and lectures about his work and ideas worldwide and travels on his special bicycle, which enables him to produce the electricity he requires. In this way he gets closer to mechanics and experiments with transhumanism. His recent book El Camino del Hardcore features his graphic notation work. His masterclass, aimed at DIY artists, composers and media artists will be an exchange of thoughts, in which also the work of the participants will be discussed.

CM von Hausswolff (SE) is a composer and a conceptual artist. Sound recording devices are his main instrument as a composer; as a conceptual artist he works with performance art, light- and sound installations and photography. Mike Harding (UK) is a curator, producer, lecturer and music publisher. He runs the Touch label together with Jon Wozencroft. In the masterclass led by CM von Hausswolff & Mike Harding, participants will work on their own version of freq_out.  For freq_out – a concept by CM von Hausswolff – twelve participants are allotted ranges of frequency within the audible sound spectrum. Participant number one will be allotted 0–25 Hz, number two 25–65 Hz, and so on. Over a period of four days, the task of the participant is to compose one sound work each. The work cannot contain any sounds beyond the allotted frequency range, but can be of any length and is played back as a loop. The final work consists of 12 smaller works joined together into a whole.

Trevor Paglen (US) is an artist and geographer. His work deliberately blurs lines between science, contemporary art, journalism and other disciplines to construct unfamiliar, yet meticulously researched ways to see and interpret the world. He is the author of five books, including Blank Spots on the Map: The Dark Geography of the Pentagon’s Secret World, and numerous articles on subjects such as experimental geography, state secrecy, military symbology, photography, and visuality. His most recent book, The Last Pictures, is a meditation on the intersections of deep-time, politics and art. His masterclass focuses on his methodologies and different ways of conducting research.

Steina and Woody Vasulka (IS/CZ/US) are major figures in video history – technical pioneers who have contributed enormously to the evolution of the medium and who continue to be major practitioners of video as art. The Vasulkas’ technological investigations into analogue and digital processes and their development of electronic imaging tools, which began in the early 1970s, place them among the primary architects of an expressive electronic vocabulary of image-making. Their masterclass will be a discussion of the development of their practice and working methodologies, and will reflect how the change of technologies and interfaces influences the presentation, documentation and archiving of their work.

The full programme of Sonic Acts – The Dark Universe (21-24 February 2013) is online.
All information on the website can be found online.

The Sonic Acts Masterclasses are made possible with the support of the Mondriaan Fund (www.mondriaanfonds.nl) and from the European Commission.
This communication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.

You can view, download or print the magazine on demand, just follow the links:

DIGIMAG JOURNAL
“PLACES AND SPACES”
Issue 73 – Autumn 2012

Download the PDF: Collaborative_AiR_Recommendations_DEF

Preview the Digimag Journal on Issuu

Online Shop

Print on demand of the Digimag Journal

With:
#1 Lindsay Howard: 319 Scholes/Eyebeam
#2 Domenico Quaranta: Link
#3 Tom Clark & Rózsa Farkas: Arcadia Missa
#4 Amber van den Eeden & Kalle Mattsson: Temporary Stedelijk
#5 Katja Novitskova: independent artist/curator
#6 Laura Mousavi: e-PERMANENT

Although curating digital artworks in physical spaces and online exhibitions is becoming more widespread, such exhibitions are mostly taking place outside of the world of traditional art. Currently a new generation of curators is organising exhibitions in old warehouses, family homes, small side-street galleries, or online. They use existing curatorial formats for these presentations, adapting them if necessary, or even creating new ones. A common denominator among these curators is their experience with online curating and presenting online artworks in physical spaces. These curators take the digital and physical realm as a given and move fluidly between the two, leaving traces in each. The interviews focus on their ideas and thoughts on curating today and how they deal with the divisions between the various art worlds.

Since their practice mostly occurs online these interviews were conducted by e-mail. All the curators were asked the same questions, with slight variations due to their specific projects or to expand on previous responses. The selection of curators for this interview series is based on my personal encounters with them during the past year. I met all of them through other projects, some by chance and some by appointment. When talking and working with them, I noticed similar lines of thinking, regardless of the differences in their curatorial styles. What at first seemed a random choice became an interesting kaleidoscope of current practices in curating.

Who can apply for subsidy from the fund?
The fund distinguishes between development and production subsidies. Production subsidies can only be applied for by a public broadcasting corporation. Development subsidies can also be requested by – for example – producers. However, their application must have the backing of a broadcasting company.

End of October 2012 the newly formed coalition of the Netherlands decided that the Mediafund should stop its activities from 2017 onwards. Please sign the petition to halt this disastrous verdict!

Teken de petitie Mediafonds moet blijven!

Alle mensen en organisaties die ons sinds 29 oktober 2012 steunen en die hun onvrede willen uiten over de voorgenomen opheffing van het Mediafonds in het regeerakkoord van het kabinet Rutte II kunnen de petitie ondertekenen op mediafondsmoetblijven.petities.nl.

Teken de door Monique Busman (voorzitter DPN) geïnitieerde petitie Mediafonds moet blijven op mediafondsmoetblijven.petities.nl en stuur via twitter of e-mail dit bericht door aan personen die misschien ook deze petitie willen ondertekenen.

Op www.mediafonds.nl/updates-toekomst staat een overzicht van reacties op de voorgenomen bezuiniging van makers, de publieke omroep, musea, de cultuurfondsen, de media en vele individuen zoals Joyce Roodnat en Frank van Vree. Op onze site vindt u ook een beknopt overzicht van wat het Mediafonds doet.

Met alle ondertekenaars willen wij voor het wetgevingsoverleg in de Tweede Kamer op 10 december 2012 zoveel mogelijk handtekeningen verzamelen en discussie voeren om aan te tonen dat deze voorgenomen bezuiniging moet worden teruggedraaid.

Veel dank en groet!

Start the tour here > http://data-centers-grand-tour.co.uk/
Viewable here 15 February – 30 April 2013

ʻData Centers Grand Tour (This Data Belongs Here)ʼ by Silvio Lorusso is the second e-PERMANENT artist commission for an online work. ʻData Centers Grand Tour (This Data Belongs Here)ʼ starts here and will be an ongoing project for which Silvio Lorusso will be purchasing domain names and hosting in each country across the globe. For each domain a single web page will be hosted showing a satellite view of the geographical site at which that particular domainʼs data is stored. The tour will start by clicking at a destination, one click will take you to the next domain in a different country where you will again be able to view where that domainʼs data is stored, and so on until all of the countries in the world are covered. Start the tour above.

e-PERMANENT is the online incarnation of Permanent Gallery, the gallery which was operating at 20 Bedford Place, Brighton, from 2003 to 2011. e-PERMANENT features an open submission for artists experimenting with the internet as medium and/or presentation space, alongside new writing and a digital archive of Permanent Gallery’s exhibitions and events. e-PERMANENT is a digital platform which provides a new context within which Permanent can continue to support artists to realise experimental projects.

in Dutch Tubelight, and English Furtherfield.

See also the documentary about tax havens, the tax free tour (by Marije Meerman).

Open(Art) Call for Proposals

Mozilla and Eyebeam Art & Technology Center are pleased to announce the launch of a joint initiative to support creativity at the intersection of art and the open web.

Open(Art) is a unique opportunity for artists and technologists to collaborate on new work that catalyzes creative participation on a global scale. Interested makers are invited to propose projects that push the boundaries of online or networked culture and address contemporary social challenges, while contributing to the community of practice around creative code.

Three (3) projects will be selected from an open call for proposals, and will each be awarded a $15,000 production budget and resources to develop the work, including desk space and access to design, research, and fabrication studios at Eyebeam’s New York location.

Deadline: Friday, October 12, 12:00PM EST

 Find out more information and apply online

Open(Art) Partners:

http://www.mozilla.org/foundation/

http://www.eyebeam.org

2014

An Aesthetic of Fun, or A Fun Aesthetic. In: Software and Fun, edited by Olga Goriunova. Continuum. (forthcoming 2014)

Future, or how to survive FOREVER. In: A Companion to Digital Art. Edited by Christiane Paul. Blackwell Publishers. (forthcoming 2014) With support of a cultural mediation grant of Mondriaan Fund

2013

(with Vivian van Saaze) Surprising usages of a documentation model: On the notion of boundary objects and beyond. The International Journal of Performance Arts and Digital Media (IJPADM) (forthcoming)

Being in the uncomfortable middle and the continued need for physical space. Furtherfield.org, March

Disney, SpongeBob en afvallige soldaten. Tubelight.nl, January / also in English Foundland: Critical Stories. Furtherfield.org, February

2012

Enjoying the Gap. Comparing Contemporary Documentation Strategies. In: Preserving and Exhibiting Media Art: Challenges and Perspectives, edited by Cosetta Saba, Julia Noordegraaf, Barbara Le Maître and Vinzenz Hediger. Amsterdam: University of Amsterdam Press

The more random the better. Tubelight.nl, December (also in print magazine)

Glazen gevels, Romeinse cijfers en obscure werelden. Tubelight.nl, September / also in English Glass Houses, Roman numbers and shady worlds. Furtherfield.org, December

Kunnen GPS-data mensen ontroeren? Tubelight.nl, July

Composting the Net. An interview with Shu Lea Cheang, Amsterdam: SKOR NetArtWorks #3, June

The use(fullness) of a Portable SKOR. An interview with Michael Murtaugh, Amsterdam: SKOR NetArtWorks #3, June

Van oude technology en nieuwe gebouwen. Tubelight.nl, May

Review Art Plaforms, by Olga Goriunova. OPEN (May)

Het documenteren van netkunst. Tubelight.nl, March

Blog: “Does everyone have a place to sit?” Masterclass Tino Seghal, blog review for Sonic Acts, 23 February.

Cloud Coins. An Interview with Metahaven. Amsterdam: SKOR NetArtWorks #2, January 2012.

Restrictions and Reservations, Examining National Public Domains. An Interview with Linda Hilfling. Amsterdam: SKOR NetArtWorks #2, January 2012.

Starting to Talk About Databases. A conversation between YoHa (Graham Harwood & Matsuko Yokokoji), a Dutch Midwife and Annet Dekker. Amsterdam: SKOR NetArtWorks #2, January 2012.

2011
Post-Internet Kunst, Metropolis M, December 2011.

How to be Pink and Conceptual. Annet Dekker in conversation with Martine Neddam. I’m an Artist too…. Amsterdam: SKOR, NetArtWorks #1, June 2011.

Naked on Pluto: Dave Griffiths and Aymeric Mansoux and Marloes de Valk with Annet Dekker, Angela Plohman and Irma Földényi. Blueprint Programme The Future of the Lab. Eindhoven: Baltan Laboratories.

The End of the Media Lab as We Know It. Blueprint Programme The Future of the Lab. Eindhoven: Baltan Laboratories, pp.276-284.

The world of an administrative content provider. About opening spaces, connecting layers and being mobile.
 A conversation between Heath Bunting and Annet Dekker. 
London, February and May 2011. SKOR: NetArtWorks_2011.

Natural and Artificial Identities, or The Ease of Interaction. 

A conversation between Heath Bunting (artist), Bob Colover (UK barrister) and Annet Dekker (SKOR).
 London, February 2011. SKOR: NetArtWorks_2011.

Data is the New Narrative. ‘Pay with Your Privacy’. Annet Dekker in conversation with Lernert & Sander, Amsterdam, 19 mei 2011. SKOR: NetArtWorks_2011.

Research: Archiving the Digital. (with Rachel Somers Miles and Rachel Feuchtwang) Amsterdam: Virtueel Platform.

Research: Blast Theory. (with Rachel Somers Miles and Rachel Feuchtwang) Amsterdam: Virtueel Platform.

Clickable Art, or, what does participation mean?, Culture Vortex, Institute for Network Cultures, Virtueel Platform, December

Interview Nancy Proctor, Metropolis M, (forthcoming December-January)

2010

The Art of Platforms, Guggenheim Museum, You Tube Play, 2 November.

(editor) Archive2020. Sustainable Archiving of Born Digital Cultural Content. (Amsterdam: Virtueel Platform).

The Art of Documentation (with Vivian van Saaze and Gaby Wijers) RTRSRCH#4 <notation> Vol.2, nr.2, pp.22-27

Space is Body Centred II. Interview with Sonia Cillari. Arie Altena and Sonic Acts (eds.) The Poetics of Space (Amsterdam: Sonic Acts Press), pp. 169-178.

(co-edited) Tubelight Special#67 Media Art. (Amsterdam: Tubelight, Virtueel Platform, Domein voor Kunstkritiek).

2009

Versions. Exhibition text and interviews with Harm van den Dorpel, Constant Dullaart, JODI, Martijn Hendriks, Theodore Watson. NIMk, Amsterdam.

City Views from the Artists’ Perspective. The Impact of Technology on the Experience of the City. Scott McQuire, Meredith Martin and Sabine Niederer (eds.) Urban Screens Reader#5 (Amsterdam: Institute of Network Cultures), pp. 221-232.

New Ways of Seeing: Artistic Usage of Locative Media. Proceedings of the Digital Arts and Culture Conference. DAC09 after media: embodiment and context. (University of California, Irvine)

Revolutionary Postcard From Berlin (With Crows). Interview with Simon Faithfull. Visual Foreign Correspondents_Berlin.

Border Soldier. Interview with Lena Merhej. Visual Foreign Correspondents_Berlin.

Beyond Physical Space. Examples of documentation: Yolande Harris, Esther Polak, Martine Neddam (DVD)

Co-editor: Navigating e-culture, Brickwood, Cathy and Annet Dekker (eds.) (Amsterdam: Virtueel Platform)

Co-editor: Walled Garden, Dekker, Annet and Annette Wolfsberger (eds.) (Amsterdam: Virtueel Platform)

Aiming for Dead Reckoning, in: Playing the City, catalogue for Schirn Kunsthall in Frankfurt (May)

A moment in time: Urban exploration in Shanghai, in: virtueelplatform.nl (January)

Traversing the Route: from MediaMarkt to Cameroon. Stephen Kovats and Thomas Munz (eds.) Deep North. Transmediale Parcours2 (Berlin: Revolver), pp.  56-62

2008

Urban Screens 2008, review, in: virtueelplatform.nl (December)

Beeldcultuur in Beweging, in: Items (5, September/October 2008

Claiming bio-diversity; interview with Tea Mäkipää, in: VFC & I-Nettime (August)

PPS: PublicPrivateSpace. Where the public space turns into private space and the private space opens up to the public, in: Proceedings ISEA2008

The fight against climate change takes effect through creative design and green consumerism; interview with Tiffany Holmes, VFC & I-Nettime (May)

A Journey Through Sound; an interview with Yolande Harris, edited with Carmen Hutting for <>TAGMag 5 (March)

Review Peter Mechant, LabforCulture (February)

The Netherlands is respectful. Russia is corrupt. An interview with Igor Stromajer in: VFC & I-Nettime (February)

The flow in the public space, where architecture and interactive art meet, in: News NIM (January)

TBT [Time Based Text]: an experiment(al) (in) writing, in Impakt Online (January)

Silke Wawro, in: Masters of Rietveld Dutch Design Education in the 21^st Century by the Sandberg Institute (Amsterdam: All Media, 2008)

Chroma by Dominik Bartkowski, in: Impakt Online

2007

Through the Looking Glass into the Clubscene, in: Nieuwe Media in Nederland (Amsterdam: Institute of Network Cultures)

Space is Body Centred. An interview with Sonia Cillari, in: News NIM (June)

Parasitaeres Verhalten als Vorslag zum Umgang mit Ueberangebot und Massenproduktion, in: Kunstforum, Band 185 (193-209)

The politics of association on display. An interview with Govcom.org, in: News NIM (March)

Looking for Nature 2.0. An interview with Daan Roosegaarde, in: News NIM (January)

2006

Natural Habitat. Artistic positions between art, nature and technology, in: News NIM December

Sensorium, in: News NIM, June

Dutch Installation Art, in: introduction catalogue Dutch Installation Art, MNAC Romania, May

The New Art of Gaming, or what gaming can learn from installation art, in: Kas Oosterhuis & Lukas Feireiss (eds.), The Architecture Co-Laboratory: GameSetMatch II on computer games, advanced geometries and digital technologies (Rotterdam, episode publishers, 2006), pp.116-125

2005

World Wide Wrong – JODI, in: News NIM, September

Sensational Technologies, in: Digital Creativity (2005, Vol. 16, No. 2), p.115-121

What’s in a name., in: microscope sessions 2.0, DVD, April 2005.

VJ Culture, in : PixelACHE 2005 Catalogue.

2004

Dancing in the Light of an Information Overload, in: Tapio Mäkelä and Mare Tralla (eds.), ISEA2004: 12^th international symposium in electronic art (Helsinki: m-cult 2004)

Sensational Technologies, in: Electronic Art and Animation Catalogue ACM SIGGRAPH 2004, co-author Vivian van Saaze, p.112-115

stories visualised + interviews with artists from “My Story”, in: News NIM, January.

2003

Media art and Festival culture, in: kM Mediakunst (nr.46, Summer 2003) co-authors: Joke Ballintijn, Nadine Bors and Theus Zwakhals

Marina Abramović. Videoworks and installations 1977-2003, in: 20. World Wide Video Festival 2003 catalogue

The Synaesthetic Experience: from Camera Obscura to Video Jockey, in: News NIMk.

De synaesthetische ervaring: van Camera Obscura tot Video Jockey, in: Bart Vandenabeele & Koen Vermeir (red.), Gemedieerde Zintuigelijkheid. Jaarboek voor Esthetica 2003 (DAMON bv) p.33-43

2002

The Influence of Technology on the Uses of Language, in: Proceedings ISEA 02, Nagoya, Japan.

The Pleasures of Language, in: Newsletter – NIM, Sept.

VOLKSWARE Home, manifest on contemporary design, reference to project ‘Volksware’ by Silke Wawro, June

Blast Theory – an introduction, in: Newsletter – NIM, May.

VJ Cultuur, a state of flux, website with information about and for DJ/VJ world, January till March 2004.

2000

Over_Game, in: Newsletter – NIM, October.

Volksware, Interview Silke Wawro, in: Newsletter – NIM, June.

1999

The Royal Navy recruits m/f; the perspective of the navy-photographer, in: Lover, magazine on feminism, culture and science (jrg.26/2)

M/F in the Royal Navy, in: Smelik, Anneke with Rosemarie Buikema and Maaike Meijer, Effectief Beeldvormen. Theorie, analyse en praktijk van beeldvormingsprocessen (Van Gorcum, Assen)

Talking

2012

Van Memex, Wiki’s en Art Platforms. Een willekeurige wandeling langs voorbeelden van online publishing, of hoe informatie op verschillende manieren tot stand komt. Nieuwe Manieren van Publiceren over Kunst en Cultuur, Jorinde Seijdel: OPEN / SKOR, Amsterdam, 12 September.

Panellist DEAF2012, 25 May.

Conserveren van netkunst. Stichting Toekomstbeeld der Techniek, Amsterdam, 26 April.

Dance Documentation. Amsterdam School for the Arts, department Image Media, 24 April.

Workshop: Advancing Collaboration in Museums, with SFMoma (Jill Sterrett and Layna White) and HotStudio (Chris Jones and Kelly Meanley). Museums and the Web2012, San Diego, 11 April.

Online Curating. University of Amsterdam, department Preservation and Presentation of the Moving Image, 13 March.

Enjoying the gap. Different layers, directions and uses of documentation. CCS, Goldsmiths University of London, 8 February.

2011

Mediakunst en Stedelijke Ervaring. Universiteit Utrecht, 20 October.

What media art (documentation) can learn from performance documentation. Recollecting the Act, Basel, 6-7 October.

Preserving net art. The acceptance of loss and subjectivity. Re:wire Conference, Liverpool, 1 October.

Versions, comments and authenticity. ISEA2011 Istanbul, 19 September.

Panel: Medialabs. Lab2Lab, Nantes, 8-10 June.

Esther Polak, from painting to locative media and public space. Netherlands Media Art Institute, 4 May.

2010

Moderator: Archive/Presentation II. ISEA2010 Ruhr, 27 August.

Workshop: Art at the age of its digital reproduction, Vincent Everywhere: a symposium on visual culture and national identity. UvA & Stedelijk Museum, 11 June.

What can media art (documentation) learn from performance documentation? Contemporary Art: Who Cares?, 9 June.

Remember conservation?. Performances of Memory in the Arts, Nijmegen University, 28 May.

Panel: Symposium Interactieve Kunst. SKOR, 23 April.

Moderator: Symposium Recycled Film. AVFestival Newcastle, 12 February.

Online Curating. University of Amsterdam, department Preservation and Presentation of the Moving Image, 17 March.

2009

Synchronising Media. Urban Screens Conference, Institute of Network Cultures Amsterdam, 4 Dec.

Future of the Lab: aan@NIMk. Baltan Laboratories, Eindhoven, 2 Dec.

Conservering van netkunst. SIMIN/NCDD, Amersfoort, 30 Nov.

Creating Digital Documentation of Performance. JISC Digital Media and the University of Bristol Drama Department, Bristol, 23-25 Sept.

Online Archiving of Born Digital Art. Ars Electronica Festival, Linz, 5 Sept.

Moderator: booklaunch Art and Electronic Media by Edward Shanken. Netherlands Media Art Institute, Amsterdam, April 17.

Beeldhonger of Plaatjesmoe? De veranderende betekenis van het beeld. 21Rozendaal, Enschede, April 4.

Methods for Curating, workshop i.c.w. Alex Hodby. CRUMB / Culturelab, Newcastle, March 10.

Opening: exhibition Echolocation: Geert Mul. 21Rozendaal, Enschede, February 13.

2008

Beyond Physical Space, symposium Living in the data cloud. Image Radio, Eindhoven, November 1.

Keynote: Art Mediated by Technology. International Symposium [New] Media Art in Museums – production, keeping, presentation, Rijeka, Croatia, October 15-17.

PPS: PublicPrivateSpace. Where the public space turns into private space and the private space opens up to the public. ISEA2008, Singapore, July.

The Sensational, and meaning of Urban Screens. Art Mediated by Technology, Virtueel Platform, Amsterdam, May 29.

Art in Virtual reality, from VR to PR. University of Nijmegen, May 13.

Wonderwall: Live Visuals. Contemporary Image Collective, Cairo, Egypt, April 3-5.

Moderator: Real Cinema. Sonic Acts, Amsterdam, February 24.

Visual Image Culture. Plaza+, Eindhoven, January 12.

2007

Croatian and Dutch Identities, Do they exist, do they meet? Roundtable discussion organised by Embassy of the Netherlands in Croatia, Split, November 20.

Silence in Art, at: De grote stilte – in filosofie, kunst en spiritualiteit. Symposium Soeterbeeck, Ravenstein, Nov. 15.

Bringing the flow into public space. Kunst en Openbaarheid, NGE symposium, Utrecht, October 5.

Moving in Flow. Architecture in the Space of Flows, Culture Lab New Castle, June 22.

Killer TV: How much interactivity can we take. De Waag, streaming InTV, Amsterdam, April 18.

Games and Art. Communication & Multimedia Design, Avans Hogeschool, Breda, March 22.

VJ Culture in perspective, CBK Assen, March 1.

2006

Moderator: VJ: audio-visual art debate. MU, Eindhoven, Dec. 6.

Vliegende Hollanders, Science & Technology Summit, Amsterdam, discussiant for Very-Disco activity, Nov. 15.

VJ Culture a phenomenon. Vrije Academie Den Haag, May 26.

The new art of gaming, or what gaming can learn from Installation Art. GameSetMatch II Technical University Delft, March 29.

2005

VJ Culture. ’t Hoogt / Lazy Marie, Utrecht, December 1.

Gaming in Art. Das Arts, Amsterdam, September 30.

Synaesthetics is Club Performances. Willem de Kooning Academy, Rotterdam, June 3.

Re:Vision/It Takes Two. Willem de Kooning Academy, Rotterdam, May 24.

VJ in the Netherlands. Grafisch Lyceum, Amsterdam, April 26 and 27.

VJ Culture. Pixelache 2005, April 16.

2004

VJ-Culture in the Netherlands. Institute of Network Cultures, HvA, Dec. 4.

Warped Vision. Filmbank at De Balie, Amsterdam, IDFA Nov. 23

Cultural Community. Cimatics Festival, Beursschouwburg Brussels, Belgium, October 28.

Dancing in the Light of an Information Overload. ISEA 2004, Helsinki, August 20.

Sensational Technologies. Siggraph 2004, Los Angeles, August 10.

Art & Games. Hogeschool voor de Kunsten, Rotterdam, April 21.

The Art of Narrative – Impakt Online. University Utrecht, January 16.

2003

VJ in perspectief, at: Academy of the Arts, Arnhem, November.

Synaesthetics in the clubscene. Cosign 2003 Computational Semiotics in Games and New Media, University of Teesside, Middlesbrough (UK), September 10-12.

VJ as a life style. University Maastricht, Maastricht, April 25.

Impakt Online. Festival of Festivals, Bratislava, Feb. 19-22.

2002

VJ in perspective. Academy of the Arts, Arnhem, Nov. 9.

VJ: from Video to Visual to Virtual Jockey. NGE Symposium ‘Mediated Sensorial’, University of Maastricht, October 5.

A historical perspective on VJ. Club Modern at LUX, Nijmegen, April 13.

From October 19 to November 18, 2012, Viewmaster Foundation presents the exhibition ‘Paraphrasing Babel’, in the public space of Maastricht and Heerlen. It is an exhibition of 28 video works and 7 soundscapes that cross the boundaries of language, (mis) communication, and speech confusion. To be seen and heard every evening from 18.00 to 23.00 hrs.

Artists: 

Marc Alberto (NLD), Christopher Baker (USA), Natalie Bookchin (USA), Candice Breitz (ZAF), eddie d (NLD), Vera Frenkel  (CAN), Mieke Gerritzen (NLD), Gary Hill (USA), Annja Knautgasser (AUT), Louise Lawler (USA), Adam Leech (USA), Christian Marclay (USA), Marijn Moerbeek (NLD), Benny Nemerofsky Ramsay (CAN), Jeroen Offerman (NLD), Nika Radic (HRV), Anna Raimondo (ITA), Imogen Stidworthy (GBR), Zhou Tao (CHN), Thomson & Craighead (GBR), YOUNG-HAE CHANG HEAVY INDUSTRIES (KOR/USA), Katarina Zdjelar (SRB).

The selected works by renowned artists and young talent give a diverse representation of the power and wealth of language. Spoken, visual, or written, the strengths as well as the weaknesses of language as a form of communication are apparent. In bringing together the diverging approaches of the artists, Paraphrasing Babel gives new insights into the scope and meaning of language.

The exhibition presents a different piece in each city by different artists and passes by cacophonies of personal confessions on the Internet and touching attempts to learn a world language phonetically. The routes lead to video works in which communication takes place by means of facial expressions, sound, or sign language. The urban dweller also comes across birdcalls that ruthlessly dissect the art world, alarm sirens by choirboys, and an installation involving the Liverpool dialect.

The works are presented from and in (empty) commercial buildings and office buildings, residential housing, and cultural institutes. The video projections, video installations, moving graphic structures, and soundscapes throw new light on the urban centres of polar opposites Maastricht and Heerlen.

Paraphrasing Babel is the largest video art manifestation in public space in Europe. The 37 artworks are rarely shown outside the confines of museums or art institutes. Their specific contents make them exceptionally appropriate for the (semi-) public domain. It is on the street where different languages meet or mix and where the media and commerce are directed at the public. In these surroundings, the artworks engage in a direct relationship with the onlooker or passer-byer, and reach the public in an alternative form.

Artistic concept:

Viewmaster Foundation, Bart van den Boom

Curators:

Bart van den Boom & Annet Dekker

Paraphrasing Babel is made possible by: Mondriaan Fonds, VSB fonds, SNS REAAL Fonds, BNG Fonds, Province of Limburg, Municipality of Heerlen, Municipality of Maastricht, Huis voor de Kunsten Limburg, Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds Limburg, Elisabeth Strouven Foundation, and Intro in situ Maastricht.

A working conference organized by Baltan Laboratories in collaboration with the Van Abbemuseum
Eindhoven, 14 – 15 December 2012

“Why is it still easier to get an entire museum collection on the Internet than to get a single work of Internet-based Art in a museum space?”

This question was posed during a book launch of the Viennese curator’s collective Context in August 2011. It very clearly points to one of the sore spots in the discussion of why there is so little digital art in museums collections. Although it is common to use digital technologies for information exchange both inside the museum and outside, through distributing content through their websites and social media platforms, the presentation and presence of digital art in museum collections is still rare.

This working conference will address significant changes in contemporary artistic production by facilitating knowledge exchange between different art worlds. Through discussions and analyzing several case studies we aim to increase understanding of each other’s aesthetics, art historical links, economies, technical challenges and organizational structures.

Sessions will be led by, among others: Sarah Cook and Beryl Graham (CRUMB), Galit Eilat (Van Abbemuseum), Annie Fletcher (Van Abbemuseum), Ben Fino-Radin (Rhizome), Paulien ‘t Hoen and Gaby Wijers (SBMK/NIMk), Christiane Paul (Whitney Museum of American Art), Edward Shanken (University of Memphis), Jill Sterrett (SFMoma).

We like to invite anyone with a profound interest in collecting and presenting born-digital art to sign up. There is a limited number of seats available, therefore a selection process will take place.
In order to participate we like you to write a statement of max 500 words describing why you want to participate and what you would like to get out of the conference. Application for participation can be send together with a short biography before 15 November 2012 to : info[at]baltanlaboratories.org.

Help!

We are also looking for students that like to help us facilitate the event, the discussions and the outcomes. If you’re interested please write a motivation + short resume to info[at]baltanlaboratories.org
Volunteering means free access to the working conference! Get inspired, be part of it!

Costs

The two-day programme is 45,- euros, and includes lunch and drinks. There is a special student price of 25,- euros.
A public event takes place on Friday evening 14 December in Plaza Futura. More information will follow shortly.

This project is initiated by Angela Plohman and further conceptualised by Annet Dekker (http://aaaan.net).

This project is supported by:

Discussion with Eleanor Greenhalgh, Aymeric Mansoux, Rosa Menkman and Paul Keller.
Moderated by Annet Dekker.

In recent years we’ve become increasingly accustomed to free applications, the free use of images and sharing texts. Systems based on copyright still try to point out that copying can be an illegal activity by undertaking absurd lawsuits against random people who (for instance) download music off the internet. At the same time commercial businesses increasingly use products offered for free on-line and acknowledge the benefits of open services. Although this doesn’t necessarily mean that this makes them transparent, it does mean that free or ‘copyleft’ systems are winning the battle. The importance of free distribution to further development and customer service appear to be valued more highly than the protection offered by the traditional copyright system. Government institutions also emphasize ‘open data’, making information freely available. This information is then protected by new licenses and conditions. The influence of these development is explicitly present in artistic production.

Artists have been copying, opening and spreading data for a long time. Currently, artists participating in Artist In Residence programmes or those applying for grants are forced to ‘open up’ their projects. But what does it mean to ‘open up’? What should be opened? Are we talking about software, technology, information, documentation, concepts or scripts? How is information shared and how often do artists work on artworks by others or are certain elements reused? To what extent is this possible? What happens when ideas, formats and entire festival concepts show up elsewhere without any reference to the ‘original’ organizers? What actions could be taken? In short, what exactly is the value and function of open art? And to what extent can these concepts be related to the ‘old fashioned’ notions belonging to the art world like authenticity and originality?

During one of the last events at NIMk we will be searching for answers and allowing experiences, solutions and new problems to intermix. With Eleanor Greenhalgh (artist), Aymeric Mansoux (lector Piet Zwart Institute, artist), Rosa Menkman (artist, theoretician, GLI.TC/H festival) and Paul Keller (Kennisland).

A glimpse of what you can expect to see and hear:

Aberration of Light: Dark Chamber Disclosure by Sandra Gibson, Luis Recoder and Olivia Block. An expanded cinema performance in which Gibson and Recoder use a system of film loops, crystals and hand gestures to bend, reflect and refract the projector’s beam, transforming the church space into a sculpture of light, blending with Olivia Block’s mixing of field recordings and live instruments. It’s magical.

An exciting audiovisual duet of Maja Ratkje and HC Gilje: Ratkje’s voice and live electronics are accompanied by HC Gilje’s a spatial light show. Not to be missed.

World premiere of the Synchronator Orchestra. On invitation of the Kontraste festival Gert-Jan Prins and Bas van Koolwijk, the inventors of the Synchronator, have put together a an orchestra of artists who play this device. Featuring Gert-Jan Prins, Bas van Koolwijk, Jérôme Noetinger, Billy Roisz, and Justin Bennett.  They join forces to create an audiovisual spectacle, an analogue noise extravaganza, giving free reign to pure signals. We think it’s spectacular.

Possible Futures proposes a debate on emergent themes in the field of preservation of artistic and cultural heritage, by gathering a net of international experts in conservation of digital art and in collections digitilization.

International symposium with: Ana Pato, André Stolarski, Annet Dekker, Arianne Vanrell, Beth Saad, Christiane Paul, Cicero Silva, Daniela Kutschat Hanns, Domenico Quaranta, Gabriela Previdello, Gerfried Stocker, Gilbertto Prado, Guilherme Kujawski, Gustavo Romano, José Luis de Vicente, Lucas Bambozzi, Manuela Naveau, Monika Fleischmann & Wolfgang Strauss, Paula Alzugaray, Patricia Kunst Canetti, Pedro Puntoni, Renata Motta, Rudolf Frieling.

At: FAU-USP (Auditório), Cidade Universitária, Rua do Lago, 876, São Paulo, SP

The growing of artistic production in digital and electronic media has urged the elaboration of specific procedures, which are different from the models of accession and cataloging systems of the existing museum collections.

This symposium aims at contributing to such a debate, by combining discussions on metholodogies of preservation of digital works, with analyses of information curatorship.

Another issue that is prominent here is the discussion of issues related to processes of computerization and information digitalization of collections, a problem that has become reccurent in the everyday life of museums and that needs a deeper and critical approach in Brazil.

It is also relevant to point out that Possible Futures confronts such issues with the need to discuss the political and ideological aspects of new storage technologies.

VJ Pixel and Sander Veenhof were chosen to work together for one month in The Netherlands and another month in Brazil. They worked on their projects from different experiences in researching augmented reality (AR) systems. The result was Narrative Navigation and You Are the Protocol.

Their process and progress can be read on the blog.

This project is supported by Mondriaan Fund.

The artist in residence was a collaboration between NIMk, STEIM and Sonic Acts Festival. The installation was presented as part of the Sonic Acts – Travelling Time exhibition at NIMk from Februari 23 – April 15, 2012.

The project is supported by the Mondriaan Fund.

Further information and video’s about the project can be found on Dukeupress and on Vimeo
And here is a review.

NLCuts_Nettime_Spectre

Amsterdam, 17 June 2011

Re: New cultural policy in the Netherlands and the future of Open, Cahier on Art & the Public Domain

Dear friends of Open,

The recent announcement that governmental funding of SKOR | Foundation for Art and Public Domain will be stopped by 2013 means that the existence of Open, as a project of SKOR, is also threatened!

On 10 June, the Dutch Secretary of State for Culture Halbe Zijlstra (VVD) presented the new cultural policy and the measures that are to be implemented in this regard. Under the pretext of economizing, an unprecedented intervention in the Dutch cultural system is being perpetrated. This above all seems to be an ideological modification of a social-liberal cultural policy into one that is neoliberal and populist. The extreme extent of the cutbacks (more than 30% for the visual arts!), the rapidity with which these must be implemented and the radical choices that have been made (whereby the Secretary of State has completely ignored the advice of the Netherlands Arts Council) would appear to confirm this. The new concept for art and culture is primarily aimed at efficiency, market processes and large audience reach.

In the visual arts, not only are fusions being forced and budgets cut in half, but governmental funding of various renowned institutions is being completely stopped. This is not just the fate of SKOR, but also that of the Netherlands Institute for Media Art (NIMK), Manifesta, the Rijksacademie, Jan van Eyck, De Ateliers and six of the eleven prestigious Dutch exhibition institutes. Art journals and magazines will no longer be subsidized.

Open is a groundbreaking SKOR project with an independent editorial team. It is published by NAi Publishers in collaboration with SKOR, and since 2004 has been an esteemed international platform for experimental and interdisciplinary thought on art, culture and the public domain. Open publishes profound, in-depth essays and is not aimed at a wide audience. It is not profitable and has but a small market. It is unique and invaluable. How Open can possibly manage to survive without SKOR in the current neoliberal and populist Dutch climate and its denuded cultural landscape is difficult to imagine right now…

Your declaration of support is urgently needed, and SKOR and Open are calling on you to make a stand against the present, fatal developments. We ask you to sign the digital petitions below before 20 June. And please, forward the petitions within your network!

On 27 June, the new cultural policy plan will be discussed in the Lower House. We will keep you informed.

Kind regards,

Jorinde Seijdel & Liesbeth Melis
Editor in Chief and Editor of Open, Cahier on Art & the Public Domain

Petition SKOR

General petition against the cutbacks in the arts

Relevant links
- Slash & Burn, blog Sven Lütticken (English)
- Platform Dutch art organizations
- Letter by united Dutch art organizations to Halbe Zijlstra (English)

Dear Mr Zijlstra
Dear Members of the House of Representatives

One of the many decisions in your arts policy paper “More than quality; a new vision on arts policy”, is the liquidation of the total infrastructure for new media and art. The media arts & technology sector, which has acquired a place in arts policy in the past 8 years, has been abolished. The socalled ‘development institutions’: STEIM, Waag Society, V2_, Submarine Channel, WORM and Mediamatic are losing their structural funding. In addition to that the Netherlands Media Art Institute, a visual arts institution which also works in the media arts field, loses its government funding. These structural institutional resources will be rerouted into a new Fund for the Creative Industry, which’s mission is to stimulate the social and economic value of the creative industry as a whole.

New media art is an independent art discipline
The existance of new media as an independent art discipline, including artistic production, audiences, (inter)national networks, and events, is completely denied in this proposed new arts policy.

New media art is a discipline which questions and researches the technological developments and challenges of our times, and designs new applications for these issues. It has its own idiom and art practice. It is an independent discipline sustaining independent thematics, international networks of media labs, festivals, publications and presentations. The Dutch model of these cooperating new media labs with crossovers into other fields (social, educational, economical) has been an exemplary model since years. The above mentioned ‘development institutions’ are internationally renowned, part of vast international networks, and contribute to the position of the Netherlands in the fields of new media and art.

Paradox: punished for success
Like no other arts field, new media art makes connections to other fields. Its R&D functions are relevant towards the total field of culture, as well as heritage and media. Exchange with science is continually growing, it plays a vital role in the innovation of social domains, and has a large impact on the current renewal of education. The paradox now is that new media art is widely acknowledged and seen as very relevant, but its source: artistic research including its audience outreach, autonomous art prodcution and international network, will now be discontinued.

Project based vs structural
The policy paper indicates a choice for a project based way of working, and for that reason a total cut in institutional funding for R&D. This is a very remarkable way of reasoning as R&D activities need long term commitment in order to be able to develop from experiment to result. It also requires excellent networking and a sustainable infrastructure, including complex relationships to social fields, business and science. The new media institutions like no other have paved the way for such cooperations, and have shown that arts, sciences, business and society in general can work together in meaningful coalitions. International cooperations that have been openend up to Dutch partners also exist thanks to long term policy. With the abolishment of structural support of these new media art institutions, the basis is washed away and it will be impossible in the future to enter into long term commitments. Like European funding for and participation in research and projects, and participation in national research programmes.
A project based way of working interferes with continuity.

Talent development
The new Fund for the Creative Industry is also supposed to work on talent development in a project based manner. This is contrary to the needs of the educational field where there is a demand for structural connections. The new media and art institutions have acknowledged that and play an important role in development of talent and skills through the programmes they have set up together with vocational institutions and universities. They also offer internships and work with PHD students. The very same sustainable long term structures are necessary here in order to be able to structurally work within education.

The way the Fund for the Creative Industry should work!

New media art can only contribute to the mission of enlarging the social and economic value of the creative industry, in case the Fund is enabled to:
(1) issue longer term institutional subsidies and
(2) means are explicitely made available for artistic research, artistic production and audience based activities

We sincerely hope that you will involve the new media and art institutions in the set up and creation of the new Fund, and that the above arguments will lead to the desired adjustments. We will be more than happy to share our views with you, as well as the knowledge that we have in the area of international new media arts policy.

Yours sincerely,

V2_
Waag Society
STEIM
Mediamatic
WORM
Submarine Channel
NIMk

International comment:

New Media Art Organisations in Netherlands lose funding.

The Dutch New Media Art Organisations Steim, Waag Society, Mediamatic, V2_, WORM & NIMK are about to lose all their funding.

The Dutch secretary of state for Culture in the Netherlands, Halbe Zijlstra, has published his policy plan for coming years. In contrast to the official recommendations given to him by the Culture Advisory Board, the cutbacks will not be spread out over a number of years, but will take immediate effect in 2013. The budget for visual art will shrink from 53,3 to 31 million.

Among the more damaging and destructive decisions is the complete cutting of funding for the six leading New Media Art Organisations that produce, distribute and facilitate New Media Art;

STEIM: A research lab and a hotspot that operates in the field of live performance. Its research themes are complexity and improvisation and STEIM facilitates hundreds of artists and scientists every year.

WAAG SOCIETY: Institute for art, science & technology, developers of creative technologies for social innovation, open design tools and platforms for artists and creative industry. Public programme with workshops, conferences, exhibits and challenges. Partner in (inter)national research programmes and incubation programmes.

WORM: Rotterdam based laboratory, venue and studios for film, music and internet featuring concerts, new media events, screenings, production of film, music and software art.

MEDIAMATIC: software art projects, lectures, workshops & screenings aiming on the young generation of artists, designers & tinkerers.

V2_: interdisciplinary centre for art and media technology in Rotterdam, activities include research and development, and organizing presentations, exhibitions and workshops, research and development, embedded in an extensive international network.

NIMK: The Netherlands Media Art Institute (NIMk) promotes the wide and unrestrained development, application and distribution of, and reflection on, new technologies within the visual arts. Since the Netherlands Media Art Institute came into being in 1978 an extensive collection of video and media art has been assembled, to which new works are constantly being added.

These institutes together form the foundation for New Media Arts in the Netherlands and fulfil an important role in the International Network that shares knowledge, exchanges, produces, distributes and promotes various forms of New Media Art. For most of these organisations the budget cuts will mean their disappearance.

The memorandum announced by the Secretary of State today does not signal a new beginning, as he indicated earlier, but simply the end of an internationally valued cultural climate, unparalleled anywhere in the world.

For Thorbecke – the spiritual father of the Secretary of State Zijlstra, or at least of his party – the policy was the result of a long-term vision. He saw the political manager as the designer of the age, who interprets historical lines and develops a vision for the future on that basis. Compared with his predecessor, the measures proposed by the Secretary of State pale into insignificance. They choose short-term results which do not take into account historically acquired benefits and social developments.

One prominent Dutch collector called the Secretary of State’s memorandum a new “iconoclasm”. This comparison is striking and appropriate. The field of the “visual arts” is crippled in and by this memorandum, with fatal consequences for the public.

We live in a culture of images. Knowledge and information mainly circulate in the form of images. Art, and the visual arts in particular, are the perfect field for teaching us to deal with things we do not yet know and providing us with unexpected visions and horizons. The visual arts relate in a self-conscious and critical way to the ubiquitous image. Therefore it is incomprehensible for a government which wants to prepare its citizens for a promising future to decide to remove the part of the social system which guides the public in this respect. The extremely hard approach adopted in relation to the sector of the visual arts (a reduction from 53.5 million to 31 million) is not supported in this memorandum by either logical or factual arguments.

Amongst other things, the Secretary of State has decided:

- to halve the budget of the Mondriaan fund;

- to drastically reduce the number of presentation institutions in the BIS from 11 to 6. The institutions which are no longer in the BIS cannot go to the Mondriaan fund either, and therefore have no chance of survival;

- to no longer provide any subsidy for art magazines;

- to put a complete stop to the government subsidy for functions which are now carried out by biennial Manifesta, SKOR | Stichting Kunst en Openbare Ruimte (Foundation for Art in Public Spaces), the sectoral institute Premsela, Virtual Platform, the Netherlands Media Art Institute (NIMk);

- to put a stop to financing post-academic education for artists in the Ateliers, Rijksakademie voor beeldende kunsten (Royal Academy for Visual Arts), European Ceramic Work Centre and the Jan van Eyck Academy;
to only support the continued development of 50 visual artists who have proved themselves as top talents in the next four years;

- to halve the individual basic stipends and working grants for artists, and to COMPLETELY stop the present subsidies which serve to provide an income.

The direct and immediate effects of these measures for the PUBLIC which wants to see and experience contemporary art are catastrophic:

The makers, producers and artists form the basis of the cultural infrastructure. After all, with no artists, there is no art. No subsidies or insufficient subsidies for artists to focus professionally and full time on creating work means that there will be no innovative work.

No post-academic education means there will be no growth of new artists who excel and can represent the Netherlands abroad. Removing this function will immediately lead to a reduction in the provision of Dutch presentation institutions, so that the Netherlands will lose its competitive position. This will result in the total impoverishment of the art market in the Netherlands and to a weaker position of the Dutch galleries on the international art market.

A minimal number of presentation institutions means that the new art will not find its way to the public and will remain locked up in studios and warehouses. The Dutch and international public in the Netherlands will not be able to see any innovative art.

Removing an institution such as SKOR means that the presence of art in public spaces – democratic and by definition “anti-elitist”, because it is accessible to everyone free of charge – will decline.

Closing an institution such as NIMk means that a valuable, partly digital heritage – video art and film art and media art – will become fragmented and will no longer be accessible to the public.

The innovative part of the field of the visual arts, which also determines the international image of the creative Netherlands, cannot survive without a financial injection from the state.

The current cultural system which was definitively torpedoed today has produced artists and curators who are currently making an international furore and are, amongst other things, a focal point in the current biennale in Venice – the world championships of the visual art

For example, the work of Navid Nuur has pride of place on the front cover of the official catalogue of the Venice Biennale. Like Amalia Pica, who lives in the Netherlands, he is taking part in the central exhibition Illuminations. Their colleagues, Praneet Soi, Yael Bartana, Wendelien van Oldenborgh, Han Hoogerbrugge, Aernout Mik, Libia Castro, Olafur Olafsson, Edwin Driessens and Maria Verstappen, play a major role in the pavilions of India, Poland, Denmark, Roma, Iceland and Dropstuff respectively. The Dutchman Guido van der Werve can be seen at the same time in the context of the Future Generation exhibition, where the Ukrainian Victor Pynchuck is showing the way to the talent of the future. It is not only Dutch artists who are a glittering presence in Venice this year; their fellow curators are also prominently present. No fewer than five curators working in the Netherlands are furnishing pavilions this year. The Marres director, Guus Beumer, is responsible for the Dutch pavilion, the BAK director Maria Hlavajova is doing the Roma Pavilion, the freelancer Maria Rus Bojan is doing the Romanian pavilion, the SKOR director, Fulya Erdemci, is doing the Turkish pavilion and the Appel tutor, Henk Slager is doing the Georgian Pavilion.

The achievement of these artists and curators were made possible due to the existence of a cultural system which has cherished experimentation, innovation, the development of talents and an international focus up to now, and made it possible (financially). They were able to develop their work and their practice due to investments by the state of the Netherlands. These investments are now bearing fruit and showing results in an “export product” of which the Netherlands can be proud. This system is recognized and celebrated all over the world because of its efficiency and future-oriented approach.

The Secretary of State’s memorandum shows that the cabinet is thinking only of what is producing immediate results today, and not about what can generate “value for the future”. We all know that there is not only a today, but also a tomorrow. We would like to see that in tomorrow’s Netherlands there will be still be a great deal of contemporary art and historical heritage which can be seen frequently. We hope that the Lower House shares this desire and will oppose a policy that looks only at today.

The boards of directors, managements and representatives of:
De Zaak Nu – on behalf of the presentation institutions
SKOR | Stichting Kunst en Openbare Ruimte (Foundation for Art in Public Spaces)
NIMk – Nederlands Instituut voor Mediakunst (Netherlands Media Art Institute)
The post-academic institutions – de Ateliers, Rijksakademie and the Jan van Ecyk Academy
The collector Martijn Sanders and the patrons Maurice van Vaalen and Rob Defares
The artists’ action group, ‘Schuilen in het Rijks’

We Are Forests is a new participatory sound work that used everyday and emergent mobile technologies to ask, ‘What would you whisper into a stranger’s ear’? The project resulted in a sound work that used mobile technologies to create a shared yet intimate connection between strangers in physical space.

The project was developed through a shared residency, supported by Pervasive Media Studio, Netherlands Media Arts Institute (Amsterdam, NL), 5daysoff festival (Amsterdam, NL) and Kitchen Budapest (HU).

Duncan Speakman and Émilie Grenier used their cross-European shared residency to develop We Are Forests, a sound work that used mobile technologies to create connections between strangers.

As part of their residency, Duncan and Émilie kept a blog to document the progress of their project over the course of 3 months. From initial experiments to final tests, the blog provides insights into the development of the project, and the varied methods techniques and methods employed by both artists in their practise.

Émilie Grenier is a Canadian artist who uses technology to produce sound experiences that encourages users and audiences to focus on their surroundings. Duncan Speakman is internationally recognised sound artist who has created a number of works that physically and emotionally engage audiences in public spaces. Both artists have previously collaborated on the creation of subtlemob, a series of soundwalks that created filmic experiences for audiences in public spaces.

Related Links:
We Are Forests

Arjan Scherpenisse

Arnolfini, Bristol, United Kingdom

Fun with Software looks at the history of software, and its relation to humour and fun. Making and using software can be experimental, humorous, and eventful. Alongside today’s rather dull use of forms, databases, schedules and processors, an element of fun has informed and guided the development of software from its beginnings. A good example of this is Love Letter Generator, conceived in the 1950s by one of the first programmers, Christopher Strachey, working with Alan Turing at Manchester University on one of the first computers, and reconstructed in this exhibition by David Link. This exhibition follows the development of software over the last 50 years through playful experimentation and art.

Fun with Software has been curated by Olga Goriunova, Senior Lecturer in Media Practices at London Metropolitan University.
Produced by aaaan.net. Love Letters_1.0 by David Link is produced by Kunststiftung NRW.  Part of Arnolfini’s Old Media season of exhibitions, films and performance, investigating redundant technologies and their cultural and political relationship to their time.  Fun with Software will have further presentations at MU, Eindhoven, Netherlands 12 Nov 2010 – 4 Jan 2011 and Hartware MedienKunstVerein, Dortmund, Germany.

Artists
David Link, LoveLetters_1.0 MCU=Resurrection (2009)

Erik Thiele, Tempest for Eliza (2001)

Christoph Haag, Martin Rumori, Franziska Windisch & Ludwig Zeller: OSK, Offenes Schaltkreis (Open Circuit) (2006-2010)

Alexei Shulgin & Victor Laskin, WIMP (2003)

Graham Harwood, London.P1 (2002)

JODI, All Wrongs Reserved ©1982 (2004)

Runme.org archive (2003)

Making and using what has become known as software is experimental, humorous, and eventful. However improbable it might sound for today’s all encompassing dullness of forms, databases, and routines, “fun” has informed and guided the development of software from its very inception.

Fun in software means non-obvious purpose, jolly experiment as an alteration to a way of thinking, modifications dealing with the glitchy nature of human-machine ensembles, and, more generally, a rupture with stratified mundanity. “Fun” is a concept that makes palpable the driving force of curiosity, dissatisfaction, experiment, achievement, laugh and sharing, that triggers forms of engagement with software to produce something different. Such fun is a means of multiplication of meaning in software which is only supposed to have one, useful, meaning or to be solely serious.

With a start in the early 1950s, when one of the first programmers, Christopher Strachey worked together with Alan Turing in Manchester University on one of the first computers, to write a Love Letter Generator (reconstructed in this exhibition by David Link), software proceeded through development for absurd uses. The 1960s were marked by the first generation of hackers feeding their lifetime into mainframe machines in the universities, brilliantly exploring and misusing technology, or coding the first computer games, like Pong. The 1970s and especially the 1980s brought about “democratic” programming languages, first home computers, video game consoles and networks, giving rise to a wider “hackerization” of youth, to people “doing strange things with software”. The rise of net art and the changes the Internet and desktop computers brought to culture gave rise to software art at the turn of the millennia. Performed by amateurs, artists, alternative coders or professional programmers for “fun”, software art as an aesthetic practice that questions, tangles and experiments  with the materiality of software, has subsequently lost its visibility again,  as attention is turned to the social networks and software applications for third generation mobile phones, which all harness the energies constitutive of aesthetic software. It is precisely for this reason that “fun” needs to be re-appropriated with its conceptual richness being reconstructed, historically documented and defended.

Looking for fun in software allows for a few views to be explored simultaneously.

First, software as a backbone of societal structures can be taken out of its “remote” professional and industrial pocket to be looked at as an open field of practice guided by irony and experiment. Here, a joke by a mathematical genius, an anonymous or non-artistic “art” piece reside side by side with conceptual software, and aesthetic experimentation with interface, hardware or network. How fun is made depends directly on its subject: coder, anonymous prankster, teenager or office worker all make fun differently, but however become linked through the process.

So, secondly, a question arises of who in fact develops software? Guys that learned Perl rather than played football with their teenage peers or corporate designers thinking of new interfaces, interactions and needs? Who does software art? Professionals in their spare time, artists learning while they are making or some amateur programmers? Here, amateur becomes professional through close engagement with material and professional becomes amateur through making fun.

Further on, fun in software allows for a bringing down high-art boundaries by looking at a history of “folklore” source of software, in the richness of jokes played on colleagues, fake viruses and hidden features of software that traveled around the globe. It problematises the site, the subject, process and purpose of software development and applications as they leap historically between university computer labs, libraries, bedrooms, studios, kitchens and various devices.

Fun is far from detaching software from political or social interrogability, it is rather a force and a method that works on complicating the normal, the serious and the dominant. Fun is hooligan, DIY, and full of interesting seams. Fun may be angry, tired or even desperate. It can be sleek, kitschy, or pop, but it does not equal entertainment (though is not afraid of it). Fun in software is a way to construct and recognize the complexity of conditioning and digression software is embedded in between art, folklore, industry, and university. It is about breaking from systems of constraints in a way that produce richness and abundance of kinds.  Its joy elaborates on  systems in unpredictable manners. It is a way to re-address software, as an invisible universal culture, in its aesthetics, commercialization, and ontology.

27 November, 10:00 – 15:30

Location: Baltan Laboratories
Torenallee 45, SWA Building, 8th floor
5617 BA Eindhoven
The Netherlands

Contrary to the belief that software is a very serious issue, a battlefield of big business interest and freedom fighters, and a field guided by rationality and formalisation, it is actually an area of practice and thinking that often advances through random acts, absurd use, jokes and curiosity.

International speakers argued that art, and in particular software art, plays a crucial role in the production of the world, undermining the seeming solidity of the infrastructural backbone of our society and opening it up for intervention and reinvention. The conference also explored the issue of fun and the potential of the humour in software art. What is humour after all? Is it in fact an artistic and critical attitude to reality?

PROGRAMME

10:00 Olga Goriunova, Introduction, ‘Fun and Software’

10.20 Matthew Fuller, ‘Always One Bit More, Computing and the Experience of Ambiguity’

10.50 Michael Murtaugh, ‘Do Repeat Yourself’

11.20-11.50 coffee break

11.50 Simon Yuill, ‘Bend Sinister: Détournement and Normative Effect in Notational Production’

12.20 Wilfried Hou Je Bek, ‘Software Is Fun & Programmers Are Clowns‘

12.50-14.00 Lunch

14.00 Wendy Chun and Andrew Lison, ‘So Fun It’s Not…’

14.30 Andrew Goffey, ‘A Little Play, a Little Humour: Escaping From the Unreasonable Exactness of Algorithms’

15.00-16.00 Drinks, Baltan Laboratories

18.00-18.30 Funware exhibition tour

BIOGRAPHIES

Wendy Chun

Wendy Chun is Professor of Modern Culture and Media at Brown University. She has studied both Systems Design Engineering and English Literature, which she combines and mutates in her current work on digital media. She is author of Control and Freedom: Power and Paranoia in the Age of Fiber Optics (MIT, 2006), Programmed Visions: Software and Memory (forthcoming MIT 2010), and she is currently working on a monograph entitled Imagined Networks. Most generally, her scholarly work investigates the relationship between cultural formations and technological artifacts, between theoretical concepts in the humanistic and technological disciplines, and between popular perceptions of technology and technological protocols. Situated mainly in the field of new media studies, her larger projects have been driven by questions such as: What is the impact of control technologies on mass media? What made the Internet, a communications network that had existed for years, a “new” or “exceptional” medium in the mid-1990s? How does the concept of “memory” cut across computational, biological and humanistic fields?

Matthew Fuller

Matthew Fuller is David Gee Reader in Digital Media at the Centre for Cultural Studies, Goldsmiths College, University of London. He is the author of various books, including Media Ecologies: Materialist Energies in Art and Technoculture (MIT Press, 2005) and Behind the Blip: Essays on the Culture of Software (Autonomedia, 2003) and the forthcoming Elephant & Castle.  With Usman Haque, he is co-author of Urban Versioning System v1.0 and with Andrew Goffey, co-author of the forthcoming Evil Media. Editor of Software Studies, a lexicon (MIT Press, 2008), and co-editor of the new Software Studies series from MIT Press. Fuller is also involved in a number of projects in art, media and software, among others with: I/O/D, Mongrel, Mediashed and Runme.org.

Andrew Goffey

Andrew Goffey is Senior Lecturer in Media, Culture and Communications at Middlesex University. He writes about issues crossing the domains of philosophy, science and culture. He is the co-author (with Matthew Fuller) of Evil Media (forthcoming) and is currently working on a monograph on the politics of software. He has published essays on a range of topics, including immunology and sophistry, and has also translated work by Eric Alliez, Barbara Cassin and Isabelle Stengers.

Olga Goriunova

Olga Goriunova is a Senior Lecturer in Media Practice at London Metropolitan University, where she is Programme Leader for the BA “Digital Media” in the Department of Applied Social Sciences. She has been involved in the field of software art, organizing a series of festivals, conferences and online projects that profoundly contributed to the shaping of the field.  Dr. Goriunova has edited four volumes on software art and cultures related to the Runme.org repository and Readme Festivals, such as Software art plays (ROSIZO, Moscow, 2002), Readme Reader. About Software Art (NIFCA Publication 25, Helsinki, 2003), Readme Edition 2004. Software Art and Cultures (University of Aarhus, Aarhus, 2004), Readme 100 Temporary Software Art Factory (Hartware MedienKunstVerein, Dortmund, 2006).  She is an author of Art Platforms and Cultural Production on the Internet (Routledge, 2011) and the curator of Funware exhibition (Arnolfini, Bristol, UK September-November 2010; MU and Baltan, Eindhoven, The Netherlands, November 2010–January 2011 and Hartware MedienKunstVerein, spring 2011).

Wilfried Hou Je Bek

Wilfried Hou Je Bek uses algorithms to design psycho-geographic walks through cities and other areas. The geographic and psychological output is visualized with the help of simple software. Wilfried is a ‘culture hacker’ who develops generative psychogeography. Inspired by concepts of drift (dérive) from Romanticism and, later, the Situationists around Guy Debord, Wilfried uses algorithmic routes to explore a city in non-intuitive ways. Houkebek organizes dérives, where people walk through a city by taking computer code as a guideline, using the body as a means to perform software. Recent commissions include work for the city of Dordrecht, Psy Geo Conflux (New York), the PixelACHEfestival (Helsinki), RAM5 (Riga), Urban Festival (Zagreb), Urban Drift (Berlin), Impakt (Utrecht), Stedelijk Museem (Amsterdam), V2_ (Rotterdam). In 2004 he won the Transmediale software art prize for .walk, a futuristic project for open space that transforms cities into computers.

Andrew Lison

Andrew Lison is an Andrew W. Mellon Graduate Fellow in Modern Culture and Media at Brown University. His work is situated around the intersection of technology, aesthetics, and politics, with an emphasis on digital media, popular music and subcultures, and avant-garde cinema. His articles include, “Postmodern Protest? Minimal Techno and Multitude.” Forthcoming in Timothy S. Brown and Lorena Anton, eds., Between the Avant Garde and the Everyday: Subversive Politics in Europe 1958-2008. Series on Social Protest and Cultures of Dissent in the 20th Century (2010, Berghahn Books). He is currently co-editing a collected volume with Timothy S. Brown entitled “Sounds and Visions: Music, Counterculture and the Global 1968″.

Adrian Mackenzie

Adrian Mackenzie is interested in the lives of data, especially in databases but also in data analysis, modelling and ‘analytics.’ At the moment, he is focusing on data as a way of thinking about ‘BioIT convergences’ across biological engineering, DNA synthesis and sequencing, clinical and research databases and visualization technologies. He’s looking at changes in the work, productivity and situation of life scientists, and on the transformations in technique, knowledge and products associated with bio-IT related developments. The wider stakes here includes the nature of promise, design, value, speculation, subjectivity and imagination in knowledge economies. He has written many articles and books among others: Transductions: Bodies and Machines at Speed (London: Continuum, 2002), Cutting Code: Software and Sociality (New York: Peter Lang, 2006), and Wirelessness: Radical Network Empiricism (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2010).

Michael Murtaugh

Michael Murtaugh is instructor for the technical course of the Networked Media Master of the Piet Zwart Institute in Rotterdam. He completed his undergraduate degree in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1994). And was part of the Interactive Cinema group, led by Glorianna Davenport at the MIT Media Lab where he received his masters degree (1996). His media lab research focused on designing systems that guide viewers through collections of inter-related material. Applied to a specific story’s content, these “storytelling systems” act as “editors in software,” making sequencing decisions on the fly based on viewer preferences or activity. In addition to teaching, Murtaugh writes occasionally on the topic of software and he is also a member of the Brussels collective Constant.

Simon Yuill

Simon Yuill is an artist and programmer based in Glasgow, Scotland. His work explores aspects of social process and formation in projects, which draw on a variety of approaches ranging from those of Free Open Source Software and hacker culture, to public workshops and discussion events. He has written on aspects of Free Software, ‘notational production’ and cultural praxis and has contributed to publications such as Software Studies (MIT Press, 2008), the FLOSS and Art Reader (GOTO10 and Folly, 2008) and MUTE magazine. He is project director of Spring_Alpha (2004) and Social Versioning System (SVS) projects. He has helped setup and run a number of hacklab and free media labs in Scotland including the Chateau Institute of Technology (ChIT) and Electron Club, as well as the Glasgow branch of OpenLab. His current projects are focused around relationships between land, law and social structures.

Curator: Olga Goriunova
Production: aaaan.net
Supported by: VSBfonds, SNS Reaal, London Metropolitan University & STRP Festival

In addition the international touring exhibition Funware is on view in MU from 12 November till 16 January.
www.baltanlaboratories.org
www.mu.nl

By Lisa Baldini on Wednesday, November 3rd, 2010

Humor, fun and nonsense often figure greatly in the current modes of communication on the web, whereby memes and sardonic blog comments are commonplace — if not expected. Such trappings have found their way into media art practices from Cory Arcangel’s cover of Arnold Schoenberg’s op.11 Drie Klavierstucke using cat videos on YouTube to F.A.T. Lab’s Kanye West Interrupt bookmarklet. The question that these works and others like it raises is this: does humor appear to be a synergistic outgrowth of technology (and how does it relate to its development)?

In the latest exhibition “Fun with Software” at Bristol’s Arnolfini, curator Olga Goriunova seeks to document and explore how humorous approaches to software lead to innovation. Working with early net and media artists from JODI to Graham Harwood, the exhibition is a retrospective of peculiar approaches to computation. I sat down with Goriunova to talk about the show’s premise and how that premise contextualizes and contrasts the current era of humor and technology.

A great deal of media art has gone the way of social media, mining memes for cultural critique. Why do you think humor seems so endemic to technology and community? Does this at all translate to computation and software cultures?

The concept of meme is an interesting one. On the one hand, it doesn’t exist, but on the other hand, the concept fills some void in the drive to understand and explain how network culture works, and is being widely, and successfully, used. In my opinion, a meme is about repetition, imitation. If we are to use a Nietzschean eternal return and the interpretation of it in Deleuze’s Difference and Repetition, there are three kinds of return: a repetition of habit (almost physical), a repetition of memory and a third (ontological repetition) that undoes the previous two. The third repetition is about passing an “exam” of becoming: only the excessive, powerful, or different can indeed return, become. The third repetition is a “pure act of difference”. Here, meme concerns the first two kinds of repetition, whereas the “fun” that interests me, is about the third one, the eternal return.

This is not to say that the first two are uninteresting, and meme seems to be able to reveal something about the ways in which digital culture operates, the stages creative production might be going through, the aesthetics about to become.

What I am interested in with this exhibition is to show, to put it crudely, that freaks run the world. It is about people inventing codes, usages, concepts, computer functions and a variety of things that change the world through a joke, through absurd acts, through unnecessary and un-pragmatic thriving for a difference.

There is a lot of artist work in the show, but also a number of projects that are done as a ‘geeky’ thing in a context radically different to art, such as Erik Thiele’s Tempest for Eliza, for instance. It is a project done by a programmer “for fun” and the author was never interested in presenting it in the art scene. The project comments on TEMPEST – a secret service term coined in the 1970s to refer to the usage and the defense against the so-called ‘compromising emissions’. Such emissions are electromagnetic waves that are emitted by every electronic device, including, for instance, a computer monitor, and which could be intercepted in order for the data displayed on the monitor to be reconstructed. Thiele makes his monitor display black and white stripes of different width, which ‘play’ For Eliza and other musical compositions on the radio that catches the radio waves emitted. It is an artistically brilliant piece of work. Being a statement within a particular programmer’s culture, almost folklore, it has the precision of the greatest work of art without any pretense.

Such moments of pure difference, where fun is the absurd, the non-pragmatic, experimental act that produces a change and gives birth to a new way of making things which the academy, industry, art and design practices, cultures then follow drive the pathos of this show.

You’ve previously relayed that there was a conscious decision to focus on the “non-industrial, non-professional, non-commercial, or non-academic character” in exploring computation and software cultures. Can you explain why you’ve chosen to focus on “fun”?

I’ve partly talked about what I mean by “fun” above. It may not be the best term to describe that free exploratory drive that is linked to pleasure, humor, and randomness, but there also seems to be no better one. For me, humor is not so much about affect. Humor and fun link to the registers of becoming of something new and thrilling. Such newness can and often is used as an innovation later on, but its ways of engendering are of a different order to what business interests try to stage now through “encouraging creativity and innovation.”

Such humor, and laughing, are more akin to a Nietzschean “nobleness of being capable of follies,” discussed in The Gay Science. It is in his “the gods are dead but they died from laughing” that an answer to such laughter lies. It is a laughter that changes the ontological status of reality with audacity, folly and nobleness.

Such fun is not a banal giggling, but an inquiry into the unknown, which takes its path through the unserious, which means a lack of grandeur. The pathos of such inquiry is not the one of the feat of Captain Gastello, or Mendeleev’s day and night amplification of thinking that made him dream the periodic table, but one of a small try, however laborious and precise it can be. The act of such humor is serene and sincere, and exact, but of a modality different to the one we’re used to in the rhetoric of either invention or progress. A breakthrough achieved through such laughter is not loud, but its profoundness can’t be underestimated.

Can you explain how this peculiar approach is illustrated in some of the works in the show?

A lot of projects in the show use equipment for purposes not intended by the manufacturers and invent ways in which both software and hardware can exhibit various versions of their materiality by blowing up the habitual and the dominant ones. Here, we have a reference to the digital folklore of the 1990s – with WIMP by Alexei Shulgin and Victor Laskin, and the two classics of software art: Auto-Illustrator by Adrian Wardand I/O/D/ 4: The Web Stalker by I/O/D.

WIMP gathers its inspiration from small virus-like prank programs of the 1990s, which would flip the desktop upside down, shake icons, change interface colors, let all desktop folders drop down and fill the screen with dozens of pop-up windows. Such jokes were necessary at times when Windows “blue screen of death” (error screen displayed upon encountering a problem that makes the operating system “crash”) was a relatively normal state of a computer. It is also a VJ tool that uses elements of Windows graphical user interface (GUI) as its sole source of visual material. WIMP does not only accompany sound; it critically comments on the aesthetic dominance of the visual elements which became the core of GUI, in fact, for rather random reasons.

The “inappropriate uses of software” strand is continued by a well-known deconstruction of a race game R/C STORY by Retroyou. It is done by only changing the pieces of code made available to gamers by the manufacturers, which explodes the game, making it into a non-functioning, abstract and absurd 3-D environment in which one can attempt some action but would most [likely] end up flying into open sky.

There is, then, a lot to be said in a “hacker” ethos in many of the works. You cite how the 1980s brought about the “‘hackerization’ of youth” culture; can you explain this notion, and why it’s so important for the context of the show?

There is, of course, a heated debate trying to establish the pristine meanings of the terms geek and hacker. For Christopher Kelty, geeks form a “recursive public” that comes into being through a shared practice of taking care of the technical means that bring the public together. There are imagination, a moral responsibility, and technical structures that are central to such understanding of a geek. I won’t even go into the accounts of a hacker.

What I meant by “hackerization of youth” in the 80s is much more small-scale, unformed and naive. Kelty specifically talks about “geeks” as being those that are “not the ones that play with technology of any sort”, not “script kiddies.” My geeks, or hackers, are maybe indeed script kiddies, are more of Guattarian “machinic junkies.”

These are the people that were the first generation of teenagers to spend their life in front of the first home computers of late 1970s and 1980s, which, to borrow the words of the founder of Micromusic, an 8-bit music community, had to “defend themselves for spending time with computers”. Carl says, “A lot of people laughed at you and thought you were weird. I can remember fighting with my father about the television set. He wanted to watch the news but I needed it as a monitor so that I could write my programs in Basic.” DRX (from Micromusic) [relays], “That was maybe the first generation, sitting in front of the TV screens in attempting to create musical tracks ‘that would have been as cool as in Arkanoid’.” (Quotations from Baumgartel, Net.Art 2.0).

Early demo and tracker communities are not represented in the show, but JODI are re-doing their Jet Set Willy Variations on Sinclair ZX Spectrum, JET SET WILLY the making of, for the exhibition version in Eindhoven. The Bristol version of the show includes their film All Wrongs Reversed © 1982. It is a recording of JODI programming Sinclair ZX Spectrum to produce graphics. The performance is captured off the TV screen. You first see ZX Spectrum being loaded from tape; then, a program runs, producing very formalist, distinctively JODI-ist graphics which is altered in real-time by changing variables in code that is displayed along, through and with the graphics. It is rather straightforward if you can follow Sinclair Basic (and even if you can’t), but not at all “simple”. JODI go along the boundary of what was offered as a platform for home entertainment in the 1980s (for which entertainment purposes was the command “flash” included in Sinclair Basic?), and deconstruct, remind, reveal, and create the language that is used up to day.

Do you think we are working towards a generation of coders?

No, we are working away from it; from a certain understanding of it, at least. In a way, this show is about things that are over. Net art and software art aesthetics is now being re-used in applications running on iPhone[s], and 90% of what populates such spaces utilizes digital aesthetics developed in the 1990s.

We have two works that engage predominantly with the contemporary developments: the wowPod sculpture by Electroboutique and Satromiser by Jon Satrom and Ben Syverson. Satromiser is an application that will be presented on iPad, and it reflects on the role that software art played in destabilizing the ‘boredom’ of software to the degree, by which contemporary software aesthetics is updated to include various kinds of “anti-boredom” – made entertainment – into its core. wowPod is a gigantic distorted iPhone that is fully functioning and is able to display its normal content in a manner stylistically aligned with its physical shape. The “idiotic” fleur of this project is a very important aspect of fun, which is not afraid of the falsehood and of primitiveness as a mode of exploration.

Lisa Baldini is an international curator, writer and new media practitioner based in New York, specializing in media, sound and process-based art. Presently, she is an adviser to GOLDEN Gallery in Chicago. Her independent projects have included exploring the critical relations between aural/oral cultures and technology through the likes of open source media and performance. In addition, she is the founding curator of the open source curatorial series Power and a founding member of the MAIM Collective.

EXPERIENCE

2009 – present

Co-founder aan @ aaaan.net (with Annette Wolfsberger).

2012

Initiator, curator International working conference Collecting and Presenting Born-Digital Art. A matter of translation and (historical) knowledge. for Baltan Laboratories in collaboration with Van Abbemuseum, Eindhoven, 14-15 December.

Tutor Piet Zwart Institute 2012-2013.

Co-curator Paraphrasing Babel. Video and Sound Art About Language in Public Space, in Maastricht and Heerlen, 19 October – 18 November.

Project Coordinator Planet M @ Lowlands 16-20 July.

Lecturer Theme project Archive and Memory, Piet Zwart Academy Rotterdam, January – April.

2011

Lecturer New Media @ Rietveld Academy Amsterdam, Arts Department, October.

2010 – 2012

Webcurator at SKOR (foundation for art and public domain) Amsterdam.

2009 – 2012

Coordinator Artist in Residence, NIMk (with Annette Wolfsberger).

2010 – 2011

Executive producer Funware, travelling software exhibition curated by Olga Goriunova: MU & Baltan Laboratories, Eindhoven; Arnolfini, Bristol (with Annette Wolfsberger).

2009 and 2010

Supervisor Masterclass Mediafonds/Sandberg, Amsterdam (with Martijn de Waal).

2008 – 2010

Programme Manager Virtueel Platform, Amsterdam.

2000 – 2008

Curator Netherlands Media Art Institute, Montevideo, Amsterdam. Since 2005 head of Exhibition, Artlab, Education and member of Staff.

1999 – 2008

Curator Impakt Online, Utrecht.

2005 – 2006

Artistic Director Virma (Virtual Institute for Research in Media Art Amsterdam; a collaboration between Paradiso, De Waag Society for Old and New Media, De Balie, Steim and Netherlands Media Art Institute.

1997 – 1999

Project Manager art- and media projects at Axis, organisation for art and gender, Amsterdam.

2008 – present

PhD: Archaeology of the future. Centre for Cultural Studies, Goldsmiths University in London. Supervisor: Matthew Fuller.

1994 – 1997

Faculty of Arts, Utrecht University, Master of Arts (Art History, Film and Television Studies and Gender Studies)

thesis: M/F. Constructions of masculinity and femininity in the advertising strategies of the Royal Navy.

1992-1993

Faculty of Social Sciences, Media Psychology, Utrecht University.

1990 – 1992

Spanish, Utrecht University.

1989 – 1990

VWO, Luzac College, Arnhem

1983 – 1989

HAVO, Stedelijk Lyceum, Zutphen

RESEARCH

2011

Documenting Internet Based Art. The Dullaart-Sakrowski Method. Culture Vortex. Public Participation in Online Collections. Collaboration between Institute of Network Cultures, Netherlands Media Art Institute, Constant Dullaart and Robert Sakrowski.

Born Digital Art in the Netherlands. Commissioned by The Foundation for the Conservation of Contemporary Art, Virtueel Platform, Netherlands Media Art Institute and Digital Heritage Netherlands.

2009 – 2010

Inside Movement Knowledge, documentation strategies for contemporary dance. A collaboration between EGlPC, Amsterdam School for the Arts, University Utrecht, Netherlands Media Art Institute.

2008 – 2010

The New Media Art Network: on Performativity and Authenticity, Tate Modern London.

2008

Beyond Physical Space – the (im)possibilities to create an affect of place. The impact of ubiquitous technologies on our sense of space: how the public space is changing into a private space and its affect on processes of in- and exclusion. With support of a Cultural Mediation grant of The Netherlands Foundation for Visual Arts, Design and Architecture (Fonds BKVB).

2002 – 2005

VJ Culture: a phenomenon in history, presentation and perception. With support of a Cultural Mediation grant of The Netherlands Foundation for Visual Arts, Design and Architecture (Fonds BKVB), Centre for Mathematics and Computer Science (CWI) and Netherlands Media Art Institute. http://www.vjcultuur.nl

1997 – 1999

Media Wise: Cyber culture and multi-media developments in the Netherlands, Centre for Addiction Research, at the department of Social Psychology, University of Utrecht, for Veronica Broadcast, Hilversum.

ADVISING

2010 – present

Advisor Mediafonds, Amsterdam.

2012

Panorama preview viewing Impakt Festival 2012.

Online archiving for May Day Rooms, London, 30 May.

Piet Zwart Institute, 22 May.

2010

Expert meeting Tate London, documentation & preservation of Internet art.

Program Committee ACM Multimedia Interactive Art Program, Florence, Italy.

2009 – 2010

Advisor Cultuur Totaal, City of Eindhoven.

2004 – 2009

Board member Umatic, Utrecht.

2008

Interview Commission, LabforCulture, Amsterdam.

2007 – 2008

Advisor Interregeling, Mondriaan Foundation Amsterdam.

2007

Curatorial Committee ACM Multimedia Interactive Arts, Augsburg Germany.

Selection panel ‘Call for Curators’, LabforCulture.

2006

Program committee ACM Multimedia Interactive Art Program, Santa Barbara.

Jury member Kunstbende, June 3.

2006 – 2007

Board member Foundation Re:Vision, Netherlands Film Festival,

Utrecht.

2005

Jury member Workspace #5, The Hague.

Program Committee ACM Multimedia Interactive Art Program, Singapore.

2004

Program Committee Cosign 2004: Computational Semiotics, Split (Croatia).

Program Committee ACM Multimedia, New York.

2003

Jury member CYNETart festival, Dresden.

2012

Paraphrasing Babel. Video and sound art in public space in Maastricht and Heerlen. (curated with Bart van den Boom, Viewmaster Foundation), 19 October – 18 November.

Artists: Marc Alberto (NLD), Christopher Baker (USA), Natalie Bookchin (USA), Candice Breitz (ZAF), eddie d (NLD), Vera Frenkel  (CAN), Mieke Gerritzen (NLD), Gary Hill (USA), Annja Knautgasser (AUT), Louise Lawler (USA), Adam Leech (USA), Christian Marclay (USA), Marijn Moerbeek (NLD), Benny Nemerofsky Ramsay (CAN), Jeroen Offerman (NLD), Nika Radic (HRV), Anna Raimondo (ITA), Imogen Stidworthy (GBR), Zhou Tao (CHN), Thomson & Craighead (GBR), YOUNG-HAE CHANG HEAVY INDUSTRIES (KOR/USA), Katarina Zdjelar (SRB).

2010

Funware (curated by Olga Goriunova) – with aaaan.net
Arnolfini, Bristol (2010)
Artists: David Link, Erik Thiele, Christoph Haag, Martin Rumori, Franziska Windisch & Ludwig Zeller, Shulgin/Laskin, Harwood, JODI, and the Runme.org archive

MU, Eindhoven (2010-2011)
Artists: David Link, Christoph Haag / Martin Rumori / Franziska Windisch / Ludwig Zeller, Dave Griffiths, Electroboutique, Joan Leandre, Jon Satrom / Ben Syverson, Roger Wigger / !Mediengruppe Bitnik, RTMark, Bob Zimbinski / Jan Hubicka / Greg Alexander, Adrian Ward, IOD (Colin Green, Matthew Fuller, Simon Pope), JODI, Amy Alexander, Annina Rüst, Gazira Babeli, Dave Griffiths / Aymeric Mansoux / Marloes de Valk, Runme.org archive.

Symposium Software and Fun, MU & Baltan Laboratories, Eindhoven
Speakers: Olga Goriunova, Matthew Fuller, Andrew Goffey, Simon Yuill, Wilfried Hou Je Bek, Michael Murtaugh, Wendy Chun and Andrew Lison.

2009

Versions (with Constant Dullaart & Petra Heck) Netherlands Media Art Institute, Amsterdam, 27 Nov 2009 – 7 Feb 2010.

versions_exhibitionbooklet Exhibition + presentations and discussion: Harm van den Dorpel, Constant Dullaart, F.A.T.Lab, Martijn Hendriks, JODI, Oliver Laric, NastyNets, Evan Roth, Theodore Watson.

Visual Foreign Correspondents_Berlin Amsterdam: Melkweg; CASZ; Checkpoint Charlie Berlin; Hungaricum, Berlin; Die Zeit Germany, September – December.

Urban screen work: Lena Merhej, Border Soldier; Simon Faithfull, Revolutionary Postcards from Berlin (with crows)

2008

Virtual Persons (Martine Neddam)

Intrude 366, Zendai MoMA, Shanghai, China (December)

Re:visie / The New Media Effect (Annet Dekker, Sabine Niederer) Netherlands Film Festival, Utrecht, September

Exhibition + performances programme:
The New Documentary: Yolande Harris, Esther Polak, Katleen Vermeir & Ronny Heiremans, Jan Rothuizen.
Performing YouTube: Constant Dullaart, Govcom.org, JODI, Emile Zile.
Super Power Point Cinema: Mieke Gerritzen & Koert van Mensvoort.
Screening: Martijn van Boven, Han Hoogerbrugge,

Visual Foreign Correspondents

Urban screen work: Tea Makipaa, Catwalk; Tiffany Holmes, FRESH2.0; Igor Stromajer, The Netherlands is respectful, Russia is corrupt.
Volkskrant Online; Amsterdam: De Balie, CASZ, Federation Square Melbourne, during the year

Impakt Online: Dissidents and Restrictions

Dominik Bartkowski, Bareback

2007

Impakt Online: Net.art is dead, long live net.art!

Jaromil, Time Based Text

2006

Machinima Salon & Machinima Competition (Annet Dekker – Virma, Mediamatic, HAFF)

CrossMediaWeek, Picnic@Night, Amsterdam, September 29
HAFF, Utrecht, November 2

Impakt Online: Art and Science

Koert van Mensvoort, Ball of Being

Dutch Installation Art (Annet Dekker) MNAC (Muzeul National de Arta Contemporana) Bucharest, Romania, 20 May – 10 Sept.

Michiel van Bakel, Jasper van der Brink, Persijn Broersen & Margit Lukacs, Rikkert Brok, eddie d, Jan Peter van der Wenden, Kirsten Geisler, Bernard Gigounon, Nan Hoover, Andreas Siefert, Bill Spinhoven, Eric Steensma, Martijn Veldhoen, Gerald van der Kaap

Impakt Online: Net.art is dead, long live net.art!

JODI & Cory Arcangel, Blogspot

2005

Re:visie / It Takes Two.. (Annet Dekker, Karel Doing) Central Museum, for Netherlands Film Festival, Utrecht, 28 Sep. – 7 Oct.

o.a. Unanimous Buck, Leesbaar Nederland, SXNDRX, Joost van Veen & Huib Emmer, Optical Machines, Sara Kolster & Derek Holzer

Wonderwall (Annet Dekker, V2)

Millenium Dialogue, Beijing China, June 20 till July 17

Impakt Online: Translations

Depart (Leonard Lass and Gregor Ladenhauf), Yarrow
Franz Alken, Superconsumers

2004

Re:visie / As the World Turns (Joke Ballintijn, Annet Dekker, Karel Doing), Central Museum & Kikker, for Netherlands Film Festival, Utrecht 23 Sep. – 1 Oct.

Babak Afrassiabi, Carlos Amorales, Peter Greenaway, Bregtje van der Haak, Risk Hazekamp, Rosanne van Klaveren, Lin de Mol, Julika Rudelius, Marc Schmidt

Impakt Online: Art of the Narrative

Tamar Schori, Beadgee

2003

Real Lear, Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennial, Japan 19 – 21 July – 7 Sep.

Opening performance and exhibition of Christiaan Bastiaans and Nan Hoover

RGB – World Wide Video Festival, Amsterdam 22 – 24 May

i.c.w. Melkweg Amsterdam and Electronation

2002

Couch.club ‘Beyond Voyeurism’ and ‘Performing Artists’, Impakt Festival Utrecht May

Julika Rudelius / David Still and Benny Nemerofsky Ramsay / Igor Stromajer & MC Brane / SKOP

Circus Maximus, Foundation Lazy Marie, Utrecht Dec. 1999 Jan. 2002

film, video and live performances by national and international artists

2001

Bijzondere Bijdragen, exhibition in public space at: Netherlands Film Festival, Utrecht Sept.

Marc Bain, Ineke Bakker, Jasper van den Brink, Claartje de Geus, Janneke Küpfer, Lin de Mol, Elske Neus, Piek!, Tom Vullings, Pia Wergius en Sonja Wyss

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NetArtWorks for SKOR (Foundation for Art and the Public Domain)

2012

Online Archives: Shu Lea Cheang, Michael Murtaugh and Société Anonyme

2011

The Database, the Datacloud and the Public (Data)Domain: YoHa, Linda Hilfling and Metahaven

Identity Works: Heath Bunting, Lernert & Sander and Martine Neddam

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EXHIBITIONS & PROJECTS for NETHERLANDS MEDIA ART INSTITUTE, Amsterdam

2008

Video Vortex.2 December 8 – February 3

Curator for One Day – Johan Grimonprez & Charlotte Léouzon, Martijn Hendriks, Jaap de Jonge, Meta.Live.Nu presents DFM RTV INT, Nancy Mauro-Flude, Oog Volkskrant Online, Park 4DTV, Rabotnik, Sonic()bject, Martin Takken, Thomson & Craighead

Workspace: Govcom.org (NL), Sagi Groner (NL/ISR), Seth Keen (AUS), FLOSS (Adam Hyde, Derek Holzer), Fattoria Mediale (NL/I), Furtherfield (UK)

Performance: Constant Dullaart

Sun Run Sun November 2007 – May 2008

Artist in residence: installation, performance, walks by Yolande Harris (UK)

Seminar: Navigating the Future, guests: Yolande Harris, David Dunn (US) and Atau Tanaka (US/UK)

2007

Video Vortex October 17 – December 2

Curator for One Day – Beatrice Valentine Amrhein (F), Giselle Beiguelman (BR), Susan Collins (UK), Jonathan Harris & Sepandar Kamvar (US), Graham Harwood (UK), MediaShed (UK), Sonic()bject, Marek Walczak & Martin Wattenberg

Workspace: FLOSS MANUALS (Adam Hyde), Democratische Video-Recensie (Constant Dullaart, Dafna Maimon & Erik Alkema), Instant Exposeren (MobileReporters), FreeJ/GNU (Mr Goi  & Jaromil), Bareback (Dominik Bartkowski)

Performance: Alex Pfahl & Max Schneider

Seminar: Mobile Art, guests: Grahame Weinbren (UK/US), Giselle Beiguelman (BRA), Susan Collins (UK), Rory Solomon (US)

(in)visible sounds June 1 – July 16

Erich Berger (AU), David Haines & Joyce Hinterding (AUS), Rob Davis & Usman Haque (UK), Informationlab (NL, Ursula Lavrencic & Auke Touwslager), Olga Kisseleva (RU/F), Brandon LaBelle (US) & James Webb (SA), Semiconductor (UK), Theodore Watson (US)

Performances: Semiconductor (UK), Interactive Sonic Systems (E) en Sensors_Sonics_Sights

Seminar: (in)visible technology, guests: Rob Davis & Usman Haque, David Haines & Joyce Hinterding and Olga Kisseleva, Rob van Kranenburg (commentator)

Pond May – July

Artist in residence: installation by Aymeric Mansoux (F) and Marloes de Valk (NL)

ESE (Evolving Soic Environment) February – June

Artist in residence: installation by Rob Davis (UK) and Usman Haque (UK)

Workshop: Build your own neuro processor

Double Skin / Double Mind March – April

Artist in residence: installation / dvd by Chris Ziegler (D) with Emio Greco/PC (NL)

Faith in Exposure (with David Garcia) February 23 – March 17

Beirut Letters, De Geuzen, Govcom.org, Lynn Hershman, Olia Lialina & Dragan Espenschied, Avi Mograbi, Sean Snyder, Thomson & Craighead, Jody Zellen, OOg (Volkskrant)

Seminar: Faith in Exposure, guests: Jodi Dean, Noortje Marres, Richard Rogers, David Garcia (moderator)

Govcom.org February

Artist in residence: tool + installation “A Thousand Dinners A Night: Amongst the Issue Celebrities”

2006

Natural Habitat November 4 – December 17

Erwin Driessens & Maria Verstappen (NL), Koert van Mensvoort & Mieke Gerritsen (NL), Boredom Research (UK), Marloes de Valk & Ayemeric Mansoux (NL/F), David Haines & Joyce Hinterding (AU), Mateusz Herczka (SWE), Evelina Domnitch & Dmitry Gelfand (RU), Pascal Glissman & Martina Hofflin (D), Merijn Bolink (NL), Simon Heijdens (NL) and Steina (TS)

Seminar: Art and Science in their Natural Habitat, guests: Driessens & Verstappen, Evelina Domnitch & Dmitry Gelfand, Alex Verkade, Ben Schouten, Robert Zwijnenberg, Koert van Mensvoort, Awee Prins (moderator)

The Body as Interface, guests: Renee van de Vall, Kristina Anderson, Christa Sommerer, Paul Verschure, Ole Bouman (moderator)

Performance: Camera Lucida: Sonochemical Observatory, by Evelina Domnitch & Dmitry Gelfand

Dune 4.0 September – December

Artist in residence: Interactive landscape by Daan Roosegaarde

The Unified Field (Netherlands Media Art Institute) August 25 – October 7

Solo exhibition Peter Bogers (NL)

BigM (NIMk, Annet Dekker) May & June

Media art tour in Holland

Se mi sei vicino (if you are close to me) April – July

Artist in residence: Multi User Installation and Performance by Sonia Cillari (I)

Sensorium July 8 – 16

Michiel van Bakel (NL) & Bill Spinhoven (NL), Sonia Cillari (I), Edwin van der Heide (NL), Jan Robert Leegte (NL), Lawrence Malstaf (B), Daan Roosegaarde (NL), Jan Peter Sonntag (D)

Vakmanschap=Meesterschap April 7 – 29

Bodies Anonymous (NL/US), Sonia Cillari (I), Ad van Denderen (NL), Depart (AU), JODI (NL/B), MVRDV (NL)

Elefants Dream (Blender Foundation, Annet Dekker) June 2005 – March 2006

Artist in residence: First Open Movie made with 3D open source software

2005

Moving Targets (Netherlands Media Art Institute) November 5 – December 4

Solo exhibition of new video works by Erwin Olaf

World Wide Wrong JODI August 27 – October 22

Solo exhibition with works by JODI (NL/B)

Performance: 11/10 JODI – LIVE

Resonance: contemporary performance art April 1 – June 5

Hayley Newman (UK), L.A. Raeven (NL), Yaël Davids (IS), Francesca da Rimini (AUS), Franko B. (I), Sterling Ruby (DE/US) and David Still (NL) + lecture program i.c.w. De Appel, Amsterdam

Wonderwall 12 – 26 February

Nam June Paik, Vasulkas, Marc Burkett (NL), Livinus & Jeep van de Bundt (NL), Paul Dougherty (UK) and Dove Eylat + Compilation tapes of live image and sound performances: Microscope Sessions; VeeJay Groove; VeeJay Nights; The best of VJ Culture 2003/04 – ICA London, Visual Sensations and Chemistry – Veronica 1999

2004

Channel Zero (Katerina Gregos) 28 june  23 october

Sergei Bugaev Afrika (RU), Maja Bajevic (F/BA), Marc Bijl (NL), Heather Burnett (UK), Ritsaert Ten Cate (NL), Nikos Charalambidis (CY), David Claerbout (B), Christophe Draeger (CH), Rainer Ganahl (AT), Kendell Geers (ZA), Kostas Ioannidis (GR), Katarzyna Kozyra (PL), Boris Mikhailov (RU), Elahe Massumi (IR), Personal Cinema (International), Francesco Simeti (IT), Eliezer Sonnenschein (IL), Lina Theodorou (GR), Palle Torsson (SE), Simone Zaugg (CH)

BigM (NIMk, Annet Dekker) July & August

Media art tour in Holland

optimize! (Academy of Leipzig, Annet Dekker) 19 june  4 july

Franz Alken, Sandy Craus, Famed, Paul Philipp Heinze, Tao Ling, Hans-Christian Lotz, Claudia Maier, Nadine Neuhäuser, Jirka Pfahl, Jan Sledz, Henning Tilp, Axel Töpfer, Simon Rübesamen, Kilian Schellbach, Cindy Schmiedichen, Ronny Zillo

Visual Sensations May  Feb. 2005

VJ contest i.c.w. Productionhouse Paradiso-Melkweg

“My Story” stories visualised 10 jan.  8 march

Emmanuelle Antille (CH), Susanne Berkenheger (D), Persijn Broersen (NL) & Margit Lukács (NL), Olia Lialina (RU), Shahryar Nashat (IRA/CH), Jogchem Niemandsverdriet (NL), Tabaimo (J)

759.987,20 Euro The most expensive coat in the world 10 jan – 8 march

Installation by Silke Wawro

2003

Optical Illusion 24 oct.  8 nov.

Michiel van Bakel (NL), Wim Delvoye (B), Bernard Gigounon (B), Nan Hoover (US/NL), Kazumi Kanemaki (J), SERVAAS (NL), Eric Steensma (NL), Jan Peter van der Wenden (NL)

Marina Abramović Video Works (Netherlands Media Art Institute) 9 may  5 july

Marina Abramović solo exhibition

Spatial Media Special (Michael Hoogenhuyze, Annet Dekker) 5  19 april

Rikkert Brok, Dirk Eijsbouts, Arnold Hoogerwerf / Seema Ouweneel, Arthur Ivens, Peter Max, Shirley Niemans, Charlotte Wanhill, Jan Peter van der Wenden

2002

Hurt Models (Netherlands Media Art Institute) 19 oct.  30 nov.

Christiaan Bastiaans + book Hurt Models (Wormer, Inmerc, 2003)

The Pleasure of Language 24 aug.  28 sep.

Brandon LaBelle (US), Péter Frucht (H), KKEP (NL), MEZ (Mary Anne Breeze) (AU), Netochka Nezvanova (NZ) & Jaine Evans (UK), Imogen Stidworthy (UK) – Vito Acconci (US), Laurie Anderson (US), Gary Hill (US), Fransje Jepkes (NL), Les Levine (US), Carolee Schneemann (US), Peter Weibel (D)

Live Art: Using Media Technologies in Performance (Annet Dekker, AMSU) aug. International workshop by Blast Theory (UK)

Prix de Rome (Rijksakademie, Amsterdam) 21 june  27 july

Igor Sevcuk, Jasper van den Brink, Saskia Olde Wolbers, Diana Ramaekers

Are You Experienced 12 jan.  2 march 2002

Mark Bain (NL), Joe Banks (UK), Gerald van der Kaap (NL),Caroline Rye (UK), Clara Ursitti (UK), Camille Utterback (US)

2001

Dialogue (Netherlands Media Art Institute) 25 aug.  29 sep.

Nan Hoover + book Rob Perree, Dialogue About Nan Hoover (Cologne, Salon Verlag, 2001)

The Performer and the Mediated Image (NIM) aug.

international workshop i.c.w. Amsterdam Maastricht Summer University

Matt Adams, Rene Beekman Titia Bouwmeester, David Garcia, Chiel Kattenbelt, Geert Mul, Sally Jane Norman, Karin Post, Caroline Rye, Michel Waisvisz

hybrid<life>forms (Linda Wallace & Josephine Grieve) 31 march  12 may

Michele Barker, Kate Beynon, Justine Cooper, Brenda L Croft, Linda Dement, Wade Marynowsky, Tracey Moffatt & Gary Hillberg, Patricia Piccinini, Melinda Rackham, Rea, David Rosetzky, Robyn Stacey

2000

Over_Spel / Over_Game (Annet Dekker, Axis) 28 oct.  25 nov.

Camille Utterback (US) & Romy Achituv (US), Marita Liulia (FIN), Annika Larsson (SWE), Arno Coenen (NL), Andy Best (UK) & Merja Puustinen (FIN), Jochem van der Spek (NL), Natalie Bookchin (US), Eric Zimmerman (US), Josephine Starrs (AU) & Leon Cmielewski (AU)

World Wide Video Festival (Netherlands Media Art Institute) 14 sep.  15 oct.

David Claerbout (B), Sophie Whettnall (B), Jeroen Offerman (NL)

Canadian Media Art (Heiner Holtappels, Annet Dekker) 20 may  17 june 2000

Jacques Perron, Garnet Willis en video collectie van distributeurs V-tape, Videopool en VVV

sHe’ll survive (Uwe Laysiepen) 8 april  3 may 2000

Pepe Jürgens / Shuichi Fukazawa, Chiho Hoshino, Armin Purkrabek / Timo Piatkowski / Domink Rinnhofer, Anne Niemetz, Claudia Westermann, Steffen Wolf, Andreas Siefert, Dorcas Müller, Michael Schmitt, Simone van gen Hassend, Angelika Lepper, Heike Böhnke

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PROJECTS for VIRTUEEL PLATFORM

2010

Publication: Archive2020. Sustainable Archiving of Born-Digital Cultural Content.

Contributions by: Annet Dekker, Martine Neddam, Anne Laforet/Aymeric Mansoux/Marloes de Valk, Florian Cramer, Caitlin Jones, Gabriele Blome/Gaby Wijers, Lizzie Muller, Jeroen van Mastrigt, Maurits van der Graaf en Gerhard Nauta (DEN).

2009

Masterclass: Kunstkritiek & Publication Tubelight Special Edition.

Project Observatory: Patching Zone.

Archive 2020, May 17 and 18

Lecture Cultural Analytics by Lev Manovich (Paradiso)

Expertmeeting with invited guests: Alessandro Ludovico (Neural), Aymeric Mansoux (goto10), Christiane Paul (Whitney Museum), Esther Weltevrede (UvA, Digital Methods), Eric Kluitenberg (De Balie), Monika Fleischmann & Wolfgang Strauss (Fraunhofer IAIS – MARS Exploratory Media Lab), Olga Goriunova (Runme.org).

Publication: Navigating e-culture (edited with Cathy Brickwood).

Publication: Walled Garden (edited with Annette Wolfsberger).

Bottom Up!, (with Premsela) January 13

Nieuwjaarsborrel with lectures by Garrick Jones and Matt Ratto

2008

Walled Garden, 20 – 21 November

Expertmeeting with moderators: Adam Somlai-Fischer Annet Dekker Annette Wolfsberger Aymeric Mansoux Bronac Ferran Edward Shanken Erin Manning Matt Ratto Sabine Niederer Tapio Mäkelä Tom Klinkowstein.

and artists presentations: Aenimae Celia Pearce Claudia Rodriguez Marloes de Valk & Aymeric Mansoux metabiosis mez breeze Tom Klinkowstein & Irene Pereyra.

e-Art, 24 – 26  September

presentations by Dutch and international organisations: 1iveOn1ine
Loca.lab, Transmediale, Hartware Mediakunstverein, BAM Vlaanderen, WORM, <> TAG, Postmachina, MU – NAT Designing Nature, MADlab Image Radio, All Media,
Stichting PiNG, Govcom.org Foundation.

Art Mediated by Technology, 29 May

Expertmeeting / workshop around the use of locative media and urban screens for cultural content. Lecture by Teresa Dillon (Polar Produce, UK)

by Matthew Fuller

A discussion with Annet Dekker and Olga Goriunova

Olga Goriunova is curator and Annet Dekker is co-producer (as part of aaaan.net) of the multi-venue exhibition ‘Fun With Software’ (in Bristol) and ‘Funware’ (in Eindhoven and Dortmund). The exhibition has many aspects to it, being in some ways a retrospective of certain strands in software art, a set of propositions about the nature of digital culture and an argument, made through the conjunction of works, for a fundamental appreciation of fun as an inventive lively force in all forms of life.  This discussion was carried out by email in late September and early October 2010.

Matthew Fuller: ‘Fun’ is an interesting term to use, it is somehow, juvenile, gleeful, grinning, something not as ‘serious’ as humour, or jokes, which have their literature and interpretations, nor does it necessarily correspond to the policy scam of ‘creativity’, or the industrial dimension of games. But yet, there’s a quality of fun which links all these things and you have assembled some exemplary ‘cases’ of them here. What forms does fun appear in, in the exhibition?

Olga Goriunova: ‘Fun’ for me is a force, an energy, an unfolding of a certain ensemble of curiosity, inappropriateness, going beyond and deviating from what is laid out or logically consequential to the current condition. Such an energy can be easily recognised in science, in art, as something traditionally acknowledged and aspired for, though more recently endangered through neoliberal framing in terms of usefulness if not direct profit.

As such, the idea behind the show is to think how freaks run the world. The fun they have when poking at the screens of reality to discover other realities is what I imagine the concept of fun is about. Now, beyond shared qualities, there is a distinctiveness of fun in relation to, broadly speaking, computation and computers. Fun here becomes related to formal logic and repetition, to the question of where software starts and ends, to mental states, to what operations it can carry out on the world, to the cultures and usages of software, to its building upon itself, to its aesthetics. Humour often adjoins fun when software, but also its realm of production and operation, is tested against dominance, boredom, madness, power; the fun I am interested in can also be absurd rather than jolly.

Fun lets one see the territories that are in-between computer science and digital folklore, the art and cultures of using conventional software. Probably, the juvenile aspect you are talking about is the unseriousness of fun, which is the bravery generally ascribed to youth to ignore the often self-inflicted order of ‘seriousness’. Such seriousness is the effect of power systems, of orders of rationality producing forces that act in a manner that is ‘more royal than the king’. And certainly, fun can be and is used then to update such orders to complexify the systems of reinforcement.

The exhibition tries to attend to different aspects of fun. David Link reconstructs the ‘Love Letter Generator’ written in 1952 by Christopher Strachey, with Alan Turing, that predates all early generally known text generating algorithms. It produced beautifully absurd love letters on a Ferranti Mark 1 – one of the first electronic computers. . On production, the poems were hung around the walls of Manchester University, mystifying the students who came there to do something very serious. The work presents the complete working memory and processor of ‘Love Letter Generator’ which can be seen on 12 cathode ray tubes which the Ferranti used for memory, storing bits in phosphor. This work will be shown in the Arnolfini, Bristol, and for Eindhoven, David is working on ‘Draughts’. Here is how David describes it: ‘ In 1947, the electrical engineers Frederic Williams and Tom Kilburn succeeded at the University of Manchester to construct the first reliable means for the volatile storage of information — the Williams tube. Two years later, the device had evolved into the Manchester Mark I, arguably the first computer worldwide. The earliest major program for this machine was written in 1951 by an outsider, the school teacher Christopher Strachey, who had obtained the technical manual from a former fellow student, Alan Turing. The task of this software was not to calculate the trajectory of missiles, but to play the game of draughts (checkers).’

In these various versions of the exhibition and with the overall concept, I try to present different time periods, problems through which fun manifests, be they visual aesthetic or functional, subjects or objects that have agency, cultures of producing fun and moments at which it can emerge.

MF: Given these different time periods, how might you perhaps characterize them, how does the possibility of fun proliferate or diminish at different times in relation to specific kinds of computing culture?

OG: This is a question to a broadminded historian. However, one could certainly say that there is a different sensibility to every time period, however hard it can be to give the exact dating. Here, David Link’s work comments of the 1950s and challenges the view that computing was always heavily dominated by the military interests. Strachey and Turing, as demonstrated in the show, were also implied in the kinds of making sense of the world through the funny, peculiar and the absurd. Computing of the 1950s and 1960s still remained quite closed for wider tinkering. The 1970s and 1980s brought around home computers and ‘script kiddies’ avant la lettre, and a new era of fun begun, less like the absurdist fun of, say, the writer Daniil Kharms, but more homebrew and hands-on, with a distinctive materiality and aesthetic that is alive up to this moment. The 1990s were the years of the explosion of digital avant-gardes, very similar to the Soviet 1920s, where similar drives of inventing and establishing new orders could be sensed in unrelated domains and artists, computer labs of Universities, companies made up the languages of today.

But again, if one changes the viewpoint and looks at the history of computer science, a different timeline could be developed, with brilliant humanist and humourous programmers, such as Dijkstra coming to the fore, whose acts and breakthroughs stand as milestones.

MF: The first stage of the show, which has just opened at the Arnolfini in Bristol, proposes perhaps a more ‘Geeky’ aspect of fun, that suggests an interest in code, devices, unexpected solutions to newly imagined problems. Is there a particular relation to fun in geek cultures you are interested in here?

OG: Certainly, there is a particular relation to fun in geek cultures. There is professional humour, the insider jokes, the obsession and dedication, cultures of enquiry and leisure, of building and maintaining the structures. I guess what interests me in this respect is the artistic nature of geekiness, for instance, the way in which objects and processes, projects that are thrilling artistic works are produced within systems of coordinates which are not interested in art at all.

The proximity of ways of working and imagining, of letting things to be seen and experienced that are offered in certain ‘geeky’ work and art work makes sensible certain kinds of forces that traverse unrelated areas in making the world up.

Take ‘Tempest for Eliza’ by Eric Thiele. This project is done by a programmer ‘for fun’. It is there to explore the reality of TEMPEST – a secret service code word coined in the late 60-s – early 70-s for the using of and defending against ‘compromising emissions’. Electronic devices emit electromagnetic waves, which can be caught in order for the original data to be reconstructed. Tempest for Eliza demonstrates this in a very precise manner: the software produces images (‘one for each note in the song’), which are displayed by the computer monitor, which sends electromagnetic waves of very high frequencies, which are then caught by short wave AM radio. Here, the thoughtfulness and irony of the project are supported by the formalist coherency of the images produced; and the seemingly non-purposeful usage of a computer reveals the multi-layeredness and complexity of its materiality.

The best examples of fun in geek cultures offer exactly that elegant complexity at the level of formalist qualities, meanings, frameworks, mixed with non-pretentiousness. As statements and ways of seeing, they are laborious, laconic and exact, like haiku.

MF: As we’ve said, the show includes work from several time periods, things that operate as art, but also under other rubrics outside of art. Elsewhere, the idea of ‘Digital Folk’ is one way in which you have spoken about certain computing cultures, the sensibilities active here cross in and out of art, particular kinds of technicity. The show feels refreshingly unconstrained in this way…

OG: As related to the question above, digital folk is a phenomenon that draws heavily on geek cultures. At the same time, there is a sense in which digital folk – a variety of cultures that use, adapt, produce software that makes and ‘changes’ sense in relation to labour conditions, states of work, certain aesthetic normalities, software operations and allowances, always stay minor.

Digital folklore still awaits its dedicated scholar while certain times and kinds of it are becoming lost. At the same time, a part of it, along with software art, made its way into the world of iPhone applications where it is often detached from its operationality, of the ways in which it had a relation to the modes in which an OS works or hangs, to the joint subject formed in-between a desktop computer and its tense user.

MF: The Runme.org site also appears in the exhibition. As a busy place for software art, what does it exemplify in relation to the theme of the show?

OG: Runme developed most rapidly during early and mid naughties when software art was in the period of bloom. In my view, which other people of Runme might not share, it is included for the purposes of remembering. Such remembering is about a somewhat missing round of understanding of the 1990-s and early 2000-s which produced systems of coordinates and languages inhabited by, transformed, used and re-used, often rather violently, in the current sleek digital world.

Here it probably makes sense to provide a short description of Runme for the purposes of reminding: “Runme.org is a software art repository created by all the people who used and contributed to it since late 2002. It offers an interesting and slightly ironic perspective on software art, and one that is rich in drawing upon programmers’ cultures alongside the more self-consciously ‘artistic’ enquiries. Software art is a set of practices which focus on software as material as well as a machine for making sense of the world we are all implied in, and it works on destabilising some of its normalities. Hosting and linking to over 400 projects, along with features and texts, Runme.org is a project of self-organisation of an art current through the ‘fun’ of exploration that tries to be open, and its position of relative success is due, among other, to the perspectival humour and inclusive drive of its structure.”

MF: Is fun with software the only way to stop it driving you mad?

OG: If you consider software to be the backbone of most management theory based processes that have an ambition to govern all aspects of life in most developed countries (that’s in fact the topic of your and Andy Goffey’s Evil Media Studies book, right?) then fun with software is not only a way to stop losing sanity but also a way to sneak out, which is maybe one and the same thing as one needs to get out in order to remain in.

OG: I would like to say that this exhibition would never be possible without two people which decided on producing it: Annet Dekker and Annette Wolfsberger. Why did you decide to take it on?

Annet Dekker: Software art is often still regarded as belonging to creative industries or nerds and not to experimentation, art or fun. We very much believe in Olga’s approach to software art and wanted to emphasise its importance for art as well as its relation to the structure of society and show this to as many people as we could take on.

We also share your view on the lack of historical recognition or understanding and certainly visibility of these kinds of works. We think it is important to present these works and we are especially attracted by the way Olga has framed the exhibition, not looking at it from a deterministic technological point of view or a merely aesthetic one but looking outside these almost traditional frameworks practiced in art and start with fun. It shows perfectly that art has a wider scope than is often addressed within the field. The focus on fun opens up the exhibition as well as the field of software art which for many, is a very closed territory consisting of and belonging to nerds, trained specialists or large business corporations.

Similarly the concept of fun is not very much talked about and in relation to software often only seen as being about play, gaming and interactivity. This narrow view totally misses the depth or the implications software art and fun have. By presenting works that show different sides of software brings in new relations that hopefully people will recognize as being closer to their own experience and at best something they can actually influence if they wish to.

OG: Annet, is there a relation between the theme and structure of the exhibition and the current layout of artistic, political, social interest in Holland and EU? Does the exhibitions’ thematic fit a certain strategy or a missing discussion? Is there a way in which MU and Baltan laboratories saw themselves implied in such problematic?

AD: I think it goes too far to connect the theme and structure to the current political situation in the EU or the Netherlands – although the issue of fun would in a way be a perfect vehicle to divert current issues. It would certainly be a welcoming addition in todays political climate as it may show things in a different perspective.

As for the venues that were approached to show Funware we tried to find different environments to connect with and relate to in a manner that will open up the discussion of the influence of software. Arnofini with its history in performance and theatre was an interesting point of departure to think of or invest with software. MU on the other hand has an interest in visual culture of the here and now but it is foremost the quirky and approachable multidisciplinary approach of MU that made it a perfect place to connect to. At the same time Eindhoven as a city has a long history of innovation and research, where Phillips has its roots, and local organisations are keen to work together. Together with MU and Baltan Laboratories we ended up organizing an exhibition, an artist in residence (together with NIMk in Amsterdam and Piksel in Bergen, Norway), an extended educational programme and a symposium at one of the largest art&technology festivals taking place in Eindhoven, STRP. It’s quite amazing that so many connections could be made in one city. In a way it reflects the diverse character of software art. In the end HardwareMedienKunstVerein brings these different perspectives together. HMKV has a long-term international reputation for display of new developments in both art and technology By choosing a thematic approach whereby technical art is seen as a means not as an end. It is their topical and conceptual discussion of our contemporary world based increasingly on media and technological structures which is also reflected in Funware.

MF: Bringing together pieces of work from different times implies some kind of preservation or reconstitution of some works. I wonder, is there some kind of fun to this process itself?

AD: Yes absolutely and in many different ways. It is the absurdism of trying to find a working plug, cable or network configuration just in order to see the authentic working. This of course relates to the practice of conservation in art where ‘the authentic’ is the most valued. And especially with software art it has become a bigger challenge to get to such an authentic experience. Rebuilding software is not only about assembling the objects and maybe slightly restoring them, but also about reconstructing the code by doing. The work by David Link is again a perfect example here. But there are of course also other methods, which aim at representing the work through documentation.

Trying to reconstruct the context of the work and doing the interviews reliving the experience can certainly be fun. It brings up aspects that were long forgotten but which when recounted, shed a totally new light on the work, also sometimes for the makers. At times, one could argue that the documentation of a work might be better than the actual work. For Funware we try all these different methods, just to see what it brings; and in case when things don’t work anymore we asked the artists to think of revisioning their work (as is the case with JODI’s JET SET WILLY the making off). Making a new version by building on the past is a way to accept loss and at the same time an attempt to prolong the work. But it all can be very serious so it is important to keep a sense of humour as a means to prevent you from becoming too frantic. In the end we are presenting a new work by Dave Griffiths, Aymeric Mansoux and Marloes de Valk: Naked on Pluto – a game in Facebook, I’m already looking forward to seeing that being preserved!

MF: One of the things that is the sheer variety of the formats involved. Some projects entail custom hardware, of several different sorts, that either ‘quote’ existing objects or invent new ones, others use conventional computing platforms. Some work exists fleetingly on networks of different kinds, one exists on paper only, others work with cracked or manipulated games or use computers primarily aimed at children. How do you see this diversity?

AD: To me this is the whole point of the show, to present the sheer diversity of software art. It is not just the ‘world of nerds’, it’s all around you, much closer than you think, and it can be accessed in many different ways and levels.

OG: It is interesting that at a point in time, there was a discussion about the problems of presenting new media art in a gallery space, as a lot of such presentation took the form of a computer sitting on the desk. It was somewhat surprising to see now, how easily a very wide range of methodologies and conceptual structures could be gathered together. Probably, an easy answer is that with such a largely retrospective show as Funware is, the body of great work accumulated naturally exhibits a richness and diversity that only proves how interesting those years and explorations were.

MF: Many mainstream accounts of computing propose that it becomes increasingly calm, intuitive, fitting into the ‘flow’ of everyday life and enhancing it. Others propose that it is not simply functionalist, but becomes a kind of event in itself, full of lots of bijoux treats, as for instance with some smartphones as mentioned already, animating daily routines with pleasure-design and things to fill time. Such figurations are perhaps most evident in HCI and user experience design or other forms of human factors. The work in this show however tends to step aside from these two poles in order to propose different kinds of thoughtfulness and experience in relation to software, each piece of work having its own characteristics of excitement, awkwardness, time-requirements, involvement and so on. Some of them are exuberant, but others, melancholy. You show us that, in places, software culture is, by several means, inexplicably richer than that which it is designed for. What might be the stakes in such explication?

OG: I would not like to end up the interview by a pessimistic rant on the ‘brave new world’ that is speedily coming towards us, though everyone holds their breathe here in Britain, waiting for the cuts, new immigration rules, university tuition fees changes, and other kinds of governmental announcements. Now, it becomes crystal clear that a sheer possibility to play around, to do something useless that may become brilliant, to be obscure and absurd is fundamental to the production of culture we inhabit and the parts of it we admire, can disappear. This is a question of education, imagination, environment, ideology, time, idea of usefulness and of value, aesthetics and many other spectra. Software culture is not different, in this sense, from other domains. However, what is also possible is a new renaissance through the very renewing of the ‘oppressed’, as hard times are often very interesting And here, software is different, in terms of the kinds of control possible and implemented, by the types of network platforms or hardware popular and desired and also by the depth of its appropriation by the pure ideological management system of society. What can be done here now, remains an open question.

Details:

The Arnolfini edition of the show includes, ‘Love Letter Generator’ by David Link, Jodi’s film ‘All Wrongs Reversed (c) 1982′, ‘WIMP’ by Laskin/Shulgin, ‘Tempest for Eliza’ by Eric Thiele, ‘London.pl’ by Harwood, ‘Open Circuit’ by Christoph Haag, Martin Rumori, Franziska Windisch & Ludwig Zeller and ‘Runme.org’.

Eindhoven’s version of the show, produced by MU and Baltan laboratories, will be much larger and includes ‘Auto Illustrator’ by Adrian Ward, ‘SVEN’ by Amy Alexander, ‘eRiceCooker’ by Annina Ruest, ‘Al Jazari ‘by Dave Griffiths, ‘Naked on Pluto’ by Dave Griffiths, Aymeric Mansoux, and Marloes de Valk, ‘wowPod’ by Electroboutique, ‘LOCUSOLUS’ by Gazira Babeli, ‘RETROYOU R/C STORY’ by Joan Leandre, ‘JET SET WILLY the making of’ by JODI, ‘Satromiser’ by Jon Satrom and Ben Syverson, ‘I/O/D 4: The Web Stalker’ by I/O/D, ‘Hardware Orchestra’ by Carmen Weisskopf, Domagoj Smoljo and Roger Wigger, ‘SimCopter’ by RTMark, the above mentioned ‘Open Circuit’, ‘Runme.org’ and ‘Textmode Quake’.

Artist in Residency by Dave Griffiths, Aymeric Mansoux and Marloes de Valk

Naked on Pluto is developed during a shared residency at NIMk, BALTAN Laboraties and Piksel, between June and November 2010, by Dave Griffiths, Aymeric Mansoux and Marloes de Valk. The project is licensed Copyleft. The research and development process is documented and can be followed on http://pluto.kuri.mu and http://facebook.com/is.so.convenient. The game can be played on http://naked-on-pluto.net

“You are 4.3 billion kilometres away from the nearest human, what would you like to do?”
Naked on Pluto is a Multiplayer Text Adventure Game on Facebook. You wake up on Pluto, in a city under the rule of Elastic Versailles revision 14, a corrupted Artificial Intelligence and former entertainment colony. It used to be the Las Vegas of the Solar System, a true paradise for consumers and corporations alike. Until something snapped… What happened and how to escape?

Versailles is a capital of convenience, a non stop 24hr zone of endless pleasure, provided by Pluto’s huge entertainment corporations. Amuse yourself and your friends for hours on end collecting meaningless tokens, talking to our bland robots, or simply relax and take in the staggering conformity of your new home. Take absolutely no notice of the areas you aren’t allowed to go into, even if it were possible to break out of the zone around the Palace, why would you possibly want to – or indeed why change the core structures of this world when they have been so excellently taylored to fit your every desire?

The game explores the limits and nature of social networks from within, slowly pushing the boundaries of what is tolerated by the companies that own them, carefully documenting this process as we go. Story and play are combined with an investigation on how exposed we are on social networks, and how our data are being used.

Naked on Pluto is also part of the international touring exhibition Funware, opening November 12 at MU Eindhoven.

Biographies
Dave Griffiths was raised on an early education in weaving, bell ringing and 8bit computers, and is now dedicated to changing the world with free software, live animation and noise. He works as a self employed artist/programmer, mainly working with the FoAM art laboratory and performs as part of slub – a livecoding band. He creates installations, open source software and teaches workshops around the themes of games, music and the lisp programming language. Past work includes computer graphics for games, feature film special effects and machine vision research for Sony’s EyeToy group.

Marloes de Valk is an (software) artist. She studied Sound and Image at the Royal Conservatory in the Hague, specializing in abstract compositional computer games, HCI and crashing computers. Her work consists of audiovisual performances and installations, investigating machine theatre and narratives of digital processes. She has participated in exhibitions throughout Europe, teaches workshops, gives lectures and has published articles on Free/Libre/Open Source Software, free culture and art (a.o. in the Contemporary Music Review and Archive 2020. Sustainable archiving of born digital cultural content). She is editor of FLOSS Art (OpenMute, 2008) as well as the Digital Artists’ Handbook (folly and GOTO10, 2008). She is a former member of artist collective GOTO10, and has helped develop the puredyne GNU/Linux distribution and make art festival. She is currently collaborating with Aymeric Mansoux and Dave Griffiths on a social gaming project.

Aymeric Mansoux is an artist, musician and media researcher.
In 2003, he founded GOTO10 with Thomas Vriet, a non profit organization and artist collective, with the goal to promote the use and support of free software in electronic music and media art creation. Aymeric has been active in the collective until 2010 and initiated several projects such as: ‘make art’, a yearly international no nonsense festival for software artists using and writing free software; ‘Puredyne’, a popular live GNU/Linux distribution for creative media and the ‘FLOSS Art publication’, the first collection of essays on FLOSS and digital art production.

Since 2009, he is mentor and co-supervisor of study for the networked media branch of the Media Design and Communication Master of the Piet Zwart Institute in Rotterdam (NL). Aymeric is also an MPhil/PhD student at the Centre for Cultural Studies, Goldsmiths, University of London, researching online art and design communities, free culture licenses and resources, and distributed collaboration.

curated by: Olga Goriunova

@ MU Eindhoven

12 November 2010 – 16 January 2011

Opening Night with SPECIAL PERFORMANCES BY: AMY ALEXANDER, ALEXEI SHULGIN, JON SATROM & BEN SYVERSON

DJ: EMILE ZILE

artists:

Adrian Ward, Amy Alexander, Annina Ruest, Bob Zimbinski, Carmen Weisskopf / Domagoj Smoljo / Roger Wigger, Christoph Haag / Franziska Windisch / Ludwig Zeller / Martin Rumori, Colin Green / Matthew Fuller / Simon Pope, Dave Griffiths, Dave Griffiths / Aymeric Mansoux / Marloes de Valk, David Link, Electroboutique, Gazira Babeli, Joan Leandre, JODI, Jon Satrom / Ben Syverson, RTmark, Runme.org.

Making and using software can be experimental, humorous and aesthetically rich. Alongside today’s rather dull omnipresence of databases and content management systems, elements of fun have actually informed and guided the development of software from its beginnings.  Fun is the energy of curiosity and inappropriateness, exploring what is not yet known in art, culture, computer science, design, math and the site of their encounter: software. Here, software art, a joke of a mathematical genius and amateur tinkering of software stand side by side.

Freaks run the world. It is through fun that they invent what becomes our reality, even if their jokes are later updated to guide matters in unappetizing ways. Our society is built and managed by software. To understand how we can act in relation to such systems and how they are made, we need to get a sense of the energy that drives software, the energy based on fun. We can come closer to these practices through the territories that are in-between geeky humour, digital folklore, cultures of using conventional software, artistic software and history of computation. It is in the fact that exploration takes place through fun and the bizarre territories always exist that there is a hope for an open horizon.

The exhibition Funware questions, tangles and experiments with the materiality of software, the backbone of contemporary society. Letting us deal with the glitchy nature of human-machine ensembles, it offers a way of understanding something that is normally hidden and serious. Fun is far from detaching software from political or social interrogability, it is rather a force and a method that works on complicating the normal, the serious and the dominant.

Starting off  with the reconstruction of an algorithm from the 1950-s, Funware references home scripting of the 1980-s, early fascination with ASCII, geeky humour, deconstructed games, classic software art and goes on to include an i-Phone sculpture and an i-Pad application.

Performed by amateurs, artists, alternative coders or professional programmers for “fun”, enquiries into software as aesthetic and political practice let us see the uncertainty and seamfullness of software in times when the dominant tendencies is to hide its operation behind security systems, impenetrable interfaces and shiny entertainment.

Fun in software is a way to construct and recognize the complexity of software as embedded in between art, folklore, industry, and university. It is about breaking from systems of constraints in ways that produce richness and abundance of kinds. Funware offers a way to re-address software, as an invisible universal culture, in its aesthetics, history, and power.

Curator: Olga Goriunova
Executive producers: aaaan.net
Supported by: VSBfonds, SNS Reaal, London Metropolitan University & STRP Festival

Thanks to: Baltan Laboratories, MU

In addition the Funware Conference is held on 27 November during STRP Festival at the SWA building, 8th floor, in Eindhoven.
www.baltanlaboratories.org
www.mu.nl

In 2011 the exhibition will travel to HartwareMedienKunstVerein in Dortmund!

Directors: Annet Dekker and Annette Wolfsberger.

If you want to get in touch or would like more information, please send us an email or visit our PROJECTS.

by Sonia Cillari

Performative electric-field sensing and sound environment (performance duration: ~ 2 hours)

Co-produced by STEIM and Netherlands Media Art Institute in Amsterdam and Claudio Buziol Foundation in Venice.

Supported by Fonds BKVB and Optofonica Laboratory for Immersive ArtScience in Amsterdam.
Sensitive to Pleasure is a work about conflict, an intimate piece in which the artist emphasizes her controversial relationship with her own work in front of the public.

Cillari stands outside the door of a dark Ambisonic cube, where she grants entry to only one visitor at a time. The cube features her work, a naked female (the ‘creature’), which reveals the sound of its body when in contact with other human beings. The physical interaction between the creature and the visitor is linked to the artist’s body via electrical pulses, provoking a strong physical experience in her which is painful but might also be considered pleasant. Cillari uses the visitor to gain a physical experience about her work.

The intimacy between the visitor and the creature inside will not be documented in order to guarantee intimacy and allow the visitor to fully experience the work through involvement and exposure. Cillari wants to explore ways in which visitors may interact with the creature knowing that their behavior causes a strong physical reaction on her outside the cube. At the same time, she explores the notion of voyeurism within the audience, watching her while she ‘experiences’ her own work of art.

A path of lights guides the visitor to the entrance of the cube; the lights’ subtle changes reflect the encounters between the visitor and the creature, enhancing the sensuality of the work.

Sensitive to Pleasure is homage to Pygmalion (Ovid’s Metamorphoses, X), the sculptor who falls in love with a statue he created. This work deals with an inverted relationship of control between the creator and his own creation. The physical connection between them represents keeping each other alive, a metaphor of mutually dependent relationship.

Sensitive to Pleasure connects with Sonia Cillari’s latest research of working with and exploring the Body as Interface.
Project credits:
Hardware interface development: Stock
Environment programming: Ulrich Berthold
Ambisonics sound design and implementation: Maurizio Martinucci (aka Tez)

21 September – 9 November 2009

curated by: Annet Dekker, Nanette Hoogslag, Anette Schaefer, Annette Wolfsberger, Berit Zemke.

Artists:

Berit Zemke (D), Little Warsaw (HU), Lena Merhej (LEB), Han Hoogerbrugge (NL), Giselle Beiguelman (BRA), Mariam Ghani (US/Afghanistan), Simon Faithfull (UK)

Visual Foreign Correspondents Berlin is the latest in a series of projects initiated by the Visual Correspondent Foundation in cooperation with WL Projects Berlin in which networks of high-profile public media platforms have been developed as specially curated spaces. In VFC_Berlin we invite a network of artists to reflect in a personal way on the recent events in their region and relate these events to ways in which the world has changed in the two decades since the fall of the Berlin Wall.

Now that the spectre of economic crisis and heightened religious differences once again are threatening to create new sets of barriers there has never been a better moment to reflect on just how much is at stake when we erect boundaries (either tangible or intangible) between nations, peoples and idea’s. In the light of this anniversary we will be asking the artists to reflect on the nature of boundaries and borders, virtual and real, which are destroyed and (re) constructed in this era of intense volatility.

Context
What is important to this project is the thought that artists, with their specific talent for visual language can take another role that of the commentator, ‘the visual correspondent’ and can give visual commentary on the state of the world today. Above all show this comment on a public platform outside a usual museum or gallery context.

It goes without saying that the fall of the Berlin Wall was one of the most momentous political and symbolic events of the late twentieth century, one of those rare events when political significance and human symbolism are inseparable. At the time it seemed that the era when naked centralized power could impose itself, from the top down over the populations of Europe, was over. Moreover it seemed Europe’s east and west could meet in open exchange and grow towards a better understanding of each other. In an era of easy cynicism it is easy to forget how much genuine hope was invested in that unique action of the human spirit’s desire to break down barriers. The fact that the history of all the contemporary arts have been driven by the desire to challenge and problematize all boundaries make this anniversary a moment for both artists of the generation who lived through those events as well as those of a younger generation to use their work as a instrument to reflect on the impact of that unique moment.

The artists
VFC_Berlin has commissioned seven artists to make screen-based works looking at specific boundary or border -related issues in their home country. For this selection we sought not only regional diversity but also selected artists on the basis of their interest in a specific types of issue combined with their proven capacity to make works compelling and immediate enough to successfully compete for attention in a modern media landscape.

Starting September 21st over a period of seven weeks leading up to the anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall, a series of seven screen-based works will be presented on both urban screens and online. Each week a new work will be shown until finally the whole series will be presented together.