ecopolis

CTM.09 – club transmediale’s 10th anniversary edition – takes place in Berlin from January 23 – 30, 2009 under the theme STRUCTURES – Backing-up Independent Audio-Visual Cultures. Our partner festival transmediale will take place under the Theme DEEP NORTH from January 27 to February 1, 2009.

The joint Call for Entries by club transmediale and transmediale is out now. As leading international festivals for art and digital culture as well as adventurous music and related visual arts, respectively, transmediale and club transmediale are calling for submissions for both festival’s program, to the transmediale Award competition and the Vilém Flusser Theory Award.

Deadline for submissions is September 5, 2008 (post stamp).

transmediale.09 – DEEP NORTH peers beyond the evolving alarmist scenarios of catastrophe prevalent in the often contradictory global warming debate.transmediale.09 shifts this focus to the global artistic, cultural, societal andphilosophical consequences that the presumed imminent collapse of the polar ice barrier may trigger. Are we about to reach another historically succinct moment of unavoidable and cataclysmic change – a point of no return leaving in its wake uncontrollable global transformations? Does climate change elicit cultural change, ashifting of extremes or a collapse in established, systemic and network norms? DEEP NORTH becomes not a fixed location, but a paradigm transforming loss, scarcity, inertia and rivalry into urgent and revealing states of being and expression.

With STRUCTURES – Backing-Up Independent Audio-Visual Cultures, club transmediale.09 presents projects that spring from the critical, interdisciplinary and experimental practice at the intersections of sound and other art forms. In recent years, a new breed of hybrid projects and initiatives that merges experimental audio and media cultures has developed in the convergence-zone between pop culture, science, arts and media technologies. This still remains primarily the domain of committed individuals and small, self-organised groups or networks that, often in the most precarious of circumstances, provide the supporting platform for these new artistic articulations and experiments. In its 10th year, CTM looks into the current state and potential development opportunities of these independent structures.

Together, transmediale and club transmediale invite the submission of works and projects that respond to these challenges and embody contemporary notions of art that embrace, question and enrich digital culture. Submissions of art works for both festivals participate in the transmediale Award 2009 while theoretical abstracts, papers and critical artistic positions are invited for the Vilém Flusser Theory Award, with prizes totaling ca. 10.000 EURO.

transmediale will handle all practical issues concerning the submission process, as all submissions do participate at transmediale’s award competition – no matter if they are for transmediale or club transmediale. All details are to be found in the PDF form, which is available for download here.

Tthe 5th International Conference on Computational Intelligence, Robotics and Autonomous Systems (CIRAS 2008) will be 19th-22th june in Linz, Austria.

Computational intelligence (CI) has emerged as a research area in the early nineties. Its origin is a consequence of the dynamic development and wide application of technologies such as neuro-computing, fuzzy logic system and evolutionary computation. These technologies are complementary to one another and allow solution of new problems in the way to manifest features that are usually assumed to be signs of intelligent acting. CI can be regarded as a research endeavor that encompasses technologies such as evolutionary computation, neural computing and fuzzy logic systems. In this synergistic combination, each of them plays an important, well-defined, and unique role.

The present research direction in building intelligent Robotic Systems requires an integrated approach to problem solving in computing, science and engineering. The study and research on robotic systems warrant the need for bringing skills and knowledge from different disciples across. The real-world operational issues, system evolution, cooperation, modeling uncertainties, sensor fusion and intelligent control designs are a few of the interesting research directions.

Autonomous Systems are capable to act independently in dynamic and unpredictable environments. Autonomous Agents are the most interesting and important direction of research and development within computer science these days. Agent technologies are being used in diverse fields and domains.

CIRAS is intended to provide a common platform for knowledge dissemination among researchers working in CI, Robotics, Autonomous Systems and these areas.

PLANETART, Kees de Groot and Viola van Alpen, organized METAL HEARTH II, it happened from the 10th till the 18th of may. The subtitle of the festival is the Aesthetics of Evil. The selection of the project was really focused but open any format of media, and the curated a really interesting and inspiring show. Here there are posted some photos to give an idea.

Jonas Staal

Mmm… (Mean meat machine)

Virtual Worlds, with interactive worlds

Hans van Bentam

Exhibition the Aesthetics of Evil

..and if you want to look more click here.

Marnix de Nijs is one of Netherland’s most famous multimedia artists. He has been invited by the CCCS to create a site specific installation in Florence. From May 15th until June 30th 2008 the installation will be shown at the CCCS at Palazzo Strozzi.

Exploded Views – Remapping Firenze comprises two industrial treadmills placed in front of a huge screen showing, part film, part computer graphics, the deserted streets of a virtual Florence. The action of the observer’s body is the determining factor: the 3D images are set rolling by the physical effort made by the viewer, revealing an imaginary, “poetic” Florence where real architectural shots explode into an infinity of pixels. The speed of the observer/runner has a direct impact on the intensity of the aesthetic experience. In the work of Marnix de Nijs, the observer becomes the protagonist. The interface between the body and technology hands over control to the viewer who decides which direction to take and how to up the intensity of the images traversed.

While the visual world represented concentrates on the concept of emptiness, on the total absence of any human imprint and on the sheer beauty of the spaces, the acoustic element takes on a new dimension with a store of sounds registered in the city.
The visual material in 3D draws on the latest experimental technology developed in the Fraunhofer Institute in Darmstadt, Germany. De Nijs is the first artist to make use of this technology, which makes it possible to combine cinematographic quality with interactive graphics.
Students from the Master Course in Communication Design at ISIA, Florence assisted De Nijs in the creation of the project.

The work Exploded Views – Remapping Firenze was made especially for the CCCS. It’s the first of a series of works by leading international artists who have been invited to Florence to create site-specific works that reflect the diverse realities of this city.

Marnix de Nijs is based in Rotterdam. He is engaged in exploring the dynamics between the human body, machines and other technology. Trained as a sculptor, de Nijs is now best known for his interactive machines which play with the perception and control of sounds and images. He has gained international recognition as one of the leading exponents of interactive sculpture.

SmartCityEU is an art project which explores and develops new artistic interventions within urban spaces in European cities during a 2 year period in 2008 and 2009.

At the forefront of new practices, SmartCityEU operates an art rereading of urban space and offers a vision of a balanced and sustainable European city reoriented towards citizens.

SmartCityEU has been initiated by 4 major cultural institutions sharing a common interest in new art forms and new media: Dédale [FR], WRO [PL], Zoneattive [IT] and AltArt [RO].

The 4 operators have applied together to the European Commission’s Culture programme.

Moreover, SmartCityEU brings together numerous actors in the fields of art, urban development and new technologies such as Recyclart [BE], boDig [TR], Kibla [SI] and Videomedeja [SR]. SmartCityEU’s art programme (exhibitions, live art, performances, concerts) takes place in 8 European cities: Paris, Wroclaw, Rome, Cluj, Istanbul, Brussels, Maribor and Novi Sad.

Front is a design group of four: Sofia Lagerkvist, Charlotte von der Lancken, Anna Lindgren and Katja Sävström. They work as a group where all members are involved in the design process from initial discussions and ideas to final product. Their works are based on common discussions, exploring and investigations about different topics. And the final products often communicates a story to the observer about the design process, about conventions within the product field or about the material it is made of.

The four FRONT members have developed a method to materialise free hand sketches. They make it possible by using a unique method where two advanced techniques are combined.
Pen strokes made in the air are recorded with Motion Capture and become 3D digital files; these are then materialised through Rapid Prototyping into real pieces of furniture.

The Swedish design group FRONT has been working in Japan since September. During this time they have developed and explored the technique they used in the making of Sketch Furniture which they showed in Art Basel Miami / Design 05 with Barry Friedman Gallery Ltd ( New York ). Front make design as a performance. During Tokyo Design week they will show the process of making Sketch Furniture and the final pieces of furniture at Tokyo Wonder Site 31 October – 5 November.

This video shows Rick Grierson demoing his initial Brain Computer Music Interface. He created it using a mashup of MAX MSP / MAX PRO and EEG and he created an application which lets you compose music with the power of your brainwaves alone.