Reviewing the Future: Vision, Innovation, Emergence

THE PLANETARY COLLEGIUM MONTREAL SUMMIT - 2007 :: “Reviewing the Future: Vision, Innovation, Emergence” :: Montreal, Canada, 19-22 April, 2007

The first International Planetary Collegium Summit will be held in Montreal from April 19 to 22, 2007, on the premises of University of Quebec in Montreal’s Coeur des Sciences. Among the speakers are many internationally recognized artists, thinkers and researchers, such as Roy Ascott, founder of the Planetary Collegium, transdisciplinary artist Victoria Vesna, astrophysicist Roger Malina, nanotechnologist James Gimzewski, philosopher Pierre Levy, culture theoretician Derrick de Kerckhove, media artist and theoretician Bill Seaman, and many others.

Entitled Reviewing the Future: Vision, Innovation, Emergence, the summit will allow 65 presenters from fifteen countries to share the results of their latest works and researches with their guests, and with the Quebec media arts and technologies community. The Summit will be an occasion for members of the different nodes of the Collegium (Plymouth, Beijing, Milan and Zurich, which will soon be joined by Seoul and Sao Paulo), along with several members pursuing their research on an individual basis as part of this international network, to get together. Many of these are amongst the best known artist / researchers of their fields.
Through mostly transdisciplinary research, calling upon artists, scientists, engineers, philosophers, educators and communications specialists, the Collegium is contributing to the production of new knowledge in the field of media arts and to the transfer of this knowledge to other fields. Computer science, communications, research on consciousness, biotechnologies, cognitive sciences, hypermedia, variable environments, robotics are but a few of the disciplines whose development feeds and informs the Collegium research in all artistic disciplines : performance, dance, architecture, new narrative forms, music, installations, design, performing arts and the arts of the screen. Although the Summit is first and foremost an occasion to come in contact with unique artistic approaches, which cannot be classified into traditional fields and are at the cutting edge of contemporary practice, several presentations will discuss the theoretical, cultural, social, educational, museological and environmental stakes of these practices. For further information and registration: http://summit.planetary-collegium.net.

The Planetary Collegium

The Planetary Collegium is an international community of researchers, thinkers and artists dedicated since 1994 to research/creation. Through its network of nodes in Europe, South America and Asia, it also offers a unique research program leading to the University of Plymouth PhD. Although its members meet regularly in various places around the world, the Montreal Summit will be the first large scale meeting of its young history. It will offer the Montreal based artist/creators and the Montreal media arts community the opportunity to take notice of the projects, methods, tools and research projects that are amongst the more advanced in the field.