HACKfemEAST is an exhibition about women, technology and networks in Eastern Europe. The exhibition project HACK.Fem.EAST seeks to present experimental and artistic practices of artists and activists working in digital networks in Eastern Europe. Main topics are media, art and hacking. Main protagonists are women or projects in which women play an important role. Aim of the project is to provide and to develop a network platform. This is achieved through five elements: the exhibition, the opening event, two days of conferences, a publication in newspaper format and a website. Central idea is to involve women artists to develop independently their concept in each of the 14 rooms of the Kunstraum Kreuzberg / Bethanien and be part of the network formed by the all groups and artists/activists participating. Existing networks from 11 Eastern countries are at the heart of the project and form the basis of the exhibition. A total of 11 networks are invited to the various rooms of the Kunstraum Kreuzberg /Bethanien to introduce their work, their strategies and their aims in the form of video and computer installations, documentations and presentations. The result is a “network of networks”.

A two day long conference on 10 and 11 May, held at the outset of the project, intends to bring the lines and networks together and discuss on women perspective in the Eastern cultural scenario. Its aim is to provide a forum for a form of politics based on radical invention - media and Internet art projects, performances, network platforms, software development, artistic coding, organization of media festivals, etc.

On SUNDAY MAY 11th at 16h Kyd Campbell will give a talk about the development of tiny noise and some other projects she was a part of in Eastern Europe. This will be in the framework of the Activism and Accessibility of Technology panel. Kyd will talk alongside Andreea Carnu (RO) and Ana Filip (RO/SK), moderated by Jasmina Tesanovic (RS/USA).

The Saturday and Sunday conference program can be found here: http://hackfemeast.org/web/?page_id=8

tiny noise is a nomadic open concept audio art platform conceived by Toni Dimitrov [skopje] and Kyd Campbell [montreal] in february 2005. It started spontaneously as a d.i.y. experiment in forming an independent network by using global communication tools, personal contacts and experiences. The idea of tiny noise is to spread and connect experimental, provocative and adventurous music and sound projects at irregular times and in diverse places. tiny noise remains open to many sound/music forms, especially those enriched by other medias and looks to collaborate with other open projects.

info: tinynoise [at] gmail [dot] com
Kyd Campbell
Toni Dimitrov

EOD 02 is an installation by Frederik De Wilde created in collaboration with LAb[au]. EOD 02 is a new-media installation exploring the capacity of special species of living blind fishes to perceive (electrosense) their environment and communicate with each other by emitting electric signals, either in pulses or waves. The installation is based on four aquariums of taintless mirror, each presenting a specific composition of fish producing different electric signals. In each aquarium antennas capture the electric communication between the fishes and render these signals into sound. Under each aquarium a matrix of leds is placed pulsing according to the intensity and rhythm of the emitted signals. In this manner the electrical impulses of the fishes drive sound, light and an entire audiovisual space. More info.

Socrates: What a lucky morning this is turning out to be! I was looking for one virtue and have found a whole swarm of them. — Plato, Meno

In September 2007, the Australia Council for the Arts announced the recipients of its $20,000 artists residency in the 3-D online virtual world of Second Life. Dodds, Nash, and Clemens were awarded the grant to develop an inter-disciplinary artwork which explores the possibilities of literary, music / sound art and real-time 3-D arts practices within the virtual world. The artwork is a simultaneous installation in Second Life and in a real world gallery, where gallery visitors can be directly involved in its creation via a computer interface.

[Image: left to right: Adam Nash (aka Adam Ramona), Christopher Dodds (aka Mashup Islander), and Justin Clemens (aka S1 Gausman)]

BabelSwarm, a metaphor for the Tower of Babel, uses voice recognition software that converts the spoken word of real and virtual world participants into 3-D letterform images in an evolving tower of words. The letterforms generate relationships with each other through a combination of visual and sonic manifestations, fragments of narrative, environmental / user awareness capabilities and through interaction with existing data generated within Second Life itself such as the virtual winds, sunrises and sunsets. According to Justin Clemens, Second Life is an already burgeoning platform for today’s art. ‘Every era has a form that exemplifies it: in Shakespeare’s time, it was the theatre; today, it’s Second Life. It’s a question of trying to meet the new challenges of a new time - and the new spaces that it generates, ”Second Life epitomises the innovations of contemporary technology and culture: an entirely virtual world that has entirely real effects,” Justin said.

According to artist Christopher Dodds, Second Life is a step in the right direction for Australia contemporary arts practice. “It is encouraging to see the Australia Council recognising virtual worlds as legitimate environments for artistic practice, and while we thought our idea was solid, we knew the grant would receive a lot of attention and some pretty spectacular applications,” Christopher said.

Read more here [PDF] and here.

To gain access to Babelswarm you need to register an avatar name, download the Second Life application software, and then log-in to see the virtual world. This can be done in three easy steps:
1. Go to http://secondlife.com/ and follow the “Get Started” link. This will allow you to register an avatar name, download the application and then log into Second Life.
2. New users go to an instructional island where they can learn to walk, fly talk etc.
3. When ready, click on (or paste into a web browser) the following link: http://slurl.com/secondlife/ACVA/119/180/295/ Follow the instructions and your avatar will arrive in the Babelswarm foyer.

Read Bettina Tizzy’s interview with Adam Nash here.

Featuring: Tiziana Terranova (IT), Christoph Wachter (DE), Mathias Jud (CH), Yolande Harris (UK), Bureau d’etudes (FR), and Di Mainstone (UK).

Topology is often mentioned as an ultimate example of the same subject being studied in parallel within various branches of science and art, each branch approaching the subject from its own background and with its own methodologies. Today, there are numerous initiatives on the radar in which representatives of the various branches of topology explicitly state a desire to exchange ideas and methodologies related to the topic. But do all these diverse branches even share a common understanding of what topology is?

In practice, it seems that there is still a fair amount of confusion surrounding the notion of topology, and that its definition is a matter of debate rather than consensus, with a single commonly agreed-on defining characteristic: topology deals with the qualitative properties of geometrical structures. Should the confusion surrounding the notion of topology discourage topologists from trying to unify the field? Or could it perhaps serve as a commonly shared ground for collaboration and exchange?

This topology edition of Test_Lab will feature several new and exciting artistic Research and Development (aRt&D) projects within the artistic topology tradition and will investigate the common understanding of the notion of topology in the arts. Audience members are invited to actively involve themselves in the practices of topological aRt&D and, on the basis of this involvement, discuss what defines the field and whether the proposed exchange and collaboration with other topology branches is justified.

Test_Lab: Topology will reveal censored areas on Google maps and the true networks of the world s power structures, and will include a sonic navigation walk and a fashionable artist intervention. The different branches dealing with topology will be represented by international experts participating in the project A Topological Approach to Cultural Dynamics (ATACD).

Test_Lab is a bimonthly public event organized by V2_, Institute for the Unstable Media, that provides an informal setting for the demonstration, testing, presentation, and discussion of artistic research and development (aRt&D).

Preceding this edition of Test_Lab, the Piet Zwart Institute will organize a seminar on mapping as a medium of cultural reflection and critique with presentations by artists, activists, and theorists, titled: The Map is not the Territory?! April 16, 2008, 19.30.- 21.30, Mauritsstraat 36, Rotterdam.

Presenters: Bureau d’Etudes, Theo Deutinger, Christoph Wachter and Mathias Jud, with an introduction and moderation by Florian Cramer.

Cantata Park explores the notion of a “cut-up narrative”. By disassembling and reassembling a passage of text, the participant is free to extract unseen meaning from an existing text. The cut-up technique was popularised by Beat poets in the 1950’s-70’s as a method to “break the linearity” of written language, with William S. Burroughs using it extensively in his works. Burroughs believed non-pictorial languages contained a virus. By using non-linear writing techniques he believed the true meaning of language could be exposed, and the spoken word used as a weapon.

Cantata Park uses a passage of 256 words from Burroughs’ The Electronic Revolution (1971) and transfers the cut-up technique into a real-time 3D environment.

The work explores the possibilities of metaverse art, limitations of Second Life’s construction tools and scripting language, and the ability to appreciate conceptual art by proxy of an avatar.

“In 2007 I began to learn to ride a bicycle. This for me was a choice not so much determined by reasons of pleasure but as a way of manifesting my need to literally move on with my life. Around the same time, I began to read Beckett’s famous Three Novels, and was moved in particular by “Molloy.” Bicycles are a very important metaphor in this book.” Haeyoung Kim

“To escape their lack of freedom, Beckett’s characters travel, taking with them a few private possessions, which reflect their personality. Of these emblematic items, by far the most important is the bicycle: it is a moving man-powered machine made for traveling (which can be both easy and difficult, according to the conditions prevailing); and it is also a prized possession through which an owner may express his personality. In this respect the bicycle is like the plot.” Janet Menzies

I Can’t Go On, I’ll Go On is a 2007 commission of New Radio and Performing Arts, Inc., for Networked Music Review. It was made possible with the funding from the New York State Music Fund, established by the New York State Attorney General at Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors.

BIOGRAPHY

A sound artist, composer, and audio engineer, Haeyoung Kim explores the territory of sounds in electronic music. Currently, under the name Bubblyfish, she has been creating 8-bit and experimental sound works. Haeyoung has collaborated with many respected sound and visual artists such as Malcolm McLaren, the founder of Sex Pistols, Hans Jochim Rodelius, and the Brussels based media art group, Lab[au]. Her work has been presented in art venues, clubs, festivals, and galleries internationally including The American Museum of the Moving Image, Pompidou Center, Kunsthalle Wien, MUTEK, LABoral, Lincoln Center Walter Reed Theater, and The New Museum.

Based on the rapidly expanding archive of music/sound experiments to be found on Networked Music Review and the fifteen short works recently commissioned for it, the symposium aims to stimulate critical and far-ranging discussion on emerging music and sound art practice.

To register, email turbulence at turbulence dot org with “Programmable Media II” as the subject.

Symposium Program

Date: April 11, 2008
Venue: The Multipurpose Room, 1 Pace Plaza, Pace University

10:00 am – 10:45 am: Introduction by Helen Thorington and Peter Traub

Thorington and Traub will set the groundwork for the conference by introducing a variety of recent works from Networked Music Review and discussing the history, ideas, tools, and theory behind today’s creative practice.

11:00 am – 1:00 pm: Round-table discussion

Panelists: Dan Trueman, Peter Traub, Zach Layton, Sawako Kato, Jason Freeman (moderator)

Panelists will be given 5-10 minutes to make a basic statement about their work. The discussion will center on the significance of networks and whether they – and the collective behaviors of their machine or human nodes – can form the basis of compelling musical experiences.

1:00 pm – 2:30 pm: LUNCH

2:30 pm – 4:30 pm: Round Table discussion

Panelists: LoVid, Tobias C. Van Veen, Adam Nash, Helen Thorington (moderator)

Panelists will be given 5-10 minutes to make a basic statement about their work. Discussion will continue with emphasis on cross-over works (music w/images, text, video, video games etc.). Nash will speak to the symposium from Second Life, which he calls a “post-convergent medium.”

Short performances by Jason Freeman with Andrew Beck and Mark T. Godfrey and Tobias C. Van Veen will be given during the course of the symposium.

Browsing the Synapse Database — which is searchable by “Individuals”, “Interests”, “Projects / Events / Publications,” “Organizations” and “Gallery” — I came across Nigel Helyer’s Sonic Landscapes R + D project:

From June 1999 until September 2001, Helyer worked as an Artist in Residence at Lake Technology in Sydney, developing the Sonic Landscapes Virtual Audio Reality system … The salient feature of the Sonic Landscapes project is the juxtaposition of a fictive (but very convincing) 3D immersive sound-scape, accurately positioned by cartographic software, upon a physical terrain. The effect is somewhat akin to Murray Schafer’s concept of ‘Schitzophonia’, where, by the simple act of recording, sound is split from its original physical context and projected into another context.

However within a Sonic Landscapes experience we are not simply dealing with the disembodied voices of popular music reproduced and re-contextualised via a stereo-sytem! Here we are engaging with a seemingly live sonic organism that is responsive to our presence, our orientation and the traces of our wanderings, and which appears un-cannily embedded in the site itself.

The prototype Sonic Landscapes Unit is capable of operating with a 2cm positional accuracy when employing differential GPS (Global Satellite Positioning) and with a one degree accuracy for rotational head orientation, which, when combined with Lake’’s headphones delivered virtual speaker array, provides a highly realistic immersive audio environment. Tracking technology for the Sonic Landscapes project has been provided throughout by the SNAP Lab of the University of New South Wales under the guidance of Professor Chris Rizos. Future collaborative projects are currently underway between the Artist and UNSW c.f. “Audio Nomad”.The choice of a prototype test site for the project was St Stephens graveyard in Newtown; one of Sydney’s oldest burial grounds, which provided an ideal pedestrian environment, rich in historical material and interesting physical structures.

The exhibition draws on SLAC’s continued interest in developing an awareness of the interconnectedness of space and material, with a goal of extending established notions of volume and scale. The gallery is fitted with sensors that draw real-time data from the installation and the people within the exhibition, which is then synchronized with streamed real-time data of solar activity and nuclear processes provided by SLAC and NASA. This information is then fed back into the object through layers of LED strands, re-visualizing the space in order to create an dynamic spatial experience.

Quasar Exhibition from Aaron Bocanegra on Vimeo.

The word “quasar” is a contraction of the term quasi-stellar-radio-source, used historically by astronomers to describe entirely unknown cosmological objects. Today, it is believed that quasars are the most distant, and yet still detectable, objects in the universe. Giving off enormous amounts of energy produced from massive black holes in the center of their own galaxies, quasars are intensely bright; their emitted light drowning out all other stars in the same galaxy.

“Quasar is an artificial counterpart hovering in response to the currents and activities of the visitors, and in doing so, stretches and collapses the horizons of the known. The possibilities of interrelated synthetic and natural processes begin to define new emergent ecologies. quasar questions the boundaries of scale and the psyche, offering immersion into a vastly expanded space which renders perception permeable, and in the end, disperses identity.”

Quaser will be exhibited at SCI-Arc until 9th March 2008 [posted by Ruairi Glynn on Interactive Architecture dot org]

This exhibition is a retrospective of the work by Uruguayan artist Brian Mackern (Montevideo, 1962), who since 1996 has been exploring and experimenting creatively with digital contexts and the Internet. His proposal represents a productive resistance within the field of new media; and while it is somewhat isolated in the Latin-American scene, it can be associated with the creations of his European contemporaries, those who worked as a team inside a theoretical framework built along a production process.

Set Variable = Random (ART): His work focuses mainly on structures in process. The artist, whose work is known worldwide, explores the design of interfaces, alternative navigation, random concatenation of events, the creation of soundtoys (objects / generative audio-visual interfaces / reactive interfaces / interactive interfaces) and real-time video-data animations as well as Net art and sound art creations. This retrospective includes sound-art creations as well as reactive and interactive pieces in audio, Net and CD-ROM formats.

Among these works is the celebrated website http://34s56w.org, where, through an emotional mapping, the artist displays the topography, urban layout and intertwined activities that are then recomposed in a chaotic, romantic and noisy experience structured in a series of interactive features associated with the “glocation” of Montevideo (latitude 34s longitude 56w).

Soundtoys, presented in CD-ROM format, includes, among many other Net art works, the 1999 project titled / Overflow/ and developed together with Chamanic Interferences, based on the work of renowned Latin-American experimental musicians; Living Stereo, a project developed from the poetics of the remix theory and the expanded / playable cinema, a reinterpretation of moods synthesized in fragmented and emotional atmospheres; and XTCS, sound art based on the static generated by a storm in Santa Rosa, Uruguay.

http://www.internet.com.uy/vibri/
http://netart.org.uy
http://34s56w.org
http://no-content.net
http://netart.org.uy/brian.html

inmerso [foro.lounge] is a space designed for live performances of net art and interactive authorship, where the ambiance of a lounge and a casual atmosphere encourage immersion in the artwork.