Closer: Performance, Technologies, Phenomenology by Susan Kozel — In Closer, Susan Kozel draws on live performance practice, digital technologies, and the philosophical approach of phenomenology. Trained in dance and philosophy, Kozel places the human body at the center of explorations of interactive interfaces, responsive systems, and affective computing, asking what can be discovered as we become closer to our computers–as they become extensions of our ways of thinking, moving, and touching.

Performance, Kozel argues, can act as a catalyst for understanding wider social and cultural uses of digital technology. Taking this one step further, performative acts of sharing the body through our digital devices foster a collaborative construction of new physical states, levels of conscious awareness, and even ethics. Continue reading

[ ... ] New Media - New Networks [1]

If you mention the term new media in the presence of one of the most prominent artists of the extremely popular virtual world of Second Life, Gazira Barbelli, you will automatically activate a programme script, which will blow away your avatar to a completely different, unwanted location. The script entitled Don’t Say Tornado is her artwork, created to draw attention to inappropriate use of some terms of traditional new media theory in the context of a completely artificial world in which the artist herself (avatar) is nothing but a set of binary data.

Although the Croatian new media art is far from being thoroughly virtual, the example of Second Life indicates the current process of redefining the new media culture in relation to the increase in the number of the Internet users, changes in the ways it is used, faster introduction of new media theory in traditional scientific fields etc. Continue reading

Tactical Biopolitics: Art, Activism, and Technoscience; Edited by Beatriz da Costa and Kavita Philip — Popular culture in this “biological century” seems to feed on proliferating fears, anxieties, and hopes around the life sciences at a time when such basic concepts as scientific truth, race and gender identity, and the human itself are destabilized in the public eye. Tactical Biopolitics suggests that the political challenges at the intersection of life, science, and art are best addressed through a combination of artistic intervention, critical theorizing, and reflective practices. Transcending disciplinary boundaries, contributions to this volume focus on the political significance of recent advances in the biological sciences and explore the possibility of public participation in scientific discourse, drawing on research and practice in art, biology, critical theory, anthropology, and cultural studies. Continue reading

Moving the Map: CAVC / MUA Plataform 2008 / 2010 :: Center of Contemporary Visual Arts, Barrio la Plazuela, Ave. Cervantes, Casa 1331, Tegucigalpa, Honduras :: Open Calls for the Interchanges Programs - Deadline: July 30, 2008.

Moving the Map is an artistic project that investigates the discourse of political spheres regarding migrations, and from which there will be debate on the analytical focus and on the execution of urban artistic practices from the articulation and recognition of the migrating weave with local scenarios. Continue reading

Technology and Humanity: The following is a call for articles for a forthcoming themed issue of eSharp, an established peer-reviewed journal publishing high-quality research by postgraduate students. eSharp is pleased to support new and early-career authors, and has actively encouraged emerging academic talent since 2002.

The twelfth issue of eSharp will consider the cultural and personal consequences of scientific and mechanistic innovation. We welcome articles which examine and engage with the effects, influences or application of technology in any area of the arts, humanities, social sciences and education, and we encourage submissions from postgraduate students at any stage of their research. Continue reading

Last year I was invited by The Bewaerschole in Zeeland to do a GPS project together with Ivar van Bekkum. As we will be executing this project in July mostly, (the opening is July 27, you are ALL invited to come over!) I thought it would be interesting to post on this BLOG a regular journal of its proceedings.

The Zeeland province of the Netherlands is economically used mostly for agriculture and tourism (as it is a series of islands) and these activities determine the use of land and space and thus the landscape and its perception. Continue reading

Electronic Media Group Call for Papers: Conservation 2.0 - New Directions :: Deadline: August 20, 2008 :: American Institute for Conservation (AIC) 37th Annual Meeting :: May 19 - 22, 2009 :: Los Angeles, California.

The Electronic Media Group would like to invite papers following the theme of Conservation 2.0 - New Directions, highlighting the ways in which emerging technologies are affecting the conservation field. This is an ideal topic for this specialty group, corresponding with the most important issues confronting EMG professionals: the migration of technologies from one format to another and the use of new technologies to preserve obsolete components. We will also happily accept other abstracts related to electronic media conservation issues and the education of conservators of electronic media. Continue reading

“The Antarctic is unlike any other place on earth: geographically, politically, and culturally. Larger than the U.S., it is a frontier where borders and nationalities take a backseat to scientific collaboration and cooperation, a place where the compass becomes meaningless yet navigation is a matter of life and death. It is an extreme environment, inhabited by some of the most unique species, but it is also an ecosystem undergoing rapid change. Last year I had the opportunity to go to Antarctica for the first time, on a National Science Foundation-sponsored artist’s residency where I worked alongside scientists studying how its weather and climate impacts on the global environment. Continue reading

The new printed Neural issue #30, “Dangerous Games” is available. 1 YEAR SUBSCRIPTION! 3 issues - Europe 24,90 Euro - World 46,50 U.S. Dollars. BACK ISSUES. [Neural n. 30 contents]:

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. Ludic Society/Margarete Jahrmann interview.
. Homo Ludens Ludens exhibition report.
. Play Cultures, the world of digital games report.
. Be My Controller, opening the urban, button by button.
news: Emotoscope, Modi 2.0, Rom Check Fail
Amalgus Cycle Process1, HAI. Continue reading

“… I have become increasingly disaffected with the sterile aesthetics and anaemic experience of virtual worlds. They simply do not capture my soul, or haunt my dreams. They do not stir my passions, as the dramatic foreshorthenings in a grand Caravaggio painting do. So I am wondering, can there be another way in which we can build a deferred reality that includes the observer and the implicit interface, suitable for explicit study?…”

Turning the machine inside out - Creating Worlds as Interface by Eric Kluitenberg: It is always a good thing for artists who work with technology and technological media to study the inner life of the machines. Break open the box and look what is inside. This helps to foreclose an overly naive relationship to the medium. Continue reading