On Friday, 22 May 2015, KIBLA hosted the final meeting, which was attended by partners from Spain, Portugal, Croatia, the Czech Republic and Latvia. The topics under discussion were project activities and coordination in terms of preparing the final report.

The programme comprise sound and bioart workshops by Slovenian artists Maja Smrekar and Monika Pocrnjic. In turn, the following week (May 20–24, 2015) part of “Virtuosi” artworks by artists Paula Vitola and Rihards Vitols as well as “Talk to Me” installation by RIXC artists Rasa Smite, Raitis Smits and Martins Ratniks will be exhibited in Maribor, Slovenia.

“Virtuosi” symposium offers rich programme of lectures, presentations and workshops around the topics – sound art and experiments, alternative food resources, collecting and archiving, communication technologies and bioart. Participants of the “Virtuosi” symposium are “Virtuosi” exhibition artists Rihards Vitols, Paula Vitola, Maija Demitere, Krista Dintere and Kristaps Biters, RIXC artists Rasa Smite and Raitis Smits, artist Gints Gabrans, biologist Janis Liepins. Established Latvian composer Rolands Kronlaks and sound artist and composer Voldemars Johansons will lecture about data sonification in art and data manipulation in musical compositions.

During the 2-day workshop “Audio.holic” Slovenian artist Monika Pocrnjic will suggest that any object that produces sound can also be a musical instrument. The workshop will provide an opportunity for developing experimental musical objects, made up of various materials and used for the purpose of manipulating sound.

The participants of the “YogHurt” workshop led by Maja Smrekar will have an opportunity to produce yoghurt enriched with genetically modified organisms that contains enzymes of the artist’s body. As the food prices keep growing due to reduction of products amount and increase of world’s population, the artist is looking for new solutions and alternatives for food production in the future.

As in the previous years, Spajalica relates to our struggle with the rapid changes and elimination of public space from common horizons and it addresses the issue of idleness, which has been labeled lately as undesirable, inefficient and lazy behavior.The repertoire includes exhibitions, art interventions and workshops, by the following artists: ARCHIsquad, Lara Badurina, Filip Cenek,Laura Llaneli, Miron Milić, Damir Žižić and Kristian Kožul.

Rijeka’s main promenade will temporarily receive a new sculpture – Inflatable Realities (Žižić/Kožul), while the atrium of Mali salon gallery and Radio Rijeka will get a modular living room (ARCHIsquad). The windows of Mali salon will become new icons of light (Badurina) and the ruins of Rijeka’s old town will provide a setting for street art (Milić). Rijeka’s music bands are also involved, but outside of the ambiance of clubs. Finally, a provision of a 95-year old charter that designates music as the
main governing principle will come into effect again (Laura Llaneli and Filip Cenek).
This year’s Spajalica will take place from February to April 2015, in a somewhat smaller range than before. While exploring the ways to continue with this project, we decided to tackle with the issue of rush and its effects on everyday life. The rapid flow of time, where success is measured with an IT-wise and quick feedback, with a clear message of irreversibility, is indeed astounding.  Tapping out the rhythm of accelerating changes of technology and innovation loops, neoliberalism acts as a pensée unique, as a monopolizing language of irreversibility, indebtedness and loyalty to a single way of life, instructing us to keep the pace or back out of the race. Too much democracy is seen as spoiling a good work; public sector is viewed as inert and afraid of changes1. And if we reflect on our own status, we may say that museums seem like dinosaurs
in today’s world.

The ticking synonym of our times can be found in traffic jams, in the frantic haste and mad pursuit of  deadlines and commitments, in a widespread confusion of memory and information…  Rush hour is the painful image of the super-speed that actually results in a deadlock, in an over-heated state; it ends up with deviation and black hole effects. A hole usually signifies a weak point full of emptiness and absence, a point where we lose our ground. The question is: how does this hole manifests in urban landscapes. Is hole necessarily a negative word, or it connotes a switch that leads to different views on the dominant picture? The map of this year’s Copula shows alternative gravitation forces that elude the principles of the new economy and promote deceleration, temporal dislocations, iconography of ruins, pensiveness… In this hole we may found ourselves, at least from time to time.

More info and programme:
http://www.mmsu.hr/Default.aspx?art=871&sec=2

Protocol for Interdisciplinary Research
One of the goals of the workshop “Synergies” is the implementation of a first draft of a protocol for interdisciplinary research. The draft is the result of the exchange of experience and the theoretical discussions among the participants of the workshop.

The protocol document for interdisciplinary research aims to provide useful references and guidelines for institutions, funding bodies, individual researchers and interdisciplinary research groups. The document takes into account a wide number of experiences and visions on interdisciplinary work. It is an open document under ongoing reviewing and discussion.

Here is the latest version of this document.

Read more / Grid Sponoza

The duration of the residence will be three weeks, from the 20th of April to the 10th of May 2015.

After reviewing all the applications we have received, the jury of Soft Control – Grid Spinoza – Spring Sessions # 3 programme has selected the
project “EXOglands radical dynamics: fluid, tissues & bloody self-aware enhancement bionicLAB” by Klau O.jamett.

Short description of the project:

Extreme own-body cognition, Anarchagland (female eyaculation) & male prostate, decolonial anatomy of pleasure. Unveil taboos with DIY biolab
techniques, DIT science & medical hacks reverse engineering. A transdisplinary collaboration based on health issues of colectives who have been marginalized by the desensitized treatment of anything deemed promiscuous & contentious. Grassroots sexual politics empowerment.

This residency is part of the project Soft Control funded by the European Commission through the programme Culture 2007 – 2013.

Thanks to attendance of Mr.Diosi (CYNETART Award 2014), we can broaden the scope of the discussion far beyond only BCI systems to anthropological conditioning…

PROGRAMME
17:00 dr. Aleksander Väljamäe – brain waves recording, use in medicine, marketing, and control
17:30 Ivor Diosi – Molding the Signifier – bio-logy and un-humanistic considerations of  human
18:00 Pavel Smetana – Room of Desires – fulfilled desires in VR
18:30 panel discussion

Host: Ondřej Cakl (CIANT)
Language: ENG primarily, Czech friendly
Entry: free, capacity limited, we strongly recommend to book the seat at info at ciant dot cz email address
—

Funded by/Podpořeno programem: EC Culture Europe 2007.
Realization/Realizace: CIANT
Project/Projekt: Soft Control

http://pipes-project.net/iconuu/

GUESTS:
Michael Bielicky – media artist, author of concept
Štěpán Kleník and Jan Patawa – digital studio BRAINZ, interactive design
Kamila Richter – visual artists, icons creator
Betka Siruckova – visual artists, icons creator

Centre for contemporary art DOX
Poupětova 1
Prague, Czech Republic

Conceptual frame:
Art and new technologies are becoming more and more connected together. Within the VETLICAT project a special module will take place – Future of Art & Science Collaborations. This module will focus on future of connecting these two fields, especially from theoretic point of view. Every third Thursday you can visit the lectures and listen to interesting speakers from Czech Republic and abroad who are specialized on the field of connecting art and new technologies, and obviously discuss the related topics with them.

KEY SPEAKERS

Doc. Ing.
Ivan M. Havel, CSc., Ph.D.
Ivan M. Havel graduated in 1966 from Czech Technical University in Prague. During 1969-71 he attended the University of California at Berkeley, earning his Ph.D. in Computer Science. For several years he worked as a research scientist with the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences. His fields of interest are theoretical computer science, artificial intelligence, cognitive sciences, and related philosophical issues. Presently he is a docent (associate professor) at Charles University and director of the Center for Theoretical Study, an international cross-disciplinary institution affiliated with Charles University and the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic. Since 1990 he is the editor-in-chief of Czechoslovak scientific journal Vesmír (The Universe). He is a member of Academia Europea and serves on boards of several academic institutions and educational foundations.

PhDr. Jaroslav Anděl
Jaroslav Anděl studied photography at FAMU and history of art at Faculty of Arts Charles University in Prague. In 1996-1998 Anděl became a director of Modern and Contemporary Art Museum of National Gallery in Veletržní palác. He is the author of numerous publications and exhibitions on modern and contemporary art. Worked as a curator, consultant, museum director, and educator; currently holds the position of artistic director at the DOX Centre for Contemporary Art in Prague. Recently initiated the series of public debates 12 Hours of the Future (2013, 2010) and DOXagora (2012) and authored the exhibitions Cartographies of Hope: Change Narratives; Jonas Mekas: …As I Am Moving Ahead.. Glimpses Of the Past Linger…; The Lucifer Effect (2011); Thinking Without Limits: Inspired by Rudolf Steiner (2011); and The Future of the Future (2010).

Louis Bec
Louis Bec is a biologist and zoosystemician who extends hisscientific field with a fabulatory epistemology based on Artificial Life
and Technozoosemiotics. He became known through his efforts related toextending biological evolution and simulating new life forms, emphasizing
in particular how these ‹could› bring forth evolution. In 1972, Bec founded the Institut Scientifique de Recherche Paranaturaliste, where he studies the incapability of living beings tounderstand their own existence. Bec is both artist and scientist in the field of artificial life and 3D technologies. He is as much a biologist, artist, curator and educator, and has been a ministry officer for new technologies in arts. Bec is Director of CYPRES (Centre Interculturel de Pratiques et Echanges Transdisciplinaires) in Marseille. He has presented his ideas in many exhibitions, such as Alife II and From Animals to Animats, and articles.

Bacteria Battery / Biotricity is an innovative art and science collaboration project by Rasa Smite, Raitis Smits/ RIXC and Martins Ratniks together with sound artist and composer Voldemars Johansons and young biologists from University of Latvia. The project experiments with new generation “green energy” technologies and sonifies the process of generating electricity from bacteria living in water. The installation consists of a cell network altogether creating a ‘bacteria battery’. The performance of „bacteria battery” not only discovers the great possibilities of the collaboration of science and art, but also increases the awareness of importance of sustainable living.

The Bacteria Battery performance programme and exhibition took place in a special spherical tent, constructed particularly for the event. The geometric planes of the tent were later used as a platform for extraordinary media visualisations. The evening programme included five different audiovisual performances, among them – „bacteria battery” in action interpreted in sounds (by sound artists Voldemārs Johansons and Mārtiņš Roķis) and visualisations (by media artist Rihards Vītols.)

All together the exhibition, performances and workshop Bacteria Battery / Biotricity were attended by 3000 local people of different age groups (starting from families with kids during the day in the framework of workshop programme till students and elderly people in the evening performance programme.

Location: Spikeri Creative Quarter, Riga
Links:
http://www.rixc.org
http://renewable.rixc.lv/?s=bacteria+battery
https://www.facebook.com/rixcriga

SET 2
Composting the city | Composting the net. Performance
By Shu Lea Cheang (FR) & Martin Howse (UK) at the opening programme of Save As exhibition.
Dates: October 8, 2013

Composting the City | Composting the Net examines the parallel degenerative process of fermentation and fragmentation of our daily food scraps and shared digital commons. While Composting the City investigates urban food waste management systems, Composting the Net sources net cultures’ accumulated data. Food scraps dumped onto a compost heap are layered and turned until all traces of labeling are erased. On the net, the abundance of info-data sinks into a deep “reservoir” with tags attached.

Location: Spikeri Creative Quarter, Riga
Links:
https://www.facebook.com/rixcriga
http://festival.rixc.lv/13

LECTURES RIXC, RIGA, LATVIA 2013
Dates: 07/09/2013 – 12/10/2013

SET 1
Bacteria Battery/ Biotricity – public workshop & lecture
Dates: September 7 – September 8, 2013

The public workshops & lectures introduced wider public with the technology of the installation “Bacteria Battery” – a unique technology in creating alternative translated into sounds, both, discovering the great possibilities of the collaboration of art and science and promoting the awareness of importance of sustainable living, giving a special attention to the many possible alternative energy sources and technologies.

Location: Riga, Latvia

SET 2
Techno-ecologies Panel B lead by chair Shu Lea Cheang in the framework of the 5th International Conference on the Histories of Media Art, Science and Technology RENEW
Dates: October 11, 2013

Techo-ecologies panel thematically approached resillient networks and emerging ‘techno-ecological’ art practicies.

Panel speakers:
Helene von OLDENBURG, Claudia REICHE. THE MARS PATENT – a living fossil
Kuai Shen AUSON. 0h!m1gas: biomimetic stridulation environment
Takis ZOURNTOS, Marjan VERSTAPPEN, Caroline LANGILL, Dot TUER. Speculative Realist Media Art Technologies: Probing into the Nature of Things
Conor McGARRIGLE. Locative Histories: exploring the continued influence of early Locative Media art
Claudia ROSELLI. Resilient networks through art practices. Old Delhi – New Media. The 5th International Conference on the Histories of Media Art, Science and Technology – RENEW, was hosted by RIXC Centre for New Media Culture in Riga in partnership with the Art Academy of Latvia, Stockholm School of Economics in Riga and Danube University’s Center for Image Science. RENEW hosted three days of keynotes, panels and poster sessions on the histories of networked digital, electronic and technological media arts.

Venue: Stockholm School of Economics in Riga
Link: http://renew.rixc.lv/days/october11.php

SET 3
Techno-ecologies Participatory Session 1 – Playing Fields lead by Armin Medosch in the framework of the 5th International Conference on the Histories of Media Art, Science and Technology RENEW
Dates: October 10, 2013

Techo-ecologies panel thematically approached resillient networks and emerging ‘techno-ecological’ art practicies. Main themes of the Playing Fields session was: Collaborative mapping, curating and tagging as a social game: which expanded fields of artistic practices offer the greatest potential for desirable social change? Playing Fields Session particularly was organised as pre-event of the huge international Fields exhibition held from May 15 to August 3, 2014.

Artistic committee:
Rasa Smite, Raitis Smits, and other invited participants.

Study visit, networking, collaboration, dissemination, presentations, 2013 the public event – installation / performance as well as workshop “Bacteria Battery / Biotricity”

On January 28 – February 3, RIXC representatives Rasa Smite and Raitis Smits as curators went to ZKM Center for Art and Media in Karlsruhe, Germany, to do a research and choose art works that could potentially be included in the exposition of the most grandiose initiative of this project for RIXC – the international media art exhibition “FIELDS” which will take place in Riga, 15.05.2014 – 03.08.2014 as one of most noticeable events of the Riga 2014 (Riga – European Capital of Culture 2014) special programme.

In framework of this study visit RIXC representatives Rasa Smite, Raitis Smits and Daina Silina also went to the annual international festival for art & digital culture “transmediale” in Berlin, where they met with co-curator of the extensive exhibition “FIELDS” – media artist, writer and curator from Austria Armin Medosch. Together they elaborated the first call for the potential participants of the exhibition which was sent out to international mailing lists, newsletters, diverse virtual platforms etc.

On September 2013 RIXC representative Raitis Smits, Rasa Smite and sound artists and sound artist Voldemars Johansons went in a Study Visit to the internationals “ARS ELECTRONICA” festival in Linz. It was also artistic visit for set up the installation “Bioticity” in Ars Electronica Center, which will be hosted there until September 2014.

Photo Gallery

With its thirteen-year-long tradition in Maribor, this year’s edition of the international festival KIBLIX, entitled KIBLIX 2014 – Parallels, addresses and concerns an array of research perspectives that pervade the field of contemporary interdisciplinary production. It is not limited to a specific niche, nor does it concern only the narrow field of authorial approaches, but accepts the heterogeneity of contemporary production and presents it with an exhibition, audio-visual performances, lectures, workshops, round tables and artist talks, appealing both to the professional, i. e. academic, as well as the wider public. Despite its seeming eclecticism, the KIBLIX 2014 – Parallels festival is in search of a hidden pulse that vibrates inside all its participants. The presented works re-question the foundations of the modern world and tackle the issues, which are becoming detected by all of us – what is the post-digital era and what are its consequences; can the combined efforts of artists and scientists hack up a free future; the uses and misuses of the enormous amounts of data; electronic and technological pollution and waste circulation; strategies of surviving in a world with only illusory privacy; the internet black market; the fragmentation of contemporary identity to the real and the virtual. The questions and issues perceived by the presented works and the festival participants are crucial to our present, and even more so to our future. Fundamentally, they represent the momentum that has been present throughput our history – what does swift progress mean for the human race? Are new technologies a way out of the gutter or just wool over the eyes of the already illusory freedom? Following the tradition of past editions, the basic goal of the festival is to act connectively and to create an open space for a common, unburdened consideration of the paths that we choose. KIBLIX joins scientists and artists, researchers and gamers, computer experts and biologists, hackers and musicians, producers and random visitors. The intertwinement of guests and visitors from most diverse directions is the soul of the festival platform – the format of the festival enables spontaneous connections between people of different professions but kindred interests, which creates an intellectual surplus and a tremendous creative potential that stands as a purified vision of interdisciplinary activity, which is almost inevitably the core upon which it is sensible to build a future.

Some of this year’s participants:
Tania Candiani • Miha Ciglar • Nataša Teofilović • Olaf Val • Ghislaine Boddington • Bojan Gagić & Cameron Bobro • Ida Hiršenfelder & Saša Spačal • JUNEsHELEN • Matej Končan, Gregor Purgaj & Črtomir Just • weAREmedienkuenstler • Mind Machines • Oliver Pietsch • Monika Pocrnjić • Luka Prinčič • Ana Rajčević • Random Logic • Vlado Repnik • Yann Leguay • Justin Thyme• Maja Smrekar, Robertina Šebjanič & Miha Tomšič • Rasa Šmite, Raitis Šmits & Voldemars Johansons • Žiga Pavlovič • Lection.7 •

Image: Ana Rajčevič

25.10
Opening visit / Visita inaugural
Inês Moreira
Curator / Curadora Technical Unconscious / FBAUP

01.11
The place and the projecto / O local e o projecto
Gonçalo Leite Velho IPT / Technical Unconscious / FBAUP
Joel Cleto Historian / historiador / PortoCanal

08.11
Cooperativism and the city / O cooperativismo e a cidade
Fernando Martinho Cooperativa dos Pedreiros
Adriano Vasco Rodrigues Historian / Historiador

15.11
Stonemasonry and work / A pedra e o trabalho
Luís Silva President / Presidente Cooperativa dos Pedreiros
Álvaro Silva Factory manager / Diretor da fábrica da Cooperativa

Contacts:
Faculdade de Belas Artes Universidade do Porto
225 192 400
softcontrol@fba.up.pt
www.softcontrol.fba.up.pt
www.facebook.com/technicalunconsciousproject

Iztok Kovac and guests / Iztok Kovac e convidados

Oficina, Cooperativa dos Pedreiros

18h15
Auditório Fernando Pernes
Pavilhão Carlos Ramos, FBAUP

23 Set
Project Presentation / Apresentação do projecto
Daniele Sambo, photographer (Italy / UK)

25 Set
Joana & Mariana, designers (Portugal)

30 Set
Máquina de Pensamento Pós-Industrial (Portugal)

2 Out
Iztok Kovac, performer / choreographer (Slovenia)

7 Oct
Manuel Granja, designer (Portugal)

9 Oct
Linda Brothwell, artist / crafts (UK)

14 Oct
Relli De Vries, artist / landscape arch. (Israel)

16 Oct
Cora Piantoni, visual artist (Swiss / Germany)

21 Oct
Tomaz Furlan, visual artist (Slovenia)

23 Oct
Moisés Mañas, multimedia artist (Spain)

COOPERATIVA DOS PEDREIROS
Monday and Thurday / Segunda e Quinta
18h15
Auditorium, Cooperativa dos Pedreiros

27 Oct
John Grzinich, sound artist (USA / Estonia)
(Monday / Terça)

30 Oct
Guidi & Racco, visual artists (Canada and Italy)
(Thursday / Quinta)

Contacts:
Faculdade de Belas Artes Universidade do Porto
225 192 400
softcontrol@fba.up.pt
www.softcontrol.fba.up.pt
www.facebook.com/technicalunconsciousproject

26.09.2014 – evening*

Performative visit to the stone quarries and the backyards of Cooperativa

Daniele Sambo, Cooperativa dos Pedreiros

*depending on weather conditions

Stevan Kojić – User Interface Art
Actively consuming contemporary technology through a graphical user interface [1], we partly control the flow of information and its safety As a result of limited control over user interfaces, we often find ourselves confronted with information overload. We don’t find the time for processing-thinking, nor time for our own reflections. Thus, we automatically consume information without understanding its wider context and truthfulness. Our virtual copy, which is born in the graphical user interface, becomes our “new reality”, easy for manipulation and control.
Through art, science and technology, Stevan Kojić points to everyday life in a graphical user interface. His planned out systems-experiments transform the gallery space into a laboratory. Here, the visitor is actively participating, partly influencing the changes in the signals-information.
Kojić’s new “Self-sustaining” system continues his previous research based on the flow of signals through various media and examines the possibility of transforming the visual impulse into an audio or motor signal. The central part of the system is the electroencephalograph (EEG). It registers brain activity from the visitor’s scalp with the help of electrodes. Obtained values of brain activity are then passed to Arduino (open-source software and electronics) and a computer, transposing them into sound and video animation, and using them for controlling vibrating motors. The visitor sees, hears and feels the changes that are a direct consequence of his brain activity. During the process of watching, new changes occur in brain activity, which the system registers and continues to transform signals that control the visual, audio and motor parts of the system. Signal values are more balanced while not registering brain activity, and more dynamic when the visitor is an integral part of the system. Brain waves intersect with radio waves received by radio receivers available on the Internet. They receive signals from meteorological satellites orbiting around the Earth. The first type of waves we broadcast ourselves, while the second type surround us. Signals circulating in this hybrid system mutate, disappear and reappear, trying to convince us that the system is self-sustaining. Caught up in this electronic “vicious circle”, we often aren’t sure what the purpose of the obtained information is, what the system is used for, besides us partly influencing it, i.e., that which it produces. Since a self-sustaining system is not possible, we realize we are brought into an absurd state, similar to the one we fall into every day with information overload. The absurdity is highlighted by the idea that the system emulates an organism “whose only purpose is its own existence [2]”.
Even though it reminds us of a science laboratory, Stevan Kojić’s hybrid installation does not serve to discover a scientific truth, it exerts its impact through the domain of comprehension of art by a visitor. It points to a contemporary position in a user tailored interface system in which we create our virtual identities.

[1] Graphical User Interface – GUI (colloquial: GUI is a type of user interface that allows users to interact with electronic devices through graphical icons and visual indicators such as secondary notation.
[2] Taken from the interview with Stevan Kojić “Početak ne leži u tezi, već u dilemi”, for the webzine www.supervizuelna.com.

STEVAN KOJIĆ (1973, Kikinda) received a B.A. and an M.A. degree in sculpture from the Faculty of Fine Arts in Belgrade. He is an associate professor at the Department of New Fine Arts Media at the Academy of Arts in Novi Sad and the Academy of Fine Arts in Trebinje. His main interests are researching relationships between art, society, science and technology through relations between the analog/digital, biology/technology, ecology/economy, low-tech/hi-tech, open/closed systems, time/space, the virtual/real, etc.

Contact: kojicstevan@gmail.com, www.stevankojic.com

ABOUT STEVAN KOJIĆ:
Remember those infinite machines from cartoons, where one action leads to another, the second to the third and so on? Stevan Kojić constructs something similar, but he uses contemporary technological methods and gadgets in combination with objects from everyday life. We will be talking in regard to the recently held exhibition “The Self-sustaining System of Absurdity – еco-technological-bio-social habitat” held at the 12Hub Gallery.
An introduction to an interview led by Žolt Kovač for www.supervizuelna.com

…The technological meets the biological in an altogether new way in Stevan Kojić’s installation “The Self-sustaining System of Absurdity” (2010). Here, through the cyclic travel of information between bonsai trunks and electronic devices, he asks (maybe rhetorically) if there is a purpose to the constant recycling of meaning and knowledge, and the infinite reinterpretations of cultural, social, political and economic information.
Ena Hodžić, from the catalogue “Device Art 4.012 – Machines, Robots and Boiled Eggs”, Kontejner, Zagreb, 2012

… we see Stevan Kojić’s need for creating a system that doesn’t strive to discover great scientific ideas and truths that real science laboratories insist on, but strives to enable freedom to act,  to simplify and repurpose existing, traditional socio-artistic systems. Here we see a noticeable orientation of the artist toward utilizing open source hardware and a do-it-yourself philosophy. This practice is characteristic for artists in the West known as makers, whose basic concepts of work are experiments in multidisciplinary projects.

Sanja Kojić Mladenov, for the exhibition: “Stevan Kojić: Unstrategic intelligence”, the Fine Arts Salon of the Cultural Centre of Novi Sad, Novi Sad, October 2012

This “laboratory” with its absurd “experiments”, that is conceptually mostly based on the principles of ecotechnology, indirectly points to the absurdity of today’s relations in society and makes one think if man should break loose from the system, return to himself and his dignity and reestablish his union with nature by recognizing the potentially mutual positive relationship between nature and technology, for mutual benefit, and a wellbeing for mankind. As long as art is in favor of consciousness, the more artists cross boundaries — the better. Stevan Kojić’s exhibition “The Self-sustaining Systems of Absurdity” does just that, and in an unobtrusive and very constructive way.

Sunčica Lambić – Fenjčev, for the exhibition “The Laboratory of Absurdity” held at the Contemporary Gallery in Zrenjanin

About the SOFT CONTROL Project (www.softcontrol.info)

SOFT CONTROL – Art, Science and the Technological Unconscious (EU)
Dom omladine Belgrade is part of the wide range European project “Soft Control — Art, Science and the Technological Unconscious” that will be realized during 2012–2015 through the cooperation of 9 partners from 7 countries. During this period there will be more than 8 symposiums, 16 solo art exhibitions/installations, over 40 talks with artists, 7 big residency programs for artists and scientists, 4 group exhibitions, 8 workshops, over 30 lectures, 12 group exhibitions, 7 performances, and many artist and project exchanges which will result from basic project activities. The goal is to make Soft Control a multi-annual cultural project with the mission to introduce science labs to a wider audience, starting from artists and experts, to various educational entities, going further to include the widest public. Through this project and the cooperation with its European partners, Dom omladine Belgrade will present to the domestic public the most important Belgrade artists from this field. www.softcontrol.info
Partners and co-organizers of the Soft Control project: Multimedijalni centar KIBLA, Maribor, Slovenia (project leader and coordinator); Hangar (Fundació Privada Associació d’ Artistes Visuals de Catalunya), Barcelona, Spain; Muzej suvremene i moderne umjetnosti, Rijeka, Croatia;
Galerija O3ONE, Belgrade, Serbia; Media Space RIXC, Riga, Latvia; CIANT (International Centre for Art and Technology), Prague, Czech Republic; Faculty of Fine Arts, University of Porto, Porto, Portugal; KGLU, Slovenj Gradec, Slovenia; and DOM OMLADINE BELGRADE, Belgrade, Serbia.

The Project Team:
Dušana Nikolić Radošević, project editor
Ivan Stanić, curator of the exhibition, art historian
Milica Ševarlić, public relations
Jakov Ponjavić, design
Marko Radojković, executive producer

This exhibition is part of the SOFT CONTROL project. The project was realized with the support of the European Commission. Sponsored by: the Ministry of Culture and Media of the Republic of Serbia, and the Assembly of the City of Belgrade. Associate partner in the field of technology:  the Computer Center of the University of Belgrade. We thank the School of Electrical and Computer Engineering of Applied Studies in Belgrade for our cooperation.

This year’s episode of Spajalica/Copula keeps its current focus – a collective appropriation of urban space and acknowledgment of its public purpose accompanied by artistic goals and community ideas, deliberating the possibilities the city currently offers or hides. However, in the omnipresent hustle with swift changes that elude the majority’s will and impose physical and symbolic distances, this year we are additionally motivated by a subject closely connected to the issue of pushing public space out of the community horizon. We are referring to the trap of the ever more rapidly subjective clock ticking, we look eye to eye with the decay of unplanned entertainment that becomes a derogatory word and a sign of an unwanted worldview – inefficiency and sloth.

Around 30 local and foreign artists, researchers and theorists will implement projects as solo or collaborative initiatives between 8 April and 31 May 2014, in the zone from the main pedestrian area – Korzo – to the edge of Sušak and Delta parking lot, over Karolina Riječka Pier, to the industrial zone near the railway station. As one-day or several-day events, workshops, lectures and public actions, the project will contribute to the idea of a city as a place of creating social alternatives. The generator of temporary art projects will this year step out of the close proximity of the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art, stretching over the museum boundaries and entering the specifics of particular urban toponyms, for and to the purpose of exchange and mutuality among people.

Copula #2 is a continuation of the current cultural practice related to the reactivation of public and urban space. Additionally, it refers to the lack of adaptation (positioning) of people in social and economic aspirations that channel the global capital flow. These are followed by dilemmas related to wishes for a better future that could be fulfilled by conscious redirection of individual desires and needs. Therefore, the project is still nurturing informal relationships in order to create a situation of mutual trust and empowerment.

Participants: Kreativni Kolektiv Kombinat, ARCHIsquad, Holger Pohl, Tanja Vujasinović, Rino Efendić, Tajči Čekada,  Luiza Margan, Dunja Tišma, Marija Kajapi, Una Rebić, Kruno Jošt, Maja Kohek, Lucija Ukić, Sanja Gergorić, Čiko i dokoličari, Mateja Bučar / DUM, Stéphane Querrec, Josip Pino Ivančić, Katze und Krieg, Nika Rukavina, Petra Mrša, Ivana Lučić and Igor Eškinja.

Participants in talks and lectures: Andreja Kulunčić, Raumlabor – Axel Timm,  Siniša Labrović, Valentina Zrnić Gulin, Zona 00 – Nina Sindičić, Aaron Schuster, Archisquad, Tina Peraica, Kruno Jošt, Maja Kohek and Suzana Marjanić.

PROGRAM

http://spajalicacopula.wordpress.com/

Curators: Ksenija Orelj & Sabina Salamon
Project manager: Nataša Šuković

Copula is a part Soft Control project http://www.softcontrol.info/

Supported by: EU – Kultura 2007. – 2013., Ministry of Culture, City of Rijeka, Primorje-Gorski Kotar County, Institut Francais , Zagreb, Goethe institut, Zagreb

Media Partners: Kulturpunkt, Novi list, Moja Rijeka, RiTv

  “With the support of the Culture Programme of the European Union”

Muzej moderne i suvremene umjetnosti
Dolac 1
Rijeka 51000
Croatia

the FIELDS Opening Programme will include Art+Communication Festival programme and RENEWABLE FUTURES – International conference on art, science and cultural innovation
Riga May 15-18, 2014

Renewable Futures is new conference series, the launch of which will take place during the FIELDS exhibition opening weekend on May 15-18, 2014 in the framework of Riga – European Cultural Capital programme. In a response to recent quests for a more sustainable future and overcoming the crisis of the present, the conference aims to invent new avenues for future developments by bringing together traditionally separated domains. Inspired by Fields exhibition approach, which does not just look at art in the narrow sense but takes into account all kinds of creative practices that brings together new thinking, scientific knowledge, aesthetics, technologies and social practices, the conference will shape new contact zones between academic research and diversity of contemporary art practices, art and science, sustainable businesses and social engagement in the 21st century.

FIELDS PROGRAMME.pdf

Photo Gallery

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Production:
RIXC, Centre for new media culture, Riga, Latvia
http://fields.rixc.lv

http://renewable.rixc.lv
http://facebook.com/rixcriga
http://vimeo.com/rixcriga
http://twitter.com/rixcriga

NewMedia art exhibition

Koroška galerija likovnih umetnosti / Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Koroška
Curator: Andreja Hribernik

Exhibition opening: FRI, 24 January 2014 at 6 pm
Koroška galerija likovnih umetnosti, Glavni trg 24, 2380 Slovenj Gradec

The exhibition entitled Temporary Objects and Hybrid Ambients concerns the unveiling of creative space established between art and technology. As an artist, Marko Batista is difficult to situate within a specific artistic direction for his works are created at the intersection of performative intermedia practices, sound and visual installations, and physical-sensorial experiments.
The basic principle of operation followed by the artist is the exploration of intermediate spaces both in the physical sense, where electronic signal – acoustic or visual – are produced via home-made interfaces, as well as in the ideational sense, where human perception is explored in a world suffused with electronic communication, digital devices and technology. Namely, human perception is adapted to a certain kind of use of technology and, therefore, it is limited to a certain type of experience. By creating hybrid technological, electromagnetic or chemical systems, Marko Batista challenges the mystification of technology while he also opens up new ways of thinking about it. With his experimental systems, which bring together various fields, he expands the field of human sensorial perception and the phenomenology of unstable audio-visual systems in space and time.
The exhibition responds to the exhibition space of the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Koroška and it works as an integral work of art, which makes it possible for the viewer, depending on his position in space, to get an audio-visual impression of the whole or of the individual modular objects. As regards content, the projects are divided into three exhibition clusters distinguished by the basic principle of “operation”.
The experimental systems of electromagnetic radiation and transfer of information deal with the exploration of visual and sound images, be it sound interventions in space or the fragmentation of media images in the transfer of information.
The cluster entitled Electro-Chemical Systems is based on the interweaving and the mutual impact of electric and chemical processes, in which electric impulses travel through a series of fluid matters, converge in spatial sound stimuli and produce unpredictable effects.
In the final, third cluster entitled High-Voltage Experimental Systems, the author explores the impact of high voltage, which enables the creation of specific architectonics of signals, whose mapping, manipulation and distribution with the system are manifested in the visual and acoustic field of the spectator confronted with real-time projections and a synchronous acoustic backdrop. The repetitive, mutating structures of audio and video elements trigger unpredictable effects at various psycho-sensorial levels of the spectator’s perception.
The artist’s installations reveal his specific relationship to technology, which, on the one hand, he demystifies by using “low-tech” elements and by visualising its processes, while on the other hand, he introduces the element of the unknown and he moves on the cusp between controlled and chaotic modular systems.
The artist’s intermedia practice also introduces the concept of time. By situating the event – the operation – in the museum space, he renders his objects permanent (for the duration of the exhibition) in their existence in the museum space and because they exist only through process – they are temporally limited, while the museum space loses its timelessness.
Nine projects will be presented at the Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Koroška; they were created over the past six years and they offer and insight into the artist’s creative work.
The projects Error Trash, Hybrid Audio-Mechanical Machines and Bentronix were produced by the K6/4 Institute – Kapelica Gallery. The projects Parallel Digital Structures, H220, Time Diagrams, CHEM:SYS:REACTOR and Optolyth were produced by the Aksioma Institute. The project SIPHON:SYS:APPARATUS was produced by the author.

The exhibition is co-produced by Aksioma – Institute for Contemporary Art, Ljubljana, and Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art Koroška.
http://www.aksioma.org/temporary.objects/
Curator: Andreja Hribernik

Technical support: Maja Brezar, Urška Batista, Žiga Palčar, M7 Grafiks, Dejan Kastelic
Partners for technical equipment: Zavod K6/4 – Kapelica gallery, Zavod Projekt Atol

Supported by:

The realisation of the exhibition is funded by the European Commission in the frame of the project Soft Control.
The content of communication is the sole responsibility of the author and in no way reflects the views of the European Commission.

SUTRA / TOMORROW

Belgrade Youth Centre as part of the European project Soft Control initiates a restart of SUTRA (TOMORROW) festival. The Artist Talk Symposium SUTRA will try in two days to present artists, concepts and projects that explore the relationship of art, science and technology through interviews with artists, presentations and interactive workshops. At the same time SUTRA is the initiative and support of the Belgrade Youth Center to re-launch this Arts and Science Festival in Belgrade.

Sutra programme.pdf

More about SUTRA / TOMORROW

Photo Gallery

26.12.2013

27.12.2013

Worskshop for kids: ” My First DiscoKosmačBot ” by Monica Pocrnjić (27. 11. 2013)

Production:
DOB, Dom omladine Beograd, Beograd, Serbia

The name for the joint festival platform MFRU-KIBLIX2013: When Worlds Collide was inspired by the 1951 science fiction classic. The symbolism of the movie highlights the split and the paradox of the gap between the developed and the underdeveloped third world. In this context, the MFRU-KIBLIX2013 festival symbolizes live nature, the reality which we live in, which is intertwined and dependent on the swift development of science, technology and consequently art and new forms of creativity.

Contemporary interdisciplinary forms of creative conceptions are intertwined inside complex junctions of different worlds and approaches, in the tension between the natural and the bio-technological, the virtual and the hybrid, the fake and the genuine principle, which – in an abundance of dialogs, contradictions and junctions – becomes visible in the form of artistic installations, digital records of process works, performances, lectures, presentations, workshops and audio-visual pleasures.

For the first time this year, the MFRU-KIBLIX2013 is taking place at Maribor’s KIBLA Portal, an old textile factory hall spreading on over 2000m2, thus joining the dispersed festival units on a single location in a get-together of artists, people working in the field of arts&culture, researchers, scientists, educators and anyone willing to receive additional knowledge about the theoretical and research work, as well as anyone willing to share and experience the creative forms of artistic experimentation and interpretation; willing to discover, work, discuss, listen and share their ideas and findings.

The MFRU-KIBLIX2013 includes interaction with various target audiences and encourages an active collaboration by everyone, especially young people, students and people with long-time professional experience… Culture and science intertwine as disciplines, constructively exchanging cultural models of critical thinking, activism and experimentation with scientific methods, research and knowledge.

Program curators: Aleksandra Kostič and Nina Jeza.

Selectors: Aleksandra Kostič, Nina Jeza, Jože Slaček, Franc Vrbančič, Maja Smrekar, Saša Spačal, Robertina Šebjanič, Ida Hiršenfelder, Marianne Wagner.

Exhibited artworks:

TANIA CANDIANI (MX), KATHY HIGH (US), MAŠA JAZBEC (SI), KARL HEINZ JERON (DE), MAJA SMREKAR (SI), OSCAR MARTIN (ES), TIAGO MARTINS, R. O’NASCIMENTO, A. ZINGERLE (PT), YURI KLEBANOV, ROI RONN, YONATAN BEN YA’KOV (IL), TIAGO MARTINS, VESELA MIHAYLOVA (PT), RICARDO O’NASCIMENTO (ES), VISUALISING PALESTINE (LB), DORON SEGAL, JENNY BAHAR, ITAY KURGAN, SHAHAR YACOBY (IL), DRAGANA SAPANJOŠ (HR), THERESA SCHUBERT (DE), SAŠA SPAČAL, MIRJAN ŠVAGELJ, ANIL PODGORNIK (SI), ZORAN SRDIĆ JANEŽIČ (SI), ROBERTINA ŠEBJANIČ, ALEŠ HIENG – ZERGON (SI), NITSAN HOORGIN, JULIAN RUIZ, INBAL COHEN (IL), EVA PETRIČ (SI), VOJKO POGAČAR (SI), ORTOTIP (SI)

Supporting program:

MFRU ARHIV, Jože Slaček (SI), HIPER FILM MFRU, Uja Irgolič, Marko Batista, Jože Slaček,

Miroslav Ničić, Marko Ornik, son:DA (SI), FEMINA (SI)

AV performances:

ELECTRIC INDIGO, MALAVENTURA, RICARDO O’NASCIMENTO, JOHNSMITH, ELISABETH SCHIMANA / NOID, ANA PEČAR / LUKA PRINČIČ, ROBERTINA ŠEBJANIČ,

ALEŠ HIENG ZERGON, OSCOFF, C-DRIK, ŽIGA PAVLOVIČ, GROOVY CARTOON SESSIONS, NEAGUSHI™, VJ POSTARTLAB & DJ DAMIR P. f.k.a. D’SUN, JOŽE SLAČEK, PRIMOŽ OBERŽAN, JAN STERNIŠA, ORTOTIP, YOANN DURANT, SAMO PEČAR, BENO SORŠAK, CAMERON BOBRO

Lectures and presentations:

William Myers, Angelo Vermuelen, C-drik, Peter Tomaž Dobrila, Christopher Fiorello, Jessica Anderson, Jerneja Rebernak, Tina Dolinšek, Zoran Poznič, Dejan Pestotnik, Jože Slaček, Djino Šutić, Monika Pocrnjić, Robertina Šebjanič, Luka Frelih, Žiga Kranjec, Stella Venciana, Vojko Pogačar, Tomaž Grušovnik, Arne Korsika, študentje FERI, študentje PF, Dušan Zidar, Natalija Premužič, Suzana Uran, Franc Vrbančič, Gregor Krušič, Ladies of the press

Workshopolgy:

Music composition and improvisation from a single sound source – Open Lab, [rdxs]:__x=e and generative systems – Open Lab, Synto-duino-beeper, Ladies of the press, My secret: Pleasure bpm, Biotweaking work_SHOP, Revaluating Memory, Q:aRt, Game today, job tomorrow, FIRST®LEGO®League, Robotics for girls, Magic Cube, Robocup – dancebot workshop, DIY Theremidi Orchestra, ShapSounds, Smilefection, Design your city, Print GREEN, Gaming Lounge: relaxation and play, MariborScore, Student Campus

More info: http://www.mfru-kiblix.si

CONTACTS

———————————–

visitors:

Nina Jeza

phone: ++386 31 330 275

e-mail: ninajeza(at)gmail(dot)com

————————————

workshops:

Tanja Grosman

phone: ++386 31 682 579

e-mail: tanja(dot)grosman(at)kibla(dot)org

——————————————

press:

Sonja Gregorn

phone: ++ 386 2 300 29 95, ++386 41 849371

e-mail: sonja(dot)gregorn(at)mkc(dot)si

Dejan Pestotnik

phone: ++ 386 59 076 376, ++386 40 895 194

dejanx(at)kibla(dot)org

——————————-

“Raablabs” is the first collaborative project resulted from the workshop Synergy organised by Hangar and Grid Spinoza in the framework of the European project Soft Control.

The theme of interdisciplinary synergy will structure the workshop itself, which will have two complementary and concurrent aspects, one practical and one theoretical  –
1. the development of several interdisciplinary project proposals, including formation of working teams, establishment of key resources and an ongoing development plan.
2. the development of a draft “interdisciplinary research protocol” document. This document is intended for international circulation as a guide for policy makers, government agencies and funding bodies.

These aspects will develop in parallel during and after the workshop. The theoretical deliberations will draw on the process of project development for examples etc, and those involved in project development will profit from input of theorists. Workshop participants may elect to concentrate on either or both aspects.

This interaction will be ongoing after the workshop is over. Projects and protocol will be hosted on the Grid Spinoza website. Development and cooperation will continue on this platform. Release of a first protocol document is planned for december 2013.

Presenters
Simon Penny is director of the workshop and of ongoing theoretical development. He is an artist, theorist and professor in media art, interactive installation and robotic art with a long history in interdisciplinary research and teaching internationally. Previously professor of Art and Robotics at Carnegie Mellon, currently professor of Art at University of California Irvine and visiting professor in the Cognitive Systems and Interactive Media master at UPF.

Roc Parés is an artist and researcher in interactive communication. Currently Professor at Universitat Pompeu Fabra and codirector of the University Master in Digital Arts, Idec/UPF.

Mara Balestrini has a background in Cognitive Systems and Interactive Media and is currently pursuing her PhD at the Intel Collaborative Research Institute on Sustainable Connected Cities, University College London. Her work lies at the intersection of urban informatics and behavior change, an interdisciplinary approach blending cognitive sciences, technology and arts.

More:
http://hangar.org/en/news/taller-sinergies-teoria-i-practica-interdisciplinaria/

After going through 39 project proposals, the Soft Control – Grid Spinoza – Spring Sessions #1 Jury has selected the project “Mixing-Up the Library” by the artist Dan Norton.

During his residency in Hangar, Dan Norton is going to carry out an investigation that brings together creative practice with Information and Library Science.

The study examines the value of creative methods for interacting in digital collections, and archives.
The research stems from an artistic interest in the relationship of the reader to the writer through technology (viewer to artist). This has been examined recently through Norton’s thesis, where the Disc Jockey’s creativity centers upon the use of the personal digital library.
In Information Science, a number of models have been developed to analyse user-system interaction in information seeking and retrieval. For example; Ellis (1989), Ingwersen (1996), Saracevic (1996), Belkin (1995). These models support development of information systems that are responsive to user needs.

However, a knowledge gap exists in these models; none are developed by observing creative practice. No creative information behaviors exist in the models Makri (2007) is an exception).
Disc Jockeys reappropriate pre-authored media. Content is reused throughout their process, and because of this it is relatively simple to observe individual creative behaviors, which allow innovation and newness to enter the process.
These two behaviours are: Selecting and mixing. I.e., the choice of material, the sequence by which it is shown, and the manner by which it is combined. This is sufficient to produce novel information.

The residency will be used to explore the value and potential application of the DJ’s creative model of information interaction, by discussions within the field of Information and Library Science.

Media Art Histories: RENEW

The 5th International Conference on the Histories of Media Art, Science and Technology
in collaboration with the 15th International Festival for New Media Culture “Art+Communication”
Riga, October 8–12, 2013

The Media Art Histories: Renew conference will host three days of keynotes, panels and poster sessions on the histories of networked digital, electronic and technological media arts.

The conference will be complemented by the Art+Communication festival programme, featuring media art exhibition, experimental film and video screening programme, live performances and workshops.
The conference will be organized by The Center for New Media Culture RIXC, in collaboration with Art Research Lab of Liepaja University, Stockholm School of Economics, Latvian Acadamy of Arts, Contemporary Art Center kim? and other local partners

http://www.mediaarthistory.org
http://twitter.com/rixcriga/
http://www.facebook.com/rixcriga/

April 4–7, 2013

Exhibitions | Performances | Lectures | Debates | Workshops | Screenings

Organized by CIANT

Enter 6: Biopolis calls for theory and practice based proposals addressing uncertainty of the division between natural and artificial, novel approaches in interaction between body and data.

Let us ask questions about future of life, ethics of scientific intrusion into exclusivity of the nature. Least but not last we will examine entanglement of our bodies and technology.

Keywords: Artificial vs. Natural, Bacteria, BCI, Bio-signals, Bioart, Bioethics, Biotechnology, Body, DNA, EEG, Genetics, Implants, Mutation, Nature, Neolifism, Next nature, Perception, Prosthetics, Science, Synthetic life, Transgenic, Wetware

Among the artists and researchers pre-negotiated to participate there are: Darina Alster (CZ), Tomáš Černý (CZ), Veselina Dashinova (BG/UK), Jalila Essaïdi (NL), Jakub Jansa (CZ), Pavel Karafiát (CZ), Jakub Ludma (SK), Martina Michalíková (SK), Jan Nálepa (CZ), , Marie Polákova (CZ/AT), Michal Pustějovský (CZ), Tomáš Suchan (CZ), Petr Šourek (CZ), , Tomáš Vavříček (CZ), Frederik de Wilde (BE) and others…

http://festival-enter.cz/2013/open-call-announcment/

MutaMorphosis is a conference on mutant futures and a platform for sustained mutalogues.
The first MutaMorphosis conference subtitled Challenging Arts and Sciences took place in Prague in November 2007 within the 40th anniversary celebrations of Leonardo | Journal of Arts, Sciences and Technology. It was a successful event thanks to the participation of a large number, diversity and quality of interdisciplinary experts, the themes discussed, the issues they raised, and last but not least the coherent and efficient organisation by CIANT | International Centre for Art and New Technologies.

Feel free to browse 2007 on-line proceedings (ISBN 978-80-254-0691-5) with over 70 papers and introductory texts with focus on extreme and hostile environments.

Here we are now, in 2012, five years after the first conference, ready to re-visit its intriguing themes and to introduce new ones while reflecting on recent and near future transformations at the intersections of arts, sciences and social change with a new subtitle: Tribute to Uncertainty (explore the theme!) and connect with conference Attractors.

Main partners for 2012 are the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic | Centre for Science, Technology and Society Studies at the Institute of Philosophy (also to publish selected papers in Theory of Science | Journal for Interdisciplinary Studies of Science) and Planetary Collegium, an international platform for research in art, technology and consciousness, with its hub and president Roy Ascott based in the University of Plymouth. Part of the MutaMorphosis II conference will be a composite session of the Planetary Collegium and selected papers will be published in the Technoetic Arts Journal.

As in 2007, there will be conference proceedings with ISBN published on-line.

Main host venues are the New Stage of the National Theatre, home of the first multimedia theatre ever, the legendary Laterna Magika, and the Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic.

We are looking forward to welcoming you in Prague December 6-8, 2012!

http://mutamorphosis.org

Preparatory Committee (alphabetical order):
Roy Ascott | Artist and educator | Planetary Collegium
Louis Bec | Biologist, artist and educator | Associated Researcher at CIANT
Roger Malina | Physicist, astronomer, editor | University of Texas at Dallas
Pavel Sedlak | Producer, curator, editor | Deputy Director of CIANT
Pavel Smetana | Artist and educator | Director of CIANT

Multimedia Centre KIBLA, Maribor and Koroška galerija likovnih umetnosti (KGLU), Slovenj Gradec announce the international contemporary art project – entitled “SOFT CONTROL: Art, Science and the Technological Unconscious” – to be held from November 14 to December 15, 2012.

SOFT CONTROL: Art, Science and the Technological Unconscious
exhibition, conference, workshops, lectures
Dates: November 14 – December 15, 2012

Venues for the project:
KIBLA Multimedia Centre in Maribor, Slovenia
Koroška galerija likovnih umetnosti (KGLU), Slovenj Gradec, Slovenia

Opening day at KGLU, Koroška galerija likovnih umetnosti, Slovenj Gradec:
November 14, 2012
Opening day at the KIBLA Multimedia Centre, Maribor:
November 15, 2012

Participants: 30 artists from more than 11 countries
Curator of the project: Dmitry Bulatov

The international contemporary art exhibition SOFT CONTROL is being held as part of the Maribor – European Capital of Culture 2012 programme. The project will be presented at two sites: at the KIBLA Multimedia Centre (Maribor) and the Koroška galerija likovnih umetnosti (Slovenj Gradec). SOFT CONTROL will be curated by DMITRY BULATOV, artist, new media theoretician and curator of the National Centre for Contemporary Arts (Kaliningrad branch, Russia). The exhibition will feature the work of thirty artists from eleven different countries.

The status of European Capital of Culture provides a powerful impulse towards the realisation of new ideas and projects. This helps to draw in both local experts and internationally renowned professionals to participate in the cultural life of the city. Devoting special attention to contemporary readings of culture and the exchange of innovative ideas, the KIBLA Multimedia Centre (Maribor) and Koroška galerija likovnih umetnosti (Slovenj Gradec) have initiated a large-scale international project focused on the latest forms of artistic creation that have emerged at the intersection of art, science and technology. “The KIBLA Multimedia Centre is one of the most important organizations involved with contemporary art in Slovenia and Europe today”, remarked MMC KIBLA president and project director Aleksandra Kostič. “For the past fifteen years we have built up a great deal of experience in conducting various art projects and festivals.” The current project seeks to analyse the impact of the development of advanced technologies on the modern individual, and to elaborate cultural strategies for re-establishing people’s sense of engagement in the technological processes under way.

The capacity of an enterprise to both make a memorable impression on the audience and become a significant cultural event is largely determined by the cooperation of major curators, artists, philosophers and art theoreticians. In order to impart a universal format of artistic expression to the collective efforts, MMC KIBLA and Koroška galerija likovnih umetnosti Slovenj Gradec invited Dmitry Bulatov to curate the exhibition. Aleksandra Kostič commented on the choice: “Dmitry Bulatov is a well-known expert in the field of new media. As curator of the National Centre of Contemporary Arts (Russia) he has brought about more than twenty major international exhibitions and publishing projects devoted to various aspects of the interactions between art and high technology.”

INTERNATIONAL EXIBITION – ARTISTS
“SOFT CONTROL: Art, Science and the Technological Unconscious” will demonstrate various patterns of the use of new technologies in the current artistic process, and also present works of art that subject the role of technology and the media in contemporary civilisation to critical analysis. “When choosing the theme of the exhibition”, notes Bulatov, “we proceeded from the idea that science and technology are not merely tools that we use to achieve designated goals. On the contrary, technologies are raising new invisible boundaries all around us, penetrating into and transforming all spheres of human activity”. This raises the question of how we ought to understand the nature of control, of the compulsion that forces each and every one of us to participate in the formation of technological systems. In Bulatov’s opinion, “the task of the exhibition can be summed up as follows: to show how artists create new forms and new identities, not, however, as the protagonists of a historically determined technological narrative, but as the creators of that narrative”. Artists including Marina Abramović (Serbia/USA) with Suzanne Dikker and Matthias Oostrik (The Netherlands), Bill Vorn (Canada), Stelarc (Australia), James Auger and Jimmy Loizeau (United Kingdom), Polona Tratnik (Slovenia), Leo Peschta (Austria), Seiko Mikami (Japan), David Bowen (USA), Tuur Van Baalen (Belgium), Stefan Doepner and Lars Vaupel (Slovenia / Germany), The Tissue Culture & Art Project: Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr (Australia), Maja Smrekar (Slovenia), Kuda begut sobaki (Russia), Andy Gracie (United Kingdom / Spain), Brandon Ballengee (USA), Louis-Philippe Demers (Singapore), Ursula Damm (Germany), Guy Ben-Ary and Kirsten Hudson (Australia), Boredomresearch: Vicky Isley and Paul Smith (United Kingdom), Arthur Elsenaar and Remko Scha (NL) and others were invited to participate in the exhibition for this very reason. All in all, the SOFT CONTROL exhibition is projected to show more than twenty technological art installations, some of which are being promoted as both international and European premieres.
Commenting on the project’s format, Bulatov emphasises: “The foundation of our exhibition lies in works of art that were created using the latest 21st century technologies: robotics, information technologies, biomedicine and nanotechnology. Artworks like these are the ideal way to convey a sense of time, which combines signs of life (like a living organism) with those of a technically reproduced artefact. This is of utmost importance when we are dealing with the approach of a new post-biological age – a stage of our human existence when the technological constituent of one or another organism will not only become inseparable from the biological, but in the long run will even overtake it”.

EDUCATIONAL PROGRAMME
Along with the exhibition programme, the SOFT CONTROL project will involve other noteworthy events, all distinguished by this synthesis of artistic disciplines and scientific/technological research. Throughout the month, MMC KIBLA in Maribor and Koroška galerija likovnih umetnosti in Slovenj Gradec will host educational lectures and discussions, seminars and master-classes given by well-known experts in the field of contemporary technological art, as well as video screenings from major international media-art festivals such as: PRIX Ars Electronica (Austria), VIDA: Art & Artificial Life International Competition (Spain), MediaArtLab Centre for Art and Culture (Russia), Experiments in Art and Technology (E.A.T.) (USA), IMPAKT (The Netherlands), The Prometheus Center (Russia), and others.

INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE
The showpiece event of the educational programme will be an international conference involving theoreticians and artists from Europe, USA, Canada, Australia and Singapore, to be held 16–17 November 2012. Conference participants invited include recognised experts in the field of contemporary art and new technologies such as Dr Roy Ascott (Plymouth University, UK) – one of Europe’s pioneers of cybernetic and telematic art; Dr Erkki Huhtamo (University of California Los Angeles, US) – well-known for research in media archaeology; Professor Andy Pickering (University of Exeter, UK) – an internationally-known figure in science and technology studies; Dr Pier Luigi Capucci (NABA International Academy of Arts and Design, Milan, IT) – a leading expert in art, science and technology. The conference will place special emphasis on the presentation of new strategies in contemporary technological art and training and education in the field, as well as practical presentations. Famous artists and practitioners including Stelarc (Australia), Polona Tratnik (Slovenia), Oron Catts and Ionat Zurr (Australia), Louise-Philippe Demers (Singapore) will enjoy the opportunity to express themselves in the papers, lectures and discussions.
Technological art today is a site for the testing of various artistic innovations. However, it is clear that this research into the New should not be seen merely as narrowly-specialised technical or aesthetic experiments, but first and foremost as cultural utterance and cultural activity. Only then can the results of the artists’ investigations have a significant influence on thought and social life. This is the sort of goal set by the “SOFT CONTROL: Art, Science and the Technological Unconscious” project – it aims to provide visitors with an opportunity to learn to relate to technology not as our slave or as a simple extension of ourselves, but as a mysterious construct with which we enter into creative unions and conclude cautious agreements.

The project will be realized with the support of The European Capital of Culture Maribor 2012, The Slovenian Ministry of education, science, culture and sport, Slovenj Gradec Municipality, Maribor Municipality and The Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency (EACEA).

Organized and produced by Koroška galerija likovnih umetnosti Slovenj Gradec and MMC KIBLA

Production:
ACE KIBLA
http://www.kibla.org

More about the project:
http://kiblix.org/kiblix2012/softcontrol/

SOFT CONTROL: Art, Science and the Technological Unconscious was performed within Maribor European Capital of Culture 2012
www.maribor2012.si
http://www.maribor2012.info/