[spectre] Hack.it.art - Hacktivism in the Context of Art and Media in Italy

[Tatiana Bazzichelli]

hack.it.art
Hacktivism in the Context of Art and Media in Italy

 From January 15th till February 27th 2005

Opening hours: Tuesday till Sunday from 12 till 7 pm
Organized by: Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien in cooperation with the 
Italian Cultural Institute of Berlin and the Bundeszentrale für 
politische Bildung. In partnership with the "U-Spot" Art Magazine, the 
"Zitty" CityMagazine, the "Taz" Newspaper, the "Jungle World" Weekly 
Magazine, Data-Recovery and the media art festival "transmediale.05". 
With the support of the Cultural Anthropology Department, Faculty of 
Sciences of Communication, University "La Sapienza" of Rome and the 
"Fondazione Bevilacqua La Masa".

The project hack.it.art at Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien 
(www.kunstraumkreuzberg.de) is an exhibition and event about 
technological, artistic and political activism in Italy. It sheds light 
onto a large complex of activities that, throughout the 80ies, have set 
up and grown alternative networks to the traditional art system. While 
these activities may not always be identified as "art", they could more 
easily be called "practices" or "activism".

In Italy, technological, artistic and political activism is closely 
interconnected, in a common network spread over the whole country, and 
consisting of collectives, activists and artists alike. Their common 
denominator is to give life to an alternative and independent way of 
producing information, cultural consciousness and communication. In a 
specific way, the correct meaning for this network of practices is the 
word "hacktivism". Hacktivism is the fusion of hacking and activism, 
technology and political action. Hacktivism is a rhizomatic, open source 
phenomenon. According to this point of view, hackers are not just those 
who destructively intrude into computer systems (and who should be more 
correctly called "crackers"), but those who share the good of knowledge, 
who fight for free communication and access for all, aiming to create 
and spread knowledge for the public domain.

A practical example of this is the hacker ethic which could be called an 
attitude of gaining knowledge through technology and sharing the 
results, using both technology and knowledge in a genuinely free way 
which overcomes traditional copyright economy.

The exhibition shows this widespread phenomenon and presents to the 
German public the multitude of Italian media and net activism. The aim 
is to give an inside view into this very heterogeneous and in Germany so 
far rarely recognized Italian scene, to provide links to the field of 
art as well as politics. Furthermore it attempts to connect and 
interlink Italian and German projects and activists.

hack.it.art is focused on Italy as a country, in which, due to its 
political and social situation, alternative media networks offer the 
only means to make voices heard in opposition to the dominant media 
monopoly of Berlusconi. This net of counter information is signified by 
its potential to mobilize (through mailing lists, forums etc.). This 
offers the possibility and ability of spontaneous intervention in 
cooperation with other social movements. In a longer perspective this 
seems to imply a great potential of political participation.

The exhibition presents artistic positions which apply themselves to 
social questions and pose a critical point of view towards a traditional 
media landscape and art scene. The exhibition explores answers to the 
question: How can there be independent media production in 
self-maintained network while there is autocratic media and a monopoly 
of communication by the state?

The political aim of hack.it.art refers to an acknowledgement of the net 
as a political space, with the possibility of decentralized, autonomous 
and grassroots democratic participation. Access for everybody, 
information as a free good and the conscious, non-commercial use of 
hardware and technology, the basic concepts of hacker ethics, are 
referred to in this project as political objectives.

For six weeks, from the 14th of January till the 27th of February, the 
exhibition will take place at the Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien. There 
will be workshops and events on various aspects of Hacktivism. Some of 
the exhibition space will become a temporary media lab for workshops to 
take place.

hack.it.art is presented by AHA: Activism-Hacking-Artivism project 
(www.ecn.org/aha) and curated by Tatiana Bazzichelli and Alexandra Weltz.

Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien
Director: Stéphane Bauer
Mariannenplatz 2
10997 Berlin
phone: +49-(0)30-90298-1455 or 1454 fax: +49-(0)30-90298-1453
Bethanien at kunstraumkreuzberg.de
www.kunstraumkreuzberg.de

Curators:
Tatiana Bazzichelli, t_bazz at ecn.org
Alexandra Weltz, a_weltz at hotmail.com


Exhibition
Opening
14th, January 2005, 7 pm
"SuperFactory (TM)" with: Pi-radio & Displaced Dilemma 
www.superfactory.biz (Berlin, D)
"PHAG OFF" with: Nikky www.deliriouniversale.com and Francesco "Warbear" 
Macarone Palmieri http://www.vidalocarecords.com/booking/phagoff.htm 
(Rome, IT) and Bernardo "Noisy Pig" Santarelli www.goodstuff-music.com 
(Berlin, D)

Exhibition (14. January - 27. February)
The exhibition connects four hacktivist concepts in four different rooms:
- Hack Gender! action pink and sexyshock; with: Betty collective 
www.ecn.org/sexyshock (Bologna, IT)
- Hack the Frequency! telestreet and subversive video production; with: 
Disco Volante TV from Telestreet Network www.telestreet.it (Senigallia 
AN, Italy).
- Hack the Code! hacker art and net.art projects from the Italian 
hacktivist community www.hackmeeting.it (Italy).
(Wall)paintings by Nomad and Miss Riel www.this.is/gata (Berlin, D)
- Hack the Reality! the art of hacktivism; with: video on hacktivism by 
Candida TV www.candidatv.tv (Rome, IT) and Italian magazine info-desk 
(Neural www.neural.it, Decoder/Shake www.decoder.it and www.shake.it, 
Simulteneità, etc.). "Inconsapevoli Macchine Poetiche" installation by 
Giacomo Verde www.eutopie.net (Lucca, IT)


Workshop
5th/6th, February 2005
Hacking TV: How to build a Telestreet
During the workshops the instructions to build a Telestreet will be 
given to the public; max 20 partecipants. 5th February, 2.00-6.00 pm/6th 
February 12.00 am/3.30 pm.
- Agnese Trocchi, Candida TV (www.candidatv.tv Rome, IT)
- Federico Bucalossi, Nothuman (www.nothuman.net Florence, IT)
- Alexandra Weltz, filmmaker (Berlin, D)

Panels

6th, Feburary, 4.00 pm
Hacking the Body
cyberfeminism panel: radical and ironical uses of technology through 
female bodies.
first section (4.00-5.30 pm):
- Cornelia Sollfrank, artist and cyberfeminist www.obn.org (Hamburg, D)
- Agnese Trocchi, Candida TV www.candidatv.tv (Rome, IT)
discussion with the public
Projection of the video (5.30 pm):
  "Bio Doll's Baby" by Franca Formenti www.francaformenti3.org (Varese, IT)
second section (6.00-7.30 pm):
- Diana McCarty, Bootlab www.bootlab.org  (Berlin, D)
- Betty, Sexyshock www.ecn.org/sexyshock (Bologna, IT)
discussion with the public
- Moderation: Tatiana Bazzichelli, AHA www.ecn.org/aha (Rome, IT/Berlin, D)

8th, February, 7.00 pm
Hacktivism. Was tun?/Che fare?
panel on the present and future of hacktivism; with:
first section:
- Tina Lorenz, Chaos Computer Club www.ccc.de (Berlin, D)
- Tommaso Tozzi, Hacker Art www.hackerart.org (Florence, IT)
second section:
- Sebastian Lütgert, Textz.com www.textz.com (Berlin, D)
- Freaknet.org (www.freaknet.org Catania, IT)
discussion with the public
- Moderation: Alessandro Ludovico, Neural www.neural.it (Bari, IT)

Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien | Mariannenplatz 2, 1o997 Berlin |
Tel.: (o3o) 9o298-14 55 | Fax: -14 53 | 
bethanien at kunstraumkreuzberg.de.de | www.kunstraumkreuzberg.de | Leiter: 
Stéphane Bauer, Projektmitarbeiterinnen: Ulrike Ettinger, Katharina 
Ballhausen, Julia Schonlau
More info on: www.ecn.org/aha
-- 



           8/|\   ---------------------------------------------
          /c_"/   Tatiana Bazzichelli
         //_/\__  web site: http://www.ecn.org/aha
           /  \             http://www.strano.net/bazzichelli
          /____\  e-mail: t.bazzichelli at mclink.it
            /|    ---------------------------------------------