[spectre] V2_Test_Lab: Fashionable Technology 20/05/2009

[V2_]

V2_Events: Test_Lab: Fashionable Technology*
V2_ Ground floor, Eendrachtsstraat 10, Rotterdam. May 20, 2009 8 p.m.
Admission: free.

*The term Fashionable Technology is coined by Sabine Seymour.

This event will be streamed live at http://live.v2.nl

Featuring: Sabine Seymour (AT/US), Mark Coeckelbergh (B/NL), Aram
Bartholl (DE), Cutecircuit: Francesca Rosella and Ryan Genz (UK), and
KOBAKANT: Mika Satomi and Hannah Perner-Wilson (JP/AT).

Clothing is an aspect of the human physical appearance with considerable
social significance. Styles, logos and prints mediate our
self-expression and publicly communicate our personal tastes and
preferences. Popular ways of doing so reflectwhat is in fashion, which
is under constant change due to new developments in fabrics,
construction methods,ancillary objects, and their (re-)combination by
fashion designers. Recent advances in wearable technology have resulted
in a variety of technologies that seamlessly connect to the human body,
or are integrated into clothing (such as shape memory alloys, soft
circuits, and embedded displays). As a result, more and more fashion
designers are turning to the field of wearable technology fornew
developments. While these progressive fashion designers are currently
setting the trend in fashionable technology with,what can broadly be
considered, innocent implementations (such as embedded iPods, integrated
LEDs, and adaptive contours), many artists and designers prophesize more
provocative scenarios for the future of such technology. These artists
foresee that this trend will eventually have an unprecedented social
impact, due to the wide-ranging possibilities for self-expression,
connectivity, and public communication of innovative fashionable
technologies.

The scenarios for fashionable technology sketched by these artists
provoke philosophical discussionas to the social impact that such
developments may have. Will the public display of Twitter messages on
our clothing open up new opportunities for social engagement? Will this
stimulate physical proximity or rather deter us from it? Would we share
the same private information as we often do in online networks when we
publicly display these messages on our bodies? How desirable are
scenarios for more intimate fashionable technologies, such asmobile
transmission of fashion-mediated physical sensations? And what happens
when these garments fall prey to fashion hackers?!

This edition of Test_Lab is organized in collaboration with Rotterdam's
acclaimed philosophy cafe Arminius Denkcafe.

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

For more information, please contact Michel van Dartel
E: michel at v2.nl
T: +31 (0)10 2067272.