[spectre] transmediale.02 newsletter: exhibition

Andreas Broeckmann abroeck@transmediale.de
Thu, 3 Jan 2002 18:05:22 +0200


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 + + + t r a n s m e d i a l e . 0 2 + + +  n e w s l e t t e r  03
 + + + 03-01-02 + + + t r a n s m e d i a l e . 0 2  + + +
 international media art festival + + + Feb. 5-10th, 2002
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 1. Exhibition
 2. Images in the Mind
 3. Spectators As Directors
 4. Inverting the Internet
 5. The Humanized Computer
 6. More ...

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 1. Exhibition
 transmediale.02 will present Berlin's first extensive media art exhibition
reflecting current developments in international media art. It shows
interactive installations which encourage the visitor to participate. The
exhibition will display internet-, video- and sound-installations,
highlighting new aesthetic concepts using digital technologies. The show is
staged in the exhibition hall of Haus der Kulturen der Welt
(John-Foster-Dulles-Allee, 10557 Berlin-Tiergarten).
 Opening February 5, 19h.
 Open February 6-10, 10-20h
 February 11-24, 11-18h
 Admission 5 Euro, 3 Euro (reduced)

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 2. Images in the Mind

 Philipp Lachenmann says that those images are most significant which are
established in the public subconscious.
 Snap-shots with highly emotional potential like the picture of a solitary
German plane in the heat of a middle eastern airport that was hijacked in
1977. Lachenmann confounds visual habits through treating the image
digitally and streching this moment endlessly. Even though his video
installation "Space_Surrogates I (Dubai)" dates long before September 11,
2001, it seems to hint at the images of the terrorist strike against World
Trade Center.
 In "Say Hello to Peace and Tranquility", a video installation by Dagmar
Keller and Martin Wittwer, life seems to be a long quiet river of deserted
suburbian images, highlighted with synthetical, electronic sound. A
constant flow of images invites contemplation. The camera's eye sees
endless sequences of straight hedges, garden fountains and white-washed
fences with no perturbance of human or animal life. This homeland made of
stone and wood serves as a protective barrier against all other concepts of
life.

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 3. Spectators As Directors

 Interactive movies that implicate the spectator in a film plot are among
the persisting  dreams of the movie industry, but it still has not been
realized in a commercially viable format. Luc Courchesne approaches this
concept from a video artist's point of view with the interactive video
panorama "The Visitor - Living by Number", which is "directed" by visitors
who navigate the plot by calling out numbers.
 The basic material of Masaki Fujihata's "Field-Work" are digital video
images that have been recorded in Tokyo's suburbia with exacte GPS-Data
resulting in a topographic und temporal coordinate system. Fujihata
transforms this system into a virtual 3-D space in which the video images
move along the GPS-tracks. The spectator may follow these traces and
navigate across the three-dimensional space.

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 4. Inverting the Internet

 "Crank the Web" combines old-fashioned forms of automation with up-to-date
digital telecommunication technology, thus making hidden computer
operations visible. Jonah Brucker-Cohen's physical web-interface is a
browser powered by the visitors' physical strength. Through a crank handle
the visitor determines the speed with which the browser loads photos and
texts of a website.
 P=E9ter Frucht captures the endless babbling and chattering that proceeds
at
all times in chatrooms all over the internet. Frucht concentrates and
visualizes this flow of speech. "iow ianalbipootv mmif with mftw ibn
cotflgohaha isbt" is an interactive, net-based installation that stylizes
texts by exchanging its letters and rearranges them by means of algorithms.
The sound is also manipulated Through the interaction of the visitors, the
live-chat can be mixed, interweaving different languages and recited by a
text-to-speech program.

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 5. The Humanized Computer

 The robot as a DJ with great precision, robotlab's (Matthias Gommel,
Martina Haitz, Jan Zappe) two "juke_bots" grab vinyl disks surrounding
them, one at a time. Interacting with each other and using different
scratch modes, they create constantly changing sound compositions. A simple
interface serves the visitor to navigate the robots' choreography and sound
sampling.
 Can the degree of civilization be measured by the way a society treats its
worn-out computers? While old but well-operating computers are often
carelessly dumped, Alexei Shulgin shows that even computers with small
memory can still play an important role. Shulgin's computer-installation
"Busking 386 DX" is a street musician who tries to fascinate passers-by. It
interprets tunes like "House of the Rising Sun" or "California Dreaming"
with its heart-rendering text-to-speech voice and asks passers-by for a
pittance.

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 6. More ...

 Jocelyn Roberts - L=B4Invention des animaux
 Seiko Mikami - Molecular Informatics
 Wolfgang Staehle - Empire
 Joan Leandre - retroyou r/c
 Kenneth Rinaldo - autopoiesis
 Stuart Rosenberg - public vote / public bet

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 transmediale.02 +++ newsletter 03 +++ annette schaefer
 +++ press office +++ presse@transmediale.de +++

transmediale.02
[ go public! ]
5 - 10 february 2002
international media art festival berlin

klosterstr. 68-70
10179 berlin
germany
fon +49 30 2472 1907
fax +49 30 2472 1909
http://www.transmediale.de
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Member of the European Coordination of Film Festivals E.E.I.G.
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