DIGICULT

Digital Art, Design & Culture

Founder & Editor-in-chief: Marco Mancuso

Advisory Board: Marco Mancuso, Lucrezia Cippitelli, Claudia D'Alonzo

Publisher: Associazione Culturale Digicult Largo Murani 4, 20133 Milan (Italy) http://www.digicult.it Editorial Press registered at Milan Court, number N°240 of 10/04/06. ISSN Code: 2037-2256

Licenses: Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs - Creative Commons 2.5 Italy (CC BY- NC-ND 2.5)

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Digicult is part of the The Leonardo Organizational Member Program TABLE OF CONTENTS

Marco Mancuso Telcosystems: Machines And Audiovisual Horizons ...... 3

Annamaria Monteverdi Medi/action And Mediam(bi)ent. The Nuformer Digital Media Method ...... 10

Carla Langella Biomimethic Prized By Science. Scientific Imaging As Art ...... 17

Silvia Bertolotti Between Rhythm And Measure. An Interview To Aoki Takamasa ...... 21

Barbara Sansone Donkijote By Cristian Bettini. The Sustainable Slowness Of Being ...... 25

Serena Cangiano Mechatronic Art And Diy. Marc Dusseiller: The Artistic Soldering ...... 34

Teresa De Feo Open Observatory Challenge. Roger Malina And The New Leonardos ...... 40

Elena Gianni A Surreal Doubt. Iocose Group’s Works ...... 46

Herman Mendolicchio A Year Of Arts Santa Monica. An Interview To Vicenc Altaio’ ...... 52

Gigi Ghezzi Synthetic Aesthetics. Life Design ...... 61

Enrico Pitozzi Spectra. Movement According To Cindy Van Acker ...... 64 Massimo Schiavoni Suspended Projections. The Changing Equilibria Of Wanda Moretti ...... 72

Mark Hancock Decode Exhibition. Software Art At Victoria & Albert Museum ...... 85 Telcosystems: Machines And Audiovisual Horizons

Marco Mancuso

and insturments in audio visual digital production, Telcosystems has been able to create, in a little over five years an activity with a limited production, a road of research that has gone beyond pure representation of sounds and images. For Telcosystems, the tension comes from a possibile audio visual representation in complex systems starting from simple singular David Kiers, Gideon Kiers and Lucas elements, in both sound and visual Van Der Velden are Telcosystems, a terms. Dutch research group very well known Speaking in terms of technical and and very respected internationally, for formal terms, from the work done by its aesthetic and important projects, Granular Synthesis (on perception, the from live performances or relation with space, the work on enviromental installations. For years elementary systems of sound and they have been advancing on many images) and that Alvs Noto ( the levels: on an academic level (they visualization of complex systems studied at the Royal Conservatory of the Royal Academy of The Hague), on starting from infinite elements an editorial level ( Lucas Van Der through evolutionary processes, the Velden is one of the directors of the emotional dialogue with the audience, audio visual festival and Sonic Acts the tension that offers new multimedia), on an artistic level, possibilities tied to the relationship emotionally and prospetively in the between man and technology), sound-imagine relationship, related to Telcosystems has developed an the physical space and in relation to independent and mature argument, the audience. enriched if you like, by some strange elements in the field of contemporary They have a method of work audio visual. This is why I felt the urge concentrated on the use of software to interview them, a little bit late

3 seeing as they have been around for by biochemical science into more five years. tipicale processes of imitation, mutation and recombination of the living subjects.

For 12_series the subjects in question are 12 machines, 12 Mini_Mac accompanied by 12 speakers, installaed in the space almost as a tribute to the 12 Tv Sets in the memory of Paik. The Korean master has the capability of changing under the influence of an external element 12_series is their latest project, (in this case not from a magnet but developed in the Spatial Media from the behaviour of a machine Laboratories and in collaboration with nearby) and to the emotional Baltan Laboratories and exhibited in relationship between the work and 2009 at the Wood Street Galleries of the audience. Pittsburgh, later on a little booklet Complex decisive processes activated written by Arie Altena, Joost Rekveld by each machine based on the and a DVD. A centre , Baltan, infact collective behavior of the system for a works on the relation between art and new form of audiovisual production, science, or anyways between human perhaps for the first time ever in this and artificial. 12_series is based on this area it is much closer to the language principle, on the difference between of films, video or sound. An natural human expressions and introduction to some of the key issues expressions artificially created. of software art and generative art: Exploring the sensorial boundries of despite an identical DNA track, the the human vision, following a journey machine is able to manufacture started before with the work of Mortal beautiful audiovisual horizons, which Electrics or Loudthings on their could perhaps be a new frontier in capacity of organizing themselves creative production of a universe we independently with auto-organization know is certainly a “tired” moment. with complex networks of data and algorythmic processes, with 12_series Telecosystems has introduces the issue of generative behaviour, transformed by evolution theories and

4 special, just imitation, mutation and recombination. Between 2007 and 2008 we made several versions of the test to study the operation of the compositional system.

We took a long time but we have finally devised a working model that meets our standards, a series of relatively dynamic audiovisual generators capable of producing Marco Mancuso:First of all I think interesting results over a longer readers would like to know more period of time, the right combination about the genesis of the project of elementary instructions to create 12_series. The project was produced complex results and the right balance by Spatial Media Laboratories, in between autonomy and control to collaboration with Baltan create a freedom of choice and, most Laboratories, and exhibited at Wood importantly, a sense of harmony Street Galleries in Pittsburgh in 2009. between individuals. At that time we To conclude the project you published were in contact with Murray Horne, a very elegant booklet and dvd. editor of the Wood Street Galleries, So, when did the project start and who offered the space to us for the how did you begin to develop the show, was an ideal project for ideas behind 12_series, maybe also in producing a horizon with speakers relation to the space of the gallery? and audiovisual displays.

Telcosystems: We began to develop Marco Mancuso: 12_series is inspired the initial ideas of the project by evolutionary principles and acts as 12_series in 2006. At that time we a single living body, which literally were working with spatial multi- lives and breathes in the darkness and channel audio systems, but always whose existence is the result of an using a single channel video. Another evolutionary process of the 12 parties starting point was the idea of having a (sottocorpi) that it is formed by. At the cloud of machines that could same time the evolution of each part generate sounds and compositions is closely linked to the outcome of the based on simple principles of generative part around it. I found evolution. ” Each with its own voice, or some similarities with your past character, but at the same time aware project Meta_Epics. As 12_series, the of the machine nearby. Nothing computer generates and consists of

5 real-time audio-visual models that affect each other. Do you consider 12_series as the next step in such research? And if so, what are the differences between the two projects?

Telcosystems: Indeed, with the project Meta_Epics we examined the basic principles of generative processes in relation to audiovisual Marco Mancuso:What most impressed 12_series feedback, emphasis is me is one of the things I read in your instead placed on the evolutionary booklet about the close links between principles of composition itself. If in composition and rhythm and their Meta_Epics we focused on specific translation into code in order to compositional ideas more restricted generate sounds and images. In other words, the machine language 12_serieswithin a system of a single entity, with we orient our efforts instructions result from the pace and towards creating a compositional composition. So 12_series is also concept which shows the general interesting as an application of behavior of the group, from limited audiovisual generated code, usually more territories explored by designers set rules, that would work for multiple and composers.. Could you explain entity that is a system based on the better how you have worked on this group. key point? InMeta_Epics many ways the predecessor Telcosystems: To create audio-visual is certainly 12_series logical, it was developments we tried, a device ME who turned in to our similar to the way in which languages FFseries. In ME we have created an work in our brain. With some bricks, environment full of sound and a like the letters of the alphabet, you virtual sense of visual space. In several can create a wide variety of words chapters we address the that can be used for the construction 12_series compositional relationships between of sentences, etc. .. So we have these two spaces. With we created a wide compositional range of witness the fusion of sound and bricks to create a “language” image in an audiovisual horizontal rudimentary, that supports the space, a wall of sound and images. creation of “dialects” distinguished by

6 their rhythmic behavior

Marco Mancuso:What is rare and very interesting, but in my opinion not very clear and evident in the booklet, for example, is the participation in the project by Baltan Laboratories. They are interested in projects on the border between art and science, Baltan Laboratories had never been concerned before these audiovisual Marco Mancuso: In 12_series seems to projects that involve an element of be a strong dialogue between basic diving physics in space. opposites, another key point of your According to you what in particular concerned them in your project? aesthetic and technical research: Perhaps the idea that audiovisual while textures, shapes and sounds composition art retains its power, and rudimentary models, others expressive, narrative, poetic and the wanted a complex display, translation of his message with interwoven, multi stratification of scientific techniques and not only these elements. Even the ‘installation with the live media or video or consists of 12 screens in the dark, installations with immersive which fill the space and push the interactive installations? public to challeng senses and sensations. So, how to handle this Telcosystems: Well, in the case of type of dualism, as work with complex Baltan things are very simple. In fact, physical and spatial pulse, starting we ourselves have founded, with the from basic elements (tangible assets, collaboration of the Muarer United such as sound and light) and which Architects and Geert Mul, visual artist, are also references to art audiovisual because we wanted to make this kind experimental the past? of complex large-scale artworks. We still can not understand why other Telcosystems: In our work, the laboratories are not interested in this complexity is not a starting point but type of work, but rather than the result of a process. There is no “wasting” our time to convince them question of opposites, simplicity or about the importance and genius of complexity, but to find a significant the project, we considered it more audiovisual behavior by setting simple productive and to allow the base rules, and having the results in Baltan . between perfect predictability and

7 absolute noise. Starting with limited generative processes and their resources and rudimentary elements outcome, while the work is for the you have to compose and / or build installation of machines that the complex in order to create a determine the outcome. With meaning. Certainly helps to think of 12_series we made a small change in how our DNA consists of only four dialogue including artificial machines bases, which simply placed in a themselves, adding an extra certain order makes possible many compositional dynamical layer. things.

Marco Mancuso: Aesthetics of man- machine aesthetics: another combination of the history of experimental arts that has always fascinated me and it has received a new impetus (in the sense discussed) some years ago with the development of art and generative software (development). How do you perceive this as Telcosystems dialogue? Have Marco Mancuso: I want to finish you ever considered the creators of talking about the possible interaction your audio-visual systems, using between emotional and public machines and codes as an expression facilities, I believe is a focal point in of your creativity and your your research and in your projects. As appearance, or leave a certain they did in the past, they are the autonomy to the machines as a small minimalist (how can we forget The form of artificial intelligence, allowing Flickr of Tony Conrad), the abstract them to create forms according to a expressionists (such as Mondrian or Le sort of ‘inner beauty? Witt), or the current audiovisual experimentation (as Granular Telcosystems: We are always Synthesis), you also work with audio- concerned about the dialogue visual abstract patterns, and simply between man and machine. Both are small to create a dialogue between capable of making decisions, act machines and humans. independently, but always in relation to each other. Their role is determined With 12_series we have now taken a by the nature of the project. During further step in this direction, using the live performance we ourselves “minimum” technologies offered by have more direct influence on the Mini_Macs. However, unlike what has

8 been done by your “fathers” in the uncharted digital territories. Our past, your approach to this dialogue is performances, films and installations never too sharp, nor tended towards can be seen as audiovisual shipments. physical limits, or related audiovisual Since our work is not based on known total immersion. Your search is more or recognizable things, the brains of focused, its also open to feedback, listeners and viewers in front of our and even sensitive to a possible work, function as generators of understanding by the public itself models and stories. But since every about the history of your audio-visual human brain works differently, each will have a different take on the work of art. What can you tell? experience. Telcosystems: One way to look at what we do is by seeing us as explorers and pioneers. But instead of http://www.telcosystems.net/ going out in search of uncharted territory, coded new wilderness, http://www.baltanlaboratories.org/

9 Medi/action And Mediam(bi)ent. The Nuformer Digital Media Method

Annamaria Monteverdi

style gets popular and turns into an example for many.

Biosensors, acoustic, magnetic, optical, electromechanical motion capture systems, MIDI messages: with new media we witness to live performances of the actor-dancer together with the “media processor” device (Lev Manovich) and body is Projectable surfaces in metropolis used as a hyper instrument, since the have become big buildings’ facades. performer is able to control just by his We already wrote on this subject in movements, interactively and in real- the previous Digimag issue and this time, inputs incoming from several time we are putting forward our peripheral devices, hence animating interview with Rob Delfgaauw from objects, environments, graphics, NuFormer, a Dutch firm which has images, sounds, 3D characters. diffused worldwide the sensationalist technique of mapping and screening We behold, therefore, the most 3d videos on bulidings thus precisely various digital technomutations of the reflecting existing volumes and actor and also of the stage/scene, altering in the public the way of contextually, since it is clothed in perceiving the static object. attributes which are as protean and Performances, advertising campaigns, metamorphic as the electronic mask: big public events. patterns made of lights, visual and audio landscapes, transparent screens Their promotional video, Projections uninterruptedly embodying bodies on Buildings, a video-live performance and images, interactive digital devices in which buildings seem to be flaking that stimulate different levels of off in front of spectators or else to be perceptions, spatial immersive filled up with colorful small balls, was strategies to fulfill the necessity of everywhere on the web. NuFormer mobility, proximity and action from

10 the public towards the event. interaction and sense-motor processes rather than preexisting “Reacting” and “acting” environments, realities, along with a new aesthetic virtual and intelligent, give shape to a risen from collaborative comparisons new theatrical space: not a mere between artistic and scientific container of events anymore, yet a research worlds, being based, that is, sensitive, extensible space, on interaction.” modulating and being modulated. Contemporary scene has developed rather atypical systems of screening on diverse surfaces. The attempt is to achieve the faded, vanishing effect of images through concealing the screen canvas: hence projections on spherical and moving surfaces (as in Intolerance 1960 by Josef Svoboda and Luigi Nono), on double tulle voiles between which the real actor is set, (like in the scene concert What is Following Varela, Paolo Atzori aspires fascism and for the multimedia to a new referential concept: space as reading Qual’è la parola by Giardini an enactive entity: “The project of the Pensili). representation stage is turned into a sort of conceptual catalyst for an Mobile panels and projections on thin elaborate team-work, where distinct textured materials letting light pass individualities and competences are through, showing blurred images, holistically integrated within a video reminiscences of archetypical planning method which, being based forms are the ones in Crescite from on contemporary conception of the Tragedia Endogonidia by Socìetas space, might encompass models of Raffaello Sanzio from Carloni’s and simulation, digital environments, Franceschetti’s hand: even screenings streams of data, dynamic fields are no longer made on plane surfaces, activated by Euclidean matrices and but on ‘space’ instead, on natural models of generative and pervasive elements as gas, water and vaporized spaces that we can, water.

Following Varela and Maturana, dub Through his Digital Versatile Theatre, as “enactive”, an environment which Fabio Iaquone is trying is regards knowledge as a result of experimenting screenings on gas and

11 smoke, re-enacting the myth of phantom visions, whilst artist Paola Lo Sciuto attempts to set a “tridimensional film” in theaters by patenting a system that uses a staging stagecraft system of projections and refractions, consisting in screens and mirrors which shift the image from the parallel plan to the perpendicular.

Furthermore, wide screening surfaces Screens showing fragments as flashes, bodies, shadows, reflections, that double the scenographic By Gorky are the ones inhabiting Mutaimago structure occupying its higher levels theatrical fields whilst Santasangre (in from Ta’zive New Riga Theatre) frees images in the air as if they were or definite the circumference of the steam or a mirage generated by the stage area (in by Abbas heat. In the end Michel Kiarostami, an ancient Iranian ritual is Lemieux/Victor Pilon duo, namely 4D The Guest recover through a theatrical ART purposes a greatly sensational (L’ospite) show as a homage to Norman Mc elaboration). Multiple gigantic devices Teorema Laren where images taken from the are used to screen iconography of this excellent film (Or), , a piece Motus extracted maker experimenter, father of from . animation, become holographic projections surrounding the dancer. Voyage In the scene does turn into a (a+b)3 cyclorama or into a surreally Annamaria Monteverdi: Can you briefly give us a little insight of your proportioned world in Dumb Type‘s 360° technical and artistic background and , in a claustrophobic cube on how you began your activity? made out of screens in by Mutaimago, the inside of a gasometer Rob Delfgaauw: NuFormer is a in by GranularMetamorphosis Synthesis, a huge multimedia company, specialized in video productions and webbased cylinder of mirrors, creating dazzling projects. The bureau is based in The lights and images in the Damnation de Netherlands. After seeing some Faust and a plexiglass cage in Fura examples on the internet of video dels Baus‘s . mapping projects from mainly artistic

12 parties we were triggered to do technical details about how you made similar projects. NuFormer has all the them? technical expertise in the house (3D modeling and 3D animations, motion Rob Delfgaauw: Unfortunately we graphic design, video editing, cannotreveal all the specifics programming, etc) and together with concerning our expertise. We can say our design capacities we succeeded however that we use a mix of to create and develop high skill 3D traditional techniques to customize projections on buildings. the animation, photos and video footage to the architectural features Annamaria Monteverdi: Where do all of the building. But most of the work your ideas and inspirations come is done in a 3D environment. from? Have you seen similar projects Annamaria Monteverdi:Do you do any around the world? preliminary drawings before modeling Rob Delfgaauw: In most of the cases or doing animations? we work from the outlines that have Rob Delfgaauw: We always start out been given by our clients. From there with a brainstorm session and come we design the content and map this up with a concept. This concept is very accurate on the architecture of then turned into a more detailed the building where we are projecting storyboard which forms the base for on. Our ideas are mainly pure our production process. From there although of course we also get ideas we start modeling, compositing and and inspiration from projects seen on create the 3D animations the internet. Annamaria Monteverdi:Which are the software programs you use for your projects? More precisely, do you use vector animation (like flash), multipurpose toolkits like vvvv (see here a very good tutorial: http://vvvv.org/tiki-index.php?page= How+To+Project+On+3D+Geometry) or just 3d modeling and animation for the digital creation of the architecture of a building? Annamaria Monteverdi: You develop high-skilled 3D video mapping Rob Delfgaauw:We use several 2D projections; would you share the (vector based) and 3D editors.

13 Annamaria Monteverdi:How do you does it take to model and animating solve the homography problem in one 3D building projection? projections and how do you achieve to map precisely the architectural Rob Delfgaauw:That really depends shape? Which software or method? on the length of the animation but we generally need two months for the full Rob Delfgaauw: We solve that by production. gathering and working with data as accurate as it can be, using high-end Annamaria Monteverdi: How do you techniques and tools. prepare the urban ambience?

Rob Delfgaauw: We always work with local event producers. They have the job to see how much ambient light can be dimmed. Also they will take care of the power supply on site and make the site suitable for audience.

Annamaria Monteverdi:You often refer to some outdoor applications for doing advertising, product launches, events, concerts, festivals and more. Annamaria Monteverdi: You are able Have you experienced applications in to design 3D projections by a battery theatre scenography as well? of powerful projectors. How many of them do you use, precisely? How Rob Delfgaauw:We do get request for many lumens each? Which software performances, theaters, events and are needed to manage them? concerts. We are now developing a new technique to use our 3D Rob Delfgaauw:The size of the projection skills indoors, especially for building, the ambient light situation theaters and during concerts. We are and other circumstances determine currently researching ways to the amount of projectors needed. We combine our projections with use different software packages to interactivity, in order to communicate control the play-outs. Most of the an experience to the audience. As projectors, mostly used stacked, have long as it is dark enough and the a capacity of 20 K ansilumen. amount of ambient light is low we are able to project indoor and outdoor. Annamaria Monteverdi: How long

14 stage. That’s impressive. If the content also is realtime generated to their moves (in 3D) than a awesome situation occurs.

Annamaria Monteverdi: On which projects are you currently working?

Rob Delfgaauw: Due to the privacy of our customers we cannot really Annamaria Monteverdi: Your disclose any specifics but we are projections are based on static currently working on projections in architectural facades. Which kind of Singapore, New York, Moscow, technical difficulties might occur in Barcelona and Poland. case of non static objects, namely, in case of trying to follow in real-time a moving object projecting a volumetric video on it?

Rob Delfgaauw: The most challenging fact about projecting on moving/non-static objects is aligning the projection with the object. From there the projection has to follow the object very accurate. We have developed techniques for this and it Annamaria Monteverdi: Any good works really good. piece of advice for anyone willing to start a career in animated graphics or Annamaria Monteverdi: Do you think video? your technology could be an important support for artists? In which Rob Delfgaauw: The sky is no limit, go way? for it.

Rob Delfgaauw: Artists have an entire new way and environment to express themselves. Consider a huge building http://www.nuformer.nl/en/ as their animated background of the

15 16 Biomimethic Prized By Science. Scientific Imaging As Art

Carla Langella

edition, aims to prize the “visual language in communication and science”, namely the ability researchers and divulgers have to make use of visual means, photos and videos in an innovative way, in order to promote the understanding of scientific research achievements.

A panel designated by the National A team of researchers from the Science Foundation and Science Seconda Università of Naples formed magazine, selects every year the best by Professor Mario De Stefano from contributions in each one of the Environmental Sciences Department, following categories: Photography, Pharmaceutical Science for Illustration, Computerized Graphics, Environment and Health Section, interactive Films and non-interactive myself from the History and Films. Winners’ contributions are Environment Industrial Design reported on a Science magazine issue Department, “Luigi Vanvitelli” School dedicated to the competition, of of Architecture and by recently which the 2009 edition was published graduated at this same school, Doctor on the 19th of February 2010. Antonia Auletta, awarded with The contribution of the Team, entitled honorable mention during the 2009 Back to the Future , predominated in edition of International Science and Scientific Illustration category. It Engineering Visualization Challenge, consists of a graphical representation the prestigious international competition of scientific photography composed by a photo of the fan- shaped colonies of the diatom organized by National Science Licmophra flabellate Foundation and by “Science” taken with an magazine. electron microscope in the foreground, juxtaposed to a render The competition, reaching its eighth image of an innovative solar paneled

17 cantilever roof taking inspiration from In that circumstance Professor De it, baptized Edo. Stefano and Seconda Università di Napoli ( Second University of Naples) respectively stood out as first Italian and first Italian University winning the competition since its beginnings.

Designing and Project

Diatoms are unicellular weeds ubiquitously diffused in all natural and artificial aquatic environments. Counting more than 200.000 species, they constitute the second larger This composition illustrates the group in biodiversity among scientific approach of Biomimetics, a photosynthetic organisms, and they discipline aimed to create material represent a remarkable ecologic products and innovative devices factor, contributing to carbon dioxide based on principles, logics absorption and to every aquatic morphologies and structures existing environment food chain. in natural systems. The innovation laying within the biomimetic Among diatoms’ peculiar features, we approach is also evoked in the title of find the capacity of extracting silicon the composition, Back to the Future, from water using it to create a unique which alludes to the need for an silicon wall shell called a frustule, understanding of the functional essentially consisting in a bivalve significance entailed in employing container encasing the living nature’s morphologies to design organism. Recent studies brought on materials and objects of the future. by the research group led by Mario De Stefano pointed out that such SUN researchers’ triumph is structures seem to be able to outstandingly significant moreover concentrate or select light in the most because it redoubles the success efficient way, therefore constituting achieved during the competition’s advantageous benchmarks to be 2008 edition by Professor De Stefano borrowed with the aim to design new, who earned the first prize presenting more efficient solar energy uptake his The Glass Forest, elected Best systems . Science Image of 2008.

18 cantilever roof is made out of plexiglass boards (shaped as the individual organisms of the colony) encompassing a flexible photovoltaic film made of amorphous silicon.

During the day, the photovoltaic surface gathers solar energy, accumulating it in batteries to then be used as a power source for a net of The development of the concept for led distributed over the bottom part, Edo falls within a research plan, illuminating the area under the subsequently widened in a project cantilever roof at night. The energy now being managed by engineers, that is left can be available for users which has involved Carlo Santulli‘s that could be able to “download” this specifics skills in materials “free energy” through a universal port, engineering. For the Edo cantilever allowing to charge or activate roof project, the colonial specie portable low-consuming devices such Licmophra flabellata was chosen as a as mobile phones, smartphones, reference since its natural shape music players, laptops and cameras. recalls of some sort of fan-shaped solar panel clustering in aggregates of The opportunity to take advantage of several organisms in order to the few minutes of waiting for accumulate all the light they need for collecting a minimum amount of their survival, this characteristics energy for one’s accessories can be being indeed of relevant interest for extremely useful for those who live a eco-sustainable design. wandering-kind of live, pertaining to the “new-madic” contemporary Edo project has a distinct connotation fashion. in terms of “design of experience”. The experience characterizing Edo is influenced by its direct reference to nature, recalling the biological organism that inspired it. These references sensitizing users about topics concerning the environment and the value of its resources.

The upper part of the diatom-like

19 The reason that led us to decide to experiences that do indeed require a share this experience with Digicult great commitment to cohesion and community is mainly that this account sharing, to choose common language, may propel many researchers and the will to explore others’ fields, being professionals to take part in curious, yet maintaining a respectful, international competitions, even humble attitude. those which might appear not to be concerning one’s usual operating A further aspect that brought us to field. Even in recent past it was rather write about all this is the fact that one unlikely for a designer to appear on a of the research team members there magazine like “Science”. But things was a young student, still are deeply changing. undergraduate at that time. An element that highlights the To represent complex concepts and importance of integrating didactics processes such as the ones about with research so that didactics would scientific research, summarizing them get enriched by cutting-edge in a single, clear yet appealing image research contributions, whilst is then a task concerning graphic research itself would be getting vital designers? Or researchers? Artists lymph from creativity, curiosity and maybe? According to the outcomes of foreshadowing energy young competitions like the one Science generations have. promoted, what emerges is that the most appreciated works are those in Italian culture and mediterranean which all these fields combine and particularly, are keenly turning co-operate. towards integration, multiculturalism, flexibility and merging of groups, The core factor is the co-work therefore predisposed to face the amongst usually unrelated disciplines challenges of such a fluid cultural (biology, design, materials dimension as the one that engineering, graphics). These are characterizes our present times.

20 Between Rhythm And Measure. An Interview To Aoki Takamasa

Silvia Bertolotti

Unlike other practitians of this genre, Takamasa is able to give to his production the necessary freshness and fantasy, going beyond the limits of the computer, without therefore delaying on the functional convenience of this mean, but impressing a creativity and an expressive force which exeed the simple borders of genre and Native to Osaka, Aoki Takamasa is an technique. This is possible above all artist who is nowadays living in Berlin. thanks to the musicality and particular He is an electronic musician and his mood he is able to impress in the works and compositions twist among innovative and engaging rhythm as a very rich and stratified melting-pot the main element of his work. of glitch sounds and rhythm, translated in a music genre already From the beginning of his production known for a decade as IDM, with and above all in the last decade, proper reference to techno and Takamasa specialized in the electro style. manipulation of softwares and other electronic elements. Starting from a It has been talked a lot in the last few strong interest in sperimentation and years about the so called “laptop the limits of musical expression, his music”, i.e. a new way of creating and work then opened to every kind of performing music on a stage, that artistic adventure. His cooperation after a first period of great with Tujiko Noriko of the Fat Cat productivity and innovation (with the Records is very famous. They created most worthy results within the field of together a disc – 28 – which brought acoustic research) is now suffering a him in the limelight of Japanese period of deep tiredness, both as electronic music. However Takamasa regards international production and is an eclectic musician and has often the public taste and appreciation. worked with other internationally

21 famous artists, not only in the musical Music Festival? field but also in the sector of visual arts. Aoki Takamasa: For my live sets, I usually use two laptops, some In the last period, as during the hardware effectors, and an Audio creation of his last live set presented Mixer. This time, for the Brussels at the Brussels Electronic Music show, I also played with my photo Festival (3 days of showcase from the slideshow for the first time, so I used 20th to the 23rd March at the BOZAR one more laptop just to play it. Centre for Fine Arts of Brussels, one of the most interesting and complete Silvia Bertolotti: You are a Japanese meeting in Europe for the fans of artist based now in Germany. What do electronic music and clubbing, you think about the electronic music featuring more than 30 musicians, djs scenes both in Europe and in Japan, and vjs), Takamasa combines music your country of origin? with visual medium, i.e. wonderful Aoki Takamasa: I think Europe is photos and slideshows of urban and something like the origin of electronic architectonical scenarios, shot by music , because this culture was born himself and available on his blog. We right here. Moreover I think it is met and interviewed him right during produced and spread in each the festival in Brussels: an interview to European country. However I basically better know one of the most feel almost the same energy interesting and refined electronic nowadays both in Japan and in musicians of our time. Europe.

Silvia Bertolotti: How do you see the future of the “laptop music”?

Aoki Takamasa: I think laptop is just one of these tools. It is just a portable. Computers brought huge opportunities to people like me who don’t have any musical knowledge. I don’t think I would make music if Silvia Bertolotti: What is the technical computer didn’t exist. I think there set you usually perform with live? And will be more more people without any what kind of instrument did you use in musical knowledge who will start particular at the Brussels Electronic making music and then will share it with everybody and communicate

22 with many people around the world with their different artistic styles. without using so to many languages. What do you think is the most interesting and stimulating interaction in terms of artistic expression?

Aoki Takamasa: At the moment, above all Rhythm and Photography can better adapt to my expressive style.

Silvia Bertolotti: Howdo you create your music? I mean, does the first inspiration come from the software or Silvia Bertolotti: We saw that in the the technology set, the experience of last years so many software-based the rhythm itself or from a musical virtual studio environments have idea? emerged and such tools provide cost- effective alternatives to typical Aoki Takamasa: My first idea comes hardware-based production studios, always suddendly and in form of making now possible the creation of rhythm. Then I try to focus on making high quality music using little more sounds that reflect the same structure than a single laptop computer. This I thought of, so that they are put somehow democratized the creation together in the right position and of music, so a lot of home produced timing, in order to create a good electronic music is now available for a groove. I want to make the right wider public. What do you think about atmosphere using two speakers it? vibrating in the air to make people feel like dancing. I think this is my Aoki Takamasa: This phenomenon source of inspiration now. surely helped a lot of people to spread music out through this planet, so that now this planet is filled with various kinds of sounds. And I think it is really wonderful. After all, making art is an essential part of the human nature.

Silvia Bertolotti: You collaborated with very famous Japanese artists like Ryochi Kurokawa, Ryiuchi Sakamoto and Tujiko Noriko and you confront

23 Silvia Bertolotti: Laptop music offers actually working on a new project. infinite possibilities in terms of Something much more simple than sounds. How do you select your what I’ve made before. But I don’t sound among these wide ranges of wanto to anticipate too much. choices?

Aoki Takamasa: I simply try to make sounds that make me feel excited and http://www.bemf.be comfortable and can calm me down. http://www.aokitakamasa.com Silvia Bertolotti: Any plans for the http://www.aokitakamasa.com/blog future? Are you currently working on / something new?

http://www.myspace.com/aokitaka Aoki Takamasa:In this period I’m masa

24 Donkijote By Cristian Bettini. The Sustainable Slowness Of Being

Barbara Sansone

instruments needed for communication and the company of photographer Martín Ruano, Cristian and Minuto tried to recreate a common memory, to remap a territory (that of the Asturias region, in Spain) and an anthropological heritage that risks falling into oblivion; to go in search of answers, information, a collective poetry that Once upon a time there was a man can be shared through digital media, who was travelling with a donkey. but that takes into account the With them was also a GPS, a solar necessity of a more human and real panel, a PC with a modem and a video way of life and experience. “Festina camera. The donkey’s steps guided lente” is the motto that Cristian carries the man through nature – steps that as a tattoo on his leg and that he tries were very different from those that to share by suggesting the act of men have taken since they have been walking as a cognitive process. walking through cities. The donkey was called Minuto, and the Italian The project, which had already been Cristian Bettini used him as a guide created in the past in Italy and and as a metronome for his journey Holland, won the Digital_LAB contest through an artistic project (Donkijote – of the LABoral of Gijón last year, and third chapter of a complex project was therefore adapted to an that started off as Lasino.org, and exploration of the Asturian territory, then continued as Donkeypedia) becoming a kind of “contemporary which allowed him to discover the tale” (this time set in the north of fascinating Asturias region in Spain Spain), curated by Roberta Boscio and with his feet firmly on the ground. Stefano Caldana. The project was documented on the Internet during By walking along paths rather than the course of its development and roads, armed with minimal was open to the participation of the

25 public in many different ways. First of having with Cristian Bettini during his all, it was possible to follow the days at The Influencers festival in 2010 journey online: it was possible to read in Barcelona. the log book, see the photographs, find the travellers on the map and Barbara Sansone and Jordi Salvadò: contribute by leaving comments. So Cristian, do you want to tell us how Donkijote started? Those who wanted to could join them physically on their journey, even if just Cristian Bettini: The project comes for brief parts of it, which quite a few from an inner need, from people chose to do. And finally, philosophical thought about people were able to take part in the contemporary life and on time and exhibition at the LABoral in Gijón and space, on how we come into contact other workshops, which Cristian with the world around us: concepts attended at the end of each journey that in the past century have changed (in all, in the Asturias he made four considerably, disorienting us journeys). A real cross-media project somewhat. On top of that, there’s my on real and virtual platforms, with the personal anxieties: I see a society that integration of technologies for is increasingly hegemonic and heavy localisation and networking to allow for anyone, and I see that people are for the co-participation of the artists looking for alternatives, for an escape. and the public. For this reason I need to find a personal narrative that isn’t mainstream and I need to connect to a place where I can find everyone else and where in fact there are many different people who think differently.

There’s also the poetic image of a man and a donkey, which is a distortion of reality, in our Western society it seems to be almost like an error, because it’s something you hardly All the documentation is still available ever see. This creates an immediate on the website and on the artist’s blog reaction in the people who see it: it’s and the information is so rich that it as of they remember, as if something will certainly satisfy the curiosity of seems familiar to them. Artists, our readers. Here we will make room economists, physicists and scientists for a chat that we had the pleasure of say that we are going in the wrong

26 direction. There cannot be any transformation that is still underway. I change, because narration was taken think that the people who participate away from us, this was the poetry that in events such as The Influencers for united us all. Once upon a time people example (not just those who present gathered to sing, they would sing their projects, but those who come while working in the fields or the along to merely take part in the event) mines. We no longer do this. work as “antibodies” in society and Therefore I, with my modest will always resist, will always be there, capabilities, am trying to recuperate even if in greater or lesser numbers this contact: I walk, I write, I take depending on the moment in time. pictures, I talk to people.

Barbara Sansone and Jordi Salvadò: Don’t you think that this narration, this poetry, which has been lost in day-t- -day life, is being recovered by various forms of artistic expression, and thanks to new technologies as well?

Cristian Bettini: It’s a path for research that has begun. But for now I have the feeling that the years that we are Barbara Sansone and Jordi Salvadò: facing are sterile, and can be You chose the name Donkijote for the translated into a period of time where Donkey, was that because of its all we can do is resist. Everything physical component? works in waves and the cultural and Cristian Bettini: The name Donkijote artistic innovations come in comes from the connection to the predetermined phases: there’s the donkey and Spain. The project started boom and then a moment that is a in Italy with the name Lasino.org, preparation for the next one. I see the where it began as an independent next few years as being difficult ones. project. Then I found a producer after Perhaps it is just a personal feeling, presenting two seminars to the but until recently when there were European Community, and so they Yes Men, Wu Ming, and 01, I didn’t allowed me to do Holland, with the have that feeling. Creative/Media Industry where the It’s been some time now that project became Donkeypedia. Finally something doesn’t happen to make us it moved onto Spain, in the art centre turn over a new leaf. Perhaps it is a called LABoral in Gijón. Therefore it’s

27 three projects that in reality are the than 30km, with a Canadian person same but came about in different and we only spoke in the evening. But ways. in the evening there was a deep recognition between us. Silence is one Barbara Sansone and Jordi Salvadò: of the strongest forms of What are the differences between the communication, because it makes you three experiences? aware, it’s a language that leaves room for a deeper kind of contact. Cristian Bettini: The first was Today, language itself leaves me characterized by its independence, perplexed because often the words which allowed me to experience it have taken on a new meaning with extreme gratification. In the compared to the etymological others there were other kinds of meaning of the word itself. Think of pressures. When I had a production “economy”, which was the synonym backing me up I wasn’t forced to do for saving and now mostly means anything but I found myself in another waste, at least when it comes to using kind of environment that functioned resources. “Voyage” (the Italian word with another language and other “viaggio”) comes from “viaticum”, the methods that had to be respected. food that people took with them for For example, in the project in Italy my their journey, which then became a face never appeared at all but after journey from one place to another. that I had to take on a defined personality that related to the In our society to travel means to go audience. I think that the best somewhere so quickly that the realisation of the project compared to journey itself almost ceases to exist. what I had imagined was that with Slowness allows me to be myself LABoral, but the best journey I had again, to posses my own being, which was in Italy, perhaps because I rebuilt is something that isn’t to be taken a memory of my land and also lightly. Think of all the things that we because it was the longest journey. do every day: they are so many, too many. I have another speed; my heart Barbara Sansone and Jordi Salvadò: has another rhythm, and walking, Now for an open question: the even more so with a Donkey, allows supporting concepts of your project me to find that, to come into a state are slowness, silence and of trance where thoughts slowly go communication. their own way, in a kind of meditation. Cristian Bettini: Once I was walking And that isn’t just a personal need: in for a whole day, side by side, for more history there were writers and philosophers who would go mad if

28 they couldn’t walk. Walking is the first two years of prison sentence to go for thing that a child learns to do, before having done union action when even learning to talk. With Martìn, the Franco died – these actions were photographer with whom I travelled carried out in the woods, because through the Asturias, we often spent they were illegal. The last Maqui days without talking. descended from the mountains during the 60’s.

Another interesting example, is that the resistance in the factories that were occupied in the Asturias was made possible (it seemed to me) because everyone had some land, a vegetable patch, a pig, an apple tree to make cider. So if you wanted to fight the system you could, because you had food to eat. We have nothing Barbara Sansone and Jordi Salvadò: and we can’t strike for too long Can you tell us some anecdotes from because if not we pay for it the your journey, something special that following month. This was taken away happened, some special encounter? from us in one generation: my Cristian Bettini: There are many grandparents had everything. stories that stuck in my mind. In the Another memory that I have is of a Asturias I really liked the story from monk in Tuscany who said that the the past century of an Italian who word “person” comes from the Latin went to live there to be a whale word “personare”, to “vibrate with”: hunter. Yes, up until the past century we exist from the moment that we there were whales in the Biscaglia relate with one another musically. gulf! It was also really nice to cross That’s beautiful, don’t you think? Or in the mine areas, where there’s a really Holland I went to visit this farm that important piece of history from the produced milk and some fascinating Spanish revolution, where the people things came from that visit. First of all, are still generous and genuine. Say a milk that is commercialised is no person stops and sees you, they then longer natural, because to be sold it go to the baker and get some bread must have certain chemical for you. If you ask someone for parameters and specific directions, they’ll invite you into their organoleptics. home. I met a pensioner who still had

29 Furthermore, this family produced surface, but with an important 20,000 litres of milk a day and had a measure. For example, lately, farm that was thoroughly mapping is very trendy, it’s almost industrialized where everything was become redundant. But there’s a big mechanical. They were really happy difference between looking at a map about it because thanks to this job and knowing the territory, which their lives had changed over 20 years: takes experience: if we give that up, if they finally didn’t have to wake up at we do not connect the two, then it 5am and could sleep until 8am, for just becomes sterile information. example. They tried to convince me that we live in the best possible world, but then one detail struck me: they invited me back to their house for coffee and the milk they used was bought from the supermarket! The umbilical chord between man and Earth is becoming completely detached. Once that is gone, and only industrial produce is made, we lose everything, we will live in an artificial Barbara Sansone and Jordi Salvadò: world, as happens in the cities. I am Yes, the over-abundance of interested in the fact that in certain information that we have today, and territories there is knowledge that has its easy access, allows us to know not yet been lost and that our much about a place before even generation can still save. visiting it. For that reason we think that a brief journey is no longer Barbara Sansone and Jordi Salvadò: necessary, but rather a longer trip for You’re an optimist. Do you believe a month or a couple of months in one they can still be saved? place is necessary to discover those Cristian Bettini: I believe there will places that information cannot reach, always be someone who will not but only experience can. accept this change, those who I called Cristian Bettini: I agree totally and “antibodies” earlier. The morphology that’s how I’ve been travelling for of a territory holds everything in itself: years now. If I happen to go to France you can observe everything that is in or England I’ll stay there for at least books, like the economy and history. four months, to give myself the time With an attentive eye and time on to understand. I don’t care about your hands everything comes to the

30 spending a weekend there. Another Cristian Bettini: No, not at all. For me thing that’s happening is that we’ve it’s a hope. (He laughs). now reached every place on Earth, and quite heavily at that. When I went Barbara Sansone and Jordi Salvadò:Of to India, with the image that we have course, there are still areas that are of it and the information that we free and can be “colonized” according receive about it, especially through to one’s own philosophy, but perhaps those people who go there to find a from the point of view of a collective refuge and a more humane dynamic it would be better to be able to live in where life is cheap, I realised that we the world with a more homogeneous have taken those things that we are distribution and in a more natural escaping from to those places. I met way, don’t you think? And going back travellers who have been travelling for to your trip with Martîn and the 30 years and say there’s no place left donkey called Minuto, where did you to go: everything has already gone sleep? Did people give you rooms? everywhere. Where did you eat?

The statistics of the past few years Cristian Bettini: We had a tent, reveal that there are more people sometimes we slept in barns, living in the cities than outside those sometimes in people’s homes, or in same cities. This change is very hotels for the pilgrims walking the important: it becomes a focus point, Camino de Santiago. We had a very which strangely is emptying those tight budget. We carried a camping territories that have always been stove, we ate bread and cheese, populated, as I found out when in the sometimes people invited us over for Asturias. Those territories are rich with dinner but that was not the norm. resources. Some holes are opening up on our maps. At just 100km from Oviedo there are villages inhabited only by pensioners that in 30 years will be deserted. Man has gone walking in order to discover the world and now in some way there’s an opposite process going on. It’s fascinating.

Barbara Sansone and Jordi Salvadò: Barbara Sansone and Jordi Salvadò: More than fascinating, it’s strange. What was your rapport with the Actually it’s quite sad. donkey like?

31 Cristian Bettini: I learned how to deal someone before yourself, which is with donkeys for two months with an great practice, which has been association in Pragelato, close to advised since the Cabala. Animals are Turin, and also through my previous interesting because they always know experiences. With Minuto we had to things before you do: Minuto brayed establish a form of hierarchy to start in the morning as soon as I opened with, but after a few days of him my eyes, but I was inside the tent and being away from home he established he couldn’t see that I was awake. Or us as his new reference points and he realised that the journey was over everything became natural. We even long before we reached our final asked ourselves if he was enjoying the destination. journey. We had some comments from the Internet that said that we Barbara Sansone and Jordi Salvadò: were taking advantage of him, but we Does this project have a future? never rode him, and he never held all Cristian Bettini: I don’t know. My of our luggage. We tried to establish a relationship with donkeys will rapport that was as equal as possible: definitely have a future as well as my the weight was distributed evenly and desire to walk 1000km a year. Will it we often allowed him to guide us, be a Web project? I don’t know. I especially on small paths.I believe that definitely want to use free forms of he enjoyed the journey, even if in a communication and I don’t want to different way than a human being write a book about these experiences. would have done. Minuto had never It could be interesting because of seen the sea and when he saw it for Martìn’s photos, but I like the fact that the first time he stood and this project had a beginning and an contemplated it. end and that people could have His owners said that when he came enjoyed it in real time and for free. back from the journey he was more sociable, as if this experience had been “therapeutic” for him. They http://www.donkijote.org/ wanted me to have him but I have no place to keep him and I believe he’s http://www.flickr.com/photos/donkij better off where he’s always been. ote-org/ Travelling with an animal is lovely because it makes you take care of http://lasino.org/

32 33 Mechatronic Art And Diy. Marc Dusseiller: The Artistic Soldering

Serena Cangiano

revisitation in an artistic way and a high tech approach to the “do it yourself” design of the fifties, which definitely represent one of the rarest organisms in the so-called undergrowth of digital culture. In digital culture the combination of trans discipline between art, science and technology is carried out covered with the reflection on today’s society There are practices in the use of and on the future society regarding artistic and creative technology that themes like: can be compared to a sort of undergrowth because rich in rare and the need to challenge our unexplored things. In the shadow of comprehension of technology in order spheres and consolidated languages, to understand our world and characterized by codes and ourselves, the democratization of aesthetics, almost all supported by technical and technological theories both by the public and by the knowledge, the production of the market. These practices are hard to artificial and technological interpret through the framework of performance systems, accessible to digital art because they are generated everyone, sharing of knowledge by s remix of ideas and subjects, that, means overcoming financial models on one hand have to do with the and the production system in crisis. history of experimentation of electronics in the artistic field and on At the DIY electronics practice, one the other hand they regard the hacker suddenly notices an original and culture, electronic art and playful approach in using technology technological design. let alone the anticipation of some key elements in new tendencies in art and We are talking about the electronic design that are directed to the and interactive do it yourself, the incorporation of the digital in the

34 physical, asking artists and designers SGMK. to abandon pixels and to pass to a transistors, circuits and welders. Serena Cangiano:Can you tell us about how your company started?

Marc Dusseiller: the Swiss company of Mechatronic art starts five years ago. There were existing projects to bound to Markus Haselbach‘s activity; he is one of the founders of SGMK. He organized meetings where various groups of artists and engineers run tests on electronics and build things such as analogical synthesizers. After a start up phase, I joined the group In the undergrowth some and we worked on the creation of this recognizable projects can stir up no profit organization. The choice of curiousity and interest, like for the name is a bit absurd considering example, the Swiss Society of that not everyone knows what Mechatronic Art, a no profit Mechtronic Art is. organization in Switzerland, particularly in Zurich. This Serena Cangiano: Can you explain organization takes care of initiatives in what is? which the experimentation with electronics and interactive becomes a Marc Dusseiller:The definition of way of connecting artists and people Mechatronic is: the combination of in the science and technical sphere electronic and mechanic and and a way to open the doors of their therefore Mechtronic. This means the world to everyone. If you walked in to union of these purely scientific worlds a room where the members of the with art, SGMK works on this unity by SGMK had decided to meet to getting people coming from the reinforce the circuit, create robots and scientific and engineering sound boxes, the first thing background, two very technical instinctively do is turn around and worlds, with the art world. leave or to ask yourself “why?”. Obviously we make sure that they are In the text that follows you will find a able to work together and share their few questions I asked Marc Dusseiller, ideas, but most importantly we make a Swiss scientist specialized in nano sure that they are able to use technology and one of the founders of technology in a fun way, putting

35 together electronic pieces, circuits like, the DIY Festival, festival of art and and robots. In our group we have technology. During this festival we people who come from different offer not only exhibitions and fields such as: media artists, sound performances, but we also aim at engineers and social workers. They involving all of our visitors, who in are not only artists working with only a few hours in our workshop electronics but there is a sort of learn how to create their own sound trans-discipline community. and robotic objects. This is what we enjoy doing: gathering people, who build things, learn and share their capabilities.

Besides the festival we dedicate ourselves to the organization of some summer meeting, it’s called Home Made, where we put together week long workshops in a picturesque or historical sights in Switzerland, a sort of summer school for handymen. Serena Cangiano: What exactly SGMK Serena Cangiano: The SGMK seems to do? And what do you all enjoy doing? offer very original ideas, a practical Marc Dusseiller: One of our main approach in DIY and hacking, that is intentions, a part from using a based on the idea that people can different approach towards recombine technology and modify it technology, is to open the so called according to their needs and wishes in “geek world”, this “do it yourself” order to create their own messages approach to people everywhere and and meanings. However not only, this create activities that have a local is all done to have fun as well. social impact, we regularly organize workshops to introduce people to Marc Dusseiller: The term DIY has a sound electronics, robotics, giving really long history but only recently it them the minimum knowledge that has assumed a connection with the allows them to control everything hacker culture. In this case hacking is using a computer. not seen for its negative aspect but they refer to the fact that technology We invite artists and people from the ” is used in a different way than it do it yourself” community, both local should be, to satisfy the need for and international, organizing events creativity. For this reason we try

36 above all things to apply an aware attitude and we try to organize events where participants can discuss what technology means to them. In our festivals dedicated to the “do it yourself” method, our goal has been to introduce people to the DIY electronics practice and to electronic art, even though this field seems a little geeky. Serena Cangiano: So you invented your own systems and kits? From the beginning of our project we have always tried to defuse this Marc Dusseiller: Usually we use kits culture and bring people closer to this that are already available on the internet, something that the DIY world and make them realize how it community shares for some time now. could be fun and interesting as well as We do not actually invent anything educational. We have also started to but the important thing for us and to organize, for example, the DIY Make help people discover the creative side away series, a few short workshops of technology. For example in the where the participants can pick out an workshops 1x_pixel children work on electronic or interactive object, like an interactive work of art that is you usually pick out things from a fast audio-visible, starting with just one food menu, that they would like and pixel, in this way they learn what a pixel is by manipulating an electronic within a few hours, with our help, they circuit, a microphone and audio are able to construct their own small amplifier that controls the LED RGB. synthesizer, laser systems and robots. Serena Cangiano: So you are In order to do all of this we have specialized in nanotechnology. Are special instruments and kits used as you able to combine your starters such as Micro Noise, a specialization with the artistic synthesizer that communicates with practices based on the DIY? light sensors and allows you to create Marc Dusseiller: I did a masters thesis beautiful sounds. Families can use this on nanotechnology and material kit and create small interactive engineering at the ETH in Zurich. I systems for their kids. tried to apply my knowledge of the

37 DIY and the knowledge in SGMK, the bio system, or vice versa, get that combining them with biological biological system to control another science. This is where my interest system, like a sort of interactive work started, for example, an independent of art where the subject of the project Hackteria, developed with interaction is not a spectator, but a Andy Gracie and Yashas Shetty after a microscopical animal. meeting at the Interactivos workshop organized at the Prado Media Lab in Madrid.

With Andy and Yashas we started working on the organization of the workshop that would be oriented on divulgating the artist techniques in bio art and this allowed me to create a point of contact between the activities that I do at the SGMK using my scientific background. The Serena Cangiano: On the net I saw question that pops up is about the some pictures where there are several Hackeria project is, how can you use people putting together and micro organisms and bacteria in a manipulating circuits in the middle of artistic way? This type of question fantastic natural landscapes. What implies that artists must be informed does DIY have to do with the white and educated on what bacteria is sandy beaches in Indonesia? before being able to work on scientific projects. Marc Dusseiller: I travel a lot to in Asia and Indonesia. I have also been in After this starting point, we tried to Taiwan and Hong Kong for DIY combine this question with the workshops. In Hong Kong for practices typical of DIY: I started to example, you can find markets in the work, for example, on the middle of the street full of manipulation of a webcam that costs technological leftovers, LED, 10 dollars for the creation of digital electronic gadgets that all cost very microscopes that cost very little, little. Over there it very common to therefore working on bio electronics build home made technological for artists. Bio electronics for artists in systems but the real artist touch is this DIY project has to do with the missing. They know media art very possibility of building a living well however only in its antique form, microscope to electronically control based on gigantic interactive facades

38 and audio visible projections. working on I tell them that I have no idea, I’m just trying! I think that the workshops that I hold in Asia and Indonesia are very interesting because they have this particular need of learning everything http://www.mechatronicart.ch before dedicating themselves to an http://www.mechatronicart.ch/lab/l electronic bricolage. They like learning ab.htm before doing, but when you actually work on these projects you never http://www.dusseiller.ch/labs know what you are going to end up with. So when people ask me what I’m http://www.tv.dock18.ch

39 Open Observatory Challenge. Roger Malina And The New Leonardos

Teresa De Feo

project, Roger Malina is currently involved in a campaign to raise awareness and public involvement to provide solutions and strategies to address the urgent issues of our time. Global warming, alternative energy research group, worrying anthropogenic changes, control and confidentiality of data by government agencies, these are all reflections that Data transparency, free movement of lead the scientist to seek our attention ideas, a fruitful collaboration between confronted with the need to choose art, science and technology, but also another road. among ordinary people and experts, this is exactly what Roger Malina is The subject areas of expertise, sharing about. Recently hosted by “Meet The of public data, the intelligent and Media Guru”, an event held in Milan. ethical use of new devices, but above At the Director of Astrophysics all a necessary collaboration between Observatory in Marseille, where he is a artists and scientists, philosophers, member of the Observational musicians and film makers, are all Cosmology Research Group, Roger essential to the French-American Malina is chief editor of the astrophysicist. newspaper “Leonardo” of the Massachusetts Institute of Given the circumstances and the Technology (MIT), and promoter of a success of his speech in Milan, we series of interdisciplinary convergence decided to interview him. Be aware, projects, of which we will talk about this is surely a great trip and indeed, later. never as in this occasion, I could see what is really possible to create an Son of Frank Malina, an aerospace oases of sharing, where the “lateral engineer and kinetic artist, who in the thinking” finds such an happy late Sixties founded the Leonardo application and the rigors of science

40 offer so much support from the Roger Malina: We live in difficult times imaginative capacity of the arts and where we must “redesign’ our cultures human sciences. now that the oil economy is coming to an end, to find ways so that the very large human population does not disrupt the ecology and curcle of life we depend on, and of course to mitigate anthropogenic environmental changes including global warming. I think one of the problems is that many changes are not really perceptible to our senses, even if we see glaciers melting CO2 Teresa De Feo: Mister Malina, you has no taste or smell and cannot be believe in the relationship between seen. science and humanity and particularly Even though we know certain species in the relationship between science, are going to be extinct, it is hard to art and technology and seeing as, see the overall impact on the circle of according your ideas, seem to be the life. Many of the risks that we must most fruitful solutions in promoting face come from data taken with necessary change. The key word you scientific instruments and not through use, the right direction to follow, our naked senses. So I think the first seem to be, in this case: the practice thing that artists working with science of a new science that you call can do is help create a culture where “intimate science “, the doubt as a the data taken with instruments is driving force behind the cultural part of our consciousness, intuition development, the value of curiosity as and way of perceiving the world. We the foundation of a new ethic. need a culture which incorporates It’s clear that many of these words scientific knowledge into its way of and concepts belong to artistic knowing and being in the world. vocabulary and practices, and this is The second thing, is that artists have not by a chance. You underline, like different preoccupations than Roy Ascott says, that the correct scientists and are very connected to sentence today is: “ask not what the the social sphere; this means they are sciences can do for the arts, ask what interested in different issues and arts, and in particular, technology- priorities. I have called this the “ethics based arts, do for science? of curiosity’ based on the writings of

41 Sundar Sarukkai in India. I think in Paris called Le Laboratoire started science needs a new ethics that is by biomedical engineer David very grounded in the issues we are Edwards that provides a platform for facing. I think artists working with this. I am part of a group that has scientists can help us develop a new started the IMERA Mediterranean ethics of scientific curiosity. Institute for Advanced Studies (www.imera.fr) that also is a platform The third thing is part of what is called for this kind of innovative the innovation theory. When you are collaborations. working on very hard problems often in the interdisciplinary areas that the We have started a network called breakthroughs in science occur, not in ArtsActive which brings together the the middle of the older disciplines. Bio various groups that are hosting artists technology for instance or nano residencies in scientific institutions. It science. This can also occur between would also be interesting to have the arts and science. scientists in residence in cultural institutions. At a time of rapid cultural change, driven by the urgency of anthropogenic planetary change, I think the arts and humanity are in the center of the various crises.

Teresa De Feo: You say that 97% of the energy and matter content of the universe is unknown to us and it is not detectable neither by our physical senses nor by our technological I very much like the work of sound senses. You call this matter dark artist David Dunn and complexity universe: the unknown matter that scientist James Crutchfield who have seems attested only by the presence worked on the area known as acoustic of some data. According to you, could ecology, driven by the interest of the art help to discover the unknown? musician in recording the sound that Could the technology-based arts help trees make when they grow. In their to decode this data? If yes in what collaboration they have made way? interesting scientific discoveries as Roger Malina: Astronomers currently well as exciting music. believe that 97% of the content of the There is an interesting art science lab universe is in a form called dark

42 matter and a second form called dark obligation, in particular: the necessity energy. Astronomers do not know that everyone contributes to the what these consist of, but can detect knowledge construction by collecting the gravity they have. It is a very and interpreting data about our own difficult problem in science at the world. The projects you are promoting moment. I think it is unlikely that to reach this goal are many, one of artists can help on this specific these is Open Observatory. What are problem, but we know that the ideas Open Observatories? Can you tell us we have about the universe are very something about it? rooted in our metaphysical concepts and also our mythological systems. Roger Malina: I am very influenced by my background in astronomy. Over Artist Donna Cox recently did a very the last thirty years astronomers have interesting PhD thesis that examines made public and shared all the data these issues. As an artist she has from many observatories. these are collaborated with several called virtual observatories. As a result astrophysicists and has helped new scientific discoveries have been developed new ways of visualising made, which could not have and manipulating astronomical data, happened if each scientist had kept and even filed patents as a result. his own data private, and in addition through groups like BOINC, many people can contribute to scientific discoveries. I think we can extend this idea in other areas. One of the thing that has helped is that the sponsor agencies that fund astronomy have insisted that astronomers paid by the government must make their data public.

In my Open Observatory Manifesto I Teresa De Feo: Mister Malina you extend this idea to say that any data believe strongly in the power of of any kind that is obtained with collaborative exploration, in opening financing from public tax money or by access data, you believe in an intimate the government must be made public science that involves billions of people and in order to keep data secret the in understanding the world. About governement must prove that the that, you require the necessity of a dangers of public access are greater new human right and a human than the dangers in keeping it secret

43 or protected. Secondly I think we now IMERA project, can you tell us have new ways of collecting scientific something about that as well? data and it is now possible for millions of people to help collect data Roger Malina: IMERA is a new especially to understand our impact residency program set up by the three on the environment. universities and the CNRS in Marseille. The condition of a residency is that Artist Andrea Polli suggested that the person needs to work with every art school on the planet could someone outside their discipline, for have a weather station and become instance an artist with a scientist, or a local experts on climate change. The social scientist with a physical cell phone can be made into a very scientist. With sociologist Samuel interesting device for collecting data, Bordreuil we have set up the ASIL: Art for instance allowing people to Science Instrumentation Language measure many medical aspects of program to set up the kinds of art their own body which they can then science residencies I have been share with their doctor. So my open talking about. For instance film maker observatory manifesto says A) we Harold Vasselin is working with have a right to the data taken that is climatologists, artist Rachel Mayeri paid for by our governement or tax with primatologists and money. b) we have the necessity to neuroscientists, and nano scientist collect data about ourselves and our Jim Gimzewski has been working both environment i think these could help with artists and philosophers. bring about the intimate science and hard humanity movements i have Teresa De Feo: Mister Malina do you been talking about. believe in the transformational renaissance that will be needed for us to learn to manage “Spaceship Earth”. According to you which is everybody’s task to help this fruitful change?

Roger Malina:As I said earlier, the kinds of changes we must make in culture and society are very rapid. we have less than fifty-hundred years to move off oil for energy, to make sure that carbon emissions do not cause climate change, to make sure that Teresa De Feo: During Meet Media there is enough drinking water, These Guru conference you spoke about the

44 are rapid changes. We have never had then converting understanding to to redesign our society before, culture changing our way of being in the and society have always evolved over world. This is not a problem that the generations to react to the scientists are experts differently from changing situation. now we have to experts in the arts and humanity are . actively re design culture so it is sustainable. I call this problem the I am encouraged by the way many ‘hard humanity’ and since it is a artists and scholars in humanity are cultural change it involves everyone. now deeply involved in these very hard problems. I think they are the “new leonardos”, often groups rather than individuals, often inter- generational. If we can combine the expertise of people over 70 with those under 30 we have reason to be optimistic.

http://malina.diatrope.com/

Teresa De Feo:The last question. The http://www.leoalmanac.org/index.ph typical question of this critical age. p/browse/C41 Mister Malina, will we make it? http://www.imera.fr Roger Malina: As a scientist I am innately optimistic. I think that the http://www.leoalmanac.org/index.ph world is understandable using the p/lea/entry/an_open_observatory_ scientific method. The problem is manifesto/

45 A Surreal Doubt. Iocose Group’s Works

Elena Gianni

sea (No Tube Contest) and foreseeable evolutions in chemicals by corporations as Rovagnati and such (MenoPausaPranzo).

All of their projects are substantially provocative and make use media as tactical tools. From flash mob, pranks and hoaxes , to mimesis and a range of different tricks, all of these are instruments to “deceive the public IOCOSE is the name of a collective and get it trapped in a semantic born in Bologna in 2006. Their style, snare”. IOCOSE put on stage futuristic, although being lightheartedly artistic- colourful depictions of how nowadays prank, also includes in its practices a situation could degenerate in series of questions which arise from a something twisted and gruesome. mature relation with the Internet, new Through actions, websites and social media and social networks. Among networks, concepts and attentively other exhibitions, IOCOSE also made artefacts are presented, making presented their works at the last cross sections of contemporary edition of The Influencers in society being crudely exposed. Barcelona. At The Influencers 2010 they IOCOSE projects could be described presented Søkkømb, an IKEA style Do as injections of surrealism in everyday It Yourself guillotine. “Are you feeling reality. Surrealism as a way of bringing increasingly annoyed by all the thoughts, tendencies and existing criminals and immigrants and all those practices to the extreme. The group people we should simply get rid of? has tackled several issues: religion [...] You are the person we have Empaty Box ( ), Italian society and thought of when we were designing Søkkømb, Doughboys, Yes we politics ( Søkkømb, an easy to assemble spam! NextQuery ), Google ( ), youTube guillotine for the whole family. A and our tendency to quickly drown practical, flawless and fast solution, ourselves in user generated content perfect for fulfilling your need of

46 safety”. The guillotine was protagonist explaining how to use it. of two main actions, in which IOCOSE assembled Søkkømb in front of the Floppy Trip was presented in the IKEA there is in Bologna as well as occasion of Pixxelpoint festival 2009 inside the IKEA in Barcellona. edition, entitled “Once upon a time in the west” and dedicated to the Søkkømb pictures a world where the relation we have with the fast- worst tendencies laying within society growing obsolescence of modern (especially in Italian society) become a technologies, to the sentimentality mass -consumed commodity. It is the bounding us to technologic devices most appalling side of what Luttazzi belonging to our past. Artists has recently named “State racism”. responded setting forth animated gifs, videos and so on in the attempt of developing in an artistic way means been proved an well known to have technical limits, instead of turning to the exploration of internet vastness and nowadays’ calculators.

Empathy Box instead, was presented during Pixxellpoint 2008 edition, entitled “For GOD sake!”. IOCOSE gets inspiration from the Empaty Box P. Floppy Trip recycles floppy discs. Dick describes in his “Do androids Creating a drug. What would happen dream of electric sheep?” and if we gave a Floppy to a today’s 15- transforms it. Empathy Box is as years-old brain-fried by glue? How matter of fact a project from the can we take the most advantage from “Bureau of united religions”, an object the potential of this outdated designed in order to take advantage technology through recycling and of consumer electronics in the fulfill new generations’ needs? “Floppy religious field, turning religion into Trip is the ultimate frontier of something appealing for young recycling. This cutting-edge smart generations. drug appeases everyone, from the young teenager who’s never seen a Empathy Box makes possible for a floppy disc before, to the old nostalgic group of people to experience the nerd.”Floppy Trip is an installation empathy entailed in the partaking of consisting in a kit, tidily set in a metal pain. Pain that can, amongst other suitcase and provided with a video things, be identified as the only

47 common factor in all religions. being characterized by a strong dark Empathy Box is a machine that can humor. They are tricks working as “be used by a group of people to assessments of our consciences. receive electric discharges, and thus Until/to what extent are we willing to share a true, forceful feeling.” believe? How much are we willing to accept? In the projects made by IOCOSE art and politics hence blend, becoming a social experiment. Following the path of masters such as 0100101110101101.org, Vuk Cosic, eToy and Ubermorgen, IOCOSE ‘hassling’ its audience. Provocation can give rise to reflection, leading who sees the artwork to think, questioning himself and his values, but could as well bring to misinterpret the oeuvre, concentrating on pointless details, Elena Gianni:How did the project of ending up speaking merely about the IOCOSE began? artist. What really matters is the reaction being triggered, since that is IOCOSE: IOCOSE was born in 2006 in what shows us wether a work of art is Bologna, where we all were studying able to leave a mark, how forceful it is, at the time. During the last two years which actually are the topics it leads the group defined and strengthened to talk about. its four-members configuration. IOCOSE first originated from one And it is indeed the quality of such staple belief: Boredom does not exist discussions the thing that worth the and Reality is overrated. We never most. IOCOSE way of provoking endeavoured to find the way to solve audience is aimed to bring to problems, neither to forthbring catharsis. There is no hope trying to solutions to the various issues being be instilled, nor positive depictions tackled in our projects. We have neither positive proposes in this always had one sole intent: collective’s works; it is rather about insinuating doubt. twisted dreams and nightmares being thrown in our face preventing us from Elena Gianni:Quoting: “We are glimpsing a way out from the fascinated by the most sensational problems. All at the while these things, overdramatized and seemingly surreal games and distorted jokes senseless”. Could you give further

48 explanation on what inspires you? countries’ dogs we collected as many How do your projects come to life? awards as threats. Essentially, our activity is about stirring up situations, IOCOSE: Each project originates from then some can misunderstand and some idea which is usually hard to be get mad, some mistake even more explained, complex and convoluted, and praise us. where each detail appears to be essential and every conceivable It’s one of the good aspects of acting synthesis would rule out a staple point on such a plurality of means and of the basic idea. Even so, a decision locations (from the Web to the on the way to clarify what is hard to streets, from art galleries to be explained must be taken, becomes newspapers). Each time we get to vital and brings the whole group to work on different audiences and the verge of paranoia. At such stage expectations, and each time we push we do usually ban democracy from to make them go off the lines. Then, any decisional procedure. Then from that point some find their way everything else just comes up, we back home, some just remain there, don’t have to invent anything any appalled. We couldn’t tell what we do further. prefer.

Elena Gianni: You make use of media to get to the vastest audience that is possible, and I do suppose public responds to your works in disparate ways: a furious bigoted politician, a nonchalant girl. Moreover, I guess that you gain much more gratification from seeing people getting irked, outraged, reacting impulsively. Which one would your ideal public be? Which are the reactions you are trying Elena Gianni: Characters as to obtain?’ 0100101110101101.org, Vuk Cosic, eToy and Ubermorgen are your direct IOCOSE: The reactions to our projects predecessors. You embody a new have, as a matter of fact, been always generation. What makes you varied and complex. At the time we different? diffused the spam Yes, We Spam! people told us all sorts of things. For IOCOSE: Well, representing a different the work about underdeveloped generation, we might obviously be

49 different. Notwithstanding, how long Neither is Sokkomb, if you consider a generation does last? 25-30 years? that the discrepancy in figures According to us, that is not enough for between the ones that have actually claiming to be representing a new touched it and the ones that have just generation. Our works take for talked about it is remarkably huge. granted that new media art does not Stories do have need of mouths and constitute a niche within hands to be diffused, eyes and ears to contemporary art, not a new thing be acknowledged. ‘We are material seeking ratification, as it could have boys in a material world’. been 10 years ago with the first works from 01, eToy, Vuk Cosic. It is nothing but a further option to choose amidst others. We differentiate the offer, that’s all.

Elena Gianni: Sokkomb and Floppy Trip are amongst your latest projects. They both are actual objects, nor websites neither softwares. If it is that you are turning back to material Elena Gianni: I quote you once again: ” objects, could you clarify what this Our projects reflect our viewpoint on fascination and these changes consist the world, but primarily the in? conception of future that we have.” IOCOSE: To tell the truth, there isn’t How would this future might then be, any proper reversal of tendencies according to IOCOSE? going on. Everything is hardware, or IOCOSE:Near future is going to be has to deal with it. Software stands as ruled by reptilians, who after 2012, a metaphor. Yes, We Spam! had to together with freemasons and manage the limits of a server and an Scientology disciples, will fight for internet connection running through planet’s resources control. Closely cables, which cable ran through following, inhabitants of planet Nibiru, territories subjected to laws. The which will by the time have Doughboys were a collective completed its 3600 years rotation hallucination, even so moving in the cycle. This will cause such violent streets and happening at precise tsunamis and earthquakes that every times and places. Floppy Trip isn’t any kind of brainwash attempted by more tangible than these ones. promoters of seigniorage during the

50 last five hundred years would be made vain. No chemtrails or reversed http://www.iocose.org/ Obama speeches would be of any worth. Hallelujah.

51 A Year Of Arts Santa Monica. An Interview To Vicenc Altaio’

Herman Mendolicchio

theories with artistic practices, in a fluid dialogue between the different disciplines that concern art, science and communication.

The Arts Santa Mònica configuration and intentions can be clearly recognized through some of the objectives that have been outlined by

The 2010 of the Arts Santa Mònica in the exhibition’s new direction, for Barcelona began with new stimuli for example: the creation of a Science creativity and discussion. Fresh with and Art Laboratory as an exhibition new mentalities, a new spirit and new space and, at the same time, as a aspirations, Arts Santa Mònica, an old place for experimentation between convent situated on the emblematic scientific and artistic research; the Rambla and just a stone’s throw from organisation of thought-provoking the sea, now passes on to a new stage activities for debates on current in its history, which is dedicated to interdisciplinary issues connected to themes and the relationship between art, science and communication. art, culture,

The new space aspires to be a communication and science; a meeting point between humanistic defined meeting place for research and scientific culture, a place for groups from Catalan universities who thought on the fast transformations work in these fields and disciplines; a taking place in a digital society where transversal exhibition program that knowledge assumes an increasingly reflects this interdisciplinary transversal character. An innovative centre that offers the Catalan capital environment and that keeps pace the possibility to unite research with the uneasiness of recent times projects with exhibition projects, and times to come.

52 three installations, (Frecuencias, Rueda de Color e El laberinto de Horta), which explored the capabilities and behaviour of light and colour during the creation and transmission of images. Frecuencias, as the Catalan artist states, “is a journey through the energy that the colours’ luminous strips create and a homage to the atoms that essentially constitute as The agreements made with the matter”. University of Barcelona (UB) and the Cultures del canvi. Àtoms socials i Autonomous University of Barcelona vides electròniques, was the first (UAB), with the purpose of exhibit conceived by the Arts Santa collaborating in the organisation of Mònica workshop. The exhibition, various activities, answer to this need inaugurated on the same day as the to integrate and bring together the celebration of the “Cultures of change new space in the Rambla with the / Changing Cultures” international more important public structures for convention (http://www.atacd.net), research and teaching in Cataluña. was developed around the study of The exhibitions that are organised by cultural and social dynamics from a the department of science, multi-disciplinary perspective, passing coordinated by Josep Perelló, through the science of complexity professor in Quantum Physics at UB, and digital technologies. The come from a scientific-technological exhibited works and projects came perspective and develop into an from research centres, academic environment where “art, science and institutions and internationally education shake hands”, as Perelló renowned artists from the field of himself states. research and experimentation in art and science. Eugenia Balcells’ monographic exhibition, which inaugurated the Arts The interesting projects present at the Santa Mònica Workshop and exhibition were Canvi i Temps, from concentrated on the perception of the Bestiario collective, and POEtic- colour and the effect that light has, cubes, by Raquel Paricio García and was definitely among the memorable Juan Manuel Moreno Arostegui. The projects. The exhibited project, first, which represented the first Arts entitled Frecuencias, circled around Santa Mònica on-line project, was

53 essentially the creation of two referring especially to the famous navigation spaces that made up an MMORPG (massively multiplayer important database for themes based online role-playing games). on the science of complexity. A series of tags give way to multiple The exhibition started from the relationships and uncover a creation of war games and analysed continuous chain of new content. its evolution up until today; it studied the concept of avatars and their use in The latter on the other hand is the videogames; it confronted social result of a collaboration between the issues and problems that come from artist Raquel Paricio and the some of the uses of these games, telecommunications engineer Juan such as Gold Farmers, and it also Manuel Moreno Arostegui, and confronted the influential possibilities consists in 9 cubes/robots that of virtual worlds in the physical world. interact with people, perceive and at the same time avoid their presence. If The different exhibitions created you come close to one of them, the during the first year of the new cube/robot begins to move in the “direction” at the Arts Santa Mònica, space in a dance-like movement, reflect the interdisciplinary will of the careful to avoid collision, be it with centre and research for a profitable other robots or people. The dialogue between art, science and cube/robot charges itself and its walls communication. The cross-over, the constantly change colour. collaboration with university research groups, the analysis and observation Frecuencias Eugènia Balcells from of artistic practices that cross over the Frecuencias on Vimeo. boundaries and flow into different fields, all these make up the new Another interesting exhibition to take mentality of the centre and promise a into consideration that also represents fascinating future program worthy of transformation and the “thematic attention. content cycle” of Arts Santa Mònica, was definitely Societats We spoke about all of these things Virtuals/Gamer’s Edition. The with Vicenç Altaió, director of Arts exhibition created a narrative Santa Mònica, a poet and idea discussion on the reality and “smuggler” who politely granted us behaviour of online video-gamer this interview. communities and underlined the passage from board role-play games to online virtual role-play games,

54 outside of the Santa Monica centre, asking questions to the people of the town through a work by Alfredo Jaar. These questions had no images and had no answers and began from a grade zero and are universal questions.

Then, through Carlos Santos’ path on the Rambla, from the source of Canaletas up to the Arts Santa Herman Bashiron Mendolicchio: The Monica, music became a score toward Arts Santa Mònica is now one year old the centre, a symbolic invitation, a after having changed direction and party, love, eroticism. Once inside the structure. How has this first period of building many evaluations were made activity been? and, for example, the objective Vicenç Altaió: In this first year the analysis of new architecture was identity of the centre has been integrated into the building, redefined and a new identity has been considering the pathologies that the created from the principle that this centre has in relation to consumerism place would no longer be a simple and the environment: this was Enric centre, but would become a “location Ruiz-Geli’s project. for locations”. Secondly, it would no We also included about 12 projects longer be a monotheist art centre but and we are satisfied about the rather a multiplied art space, in other intellectual project and, most of all, of words, dedicated to “art and its having activated the cultural elements relationship with…”. From the of the city. We are happy because it electronic writings to the scientific was, and is, a participatory project: speculations, passing through cinema from the political environment to the without images. urban one, passing through different All of this obviously has to do with art: environments, many layers of therefore the arts are multiplied and participation have evolved. are interrelated in two new fields: that In the field of interrelations with the of science and that of cultural centres of the city, we communication. In this redefinition collaborated with the Mirò the subject or genre is multiplied Foundation, with the MACBA, with through what we call collective the CCCB, with theatres, Universities, consciousness. The project began

55 social groups, etc. Then, working with associated with conflict. As we know, the public, with all the money that is this is not true. Humanism is often an invested (as we ask that culture be a empire of a civilization and a form of social asset just like healthcare and knowledge that is imposed onto education are), we must be very others. I like the “pre” state, therefore conscious of what cultural I prefer to be the heir of avant-garde, consumption is. “Consumption” is an even if dealing with elements from ugly word, it’s better to talk about medieval times; what seems “cultural formation” or “shared cultural important to me is facing challenges, project”. In any case, we are extremely being capable of asking questions. happy about the increase in visitors and the Arts Santa Mònica can now be In our times, what is important is considered to be well-established. taking science as a challenge on all levels, a challenge within knowledge, a challenge within culture. We are up against a new culture, which we are building. It’s for this reason that there are so many crises at one particular time: there’s crisis of knowledge, the so-called immaterial culture, and this is a fundamental step that we are taking. This step must be taken with three feet: the so-called culture of the arts, creation and humanism in Herman Bashiron Mendolicchio: Art – relation to science, which is a new Science – Communication. The Arts kind of humanism, in relation to Santa Mònica believes and bets on communication, which allows us to multi-disciplinary and interdisciplinary cooperate on a project. systems. What do you think about the strong relationship between Herman Bashiron Mendolicchio: Do humanistic research and scientific you think that this flow of thoughts research? and discussions between art, science and communication can influence Vicenç Altaió: Often people think that society and politics? humanism initiated during the Renaissance and that in some way it Vicenç Altaió: Undoubtedly. They can can be interpreted as a model for influence politics as much as politics peace and harmony: on the contrary, influence all of us. All the elements the medieval world is always are essential and the limits that exist

56 today in politics partially come from the fact that actions are taken through models that having nothing more to do with reality. For example, I think of the fact that we have technologies for communication that would allow for a greater awareness, and I also think that we should reconstruct politics and reconstruct art and creativity and their relationship with society. Herman Bashiron Mendolicchio: A Barcelonan structure, a Catalan It’s not acceptable that a work, for structure, but with an international example, can be bought by one buyer vision and outlook. What are the local alone who contemplates it in the and global objectives of the Arts privacy of their own home; as it is Santa Mònica? unfair that innovative projects are only funded by the pharmaceutical Vicenç Altaió: It’s the same objective. industry. The bigger the “micro” knowledge, the bigger the “macro” knowledge is as We are facing a new projection of the well. It’s fascinating, how two realities public space, there are a lot of work as a kind of mirror. The greater scientific challenges and we must the capacity for reading one has, the teach people that there’s not just the greater chance they have of seeing Parliamentary vote, but we must what is invisible, in the Universe and in elaborate some kind of pedagogy. the Human body. Today, we have this This all has to do with the word technology that is also necessary as a “freedom”, and with the freedom of metaphor in astronomy and biology, expression in general. It’s also as well in the great sciences and the important to redefine the concept of challenges of our era: a material that ethics and the aesthetic space. It signals that everything is natural and seems that we no longer need moral that what we call artificial is none judgment as such, but rather practice other than the reproduction of a of multi-knowledge and multi-culture model of what already exists in in the hyperpresent era. nature.

What is artificial has in fact never existed. From that point of view the local becomes local-global, but on the

57 contrary also global-local. Today we In all of the projects we develop have are, as we always have been, inside a nothing to do with the old material net. In general, the concepts of “local” culture, or rather, this is not a place and “international” are necessary for for exhibiting, but a place where reductionist arguments, for politics, works are made that generate etc. In reality, everything is, has discussions that we try to give a always been, too interconnected. The certain complexity to. Younger and world of innovation, which is the older people take part in this project, world in which we move with critical because it is an intergenerational thought, has always been very project, as well as an international cosmopolitan and therefore always project. When I say that the lower part ultra-local, because it defends us from is dedicated to memory and the the risks and perils of extinction archive, and the upper part is dedicated to innovation, it’s because Herman Bashiron Mendolicchio: The we have our feet embedded in our Arts Santa Mònica declares to be an roots and our head collocated in open platform for research and experience, in innovation and creativity. What kind of rapport do challenge with everything that is new. you want to establish with young researchers on the one hand and artists on the other?

Vicenç Altaió: Well, we have a building and this building is divided into four conceptual areas that are necessary to develop programming. The archive part and the “memory” are below. The space dedicated to collective projects, the most representative of them all, are in the But, the whole building must function grand cloister. The ring, which is the at the same time: what is no longer place of the wise and of experience valuable today is giving greater and the supra part, is the workshop importance to one discipline rather for the relationship between art and than another. What is more science. All of this stops being an interesting to me is that we know how architectural building and is converted to construct action and action is made into a large Web which will have the by moving: therefore everything must workshop for communication media function at the same time, not just the at its front.

58 lung, the foot or the desire that we “centre” on the other hand is a word have in our head. It’s everything, the which gravitates around a certain body that breathes, that makes the “centrality”. In a certain sense, the movement and that is manifested centre is built in opposition to the outside the brain. museum because it does not have a heritage and follows the kunsthall I am definitely talking about a model. conceptual and metaphorical form, but there is a basis of reality in it. The The “contemporary” is what is projects that are developed in the happening in a precise historical upper part are those that have a moment: therefore a centre is more greater tendency for participation, not contemporary because of its very just with artists and scientists, but nature, whereas a museum can only most of all with the young people have a contemporary view of the past. who are coming out of University. This I believe that we must work is a progressive challenge, we are just simultaneously with all of the verbal at the beginning: I believe that it will tenses, which is what I am trying to do take at least four years, but the here with the whole group, in other project wants to spread its roots out words working with multiple and to the University sector as a sector diverse systems and so that extreme that is not just for training, but also for radicalism can be accepted as much specialisation. as the supreme, until they meet and new realities are formed. Herman Bashiron Mendolicchio: In your opinion what will the future hold for museums and contemporary art and culture centres?

Vicenç Altaió: You nominated three things that are distinct from one another: the word “museum”, the word “centre” and the word “contemporary”. Generally the word “Museum” refers to a place destined to that which is symbolic, where Therefore, multiple verbal tenses and history is preserved and can be re- distinct timing. That which is natural read. The important thing about a thought must be configured following museum is that it contains a heritage the structure of knowledge, that that must be preserved. The word thought which is built every moment.

59 This is the most complicated thing: convent, then barracks, then it went but here lies the big challenge, be it back to religion, then it became a for those idea “smugglers”, be it for warehouse for smuggling, and it was politicians, scientists, etc. The even a dance hall. For a period of time challenge is: if we are already here, it was an art centre and today it is still why are we so archaic in our ways and an art centre, even if I think that this manners? This forces us to a constant place still has something to do with self-training, to an amateurism and an movement and dance and the human upgrade of everything. body.

In the course of its history, the Arts Santa Mònica was first a religious http://www.artssantamonica.cat/

60 Synthetic Aesthetics. Life Design

Gigi Ghezzi

spend two weeks in the laboratories and six scientists and engineers will spend the same time in atelier and spaces aimed at the artistic creation. Above all the latter is an absolutely new exchange of working places. The results can be different: new essays or new writing styles, protocols or new bacteria and biologic forms.

The project has been organized by the It is too late to apply for the bursary in Universities of Edinburgh, Scotland, Synthetic Aesthetics: the deadline for Stanford and California and funded by submitting the applying form was set the National Science Foundation on the 31st March 2010. The call for (USA) and the Engineering and bid was addressed to 6 Physical Sciences Research Council artists/designers and 6 (UK), whose aim is to create the best scientists/engineers who wanted to conditions for interaction between take part to the exchange project in arts, design and biology. The objective Synthetic Biology, design and is to engineer biology into a new form, aesthetics. Anyway, this is also an “generally defined as the application opportunity to expand on the topic of of engineering principles to the synthetic aesthetics, which is directly complexity of linked to synthetic biology”( biology,(h http://syntheticaesthetics.org/). ttp://www.digicult.it/2008/synthetic biologydebate.asp) a theme which Digicult has already coped with, although briefly, in the past.

The project called “Synthetic Aesthetics” foresees a study exchange of a logistic and methodological nature: designers and artists will

61 2010.

In all the above mentioned examples, engineering is used as biological project lever, according to intentional human processes which emulates the selection pressure of natural evolution. Synthetic biology could in this sense simplify the scientific governability of life, through the understanding of its synthesis Engineering means above all apply mechanisms: abstraction, modularity scientific principles to plan and and standardization. develop structures with defined functions, foreseeing their behavior in specific conditions, aiming at the highest efficiency from different points of view, i.e. physics, mechanics, economics, etc. The synthetic biology wants to offer a new living matter to engineering as a subject to be studied.

Among the most important examples it is worth to remember the planning of basic biological DNA circuits, as Therefore the interdisciplinary field of well as the creation of new biological Synthetic Aesthetics must be parts and their “re-functionalization”. necessary crowded and populated by A more specific example is Jim biologists, IT technicians, engineers, Haseloff’s one about plant growing designers, artists, professionals and morphology, whose aim is to embody sociologists. Everybody is engaged in the products needed for plant survival exploring the possible interactions into the plants themselves. between engineering forms and new arts and design schools, in order to In this regard, it is worth to see the improve the understanding of social appealing images by Alexandra Daisy sciences through natural sciences and Ginsberg, who invented this abstract engineering, and support connections idea of nature engineering, as well as between the social engagement and the interview published in the ethics problems of modern Worldchanging on the 16th March biology.

62 Synthetic Aesthetics shows how organizzazione per i nuovi prodotti, often, in our modern society, we assist 2006 – New products’ marketing and to the interaction among different organization). disciplines, in this case of second level, because synthetic biology represents already a hybridization between engineering and biology.

The ways in which we can explore and interrogate science are constantly increasing, with the aim of unhinge hierarchical and impregnable ways of thinking in order to open new areas of thinking and processing. This is another aspect of Network These new forms of interdisciplinary Theory which has a strong cooperation are based on associative interpretation paradigm and can be processes of skills which are perfectly therefore considered an epochal in line with the collective innovation condition which extends from the economies – i.e. the so called neurological field of human brain to “collaborative innovation”. It is gaining digital technologies of World Wide more and more importance in order Web. However its presence is felt also to increase the social complexity and in ecology and in some studies using allow knowledge creativity to become the net theory to better understand more fluid and change into innovation how is it possible to interconnect (Janice Gross Stein, Networks of species and improve biodiversity ( Karl knowledge: collaborative innovation Zimmer, Network Theory: A Key to in international learning, 2001 and Unraveling How Nature Works). within the Italian scenario: Gianmario Verona and Emanuela Prandelli, Of course this will be a topic we will Collaborative Innovation. Marketing e cope with in the future.

63 Spectra. Movement According To Cindy Van Acker

Enrico Pitozzi

international choreographic field such as Laura Tanner, Hestelle Héritier and Myriam Gourfink. Among her most important works are Corps 00:00 (2002) – created for ADC (Association pour la Danse Contemporaine of Geneva) – Fractie (2003), and in the same year, Balk 00:49. Among her most recent works is Pneuma 02:05 (2006) as well as the aforementioned Cindy Van Acker – a choreographer Kernel. who is among the most interesting The choreographer’s works have been international figures in this field – for presented in the most important years has been involved in radical international contexts, as well as the research on movement, with which Biennale di Venezia (Venice Biennale) – she associates an investigation into 37 and the International Theatre the mise-en-scene as a device, but in Festival in 2005 directed by Romeo an auditory key, accompanied by Castellucci. Cindy Van Acker also leading figures of the contemporary worked for the choreographies of La electronic field, such as Mika Vainio Divina Commedia (The Divine from Pan Sonic: she has been Comedy), also by Castellucci, for the collaborating with him since 2007, Avignone Festival in 2008. Among her when they worked on Kernel. most recent works are her six “solos” A Swiss resident, Cindy Van Acker created between 2008 and 2009 founded the Greffe Company in 1999, where the score was created by Mika which she is currently managing. She Vainio, especially for the works Lanx studied dance in Antwerp with Jo (2008), Nixe (2009) and Obtus (2009). Brabants and subsequently worked with important institutions like the Ballet Royals des Flandres, but also with leading figures of the

64 such as Corps 00:00 or Kernel or the more recent Lanx and Obtus, seem to be thought out so they can step over the limits of the body and consequently deconstruct its figure.

In her choreographic writing, gravity has a binding role in the definition of the quality of movement: in order to manage this in the composition, it is necessary that the movement be Van Acker’s choreographic weighed compositions seem to rotate around . In order to obtain a shift in certain operative notions: these being weight the choreographer works on the investigation into weight and its the dynamics and intensities of the dynamics, the flow of movement and forces used, as well as their its suspension, as well as the vectorialisation. To weigh the relationship between these three movement means to “outline” its components and the notion of time internal resistance, where weighing and space. becomes weighing up the different movements in space. Therefore, on the Swiss’ choreographic scene, there are two Here we refer to an internal fall within main ways of articulating this the movement that is created by the relationship: on the one hand the shift in weight; it is, in other words, an diastematic relationship, the intervals, infinitesimal fall that is produced by constituting of rhythmic caesuras; on the deep articulation of the gesture. In the other, in an opposite sense, an other words it is a fall that, like a form adiastematic movement, therefore of decalage, gives structure to the linear and continuous which thinks of visible movement, informs it and movement as an internal modulation deforms it incessantly on a micro- without caesuras. This is precisely the movement level. direction that is privileged in the compositions, which we will consider Therefore it is a fall that operates on another level of resistance and here: even if in some cases, the two vertigo lines tend to overlap one another. produces a kind of that is determined by the abandonment of Thanks to radical choreographic the traditional reference system writing, signalled by a rigour that is at founded on the alternation between times almost mathematical, works verticality and horizontality, and

65 rather exploring diagonal expression produced in the general motion of the in works such as Lanx, Nixe and score. In this case, from the point of Obtus. It’s as if this vertigo is obtained view of movement analysis, this in two different ways, according to means triggering an internal two different strategies: on the one resistance within the transformation. hand on the level of slowness in the And the resistance, in this case, is also organisation of movement, on the necessary for the maintaining of the other- its opposite – on the level of score and the guarantee of the speed-acceleration. precision within its execution. In fact, if the movement were entirely and freely subject to flow, caused by the progressive acceleration of the performance, it would reach a point where it would collapse and fall apart.

I. Dissection

From Van Acker’s work, especially this more recent phase of her research into the structure of movement itself On the level of slowness the in a geometric context, a radical re- movement does not have rhythmic thinking seems to emerge which fractures and the spectator is invited invests the term anatomy with its to enter into its folds and to follow its etymology (anatomy: from the Greek variations, the internal modifications. word ana (upward) and tomé (cut): a On the level of speed everything is directed cut). By forcing this redefined and the performer, as in a interpretation a little, we could say passage from Nixe (Perrine Valli) or that anatomy has to do with Obtus (Marthe Krummenacher), directions, with vectors: the doesn’t just carry out the score, but relationships between speed and rather during the acceleration of the slowness, its way of being and how choreographic movement the posture the movement is directed. transforms into a line, allowing the score to proliferate. Therefore this means spatialising the body: making space with anatomy, In other words, by augmenting the with the directed disposition of the speed of execution of the single organs, their segments. It is precisely moments of movements, a at this point that Van Acker activates a progressive transformation is geometry of composition which

66 allows to put movement in the By drawing geometric shapes in the spotlight and beyond being a mere space through folds and borders, the shape of the body. body probes the infinite possibilities through which it can leave a mark and give shape to the space. It is here that air takes shape, takes on a new volume. As if the body literally leant on the air, made the air a solid within which it can define the negative of the trace of the movement.

If in Lanx it isthe whole movement of the body – in a logic based on opposition between the horizontal and vertical plane – which is etched In other words it’s as if the movement onto the space, in Nixe it is the – as in Nixe or better still, Obtus – kept movement of the arms, as a privileged going when the body appears to have sign of research into gesture, which stopped. It is here that movement will search for a crack in the air. In this literally makes the space: the solo the body tends to disappear, to geometric perception of the scene fracture: it appears to be varies from the varying of the lines dismembered, literally, inside the light that the movement- and therefore the beam given off by the neon lights put presence of the performers – draws in on the set. it. The movement is a vibration in the In this sense, in Lanx, a current seems space. The dancer is to one side, to cross the scene and make the body parallel to the neon lights, a makes of the performer – Van Acker – create a segments of her body emerge from kind of continuity in the space of the these, collocating herself in the space scene; as if there was a continuity between one and the other. It’s here that, from the lines that transversally that the body becomes an interval in outline the scenic space, passes the continuity of light: the silhouette directly to the body of the performer. emerges like a photographic negative. The scenic line is static; the body is the mobile line. In this sense the Obtus, on the other hand, is a kind of movement extends beyond the body, counterpoint where the body in coming into a direct relationship with motion is used to research the limits the scenic structure. of balance through the investigation

67 into a precise and surgical movement, and down, obtaining a spiral line that executed by the gesture of Marthe shakes the body by passing through it. Krummenacher, a Forsythe dancer, In this new configuration, the who experiences the score as a ghost eponymy is created by the legs and that frees vibrating movements into the head and, from behind, with the the air whose phantom characteristics arms. are accentuated by the light. The figure that comes from this is In certain parts of this work, the body completely deconstructed. In the seems to disappear, leaving space for image that is shown to the spectator, movement. The centre of the body no its globality, disappears in favour of an longer exists. The movement exhibition of details of a body that becomes a kind of interrogation of the jump to centre-stage, as if exposed vertebrae: the body becomes a piece under a magnifying glass. of paper, a diagram, a constellation. Here lines must be traced at a variable speed capable of connecting all the peripheries of the body, all its extremities, making its shape literally explode.

The starting point of the movement does not correspond with the centre of the body (a unique point of equilibrium), but seems to come from one of its peripheries: arms, and even hands. In some phases of Obtus the II. Inframince movement seems to come from the hips, even if there is always one Within this structure – in Lanx as in movement – in an opposite direction – Nixe or Obtus – the light compositions which counterpoints it. play an essential role so as to take movement to the limelight. The The opposition develops in two luminous geometric shapes by Luc directions, toward the head and Gendroz seem to give a materiality to toward the feet; whereas the arms the space: they give volume to the move in a kind of eponymy given by scene just like the sound counterpoint the relationship between the head by Vainio works in the direction of an and the arms. The figure seems to atmospheric – therefore dense – bend, to invert its directions from up construction of sound. The

68 atmosphere is tense and the air smallest of shifts of weight that, just becomes volume. like in a microscope, are delivered to the spectators’ eye through the The light builds a liquid space that intervention of light, the sound is mutates constantly, isolating the conceived as a continuous variation body, allowing the movement to and alteration of its granular matter. emerge in order to cross the space and, intermittently, imprint itself onto It’s here that we can talk about a the retina of the spectator through a resounding body that becomes series of palpitations. matter and modulates on moments of density and rarefaction. At times Light is matter and volume; here, in tellurically penetrating, organised this dense luminosity, Van Acker’s set around a matrix of glitches, this sound seems to be built, as in the past part emerges and disappears to the ear of Nixe, on the model of a negative of like a sculptured figure in the space, a photograph: the performer’s body is finding its resonance in both the perceived as a shadow, an interval in choreographic movement and the the luminous continuity of the neon spectators’ body. lights on the backdrop. The neon lights deconstruct the silhouette of As the body explores the threshold of the body, transforming it into a the “visible”, sound explores the limits shadow projected at the front of the of the inaudible through an stage. Its movement is, once again, a investigation into frequencies. There’s vibrating trace that the light delivers a subtle relationship with silence that to the atmosphere. Vainio seems to create for the scores created for these performances: III. The logic of resonance silence is a place of emersion, the founding texture that allows for sound From the point of view of a to manifest itself, to take shape, to soundscape composition of a , the become dense like an atmosphere, in score elaborated by Mika Vainio for a continuous dialectic of ampleness Lanx, Nixe Obtus and is the exact and retention, intensification and counterpoint of movement. It was modulation at the brink of being thought out to be performed live, as a perceptible. However the sound form of response to the gesture of the constitutes the field of tension on performer, the point of contact with which the movement is based on: it’s the gesture can be perceived on an an elementary pulsation that, in infinitesimal level. If on the one hand counteraction with the luminous the movement seems to probe the density, releases tension into the air.

69 above, have an impact of their level of reception: the scene is thought of as a magnetic field capable of redefining the perception of the spectator. This plunge is produced through the composition of an atmosphere, made up of sound and light tensions, from which a movement can emerge that can imprint itself onto the retina of the spectator. It is there that the brain In other words, the sound travels over can become a screen on which to the space, tracing shapes that relate inscribe the passing trace of the to those traced by the movement. gesture. When in Nixe the movement of the arms of the performer undulates, as if signalling an acceleration, a point of escape, the sound becomes more dense around this vibration to produce waves in the space, as if this were none other than a system through which the gesture, accompanied by and drawn by the light, reverberates and makes itself be seen.

Therefore, in Cindy Van Acker‘s In other words, it’s as if the movement compositional writing, there exists a produced by the performer is defined mathematical score of relationships – as well as on the material scene – in a that evokes visual and auditory kind of simulation incarnated in the images, strongly influencing the spectator. During the performance of aisthesis inside the work; it’s as if, in the choreographic score a resonance this logic of resonance, the sound is produced in those who watch added a state, a kind of relief to the which brings them to simulate the movement and its entire perception. action of the performer: the spectators feel the tension that flows IV. The brain is the screen through the body they are observing in their muscular memory. All of Van Acker’s work, and mostly her “solos” that have been mentioned It is exactly in this reverberation that

70 the body stops being a symbolic the light-sensitive plate in the entity and radically opens up to its spectator’s brain, this being the real, physical materiality. the most hidden and the most radical stage. The suspicion is that, for Van Acker, the material scene is just a passage point – a place where intensities which define the atmosphere are http://www.ciegreffe.org/ composed subliminally – whereby to have an impact on the movement on http://www.phinnweb.org/panasonic

71 Suspended Projections. The Changing Equilibria Of Wanda Moretti

Massimo Schiavoni

swallows ..), and that each of them is brought to live its daily experience as an event, and architecture as a daily experience. Because of this I feel like recalling and embracing a spectacular experience, communicative and very “touching” (like fashion); the experience of an artistic career born from below and which, as a tangible postmodern morphing, is naturally Luisa Valeriani in his latest essay intertwined with places, spaces and “Performers – figures of change in environments which turn into widespread aesthetics”, looks at the activating “the performance in situ”. It artist and the consumer as a sole is a body-material interactive figure. Both represent social and performance which the company Il anthropological practices of creative Posto di Venezia parades meticulously spectacularisation which nowadays based on its experience and emerges from below; these ” professionalism. performers ” favour their point of view and their own style by staging an The performances by the company Il innovative artistic creativity that goes Posto are events of great impact and beyond fashion, but which is also appeal. They are made on the facade related to both the political field as of buildings which are important in well as sociology. the life of cities like bell towers, historic buildings, contemporary She says that “architecture, rather architectures or others significant than the abstraction of the project places in the territory. They are drawn, speaks the language of performances of vertical dance, which images, emotions, sounds (the roar of is now ranked among the most the stadium as the patter of footsteps, popular arts in the recent years. One voices of the market and the street, of the most spectacular and cries of children and flights of fascinating arts in spite of the

72 tremendous sacrifice that lies behind collaboration with the Chair of History every live performance, the only way of Dance – DAMS University in they perform,. Bologna and with Aterballetto. She is also teaching, doing some training In Italy the author of this ” spectacular and workshops for museums and balance ” and founder of the company organizations. About her work she “Il Posto” is the choreographer and says: “Vertical dance offers a different dance-educator Wanda Moretti. She observation standard of the place. The departed from Venice and enchanted place is not a simple container of the audiences around the world, event but becomes itself part of the performing at the Singapore Arts performance. The show we propose Festival, the Biennale International adds to the space a new unusual and des Theatres du monde of Rabat, at unexpected point of view and music the Fools Festival in Belfast and at the by Marco Castelli, performed live, Mittelfest. Wanda is the author of a creates an atmosphere in which the path of vertical dance which began in event comes to life.” 1995. She also studies the space in its anthropological, social, cultural and So the performance – in this case the architectural features. From this vertical dance – blends with its analysis she creates an event-show surroundings, with the rough surfaces where space, sound and movement of a bell tower, with the bricks of a combine in a single representation gallery or a civic tower, with the Artistic Heritage which welcomes all its persuasion and grace in a contrast that attracts and become complementary. It was Venice that gave the first input to Wanda; Venice, the mother par excellence of architectural art worldwide, where the typical streets do not allow us to see the horizon as if to indicate the only possible way out: the sky. Together with her choreographic And between heaven and earth the work, she has undertaken a personal artistic creation comes to life. Rhythm research on the educational potential suspended in an immersive- of dance in schools and performing experience that leaves no extracurricular structures. She studied room for errors; body domination and at the Mousikè Centre of Bologna in “èloge de danse”. A performance that

73 overflows in our “everyday spaces” quan, capoeira, I have no objections redefining iconic “symbols” by actors; with regard to any form of movement. a convergence between art that And then, I was into the Movement moves and that which does not move; Analysis based on the studies of integrated testing and changing sets Rudolf Laban which I studied while I of cooperative processes, the need to was training in dance. Along came let those sites “relive”, those sites and also harmony of space studies, emblems, those “space of coreology and the interest in experience”, which is- to put it as architecture and visual arts, learning Franco Speroni would- “a symptom of methodologies, teaching and art reality, a fascinating reading of the education through a body process. world beyond any interpretative Today I am and I feel the result of a arrogance.” gradual and perhaps unconscious approach to the vertical.

In 1990 I had an experience with the Canadian artist Jana Sterback; I was part of one of his works, Remote Control a Motorized crinoline / skirt. I was suspended 2 meters above the ground level for the Art Biennale. Then in 1993 at the Teatro Guardistallo with Cassandra by Crista Wolf I climbed a huge spider web made of Massimo Schiavoni: Who was Wanda rope and placed on the proscenium. Moretti and who is she today? Finally the work Aprimi un Wanda Moretti: I startedmy dance nascondiglio by Alda Merini in 1996 for training very late, following some the Poetry Festival in Venice; on the amateur courses when I was around wall, a type of ‘Mary Poppins’ 12 years old. My strong passion for crucified, I represented the parallel contemporary dance began when I and elusive world of a psychiatric was around 18 years old. Because of patient. From this point on, the that I have been busy looking for vertical became a need, I felt every something more; I have met and have experience was to be made on the even chased teachers, I participated in wall. I needed that point of view to workshops and met people as well as see the dance and watch the space learning techniques. In addition to around me. All uphill: the personal contemporary dance I did yoga, tai chi experience and the architecture, the search for dancers and choreography,

74 the certifications required for those scientific method of movement who work above the ground, safety analysis and a system of movement and then the body seen with different notation (labanotation or eyes. cinetography, treats the body like a piece of architecture and allows us to Massimo Schiavoni: Tell me in detail reflect on the planning of a how passion and the need for movement. contemporary dance and related studies and methodologies also Another extremely important example associated with space, architecture is the recent work by William Forsythe and art education come to you. I want which is presented at the website to know what techniques, processes, http://synchronousobjects.osu.edu. events and what people were The exploration of a short essential to your artistic growth choreography, is analyzed and towards a discipline which is both interlaced with different forms of versatile and multifaceted, innovative space writing, and of graphic and and meticulously complex and sound visualisation. Regarding the delicate. teaching of art, I am back again to the Labanian influences, which pushed Wanda Moretti: Without wishing to me to an always open research that make a summary of the history and considers the body, perception and the origins of contemporary dance, art as fundamental for knowledge and let’s say that, unlike other kinds of for learning methodologies. Of course, dance, this one is born and is still there’s more, but I think this is the today a research on the construction ‘core’. techniques of movement and choreographic composition. In the study of improvisation structures by Trisha Brown, for example, there is a modus operandi that allows the realisation of an artistic project through the application of rules of detection of space and shapes which are associated with a process of the creative practice of movements. A piece of art is the result of a thought Massimo Schiavoni: How would you that excites us and helps us to see and entitle your artistic work if you could understand different meanings. not use the term “vertical dance”? Rudolf Laban, to whom we owe a

75 Wanda Moretti: I would say, “the action that allows, encourages and practice of moving spatial planes “. suggests – affects the quality of living. Indeed, space practice where the body of the dancer is in charge of the The vertical dance performance that negotiation of borders and boundaries we made in Paris was used as an in vertical territories, with a variety of investigative tool in very special urban sensitivities, knowledge and skills. contexts. I chose a gray multi-storey parking building with a -4 Massimo Schiavoni: How important underground level, to blast over 10 was a city like Venice for your “birth” floors into the sky, and so alongside and artistic growth, a city with its art the skyscrapers. The aim of the show and its constraints – although was to see if through “dissociating” fascinating and unique – its practices, something different from dislocations, the paths and routes the usual customs could somehow “obliged”? affect areas and people. Here you have the answer to your question; it is Wanda Moretti: Certainly I belong to surely this: the body is the medium Venice and I’m certainly influenced by through which we experience space, stones and the presence of water; we are “carriers” across physical everything is toned down and spaces, and we express personal softened by water, our roads are judgments through the experience of “water”, things and homes float, and our body. The place where we live gravity seems to be less important. always reflects what we do. Even the floor is softer and more elastic than the “mainland” roads. The Massimo Schiavoni: How does your inhabitants are accustomed to the performance take life? The places and rise, fall, slide, surf, movement into locations – historical buildings, deep water. Sometimes I get the architecture, towers, castles – and the impression that the magnetic force choreography go together or is there that causes tides, causes something in a defined hierarchy? me too. I remember a research project by some planners with whom I Wanda Moretti: In most cases we worked as a choreographer in 2008, have committees, so the choice of together with the architect Cristina locations is a request coming from Barbiani with whom I share part of others. What I do with my company is this research for a project on the to interpret the architectures that are redevelopment of La Defense in Paris: proposed to us; we decide how to set we were studying how the quality of up, where to place the dancers and if the space – depending on the type of it is possible we create something on-

76 site, refining the “listening” in the short term we are living in that place. Massimo Schiavoni: You told me Regarding the specific construction of about the musician Marco Castelli and the show, the subject grows slowly about the dancer Marianna Andrigo. inside of me: on this I prepare studies, How did you meet and how did your I research and I make hypotheses. collaboration start? Do you also work Then I talk to Marco Castelli, the with other artists-dancers who are not musician I have founded the company permanently in the Company? with. He writes and plays the music Wanda Moretti: Marco was a friend of we use in the performances. some musician friends, I met him at a I share and discuss the project with concert: he plays in various jazz him, then we process everything on groups, and collaborates on various our own. We then do the rehearsals projects for musical theatre, video, with proposals by both of us to be performances, and readings. He has explored. Marco is a jazz musician, he always been very “diverse” in its plays saxophone and live electronics, interests and was immediately tested is an artist accustomed to work when I told him what vertical meant improvising. He has a particular talent to me. The first collaboration together for sound design. Then I also discuss and with vertical dance was in the with Andrigo Marianna, a beautiful show with Alda Merini. I danced on dancer, who has been with me for the wall and he took care of the music many years. She has a unique a skill in and played on stage, accompanying movimg on the wall. In general, it is and linking the reading of poems by necessary to give more stimuli and to Alda and my dance. In 1999 for the be clear and ready to take the first great performance of vertical proposals the dancers make and start dance: Progetto Proteus, which was again, if necessary. produced for 16 dancers at the University of Architecture in Venice, Marco put together and directed an orchestra of 10 brass and 6 percussion instruments.

I remember this show with real emotion; the cloister was full of spectators and everything was moving: the sound and the movement on the ground and in the air: it was a great experience. It tied for all the

77 works to come. In a project with the but today Marianna collaborates as a Compagnia Il Posto, we consider dancer and helps me in the rigging music as a chance to further (construction and assembling of investigate space; to add information ropes) of performances. She has a to its perception. I think it’s a great great expertise in vertical dance, and chance to use live music composed an important technical knowledge of on purpose for dance because it this work. Other dancers who work allows a more targeted research and a with me are professionals who play a better interaction between the form regular training in their basic of dance, the dancers and the place in technique. which the performance takes place. They prepare themselves for vertical Marianna is a dancer I selected in dance with a specific training which I 2002. She had never been on the wall, personally teach them when I choose but once the shelf below her feet had them. As for all contemporary dances, been “changed”, her predisposition to the training and the learning of the vertical was suddenly clear to me. She techniques comes while we prepare was young, now she is 27 years old. choreographies. Collaboration with She has the experience and energy of other artists and groups in Italy and a mature dancer who has danced abroad are part of my work and I’m everywhere. I’m very happy when we often called for choreographies, are together. She can dance wherever workshops and for the production of she is able to negotiate space with the “specific” vertical events. intelligence of the body and she can manage her weight, strength and balance on windows, gutters, cornices, skyscrapers and houses mountain, on the stone, marble, on the battlements of castles, glass and aluminium, granite and slate. I think Marianne is the historical memory of most of my work She has accumulated a wealth of information and practices that make her a Massimo Schiavoni: Can you champion today. remember and outline for me your first performance of vertical dance? This is why sometimes I have trouble Rehearsals, sounds, smells and in comparing her to other dancers. emotions. She left the company for a few years,

78 Wanda Moretti: The first performance people to the built-up space – blurring with Mark and Marianna? Do you the boundaries – so for me it might be know Teatro Verdi in Cesena? It’s a on the streets and between the trendy place, a former theatre turned houses. into a nightclub. The climate is very aggressive and not that poetic. We A point of view which is not exactly had a carpet of 2500 people glued the one of street artists. We are an one to each other who were looking hard “genre”, we do not fall precisely up: Marianna and two other dancers in the category of dance activities, we were on the wall, Mark played the feel more akin to contemporary art, saxophone on the platform of the DJ. physical theatre, but we have also an “acrobatic” look that brings us to the We did 3 sets of 4 / 5 minutes, the last circus disciplines: and also issues of one between 3o’clock and 4o’clock in architecture and visual arts. We work the morning. I remember the primarily in restored open spaces, but rehearsals we did in the afternoon also in industrial archaeology venues. went well. Nobody was there and We have performed plays in historic nothing would happen until midnight: buildings and modern architectures in then the sea of people and unconventional places, towers, bodyguards who escorted me to let steeples, farm houses, churches, me reach the strings and test them museums, bridges, trees. before the first performance. I remember the smell of spirits and a I like to think that the relationship lot of concern for the girls on the wall! which takes life among the places Then, we have only worked outdoor where we work and the performance on buildings in the streets … deep is as a public work, in the street, in down we are street artists. front of everyone. During the setting up of the show there is a break- Massimo Schiavoni: What does it building phase, we enter and exit mean today to be a street performer? from all the sides of it: it’s like weaving a thread between the inside and the Wanda Moretti: What a difficult outside, to connect but also invade. question! Mark would reply: “being People are interested and comes back too cold or too hot and having to several times during the construction answer strange questions”. And and testing, which often lasts a day or Marianne would answer: “is like being two: then they also see the show and a fairground worker, we are there and let us know what they think. They people come and watch us”. One of always ask why we chose their town the aims of our work is to bring and why we chose that very building.

79 unable to correct.

There were 10 small bodies almost invisible on the huge stage and I did not know how to make them move. The hundred feet of rope that was left to each of them and needed to get them on the ground had a three times weight, it looked like a stick planted hard and durable. It was a bit all Massimo Schiavoni: One of the most “against” our performance! I think the interesting things is the contact and scene was breathtaking but when the exchange with the audience which is architecture is so far from the human inevitably involved during the scale it is also far from the natural rehearsals and fittings. Can you tell scale: it seemed to me it was me about and describe one or more refractory and difficult to be “scenic places” where you have transformed into something else, encountered difficulties or where it there was no place for nature nor for was somehow harder to work man. because of the physicality of the building and because of other One of the most charming places was problems not related to the the Fondaco dei Tedeschi in Venice, a performance in situ? What are the sixteenth century palace with a places in which you can give the best courtyard overlooked by 144 arches of yourself? across 4 floors of galleries, a spell of lines and forms in a perfect synthesis. Wanda Moretti: Ridracoli Dam on We did the performance by night Romagnolo Apennines, a concrete working on several orders of height concave giant, 103 meters high and and on different sides. Most of the nearly 500 long, a very difficult audience was lying on the ground to location. People were watching from see comfortably and was surprised to above the crown and below near the see dance appearing always in reservoir: they were all far away and different places. Dancers seemed to also there were dancers among them. materialize in space and the strings The vacuum was impressive, as well were not visible, the sound of Marco as the acoustics; dancers hardly heard propagated magically and also the each other, and music bounced from acoustics were perfect. one point to another creating resonances and echoes that we were I worked a lot on the show design: is

80 one of the places where I wish to many experiences abroad on the return. An extremely delicate place occasion of many festivals like the that surprised us for the architecture Singapore Arts Festival, the Lugar a itself, a historic building in the heart of Dança in Portugal, the Biennale Venice. I absolutely wanted to use all International des Theatres du monde the 4 walls facing the courtyard: it was in Rabat. Shows presented gruelling there that the German merchants rehearsals, different cultures and were locked in from 7 pm to 7 am at people certainly not easy to forget. the time of the Serenissima Republic. They did their business and played Wanda Moretti: Yes, people that we their games, very risky games leaving will not forget and do not want to traces and recording the Istrian stone forget: we have discussed for months with signs which are still with Hang Quan, the Deputy Director indecipherable. of the Singapore Art Festival, thinking he was a man. only when we arrived Perhaps all places are perfect, all are we realized that she was a woman! possible to be managed, they all have We did two shows a day for 8 days different energy, although there are and a preview for the press: the structurally half windows, gutters, riggers who set up the installation on cornices and triples. I feel when they the building were two “super” Maori, have that energy that has to do with powerful and fast. without living, with history and modernity that carelessness they worked on the roof belongs to us. of a skyscraper, aluminium coated, with a temperature of 40 degrees. We were guests at the Hilton. There was a pool on the roof from which we could see all of Singapore: its skyscrapers. We were constantly surrounded by people who made us feel perfectly at ease. It was a very nice experience, we worked hard with new energy every day.

In the summer of 2005 a devastating Massimo Schiavoni: Venice definitely fire across one side of the Atlantic has a unique charm from an artistic coast from Santiago to Coimbra in and empathetic point of view which Portugal, seemed to precede our tour: cannot be replicated or adequately we met sites with gray ashes still in described here. Please talk about your the air. Despite this ongoing tragedy,

81 VO Arte did not want to stop the seats with an average of 3 shows per shows and we went ahead and felt day! the fear of people who saw the red sky. The fires were close, but they went to see the show, they brought a chair and remained to see us with a handkerchief over their mouth because of the ash, they clapped their hands and offered us some wine.

We’ve been back there several times, also last year for the 7th anniversary of the CAE – Centro De Artes and Massimo Schiavoni: What comforts Espectáculos Da Figueira Da Foz, and you and satisfies you more than the architecture that overlooks the anything else in this balance between ocean in a surreal completely white being in heaven and on earth? Is there landscape. Rodrigo Nunes was our any place where you would like to tour manager, a film student who perform but still you could not do it? works for the Festival and with Ângela Tell me in a word (if there is one) a Arrojo, from the production team, we limitation in this discipline so “wild” spent a few evenings in “vida loca” but even so scrupulous. style! Wanda Moretti: The desire to fly Also last year, at the International becomes poetry and the body, dance Biennial of Morocco, we were all and movement help us to transform worried about the installation. this subtle and profound desire to Nothing worked and although there break away from the floor challenging were perhaps more than 40 gravity, to break away from everyday technicians taking care of the rigging life to rediscover the flight of art, a (sound and lights), only one seemed new reason. The border is not being to work: every 3 hours a muezzin able to fly. There are plenty of places called them back and they went away in which I’d like to create a new work: to pray. Then they came back on the the interior of Pescheria in Pesaro, the set to do a little (very little). courtyard of Palazzo Grassi in Venice, Eventually, almost by magic, the Ponte Vecchio in Bassano del everything worked … it was Grappa, the Bargello Museum in exhausting. We set up the installation Florence, the Mole Vanvitelli in on one side of the National Theatre Ancona. I could go on listing areas in Mohammed V, a theatre with 5,000

82 Italy as well as worldwide. visions, different forms. I want to use dance to put each area of a building in Massimo Schiavoni: Of course I communication with the understand your desire to perform in environment, through the elimination other fascinating and engaging of boundaries and roles, because places, not only in Italy, and this is everything is a space that changes normal. You have already talked about only according to the body. “particular” experiences difficult at times but always representing a This is an ongoing project for places of “challenge” to yourself and the various kinds, as in the realisation I external environment. What was your created for the Festival Valle Olona most successful performance, the one headed by Gaetano Oliva, from CRT of where the edge of not being able to Fagnano Olona – a festival that deals fly has shown up the most? Tell me with environment and landscape – last about your next show and future year we made the show in an projects of this wonderful artistic abandoned mill located in Medio project you’re pursuing with passion Olona park, near Varese. The deep aim and elegance, with determination and is to encourage the actual knowledge sacrifice. of places, landscapes and spaces that, while seemingly outside the usual Wanda Moretti: I often walk with my routes of socialization, belong to eyes upwards, I look at houses and those who live and work there. think about where I could hang the dancers, in which position a moving We want to suggest a reflection on body would have the most meaning. the change of the landscapes, on the Which part of the building makes me need to preserve and maintain traces “move”. The best performances are and signs of the civilization that those in which the use of space preceded us, the knowledge that the excites everyone. Preserving the spread of a culture heritage is vertical dance characteristics, the use expressed through the link between of “empty” spaces as I feel the need to places and individuals. Future add a reflection on the forms of the projects? Right now, the tour of my landscape that surrounds us. I try and new show Exuvia, also I’m engaged in think new angles, another perspective a study of lifting water tanks at the that shows the visual and kinetic entrance of towns, so present environment turned into figures, architectures in our landscapes.

83 video as a further investigation tool on space, and then on the body and movement. I use video to show points of view that the audience do not see. This is the reason why I started using video: to send in real-time and without any change the image of the dancers during their performance, to let them be seen from different angles. This phase is a challenging Massimo Schiavoni: Before you leave part in the sense that on every show I and I thank you for the collaboration, I re-think the “points of view” according would like to ask you one last to the place where we are. The result question: what is your relationship is to re-project bodies on the nearby with the new digital technologies, buildings, in different sizes. This idea such as video or 3D mapping – digital was realized with Exuvia, which is the processing in three dimensions mainly latest show on the subject of used for architecture. Do you think transformation. The use of 3D somebody could somehow mapping programs is still a study. “experiment” with your creations.

Wanda Moretti: My experimentation is just a beginning. I see/think the use of http://www.ilposto.org

84 Decode Exhibition. Software Art At Victoria & Albert Museum

Mark Hancock

sure where the imagined divide between art and design may sit, but it was certainly one question raised by the exhibition. What seemed more important about this work was the chance to move media art into a broader public awareness. Despite all the festivals, conferences and conversations that take place across the Internet, it can still feel as though When is a work of art a design object? media art operates within a narrow When it has a utilitarian purpose? framework of artists, critics and When it has no purpose but is specialists. designed to encapsulate a concept that relates to human experience and On the day that I visited the attempting to capture something exhibition, I was fortunate enough to about the essence of our existence? be in with crowds of schoolchildren. Or when the sign on the gallery wall Normally it would be terrible to be says so? This was the first question stuck with children running around that crossed my mind when I arrived and calling out to each other when the the Victoria & Albert Museum in you’re trying to think about such lofty London to view the Decode thoughts as art versus design. But in exhibition. The exhibition ran from 8th the context of Decode, it felt like the December 2009 until 11th April 2010. perfect opportunity to observe how people who hadn’t spent time In the context of the museum all of absorbing and thinking about art and the work on display was design work. design would react. For these visitors, Which may come as a surprise to the the interactive projects became people who would have originally spectacle and entertainment. commissioned or funded some of the work, because much of it originated With the interactive works it meant within an art world context. I’m not taking ownership of the imagery and

85 entertaining each other. This was in the Victoria & Albert museum, with media arts as place of pop culture its origins in London’s Great Exhibition entertainment and performance. of 1851 that celebrated world culture Which made me think about the and industry: which, it could be multiple layers of art. Just as it’s argued, is exactly the position from possible to watch the television within which media arts operates. program Big Brother and think about media and technology along with Reflecting back to us the best that socio-cultural influences, while also current technology has to offer. As being able to watch it for the well as lessons and warnings about childishness and gossip factor. the potential hazards of the military- industrial complex.

Design as Raw Material

The exhibition is broken into three themes addressing the notion of digital design as technological product, rather than any kind of artistic metaphor. It’s an interesting choice to make, as many of the works may well have worked alongside each So it was at the Decode exhibition. other under other themes. The first The schoolchildren thought of the theme is Code as Raw Material, work in the most sublime and showing works that create art straightforward way: the work was spontaneously from code. The just fun and interactive. It was catalogue says that the new designs comforting to know that the young ‘carved’ on the screen are from the visitors instantly understood how to raw materials of code in the same way use the works on display, taking that a real world sculpture might be ownership of the projected images carved from clay or wood. and using them to amuse and Daniel Brown exhibits a piece from his entertain each other. On Growth and Form series, which They have no reservations about takes it’s inspiration from the Victoria standing in front of mirrors and posing & Albert collections. These screen- or having their portrait taken and based works sit in a narrow corridor added to a collage to be shown to that you enter the gallery space their friends. Decode rightly belonged through. The closed in intimacy of the

86 space, means that you’re forced into draw the viewer in and demand some closer relationship with the screens action. It’s appropriate that the works that you might have ordinarily be. place the viewer at the centre of the piece, sometimes quite literally, as It’s a good decision to make, if the with Venetian Blind by Fabrica. This intent was to remind traditional piece places the viewer within an gallery going visitors that these are ornate glass mirror, although the works are for close scrutiny and that image takes a few seconds to appear, there is no limit on how close you can in the style of old Polaroid get to them (unlike traditional art photographs. works, perhaps?) then they have succeeded. Networ(th)k

The flowing, patterned screens work The final category seems to be the well and, as the first taster of the one that finally addresses the result of exhibition, present the most our using the technologies and offer a aestehtically pleasing of the works on comment on our passing through the display. new technological landscape. The selected works respond to the traces left within the network by human behaviour and creative activity. In We Feel Fine, by Jonathon Harris and Sep Kamvar, blog comments that are emotional responses to blog posts. Taken from across the world, they build to represent the information as floating information spheres.

Interactivity as the point of contact

The interactive themed works also include many familiar names, such as Golan Levin. Weave Mirror by Daniel Rozin offers an unusual aesthetic for the exhibition reminding visitors that the works aren’t just about the stylised images they might encounter in film or computer screen. These On the day that I visited the

87 exhibition, at least two of the works about our contemporary were either not functioning or had technological culture than any artists been shut down. The signs telling the created project ever could. public that the works was temporarily off line and would be available soon, as with many media art exhibitions http://www.vam.ac.uk/microsites/de throughout the world, said more code/

88 Link index

Telcosystems: Machines And Audiovisual Horizons http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Telcosyste ms-02.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Telcosyste ms-03.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Telcosyste ms-04.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Telcosyste ms-05.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Telcosyste ms-06.png

HTTP://www.telcosystems.net/ http://www.baltanlaboratories.org/

Medi/action And Mediam(bi)ent. The Nuformer Digital Media Method http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Medi-action -02.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Medi-action -03.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Medi-action -04.png http://vvvv.org/tiki-index.php?page=How+To+Project+On+3D+Geometry http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Medi-action -05.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Medi-action -06.png

89 http://www.nuformer.nl/en/

Biomimethic Prized By Science. Scientific Imaging As Art http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Biomimethi c-02.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Biomimethi c-04.png

Between Rhythm And Measure. An Interview To Aoki Takamasa http://www.bemf.be/ http://www.aokitakamasa.com/ http://www.aokitakamasa.com/blog/ http://www.myspace.com/aokitakamasa

Donkijote By Cristian Bettini. The Sustainable Slowness Of Being http://www.donkijote.org/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/donkijote-org/ http://lasino.org/

Mechatronic Art And Diy. Marc Dusseiller: The Artistic Soldering http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Mechatroni c-02.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Mechatroni c-03.png http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4emP94Signs http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Mechatroni c-04.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Mechatroni c-05.png

90 http://www.mechatronicart.ch/ http://www.mechatronicart.ch/lab/lab.htm http://www.dusseiller.ch/labs http://www.tv.dock18.ch

Open Observatory Challenge. Roger Malina And The New Leonardos http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Open-oserv atory-03.png http://www.imera.fr/ http://www.leoalmanac.org/index.php/lea/entry/an_open_observatory_ma nifesto/ http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Open-oserv atory-05.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Open-oserv atory-06.png http://malina.diatrope.com/ http://www.leoalmanac.org/index.php/browse/C41 http://www.imera.fr/ http://www.leoalmanac.org/index.php/lea/entry/an_open_observatory_ma nifesto/

A Surreal Doubt. Iocose Group’s Works http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_A-surreal-0 2.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_A-surreal-0 3.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_A-surreal-0 4.png

91 http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_A-surreal-0 5.png http://www.iocose.org/

A Year Of Arts Santa Monica. An Interview To Vicenc Altaio’ http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_A-year-of-a rt-02.png http://www.atacd.net/ http://vimeo.com/8420072 http://vimeo.com/user2872538 http://vimeo.com http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_A-year-of-a rt-03.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_A-year-of-a rt-05.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_A-year-of-a rt-06.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_A-year-of-a rt-07.png http://www.artssantamonica.cat/

Synthetic Aesthetics. Life Design http://www.digicult.it/2008/syntheticbiologydebate.asp http://syntheticaesthetics.org/ http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Syntethic-0 2.png http://www.daisyginsberg.com/projects/growthassembly.html

92 http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/011029.html?utm_source=feedburn er&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed:+worldchanging_fulltext+%28W orldChanging.com+Full+Text http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Syntethic-0 3.png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Syntethic-0 4.png

Spectra. Movement According To Cindy Van Acker http://www.adc-geneve.ch/ http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Spectra-02. png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Spectra-03. png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Spectra-04. png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Spectra-05. png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Spectra-06. png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Spectra-07. png http://www.ciegreffe.org/ http://www.phinnweb.org/panasonic

Suspended Projections. The Changing Equilibria Of Wanda Moretti http://synchronousobjects.osu.edu/ http://www.ilposto.org

93 Decode Exhibition. Software Art At Victoria & Albert Museum http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Decode-02. png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Decode-03. png http://www.digicult.it/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/numero53_Decode-04. png http://www.vam.ac.uk/microsites/decode/

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