Interactive Art

Call for submissions: Next idea grant

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The Ars Electronica Linz GmbH in Linz/Austria welcomes submissions for the “next idea grant” 2012.
Every year Ars Electronica awards prizes to artistic works in the field of media arts in the following seven different categories:

  • Computer Animation / Film / VFX
  • Interactive Art
  • Digital Musics & Sound Art
  • Hybrid Art
  • Digital Communities
  • u19–Create Your World
  • [the next idea] voestalpine Art and Technology Grant

The Prix Ars Electronica is one of the most important awards for creativity and pioneering spirit in the field of digital media.
The aim of “THE NEXT IDEA” grant is to honor new and extraordinarily promising ideas and to support the process of developing them further. This year Ars Electronica looks especially for projects that deal with three themes of key importance to humankind’s future: energy, mobility and access.

For detailed information about the grant see http://www.aec.at/prix/en/

Everyone is invited to submit new projects/concepts or prototypes here: http://prix.aec.at/
The deadline for submission is March 2nd, 2012.

Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.

Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.

The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:

– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)

Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21

Go to Cultura21

Art Performance with Hundreds of Children as Statement Against Rising Sea Levels at United Nations Climate Conference #COP16

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Javier Velasco, La Isla Hundida, Performance, 2010

November 29-December 10, 2010

New York-Valencia-Zurich, November 9, 2010—ARTPORT_making waves, an international arts and sustainability organization, and CINEMA PLANETA, a Mexico-based environmental film festival with international reach, present Cancun: 2 Degrees of Separation, a comprehensive arts program aimed at bringing a breath of fresh air to a sapless United Nations Climate Conference, COP16, in Cancun, from November 29-December 10, 2010.

As part of 2 Degrees, Artist Javier Velasco, who has exhibited at the Venice Biennial, will make a statement about rising sea levels with a live arts performance involving hundreds of local children in a public space in Cancun—right at the heart of the conference. The performance will be accompanied by a rich program of a cell phone video contest, art video screenings, panel discussions on the role of art in the climate debate, and an exhibition on gender and climate change.

Anne-Marie Melster, Corinne Erni, and Oliver Orest Tschirky from ARTPORT_making waves are behind the innovative concept of bringing art to the heart of where it matters. They explain: “Art can inspire change, and that’s why we bring this program to the very people who will be making crucial decisions about the future of our planet.”

2 Degrees will take place in public spaces, at CINEMEX movie theaters, on large outdoor screens, and conference locations in Cancun, Playa del Carmen, and Tulum, Mexico.

A detailed program, schedule, and locations will be announced at the end of November.

About Cancun: 2 Degrees of Separation

La Isla Hundida (The Drowned Island) is an interactive art performance with hundreds of children by the internationally renowned artist Javier Velasco. In collaboration with the International American School of Cancun, Velasco will work with local children to build little islands and drown them in a large container filled with water in a public space in Cancun. This symbolic, playful and educational act is intended to create awareness about rising sea levels among the next generation. Prior to the performance, Velasco will work with the school to teach the children about climate change. Velasco represented Spain at the Venice Biennale in 2001, and has exhibited at MoMA P.S.1 in New York and the International Biennial of Contemporary Art of Seville in 2004 under the direction of Harald Szeemann. The message of La Isla Hundida will be spread beyond Cancun. We will invite children, schools, and educators around the world to participate in the project and share photos, videos, and comments from their own performances on the website www.laislahundida.org.

20 Seconds for the Planet is a cell phone video contest by Cinema Planeta in collaboration with Green Film Network and Environmental Film Festivals Network. People from all over the world are invited to produce a video with a cell phone. Each festival from the networks selects 10 winning videos—based on content, message, and creativity. All winning videos will be shown as a “video wall” in Cancun. www.my20sec.org

Cool Stories For When The Planet Gets Hot II is a compilation of 17 short videos and animations by international artists who won the second short video and animation contest on Global Warming by ARTPORT_making waves in 2009. It was first shown in conjunction with Art 40 Basel 2009, Switzerland.

ARTPORT_making waves and CINEMA PLANETA will jointly host a panel discussion bringing forward ideas of how art can have an impact in political decision-making, especially in the climate debate. We will invite artists and participants of the Conference—scientists, politicians, and economists—to participate.

Leading up to the events in Cancun, ARTPORT_making waves presents (Re-) Cycles of Paradise, an exhibition on gender and climate change, to open on November 11, 2010 and running through January 9, 2011, at the Spanish Cultural Center in Mexico City. The exhibition explores both the vulnerability and ingenuity of women faced with climate change. The exhibition was launched in conjunction with COP15 in Copenhagen last December.

Partners: United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC); International American School of Cancun, Mexico; Summit of Environmental Cinema, Mexico; Government of the Maldives; Maldivian Youth Climate Network; Bluepeace Maldives; Spanish Agency of International Cooperation for Development (AECID); IPADE Foundation Spain.

About ARTPORT_making waves and CINEMA PLANETA

ARTPORT_making waves is an international curator’s collective that raises awareness about current social and political issues worldwide through theme-oriented exhibitions, residency programs, and artists collaborations. ARTPORT_making waves aims at creating sustainable networks of artists, curators, galleries, and art collectors to promote a true globalization of the artistic discourse, giving a voice to promising artists from all over the world. At the same time, ARTPORT_making waves encourages the cross-fertilization of art, science, and politics. ARTPORT_making waves is a fiscally sponsored project of the New York Foundation for the Arts, a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt organization, and incorporated as non-profit associations in Spain and Switzerland. www.artport-project.org

CINEMA PLANETA is an international film festival and non-profit organization based in Mexico. The festival is committed to creating spaces of consciousness and to raising awareness through images that promote the conservation of the planet through film, art, and science. The program includes exhibitions of photojournalism and contemporary art, conferences, and open air cinema. It takes place every spring in Cuernavaca, Morelos, and is a unique initiative in Mexico. CINEMA PLANETA has presented more than 100 contemporary films in various sections in its first two editions. The films have previously been shown at festivals like Sundance, Cannes, and at the Oscar’s. CINEMA PLANETA is a member of the Green Film Network and Environmental Film Festivals Network. www.cinemaplaneta.org

Contact:

Corinne Erni, Co-Founder and Co-Director of ARTPORT_maing waves New York

T: (1) 646-641-4268   E: corinne.erni@artport-project.org

Commissions for ‘Artists Taking the Lead’ / Cultural Olympiad announced

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The twelve regional winners of Artists Taking the Lead, the major art commissions for the Cultural Olympiad part of the London 2012 Olympics, were announced on 22 October.

Although the winners are more strongly based in installation, sculpture and visual arts, several do have performance and participation elements as well as an environmental sensibility. Those winners include:

North East
FLOW
by Owl Project, based on a concept by Ed Carter.

  • FLOW is an environmentally sustainable floating waterwheel and mill house. Entering the mill house will be like entering a turn of the century workshop where basic electronics, wood and water replace metal and steam, creating an accessible and interactive art space on the River Tyne.
  • The artwork will generate its own power and combine traditional and new technologies to monitor the river’s environmental details including water temperature, speed, and turbidity.
  • A series of Owl Project musical instruments on display in the mill house, will respond to this data. The audience will be able to interact with these instruments, performing alongside each other and the Tyne itself.
North West
Projected Column
by Anthony McCall
  • Projected Column will be a slender, spinning column of cloud rising into the sky from the surface of the water in Birkenhead’s disused Morpeth dock in Merseyside, directly opposite the city of Liverpool.
  • Extending upwards as far as the eye can see, and visible on a clear day from up to 100 km away, the column will disappear and re-appear in slow structured sequences, punctuating the skyline whilst connecting it with the city and its docks.
  • Projected Column will recycle discarded local heat, and, day or night, will operate as a self-sustaining system.
South East
The Boat Project
by Lone Twin (Gary Winters and Gregg Whelan)
For The Boat Project Lone Twin will ask the people of the South East to donate a wooden object of personal significance, be it a favourite pencil, a much used dining table, or the garden shed, to be used in the building of a sea-faring boat.
The community, guided by a professional boat builder and using a combination of traditional and contemporary construction techniques, will then build a boat from the donated wood. The boat and a book collecting the stories of the contributors will be launched in May 2012.
Crewed by trained community members, the boat will make a two-week maiden ‘Olympic’ voyage in June 2012, becoming the focus of four celebratory arts events.
South West
nowhereisland
by Alex Hartley
For nowhereisland Alex Hartley will bring Nymark, an island he discovered in the High Arctic region of Svalbard in 2004, to the South West of England. The island, about the size of a football pitch, consists of rubble and moraine around a small amount of bedrock. It was revealed from within the melting ice of a retreating glacier and Alex was the first human to ever stand on it. The island has been recognised by the Norwegian Polar Institute and is now named and included on all maps and charts.
A portion of the island will be transported to South West England through international waters and whilst en route will apply for micronation status. The new ‘micronation’, nowhereisland will navigate the entire 702 miles of the coast of the South West region, visiting its ports and harbours accompanied by a travelling embassy/support vehicle.
The project explores climate change, land ownership, national identity and the exploitation of the Earth’s remaining natural resources. At the end of the Olympic year, the island will return to the Arctic to be made whole again.
Scotland
Forest Pitch
Craig Coultard
Craig Coulthard’s Forest Pitch involves a football pitch hidden within a forest. Trees are felled to make way for a football pitch and used to create a stand, goalposts and a shelter that will act as both changing room and exhibition space. One football match is scheduled to be played on the pitch, open to spectators and once the match has taken place, the pitch will be left to become taken over by nature again. The changing room is kept as a simple exhibition space to document the project.
The pitch itself, with surrounding infrastructure will become a living relic of the Olympics, in contrast to the new buildings created in London for the Games.
Wales
ADAIN AVION
by Marc Reed
For ADAIN AVION, a fuselage of an abandoned DC9 airplane is recycled and transformed into a mobile art space. It will travel across Wales ‘nesting’ in different locations having arrived at the site pulled by a large team of local athletes, youth groups and other members of the community.
In each location the project will engage the community in a festivity marking the arrival of the plane in the form of a colourful procession, including a specially commissioned composition which will be played by local brass bands heralding the arrival of this migratory ‘bird’.
During the nesting week, a series of arts, cultural, sporting and community activities will take place in and around the space.
Shortlisetd for the commission were NVA and Red Earth. Both are companies represented here on the Directory.
The commissioning is developed by Arts Council England, with London 2012 and the arts councils of Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales.

www.artiststakingthelead.org.uk