A Series of Projects Made for Urban Screens
From the subways of Paris to electronic billboards in Toronto, Berlin and Amsterdam, Our Friends Are Electric is a series of projects created specifically for public screens throughout the world.
Beginning with the launch of Streaming Museum, the first international moving image gallery to be broadcast both in cyberspace and public space over seven continents simultaneously, Our Friends Are Electric celebrates how today’s cities are becoming connected through a network of urban screens. In a showcase of international urban screen initiatives beginning in January, Our Friends Are Electric introduces the concept of urban screens to the Melbourne audience in the lead up to the 2008 Urban Screens Conference, 3-8 October.
The series will include a range of international video art programs produced for outdoor screens around the world in addition to individual artist initiatives created from collective, worldwide contributions.
This project is presented by Federation Square and the International Urban Screens Association – a network of international collaborators Curated by Kerrie-Dee Johns and Mirjam Struppek.
http://www.fedsquare.com
http://www.urbanscreens.org
Opening: 29.01.08 > 03.10.08
Streaming Museum, the first real-time museum of cyberspace and public space on seven continents, celebrates its launch at Federation Square. The Museum’s exhibitions will be seen in public spaces in Antarctica, Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, North America and South America, and in cyberspace at www.streamingmuseum.org and Second Life. The opening exhibition is a 38-minute video work, "Good Morning Mr. Orwell", by pioneer video artist Nam June Paik. First broadcast by satellite on January 1, 1984, the work illustrates the global connectivity Paik forecast for the ‘information superhighway’ as early as the 1970s. It interweaves fine art and pop culture icons including Laurie Anderson, Peter Gabriel, Merce Cunningham, Salvador Dali, Philip Glass, John Cage, pop singers Sapho and The Thompson Twins, and many others. Visitors are invited to a "Global Meetup" by uploading pictures via cell phone or email to www.StreamingMuseum.org/globalmeetup <http://www.StreamingMuseum.org/globalmeetup> using an address displayed at the location. Founder/Creative Director: Nina Colosi Opening: 29.01.08 > 10:00 pm Check screen guide @ www.fedsquare.com http://www.streamingmuseum.org
Flag Metamorphoses
A participatory art project - a continuously growing series of animations with many authors: The flags of every nation in the world will transform into each other through flash animation. Between each two flags, scenes appear that show an aspect of the relations between the two countries - an exploration into the meaning of imagery on flags, aiming to create interrelated associations through questioning, reassessing, fluidizing and re-mixing of diverse national iconography.
FLAG METAMORPHOSES lays stress on the relations between nations as changing ones: Only in the permanent re-creation of values, symbols and ways of life, in mixing with others and differing from others, identities, cultures and societies stay alive. Each artist who creates a flag animation expresses such a relation in his/her own way.
Concept: Myriam Thyes
Call for submission / participation:
www.flag-metamorphoses.netFunding
Commissioned in 2005 by the Swiss Federal Office of Culture (BAK / sitemapping.
Opening: 07.02.08 > 7:30 pm
Check screen guide @ www.fedsquare.com
http://www.flag-metomorphoses.net
Visual Foreign Correspondents
Visual Foreign Correspondents is a monthly series of audio-visual artworks for a number of screen-based platforms. Distinguished artists from around the world are invited to give their personal visual commentary on events and situations from their locally situated perspective.
Visual Foreign Correspondents launches in February at Federation Square with works by Erhan Muratoglu (Turkey), Shahram Entekhabi (Iran) and Lin Yilin (China).
Curator : Nanette HoogslagThis project is presented by The Globalised Chrystal Ball. Funding Partners include:
Amsterdamse Fonds voor de Kunsten, VSB and Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds
Opening: 21.02.08 > 7:30-8:30 pm
Check screen guide @ www.fedsquare.com
http://www.visualcorrespondents.com
Videospread
Videospread distributes a collection of artist films and videos destined to be screened and/or broadcasted in public and semi-public places. Its concept is based on a silent (mute) program, which puts forward the power of images through their visual attraction.
This program questions the capacity of Art having a direct impact on the perception and appropriation of an artistic content on the general public - considering the areas of broadcast- Furthermore, Videospread wishes to develop a new market for Video Art.
Videospread programs should not be considered like common television programs, but should rather be regarded as a visual presence, a moving painting.The content of the program is silent, non-narrative and specifically conceived for television broadcasts.
Each individual is confronted daily - voluntarily or not - to the growing exposure to visual information (at home, at work, in public places, during transports, in the street…). These images are usually of commercial and/or advertising nature, and rather poor in cultural and artistic content.
To try and impose a new type of visual « standard » can be the beginning of a different relationship between us – spectators - and the images that we are fed, on a daily basis.
Videospread wishes to encourage and promote critical thinking, as well as challenge the way we look at moving images.
Curator/Managing Director : Céline JouenneEditor : Fabrice FaivreArtistic Director : Olivier Berhaut
Opening: 28.02.08 > 7:30 pm
Check screen guide @ www.fedsquare.com
http://www.videospread.com
Do Billboards Dream of Electric Screens?
Trampoline, a new media art organisation based in Nottingham, UK, and Berlin, Germany, has been running showcase events, festivals*, conferences and other media art related projects for the last 10 years. With a close focus on the live aspect of media art, Trampoline has explored experimental artforms as well as innovative ways of exhibiting focussing on public, site-specific contexts.
Do Billboard’s Dream of Electric Screens? is Trampoline’s touring programme of moving image works, highlighting innovative approaches by artists from all over the world.Do Billboard’s Dream of Electric Screens? endeavours to uncover the possibilities of this new digital infrastructure for artistic production. With the overload of commerce and consumerism in our city centres, it is an important step to reclaim this space and question one’s relationship to our urban environment.
The programme is divided into two chapters, "The Citizen" and "These Four Walls". While "The Citizen" shows mainly cinematographic works reflecting upon the relationship between the individual and society as such, "These Four Walls" understands the screenin its two-dimensionality, as an electric canvas or simply a wall.
Curated by: Trampoline (Miles Chalcraft & Anette Schäfer)
This project is supported by Arts Council England, Three Cities Create and Connect and part-financed by The European Union
*Radiator Festival for New Technology Art
Opening: 03.04.08 > 7:30 pm
Check screen guide @ www.fedsquare.com
http://www.trampoline.org.uk
http://www.trampoline-berlin.de*http://www.radiator-festival.org
VERNACULAR TERRAIN
In this exhibition, titled ‘The Vernacular Terrain’, works have been selected from artists that respond to their environment in a broad philosophical manner.
Is it possible to speak of local dialects of the terrain? Are the artists presenting specific viewpoints of the landscape within a contextual framework? What are the influences of hyper-techno landscapes surrounding the vernacular in virtual worlds, interactive design, gaming, locative/mobile technologies and web culture?
What we see in this exhibition is an eclectic anthropological view of our world. These artists explore and engage in interdisciplinary practices and hybrid processes that go beyond any single art form
IDAprojects creates a scenario of open disciplines, and is an inclusive hub promoting narrative drawing on social and physical structures that make up the environment we live in.
The changing relationship between technology and culture articulates a process of experimentation found within the arts. The result is an interrogation of the locality and its history"
IDAprojects is supported by the Queensland University of Technology, Beijing Film Academy, China, Yokohama Art Project/City of Yokohama, Platform Contemporary Art Institute China and Monash University Australia.
IDAprojects acknowledges the generous assistance from the Australia International Cultural Council, Australia China Council and the Australian Embassy in China.
IDAprojects acknowledgements:IDAprojects is Directed by Stephen Danzig
IDAprojects is curated by:Stephen Danzig, Founder and DirectorLubi Thomas, Public Programs and Curator, QUTRyuji Enokida, Director Yokohama Art ProjectWang Hong Hai, Beijing Film AcademyMatthew Perkins, Studio Co-ordinator New Media, Monash University
Opening: 20.03.08 > 7:30 pm
Check screen guide @ www.fedsquare.com
http://www.idaprojects.org
Upgrade International
Upgrade! are an international, emerging network of autonomous nodes united by art, technology, and a commitment to bridging cultural divides. Appropriating the functional model of online videosharing sites such as Youtube, Upgrade! Is a series of exploratory events that translate social videosharing into the analogue environment of the urban street.
Upgrade! International functions as an online, global network that gathers annually in different cities to meet one another, showcase local art, and work on the agenda for the following year. As of 2008 Upgrade! International includes nodes in 27 cities.
Video programmes are curated by individual Upgrade nodes and screened outdoors in the built environment of cities including Vancouver, Paris, Montreal, Belgrade, Seattle, Boston, Scotland, Skopje, Chicago, Amsterdam, and Istanbul.
Upgrade! Federation Square is a screening of select Upgrade International programs of experimental video art from Boston, Paris, Scotland, and Vancouver.
>Opening: 10.04.08 > 7:30 pm
Check screen guide @ www.fedsquare.com
http://www.theupgrade.net
Best of Transmedia
‘Best of Transmedia’ presents the highlights of Transmedia series of projects by the members of the art collective, Year Zero One, who have been using urban screens in Toronto, Canada to display work by artists since 2000. The group has produced screening programmes on three different urban screens in downtown Toronto, where video art was presented at regular intervals between advertisements.
Curated by Michelle Kasprzak.
Year Zero One gratefully acknowledges the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.
Opening: 17.04.08 > 7:30 pm
Check screen guide @ www.fedsquare.com
http://www.year01.com
At Play
Pure visual fun is in the spotlight of this programme featuring video artists from Canada and the USA. The videos in this programme utilize a wry sense of humour, a nuanced notion of the absurd, and clever visual trickery to engage and delight the viewer.
Curated by Michelle Kasprzak.
Michelle Kasprzak gratefully acknowledges the artists that she has worked with in producing the "At Play" programme.
Opening: 17.04.08 > 7:30 pm
Check screen guide @ www.fedsquare.com
http://michelle.kasprzak.ca
CREDITS:
Image credits for Streaming Museum:Federation Square, Melbourne; Time Square, New York; Victory Park, Dallas, Texas, USA; Piazza Duomo, Milan, Italy
Image credits for Flag Metamorphoses:Rona Innes (UK), Malawi + Mozambique (+Portugal, UK), 2005; Myriam Thyes, Caribbean Carnivals, 2006; Myriam Thyes, Congo – Belgium, 2005; Myriam Thyes, Caribbean Carnivals, 2006
Image credits for Visual Foreign Correspondent:Erhan Muratoglu, Turkey, No Parking, 2007; Lin Yilin, China, One Day, 2006; Shahram Entekhabi, Iran, Haji Firouz, 2007
Image credits for Videospread:Madeleine station, 2007, Laurent Chambert, RER, 2007, Video, Courtesy of the artist; HI Hotel, 2006, Kristina Solomoukha, A suivre, 2002, Production Association Panoplie, Courtesy of the artist; Europe station, 2007, Cornelis Gollhardt, Legowürstchenshell, 2004, Video, Courtesy of the artist
Image Credits for Vernacular Terrain:Kim Joon (Korea), Bubble pink, 2005, Duration 02:00 minutes, digital video
Image credits for Do Billboards Dream of Electric Screens:Adi Shniderman, Merav Ezer, (Israel), Air Condition, 2005, Nottingham Royal Centre, Photo: Karen Fraser; Suzanne Moxhay, GB, Hinterland, 2007; Image courtesy of Trampoline, for Do Billboards Dream of Electric Screens
Image credits for Upgrade! International:Alex Hetherington, A Film Found in A Dump; Claude Le Berre, Anamnese, 2006; Julie Morel, POOL, 1999; Jimmy Owenns, The Fortune Cookie, 2006
Image credits for Best of Transmedia:Pascual Sisto, 28 Years in the Implicate Order; Collin Zipp, Niverville, MB 08.04, Marina Zurkow, Parthenogenesis
Image credits for At Play:Peter Eudenbach, Odocoileus Virginianus; Adam Frelin, The Ladder; Jon Sasaki, Worrydolls
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