Plateaus: Computation, Geology, Ontology
Zachary Kaiser, Rebekah Blesing, Gabi Schaffzin / USA
Michigan State University
kaiserza@msu.edu, http://mediated.space
“The smooth skin of the device demands gore to feed its gloss.”
—Benjamin Bratton
In this ArtistTalk, we will present a recent work, entitled, Plateaus: a meditation on the geological nature of mobile technologies and the socio-political and environmental implications of the mining of minerals for those technologies. Plateaus seeks to elicit an understanding of the relationship between humans, geology, and media technologies: media not as immaterial but as geological.
Plateaus itself is an interactive transmedia system: a topographical model of a region of the Congo in which some of the minerals for our mobile devices are mined sits atop a stainless steel sifting tray. Meanwhile, a device inside the pedestal on which the landscape sits tracks mobile devices searching for Wi-Fi networks and, in response, shakes the topographical model with a force proportional to the total number of Wi-Fi devices it counts, causing the landscape to erode and be sifted through the steel grate.
The structure into which visitors enter in order to view the work references temporary shelters—ranging from those of peoples displaced by environmental crises to those of ancient civilizations—as well as Faraday cages, which are used to block electricity or Wi-Fi signals.
- Date
- May 31, 2017
Artist Talk: Translational Spaces | Translation Spaces
Santiago Tavera / Colombia - Canada
Elastic Spaces Lab, Concordia University
santiago.tavera.v@gmail.com, www.santiagotavera.com
The artist talk, Translational Spaces, by Santiago Tavera presents his latest creative-research on the construction of interactive and immersive digital architectural environments. The use of digital media presents the potential to simulate a state of disembodiment (elasticity, alteration, translation) for viewers and participants. Tavera investigates the potential of digital technologies to create virtual environments that alter our thresholds of perception.- Date
- May 31, 2017
"We—The Common Body", 2016-2017 (triptych): A). "This view has potential", B). "Vanitasity", C). "Virtual Phenotype"
Elvin Flamingo / Poland
www.elvinflamingo.com
"We—The Common Body" project is created as a collective of Elvin Flamingo + Infer. The project is comprised of three parts: A.) "This view has potential", B.) "Vanitasity" and C.) "Virtual Phenotype".
Object A.) is an incubator inhabited by thousands of earthworms - the oldest group of invertebrates on Earth (Aristotle and later Darwin recognized them as the bowels of the Earth. Darwin devoted nearly 30 years of his life to studying them). Vermicompost which is produced by the earthworms moves to the respectively arranged sensors and the signals captured are transferred to other objects.- Date
- May 31, 2017
Instable Landscapes: Visual Autobiographies in real-time performances
Georgina Montoya Vargas / Colombia
University of Quindío - Technological University of Pereira
gmontoya@uniquindio.edu.co, www.georginamontoya.net
Research synthesizes the explorations and processes developed from the research—artistic creation and its link with design through a common theme: the phenomenon of audio-visual creation in real time and its connection with the body. This theme will be approached through visual autobiographies and the intimacy with objects as carriers of memories, sensations, and atmospheres that not only constitute or form part of an epoch, but also configure individual forms of inhabiting the world.- Date
- May 31, 2017
SoundMind
Tara Parker-Essig / USA
N/A
tparkeressig@ucdavis.edu, www.taramakes.com
SoundMind is a virtual environment in which, through the power of technology in combination with the mysterious phenomenon of creativity, sound becomes visual. Participants can relax, observe, and participate in unified creative expressions. The goal is twofold: First to explore and understand the ways in which the technological environment affects the individual and the individual's interactions, and Secondly, with these understandings, to develop an environment that will build participant's empathy, curiosity, interpersonal understanding and soundness of mind via the sharing and receiving of audio and visuals.- Date
- May 31, 2017
Galleries, market places and fruit shops, as spaces for cultural expression, graphic creation and folkloric preservation.
Rafael Angel / Colombia
Autonomous University Corporation of Nariño – Cali Extension
rafael.angel@aunarcali.edu.co, angelrafael1980@hotmail.com
Using photography as capturing and evidencing tool, the Siga Bien Pueda project has been developed since 2011, reaching an extensive body of graphic work, consisting of more than 2000 pictures from three different countries, with the purpose of describing and analyzing the galleries or market places. , fruit stores and similar spaces, to identify common and differential factors, based on its aesthetic, chromatic and objective characteristics, understanding its importance for our cultural expression and folklore, as a reflection for the beliefs, activities, identity, costumes, These traditional spaces , with their fruits, vegetables, flowers, pottery, craftwork, religious American identity; Each city embraces and preserves those places that survive as a picture of who we are and where we are.- Date
- May 31, 2017
Times series arrested (deed)
Ligia Amparo Escobar Calerin / Colombia
liescow@gmail.com
It is lived to do and is done for to live, Thinking that it does not get lost the time, but inevitably the time's running out and gets lost, because this one is never stopped. But. What would we do, if we could return the time fifteen minutes, two hours or more? Maybe we would do the same thing: to try to do more, taking advantage of the possible maximum thing this space of time. Because of it, this offer is a metaphor in which the wear or the use of time, it is also an accumulation of hours, minutes and seconds that remain recorded as evidence of the passage of time; times that become exhausted to fill or to complete a time. A time full of past.- Date
- May 31, 2017
Biomimetics and digital fabrication technologies, creative integration for product design
David Andres Torreblanca Diaz / Colombia
Pontifical Bolivarian University
david.torreblanca@upb.edu.co, www.upb.edu.co
Nature has been an infinite source of conceptual, morphological and functional analogies; it has been inspiring designers and architects of all eras. Biomimetics is a discipline oriented to study different characteristics and qualities of nature to be transferred to the artificial world through a creative process. Since the last decades have been emerging the digital fabrication technologies, they are radically changing the design process of designers, architects and different creative professionals.- Date
- May 31, 2017
Smart secrets of great paintings and Unframed: using pictorial heritage
Charles Franklin / France
carlosfranklin@gmail.com, mistercarrot.org
Carlos Franklin will introduce the work he has been doing during the last three years as director of the animated documentary series Smart secrets of great paintings and animated documentary VR experiences Unframed. The first subject is about creative documentaries. Carlos Franklin will present some excerpts from the episode “View of Warsaw from the Royal Palace by Bernardo Bellotto” (dir. J. Darakchiev) focusing on the rebuilding of central Warsaw from Bellotto's paintings and how we rebuild all the historical process using digital image. Carlos Franklin will also present the case of VR experiences “Las Meninas” by Diego Velázquez” and “The temptations of Saint Anthony by Hyeronimous Bosch”, and the transformation of paintings into uninhabitable spaces thanks to 3D / VR software.
English 
Español