Symposium #4
Modern technology has provided us with endless possibilities, but at the same time thrown us into a society that is highly complex and difficult to navigate. Keeping things simple is not always an option. We find complexity as a fascinating challenge for every discipline.
“Next Nature” theorist Koert van Mensvoort provides a framework to look at design, nature, and culture in a new way, whereas researcher and new media artist Chris Salter tries to create a unique phenomena through the design of complex interactive environments. Tez and Sonia Cillari from Amsterdam based artist-lab Optofonica will talk about their latest artistic pursuits and Leiden University PhD candidate Staas de Jong will demonstrate his haptic musical controller. The session will be hosted by STEIM Director Dick Rijken.
→With: Chris Salter, Koert van Mensvoort, TeZ, Sonia Cillari, Dick Rijken and Staas de Jong
Christopher Salter is a media artist, performance director and composer/sound designer based in Montreal, Canada and Berlin, Germany. His artistic and research interests revolve around the development and production of real time, computationally-augmented responsive performance environments fusing space, sound, image, architectural material and sensor-based technologies. Such projects range from large scale, public driven installations where the line between spectators and performers is blurred and questioned to traditional performance environments with trained performers that are augmented with computational and media systems. His current research interests include the use of wireless sensor networks and ubiquitous computing technologies in artistic contexts, cross modal perception, enactive interactive systems, real time audio and critical studies of media, technology and performativity.http://www.chrissalter.com
Koert van Mensvoort is fascinated by the idea that people, in their attempts to cultivate nature, cause the rising of a next nature, which is wild and unpredictable as ever. All of his activities revolve around the exploration of this nature caused by people. He is author of numerous books and publications; among them Next Nature, Visual Power, What You See Is What You Feel, Natuur 2.0, Entry Paradise – New Worlds of Design, Everyone is a Designer, Artvertising, and Style First. Furthermore he is the director of the Next Nature Institute in Amsterdam, initiator of the Next Nature Lab at the Industrial Design Department of the Eindhoven University of Technology and editor of the well visited website www.nextnature.net.
Maurizio Martinucci (aka TeZ) is an Italian interdisciplinary artist and producer, living and working in Amsterdam. He uses technology as a means to explore synesthesia and the relationship between sound, light and space. TeZ is the brainfather of the Optofonica Platform for Synesthetic Media and Sound Spatialization, which was founded in 2007. In 2009, together with fellow artists Evelina Domnitch and Dmitry Gelfand, he established the Optofonica Laboratory for Immersive ArtScience in Amsterdam.
Sonia Cillari is an Italian media artist and architect, based in Amsterdam. Her work involves the creation of sensorial and perceptual mechanisms in immersive and augmented environments. Her artistic investigation examines how patterns of consciousness, perception and identity emerge in such settings. Over the last years she has been specifically interested in a field of research concerning the ‘Body as Interface’. Her work has been presented internationally, recently winning her prizes such as ‘First Prize’ at VIDA 13.0: Art & Artificial Life International Competition (Madrid, SP 2010), ‘Art Division Excellence Prize’ at 11th Japan Media Arts Festival (Tokyo, JP 2007), ‘Honorary Mention’ at Prix Ars Electronica, Interactive Art (Linz, AT 2011 and 2007).
Staas de Jong has a background in Computer Science and Media Technology. Despite the ubiquitous presence of touch-activated devices, he is convinced that in current digital musical interfaces our fingertips are still far from getting what they deserve, and that both new technologies and new approaches to touch are necessary. Staas will share one of his PhD research projects at Leiden University, where he has developed a novel haptics technology specifically for fine manipulation in musical interfaces. He will also bring along the hardware, running a number of prototype interactions. Of course, he will let you play with these.