The 10th edition of Pixelache Helsinki will take place mostly on Suomenlinna island, located right outside central Helsinki. The focus this year will be on workshops, exhibitions, seminars and various informal events.
MAP ME IF YOU WILL
By the mere fact of living an ordinary modern urban life, we produce a huge amount of information about ourselves that we are hardly aware of, nor we usually see or make use of. Through this data we become traceable, accessible, predictable – and clearly enough – ideal clients of information-based capitalism. So if we cannot prevent the production and the corporate or governmental use of this data without changing our lifestyle completely, how can we at least benefit from it ourselves? How could we build systems that collect, visualise and publish data for our own purposes? And how can we share personal and public data with the society at large or the community we live in to our common advantage?
map me if you will features a public seminar and a one-day workshop for practitioners (a think-tank on current mapping projects). Invited guests include Christian Nold (UK), Esther Polak (NL), Wouter van den Broeck (BE) and RYBN (FR/int) (more to be confirmed).
map me if you will is a programme devised by Susanne Jaschko, a Berlin based independent curator of contemporary art with a focus on public and experimental art and digital culture.
GROWORLD BAZAAR
The Groworld Bazaar is a collection of projects exploring connections between plants and people. The Groworld initiative brings together three ‘forces’ capable of transforming the world on human and ecological scales: culture, gardening and technology. These three strands of inquiry inform and support each other, aiming to forge new symbiotic relationships between the post-industrial human societies and the rest of the Earth.
Bartaku will be building Temporary photoElectric Digestopians in an edible solar cell workshop using the Aronia berry as a sustainable power source. Lina Kusaite and Dave Griffiths will be inviting you to make seedballs for guerrilla gardening and take part in a drawing and game design workshop involving permaculture guilds incorporating the Aronia berry – helping to develop an online multiplayer permaculture game. Theun Karelse will organise an augmented ecology meeting focused on the benefits and consequences of mapping wildlife: ‘Is there still a private life for plants?’.
Theun, Bartaku, Lina and Dave are all members of FoAM, a transdisciplinary laboratory and a research group committed to developing a holistic culture, by actively propagating resilient cultural forms. FoAM’s members include artists, gardeners, cooks, technologists, designers, writers and scientists from all walks of life.
COMPUTATIONAL PHOTOGRAPHY
In computational photography, camera and picture-taking are perceived as concepts that can be modified in do-it-yourself spirit and are therefore open to discussion, redefinition, and hacking. This artistic approach to the field differs from how the term is understood in the photographic industry where the focus is on features that serve typical photographic purposes.
Computational Photography programme will feature an exhibition in MUU Gallery and a small seminar. More details will be announced in January 2011. The programme section is organised by guest curator Markku Nousiainen and in collaboration with Aalto University Media Factory. The advisory board for this programme section consists of Antti Huittinen, Jussi Ängeslevä and Miska Knapek.
PROFESSIONAL WORKSHOPS
Pixelache Helsinki 2011 will feature several workshops for professionals:
– Bioelectronix for Artists workshop by Andy Gracie & Marc Dusseiller / Hackteria (organised in collaboration with Finnish Bio Art Society, www.kilpiscope.net)
– Environmental Sensors and Sensor Networks in Media Art workshop (organised in collaboration with M.A.R.I.N project, www.marin.cc)
– A think-tank on current mapping projects (related to map me if you will programme)
– Temporary photoElectric Digestopians, edible solar cells: e-pastry, e-sushi… for heliotropic tasting towards tickling tongues and enriched tastes. (a part of Groworld Bazaar programme)
The Hacteria and M.A.R.I.N workshops will start already a couple of days before the festival. More information about the workshops’ contents and schedule will be published very soon in a separate announcement.
CAMP PIXELACHE
Camp Pixelache will is an experimental event format, featuring:
– Presentations: the programme of presentations is put together in the morning, when the participants arrive at the venue.
– A temporary exhibition: a selection of works from an open call is presented for a duration of 1-2 days (Sat 12 March + Sun 13 March)
– A temporary lab: non-stop workshops and showcases, either from invited collaborators or from the open call
More information about Camp Pixelache 2011 will be published early next year. The open call deadline is Friday 14 March. To get a better idea of what Camp Pixelache is about, have a look at previous Camp Pixelache wiki at http://wiki.pixelache.ac/10kerava/home
SIGNALS FROM THE SOUTH
The 4th edition of Signals from South (a programme section focusing on art, media and technology projects from Asia, Africa and South America) will feature an exhibition by Jean Katambayi Mukendi from Congo (RDC). Jean Katambayi Mukendi is a self-taught artist and scientist, who has a passion for logic, maths and electricity.
PIXELACHE CLUBS
The Finnish Äänen Lumo association has been invited to put together the programme for Pixelache club events in Club Dubrovnik on Friday 11 March + Saturday 12 March. The programme details will be announced in Jan/Feb 2011.