The Vibrancy Effect was a closed expert meeting held at V2_ in April 2011 and curated by Chris Salter that sought to bring together a select group of natural and social scientists humanists and artists, working in different disciplines but united in their underlying urge to explore the aesthetic-political-technical-ethical effects of “vibrant matter.”

Concept by Chris Salter and Erik Adigard

Edited by Chris Salter, Harry Smoak and Michel van Dartel   

Design & production by M-A-D / Erik Adigard, Patricia McShane & Htet Win

Book Launch

Vibrancy Effect will be presented during the DEAF2012 festival,
Gouvernestraat 133 Hotspot, on May 18, 12:00-13:00.

With: Thierry Bardini, Philip Beesley, Caroline van Eck, Gustav Fechner, Mark Frost, George Gessert, Tim Ingold, Arjen Mulder, John Ruskin, Steven Shaviro, Lars Spuybroek, Wendy Steiner, Daniel N. Stern.

Edited by Joke Brouwer, Arjen Mulder and Lars Spuybroek.

Our need for beauty and our pleasure in it have not been annihilated, as hard as the 20th century’s various forms of modernism tried to erase it from art and life and supplant it with “the sublime.” The sublime is awesome: it does not evoke empathy, let alone sympathy with the world and the things in it. Beauty does: it not only makes life interesting but brings well-being into the picture. We do not associate beauty in any way with Prince Charles-type neoclassicism, but neither do we link it to recent attempts to come up with a “bioclassicism” that would reintroduce the ideal proportions of natural systems as measures for human aesthetics. Technology is the new nature, and the updated kind of beauty we’ll explore in this symposium is a technological one. We will call this beauty “vital,” in honor of the 19th-century art critic John Ruskin, who distinguished between “typical,” conventional beauty and the “vital” kind, which surprises us with new connections, relations and potentialities.

The publication will be released during the Vital Beauty Symposium at May 16 in de Balie, Amsterdam.

Palm Top Theater supports a wide range of applications and media formats, from videos, music clips and animations to interactive works that use the iPhone sensor technology. 

The contents will be accessible for download via the Palm Top Theater browser app, which will be available in the Apple App Store. Submitted contents will go through an small internal jury process. 

All information on how to make content and further procedures will also be available on the product’s website www.palmtoptheater.com. The website will go online late June / early July at the latest. 

Please reply to this invitation asap to let us know if you are coming and with how many people, we still have seats available (60 in total) and will confirm possible seating with you. Contact Christina at info@deaf.nl for confirmation.

Produced by Palm Top Theater B.V., which is a joined venture between Foundation DIRECTIONS (JP) and Palm Top Media Foundation (NL). 

The Power of Things

How things relate to each other, how they connect to each other, and how biological, cultural, social and technological structure, form and networks arise from out of those processes will be the focus of the artists, designers and scientists in the 2012 edition.

Tickets and extended program information at: www.deaf.nl

DEAF 2012 is produced in collaboration with V2_, WORM, De Gouvernestraat, Virtueel Platform, Todays Art.

Admission: €3 | Doors open at 19:30

Tumblr: http://dederdedinsdag.org 

We do not associate beauty in any way with Prince Charles-type neoclassicism, but neither do we link it to recent attempts to come up with a “bioclassicism” that would reintroduce the ideal proportions of natural systems as measures for human aesthetics. Technology is the new nature, and the updated kind of beauty we’ll explore in this symposium is a technological one. We will call this beauty “vital,” in honor of the 19th-century art critic John Ruskin, who distinguished between “typical,” conventional beauty and the “vital” kind, which surprises us with new connections, relations and potentialities.

We start with two statements by Alfred N. Whitehead, that "Beauty is a wider, and more fundamental, notion than Truth" and that "Beauty is the one aim which by its very nature is self-justifying." It is our belief that, without beauty, calls for sustainability and all other forms of ecological responsibility lack conviction. This is why we wish to explore vital beauty as a means of making all living processes valuable again.

Program

09:45 Introduction by Lars Spuybroek (Moderator)

Speakers:

10:30 Thierry Bardini

11:30 Wendy Steiner

13:30 Arjen Mulder 

14:30 Timothy Ingold

15:30 Philip Beesley

17:15 end

Tickets available at www.deaf.nl

Symposium: € 40 (students € 25) – Publication: ISBN 978-90-5662-856-7, € 22,50

In 1994 was XS4ALL nog maar juist begonnen met het aanbieden van Internet aan particulieren. Het idee dat deze technologie een belangrijke rol zou gaan spelen in de samenleving, of dat de kunst ingrijpend aan het veranderen was door het gebruik van nieuwe media en computers, was nog niet heel breed aangeslagen. DEAF was een logisch vervolg van de Manifestaties die V2_ al sinds 1987 organiseerde.

Voorafgaand aan DEAF94 was er eigenlijk alleen Doors of Perception I geweest, in november 1993, georganiseerd door het Vormgevingsinstituut en Mediamatic. Sonic Acts begon ook in 1994, maar was de eerste edities vooral een festival voor elektronische muziek. Een festival als Impakt was in 1994 nog volledig gericht op korte film- en videokunst.

Elektronische kunst en cultuur

Bij V2_ stonden elektronische kunst en cultuur al lang centraal. Neem bijvoorbeeld de tekst die in 1990 werd geschreven voor de derde Manifestatie voor de Instabiele Media:

“It's striking how news media and the official art circles pay almost no attention to the developments in electronic art – while, nevertheless, the increased use of these media by artists is a good mirror of the influence of these media on society. Or perhaps it’s not so strange. Maybe these new media have characteristics that are opposed to the rules and interests of official art circles and mass media. Transitoriness and instability are elementary principles in electronic media – concepts that closely relate to processes in society. The concept of chaos draws more attention than ever in science and art. All these concepts indicate our current interest for dynamic processes, present in all levels of society (sociology, anthropology, natural science, art and philosophy).”

DEAF was een logisch vervolg van de Manifestaties die V2_ al sinds 1987 organiseerde. Zoals de vijf Manifestaties voor de Instabiele Media, waarvan de eerste in 1987 plaatsvond en de laatste, onder de titel The Body in Ruin, in 1993.

Tijdens die manifestaties viel er altijd elektronische kunst te genieten, en was er veel aandacht voor wat V2_ sinds 1987 ‘instabiele media’ noemde. V2_ bood plek aan de nieuwe dynamiek en de nieuwe elektronische kunst en cultuur die op dat moment genegeerd werd door de traditionele kunstinstituties.

Jeffery Shaw was een van de gasten op de eerste Manifestatie voor de Instabiele Media in 1987; daarna kwamen ook Friedrich Kittler, Stephen Wilson, Peter Weibel, en Derrick de Kerckhove; en bijvoorbeeld Marc Adrian – een pionier in het elektronisch netwerken – gaf een presentatie tijdens de manifestatie The Art of Being Everywhere (1993).

Festivalvorm

In 1994 was het hoog tijd voor een uitwisseling van ideeën op het gebied van elektronische kunst en voor reflectie op de culturele en maatschappelijke impact van digitale media. In 1994 besloot V2_ daarom een festival voor elektronische kunst te organiseren.

De festivalvorm bood de mogelijkheid om een onderwerp vanuit verschillende invalshoeken te belichten en was een gelegenheid om mensen uit verschillende disciplines en windstreken samen te brengen. Het is nog steeds een manier om tot de meest vruchtbare uitwisseling van ideeën te komen. DEAF werd thematisch opgezet, en bestond uit een combinatie van een symposium, een tentoonstelling, verschillende losse presentaties, lezingen, en concerten.

DEAF94 vond plaats in november 1994 onder de titel Digital Nature – daarin stond de veranderde kijk op en omgang met natuur centraal. Het ging over Artificial Life, de koppeling tussen biologisch leven en de machine, en de toekomst van het lichaam. (Het was de tijd van de cyborg...) Lev Manovich behoorde tot de sprekers, onder andere Ulrike Gabriel, Knowbotic Research en Woody Vasulka hadden werk in de tentoonstelling.

In de loop van de jaren groeide het festival, het aantal programma-onderdelen nam toe, net als het aantal bezoekers, die ook steeds vaker uit het buitenland kwamen. DEAF groeide uit tot meeting place van iedereen die zich met elektronische kunst bezighield.

Ongeveer eens per 2 jaar werd er een DEAF georganiseerd, de titels en thema’s waren: Interfacing Realities (1995), Digital Territories (1996), The Art of the Accident (1998), Machine Times (2000), Data Knitting (2003), Affective Turbulence / The Art of Open Systems (2004), en Interact or Die! (2007).

Sinds 1998 wordt er bij elke festivaleditie een boek uitgegeven, in de meeste gevallen samengesteld door Arjen Mulder en Joke Brouwer. Meer dan puur een catalogus, is deze publicatie altijd een verzameling van speciaal voor de gelegenheid geschreven essays en interviews over het gekozen thema. Daardoor zijn boeken als Feelings Are Always Local (2004) of Information is Alive (2003) nog altijd relevant en zeer de moeite waard.

Interactieve kunst en reflectie

Door geschiedenis van DEAF lopen verschillende rode draden. Eén daarvan is de aandacht voor interactieve kunst, gepaard aan een diepgaande theoretische reflectie over het begrip interactiviteit. Daarbij werd ook vaak geput uit biologie, complexity theory en aanverwante wetenschappen.

Na een hiaat van 5 jaar is er in 2012 weer een DEAF, met aandacht voor de ontwikkelingen in wearable technology en Augmented Reality, en voor de noodzakelijke herwaardering van ‘vitale schoonheid’, en voor ‘the power of things’.

DEAF houdt daarmee niet alleen de hand aan de pols van de laatste ontwikkelingen op technologische gebied, maar sluit ook aan bij recente ontwikkelingen in zowel design als de filosofie. Het programma is even uitgebreid – misschien zelfs nog uitgebreider – als in 2004 en 2007.

DEAF steunt op een geschiedenis van inmiddels 18 jaar, V2_ zelfs op 30 jaar. Een groot deel van die geschiedenis is ontsloten op de website van V2_. Een goed begin om door de geschiedenis van DEAF te browsen is www.V2.nl/events/deaf: er zijn foto’s, teksten, scans van programmaboekjes, publiciteitsmateriaal en video’s. Niet al het historische materiaal staat vrij online; maar alle foto’s, en bijna al het videomateriaal zijn gedigitaliseerd bij V2_ beschikbaar voor onderzoekers.

Written for an published at http://virtueelplatform.nl/kennis/de-historie-van-deaf-het-eerste-elektronische-kunstenfestival, 2012. (The links are, for once, mainly to external websites, not to information on the V2_website.)

Each workshop will take place over two days; participants should attend both days. Below is an overview of the themes and workshops. For more details and further information on the education program and workshops by Digital Playground, NiMK please see www.deaf.nl.

Thing Power

deaf.nl/program/modules/power-of-thing-power

Thing Power refers to the notion that all the things in the world are not just inert matter but causal forces that play decisive roles in worldly events. In philosophy, there’s a long-standing debate on the nature of the power of things. Artists and designers seem to explore and use this power on a daily basis.

May 17 Debate: Cesar Harada, Jae Rhim Lee, Harry Smoak, Roman Kirschner, Christien Meindertsma, TeZ

May 17 Meet The Scene: Arjen Bangma, Koert van Mensvoort, Simone de Waart, Sam Nemeth 

May 18 & 19, Thing Power Workshop: Decompiculture

In this workshop, you will be introduced to corpse decompiculture by learning to grow edible mushrooms on your own discarded body tissue (hair, skin, nails) using simple DIY materials at home. The Infinity Burial Project’s Decompiculture Society will host this workshop, promoting awareness and acceptance of death and the cultivation of organisms that decompose and remediate toxins in dead bodies.

Crafting the Future

deaf.nl/program/modules/crafting-the-future-1

Wearable technology is an electronic-culture knowledge domain situated at the intersection between art, technology and fashion. Its purpose is to research and develop interfaces between virtual and physical realities using the body as a locus. Artists working in this domain have particular knowledge of what various materials “do” in relation to the body – for instance, how they allow, amplify or restrain certain movements, behaviors and modes of bodily expression.

May 18, Debate: Bernard Foing, Anouk Wipprecht, Mika Satomi, Moritz Waldemeyer, Francesca Rosella, Syuzi Pakhchyan

May 18, Meet the Scene: Alex Schaub, Kristi Kuusk, Mili Tharakan, Melissa Coleman

May 17 & 18, 3D Textile Workshop: Crafting the Future 

This workshop will pair two crafts that are unlikely to meet in everyday life: 3D printing and weaving. You’ll create samples of new materials that could be useful in e-textiles and wearable technology, combining the two techniques in the process. The workshop will be led by professionals from the Ultimaker community and the Swedish School of Textiles. You'll explore the possibilities together in an intense day-and-a-half-long workshop and present the results at the networking event Meet the Scene.

Augmented Society

deaf.nl/program/modules/augmented-society

Augmented reality is being applied more and more in specific domains such as advertising and location-based services. But the utopian future in which everyone constantly lives in augmented or mixed reality seems just as far away as ever. In the technical, academic AR community, this is often attributed to current technical constraints, but it can be argued that there are also societal reasons, including privacy concerns and aversion at being disconnected from the physical body.

May 19, Debate: Jacco van Uden, Julian Oliver, Mark Shepard, Prof. Mireille Hildebrandt, Christian van 't Hof

May 19, Meet the Scene: AR Lab, TU Delft, Layer

May 17 & 18 Augmented Society Workshop: Mock-It-Up 

This workshop with Jan Klug, Olivier Otten and Keiichi Matsuda will investigate dystopian and utopian visions of augmented reality. Of course, it is not technically possible to create all these experiences now, so we'll create mock-up visualizations instead. The first morning will be devoted to concept development; after that, storyboarding and initial video shooting will begin. On the second day, we'll create compelling videos, using tools ranging from cardboard to AR markers and video manipulation, depending on the concepts and storyboards dreamed up by participants. This workshop is available by registration only. Click here to download the registration form. Please fill out the form and e-mail it to Jan Misker with "DEAF2012 AR workshop application" in the subject line.

Read More

More information about this event... 

As part of his residency, Maire is teaching a group of international master's students in Brussels. He is supervising them in working with electronics and mechanics and introducing them to tools such as Max/MSP software. At the same time, the students are helping to produce two of Maire’s installations, the technological elements of which are being assembled at the V2_Lab. 

For the residency, Maire is working on two installations, provisionally entitled Radio Flesh and Dia/Portrait. Radio Flash is a photographic project in which Maire turns night into day by photographing landscapes after dark with an assortment of flashes synchronized to create a surreal "daylight." Dia/Portrait will be a stop-motion film in which a machine slowly polishes an aluminum plate in such a way that a mirror is created. The residency will continue until June. Check the V2_ website for announcements of presentations of these new works. 

Credits: Design by Iwan Smit, Jesse Vink; Production by Snijlab: Jiskar Schmitz & Christian Waber; Concept by Micha Prinsen & Roel Roscam Abbing.

That was 30 years ago. We'll celebrate this milestone in a range of ways in 2012, starting at DEAF in May. The 30 Y V2_ party at DEAF, featuring performances and plenty of music, will take place on the festival's closing club night on Saturday, May 19, at WORM. DEAF and TodaysArt have planned a killer club night. What's on the program?

Performances:

Kicking off the performance program at 23:00, Edwin van der Heide will play with visitors’ perception of sound and space in Shape-V2_, using an eight-channel speaker setup as his instrument. Varying time delays between speakers will create changing structures in the arrival patterns of the sound at the listener’s ears, creating a continuum between the spatial perception of sound and rhythmic patterns at both a micro and a macro level. This principle forms the starting point for the composition. Please note that this is a delicate but intense sound performance. (Please note: no entry after the performance has started.)

Pierre Bastien will perform with his famous mechanical orchestra. The French artist spent many years composing music for dance companies and playing with Pascal Comelade, developing his mechanical orchestra all the while. Since 1987, he has concentrated on solo performances, sound installations, recordings, and collaborations with artists such as Pierrick Sorin, Karel Doing, Jean Weinfeld, Robert Wyatt and Issey Miyake. 

Electronic music:

Jimmy Edgar, Conforce (Detroit and Berlin dub techno), D44N and Marcel Haug!

So whether you were a part of V2_'s unruly 1980s scene or have only recently come across the Institute for the Unstable Media, we invite you to celebrate V2_'s 30th birthday with us, starting at DEAF2012. Tickets are available at www.deaf.nl.

Those wishing to peacefully recall memories over a glass of wine might prefer to (also) come to the festival's opening May 16.

More information on this program...

We are looking for art projects that fit one of the Lab’s three areas of focus: wearable technology, augmented reality and ecology but we are also open to proposals within your personal field of interest. Your project should be conceptually sound and outline a concrete, realistic plan. Your proposal’s chance of being selected will be directly proportional to its quality.

Each selected artist participates in an intense working period during July and August, in which he or she develops a project from concept to artwork, ready for presentation at a public event. We schedule the residencies to overlap as much as possible so that we can foster an active working atmosphere in the Lab and stimulate interaction between artists. The Summer Sessions will conclude with Test_Lab presentations in Rotterdam and within an international festival context. 

Are you an ambitious, early-career artist with an interesting idea for a project? Then send us your plan by April 15, 2012. To apply, submit a video presentation of maximum three minutes in which you briefly explain your project, the support you expect to need from the Lab, and why we should choose you to take part in the Summer Sessions.

We have a budget to make it happen, but first send us your plan!

How to apply

• Create a short video (max 3min);
• Go to calls.v2.nl and create an account;
• Select 'Summer Sessions 2012' and complete the form;
• Upload your video as "unlisted" to Youtube and paste the link in the submission form.

In the light of this collaboration, V2_Lab welcomes Valia Fetisov as our guest. Valia's projects 'Eye's Editing' and 'Global Interaction' are the first to benefit from this exchange. 

We offer you:

• Experience in the production of an international, interdisciplinary festival;
• Being part of mind-blowing art-projects;
• Free entrance for performances/ discount for the professional-expert program, when you work a minimum of two shifts;
• Free entrance for the closing-party (with coupons for free drinks)!

Click here for the English application form
Mail to: Anne-Mercedes

[Dutch]

Ben je stressbestendig, sociaal, flexibel en beheers je zowel de Nederlandse als de Engelse taal, meld je dan nu aan als DEAF 2012 Vrijwilliger!

Wat bieden we jou?

• Je doet ervaring op in de productie van een internationaal, interdisciplinair festival;
• Je bent onderdeel van baanbrekende kunstprojecten;
• Bij minimaal twee diensten krijg je gratis toegang tot een performance/korting voor een professionals programma onderdeel;
• Gratis toegang tot het slotfeest (met consumptiebonnen op zak)!

Klik hier voor het Nederlandse aanmeldingsformulier.
Mail naar: Anne-Mercedes

Piem started with an introduction about V2_ and the wearable artworks that are produced by the Lab. She focussed on specific issues regarding presentation formats and the differences between Art and Fashion when presented on stage or during a performance. After that, all participants briefly introduced themselves. Melissa then moderated the discussion.

Here is a summary of the discussion, thanks to Meg and Evelyn for taking notes!

Initial ideas from the fashion design group

First, the group explored the overall question. We asked the participants to give an opinion on existing examples of Wearable Technology and how they feel about WT in general. 

• Should you approach WT as a component, or as a type of clothing? If you compare electronic components to buttons and zippers, they are not considered to stay forever as basic parts. 
• It seems like wearable technology is more likely to be a trend, here today gone tomorrow, rather than something in the designers' toolkit to be integrated again and again into a design. 
• What is the function of WT? To the fashion group it seems more logical to have an application in accessories, since these are considered more functional in themselves (reference: bags, shoes). And you don't have to change them all the time to wash.
• Chargers for electronic equipment is considered functional.
• "I don't need something that can DO something. It unnecessarily involves with my life. There are already too many computers around me."
• Hussein Chalayan's pieces are well known, but this 'Back to the Future' style is considered a pitfall. Subtlety is the way to go. 
• None of the fashion students has seen any convincing piece yet.

The roles of art, fashion and technology

To better understand the matter, we shortly discussed the respective roles of art, fashion and technology.

Do we want wearable tech? Do we want it in fashion?

Wearable technology started with wearable computers developed at MIT and is going towards mainstream fashion; do we want this, and where to go next?

• The question is: Does it add extra value or not? Wearable Technology should be subtle, not flashy. 
• The function of the technology (if there is one, e.g., posture corrector) is seen to be separate from the fashion element.

This last point, function not integral to form, is seen to be a big obstacle to wearable tech. The example of solar-panel backpacks was brought up. This is potentially a really handy accessory and it's relatively easy to find a bag with solar-panels. The problem is that most of them don't fit into a fashion palette at all.

Another point raised, is that things you wear every day often already have a function. If technology adds a second function, the two can clash. An example would be a dress with solar panels to charge your devices. A dress is worn one or two times before it must be washed and a new dress (also with solar-panels?!) would be required.

Where are we now, technically?

The technical possibilities play a central role in the design-process of wearables. Wearable Technology is often developed as a 'technology-driven' piece of work, and focussed on the further development of the tech or to explore the limitations. 

• We can integrate light, shape and sound and develop fabrics that generate power.
• Dynamics that did not exist before into textiles create new materials. 
• Wearable technology communicates and people start to understand how to use the new materials. 
• Designers inspire textile companies and should collaborate more, the lab helps to mediate between these two. 
• Sustainability and electronics; deadly combination OR future fashion possibility towards the creation of fashion?

Would you use technology to add light/sound/movement to your collection?

Having discussed the most common expressions in wearable tech, we asked the fashion students directly if they would be interested to use any of these 'usual suspects' in their future designs and collections. 

• What if you could have fabrics that accentuate your movements or change, depending on your mood? Or have acoustic fabrics with noise cancellation, or a REALLY GOOD working invisibility cloak/ projection dress.
• When a child gets a flashy toy with light and noise, it's fun at first but after a while they'll return to the old toy that does nothing. The toy with no lights or noise is attractive because you can play with it using your own imagination.
• Fashion designers don't want to have to learn to be engineers, they want to use traditional techniques (cut, sew, drape, etc) and have the technology fit that.
• So we see the future as more embedded technology, i.e. cotton transistors, but we need it to be intuitive to use.

If we didn't have to worry about things not working, what would you make?

It seems that this question hadn't really be posed to the fashion students before. They feel the answer is something beautiful, not necessarily functional, like fabric that is lighter than air. The idea of a self-repairing fabric or energy-generating fabric was also exciting, but it was seen as a function adjacent to fashion and not the main focus. The main focus would still be the look and feel of the garment.

• They want to start with a story to tell or a concept or a particular environment and design for that rather than starting with the technology and trying to integrate it. The idea of transformation is key to fashion concepts, so there is definitely some potential there. The fear is that things will become gimicky and too “futuristic”. But then maybe that's just the result of bad design, not necessarily the technology itself.
• Fashion is focussed on change - if it's fashionable this year, it won't be fashionable next year because that's how fashion works. Also, marketability is important to the fashion industry, although the fashion students think it's more about self-expression. They see the fashion system as a means to an end. And fashion needs frontrunners who do something crazy that no one pick up until later.
• Buying ever-lasting BASICS is considered an interesting idea: that you can buy one garment and change it's color at will. Or you can buy an 'upgrade', comparable to software updates. 
• The textile companies want to try new things, but no one asks them for it. Fashion people want to try it but they are afraid to come to the textile companies and ask.
• Collaboration is key - fashion + textile designers working with engineers and textile manufacturers plus a mediator like a university or a lab. 

Conclusion

So, is wearable technology just bad fashion?? At best, wearable tech is currently seen as a showpiece from which to derive more sellable works, or a performance piece, to garner attention. The students were also aware of technical limitations – wearable tech might not always work as well as we would like it to.

The agreement after this discussion is that it does not have to be bad fashion, it is up to the designer. Given the state of the technology, we are simply not there yet. On the way to innovation, failure is inevitable and that is what we see a lot nowadays. To be ready for fashion designers to work with it, smart materials should be as intuitively to handle as normal textiles. Generalizing: where artists and engineers see beauty in the challenge of experiment and research, fashion designers are more interested in the resulting looks and do not want to deal with the technological hassle. Collaboration with people from different backgrounds and education is key, provided there is clear guidance from a mediating party. And don't underestimate the value of amateurs working in the field. Amateur has it's origin in the word 'amare = to love something'. Do it because you love it! That will give you best results.

Participants