It was a lot of fun reBlogging for the last two weeks. As you may have noticed I had a little bit trouble to keep it going every day but it was a really good experience for me. I learned a lot about blogging and I finally managed to start my own blog about my projects, events and relating stories. I hope you will enjoy it. www.datenform.de/blog

Thx to the EYEBEAM team for inviting me to the OPENCITY exhibition and thx for having me as a reBlogger!

In NYC there are huge power hungry TV screens above subway entrances that play ads for reality TV shows, and well, other reality TV shows, 24 hours a day 7 days [Read this article] [Comment on this article]

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Hey, great! That's related to my TV-Filter project. And they even show a pic of my project on their site. I know there has been this groovetube.tv product. I can't find it any more and I don't know if they where first. Does somebody know when they startet it? -AB

Urban Interface Berlin is a symposium and exhibition that will happen “between April 15 and May 6, 2007. The project will present artworks in the Berlin districts Mitte, Wedding and Gesundbrunnen. The selected works deal with the changing notion of private and public space which occurs (not only, but also) due to the everyday use of communication technologies.” The exhibition “will show 10 new artworks which convey the idea of public space as an accessible and contributive sphere and call attention to a more sensitive engagement with the private, physical and digital spheres.” Seems like an interesting event with a good group of artists (program available as a large image here)

location: "Muro Torto Dove Fai il Chioppo" Roma
Photo by Franco Mapelli

More on the project here and here.

"The eyes are a partial mirror into the world in which you're photographed," Farid says. If there are two white dots in each eye, there had to have been two separate light sources. So, if a photo shows two dots in one person's eyes and only one dot in another person's eyes, it must have been spliced together from two different originals.

Also, the color of the light determines the dots' precise shade of white. A composite image from different photographs may have shades that vary from person to person...

"This is an arms race," Farid says. "I can already tell you how it's going to end: We're going to lose..."

Ant colony simulations are incredibly useful and deeply weird. I wrote an entire novella about them, called Human Readable.

"You can also teleport to Elon University [island] (direct portal at this link), where I did most of this work, and test out two demos that I have. One demo shows clustering, which is a computer science algorithm that detects groups of things, and the other demo shows emergent synchronization, in which a bunch of entities start out flashing at random phases and end up synchronizing. This is much like what some species of fireflies do: there are firefly species in Africa that synchronize their flashing such that entire trees end up flashing in sync. I imagine it's quite spectacular."

He's even transformed that technology into commercial weaponry. "One of my other inventions, which I sell, is called PODS: Plasma Orb Defense System, and is a system of networked orbs that orbit the user and defend them," he says. "The PODS communicate, but nowhere near at [the ants'] complexity. The PODS coordinate to cage an enemy: the cage broadcasts when someone escapes, and the PODS then attempt to re-cage. It's pretty primitive, but works OK."

Haven’t read much yet about the story behind this, but digging this line from chocolate bar in NYC, featuring wrappers by “ten legendary New York City graffiti artists including Blade, Crash, Crachee, Crime 79, Dondi, Dr. Revolt, Iz the Wiz, Lady Pink, Spar One and Voice of the Ghetto (Stay High 149).” A portion of the proceeds go to the All Stars Project, a non-profit focusing on underprivileged youth and the performing arts. More images and background on the project here.

Here are some more pictures from the opening at Laboral! Pretty amazing space and some really cool work on display there!

“Lab_Cyberspaces Exhibitions Space”

Alerting Infrastructure! - my project installed there!

Symposium

“Furminator” - first person pinball machine from German artist group ///////Fur///////

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WoW! We had a really good time there. I will sort and upload my pics tomorrow on flickr. Thx for this post Jonah and see you soon!
- AB

(nicked from here)

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(nicked from here)

More examples can be found here.

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Yes very nice. I got to know Guillaume in Feburary at Vooruit.be during the 'game is up festival'. He was doing a version of Pole Position there which you can find here www.notsonoisy.com/poleposition.
- AB

Tim Edler, co-founder of media facade specialists realities:united believes that ten years ago, many architects asked themselves how to connect to the hyped digital media. Architecture today has grown a bit more complicated since Dubai for instance shows that any hope for consistency might currently be lost and the place, as interesting as it is, seems like a spot on the planet where all (at least the architects) meet for business and that spot might as well be somewhere else tomorrow.

Another good example for the contemporary confusion is one of realities:united's own projects – the Museum X in Mönchengladbach, Germany. The actual museum is currently being renovated and so they were asked to transform an old theater in the center of the city into a temporary museum before it will eventually be turned into a shopping-mall ("to save the city"). Although the building is more or less fake and basically not much more than a facade which resembles modernist museum architecture, it takes on the same role as a real museum-building would. The same can be observed at Berlin's Leipziger Platz where whole "voids" are covered with faux facades and are often perceived as real buildings in the context of the city. This, according to Edler, has a very confusing effect on himself as an architect as it profoundly questions the role and impact of architecture itself.

realities:united became well known for the BIX light and media facade on Peter Cook's Kunsthaus Graz. They managed to convince Cook to make the device a real part of the building which is "tattooed" like pigments into the skin of the building. It's very low-res (less than 1000 pixels) but works very well with the architecture, also because with incandescent kitchen lamps it uses "pre-aged" technology. They applied a similar design called SPOTS to a building vice-versa of the mentioned facade at Leipziger Platz. They regard this project as a half-step towards something that might eventually be able give buildings a greater and dynamic identity. For a current project at the new ECAC-media center in Spain, they have almost completely let go the notion of a raster of pixels in favour of something that more resembles a crystalline surface with the structure of the retina with denser and less dense areas. Due to how our perception works, images that have been in the higher-resolution area will work better in the outer, low-res areas as well.

Faux buildings in Berlin

So what to actually show on media facades? Creating a dynamic surface brings about a certain responsibility and according to Edler, it will not be enough to have buildings which look vaguely remindful of Blade Runner or something that is just arbitrarily reactive to motion. Future projects might include a building where all lamps can be controlled to create a volumetric display and shake off the notion of the media facade as something that is "glued on". Many of those designs aren't exactly great with the current debate about energy consumption and sustainability but realities:united are confident that also big-scale light installations can be designed in a reasonable way.

With a project called Openhouse, Edler and his colleagues also ventured into the realm of wearables and conceived prototypes of houses which would adapt to future clothing that might feature build-in air condition or heating. The houses would just contain one heated cell and otherwise expose their well-heated inhabitants to the surrounding air in favour of greater exchange with the environment.

On April 2nd, Spain will witness the inauguration of LABoral, a new exhibition center devoted to the intersection between art, science, technology, and creative industries. Based in Gijon, this venue will pay special attention to new media's history and current production, as demonstrated by its opening program, which includes five shows and one symposium. One of the highlights is 'Feedback,' an exhibition curated by Christiane Paul, Jemima Rellie, and Charlie Gere and focused on artistic practice reactive to instructions. Bringing together historical and contemporary works based on systems of response, this project proposes an innovative genealogy of new media activity. Also worth mentioning is Carl Goodman's show, 'Gameworld,' that features works referring to the designed world within a video game. This project thus examines a pertinent contemporary topic: the extent to which current lived experience is being informed by machine-mediated interactions. In order to mark the institution's commitment to theory and provide an intellectual framework to the opening program, Jose Luis Brea organized 'The E-Image Era,' in which artists and scholars discuss the rise of an electronic zeitgeist in Western societies. LABoral, as its name suggests, promises to be a laboratory in which creative ideas, experiments and practices will grow. - Miguel Amado

http://www.laboralcentrodearte.org

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Yeh, right. We are having a great time here at laboral, just coming from the after opening party! Everybody is here. There are three different shows with a lot artists and pieces. laboral is huge! WoW!
- AB

More here.

A quick tip - Leon Reid (aka Darius Jones of Darius and Downey) will be giving a lecture tonight at Eyebeam as part of their OPEN CITY exhibition. Leon says that the speech is entitled "The Duty of the 21st Century Artist" and "the lecture is designed to kick artists' behinds out of the safe "Art World" and into making relevant work which effects events of the "Real World"

Admission is free.

Leon Reid "The Duty of the 21st Century Artist"
EYEBEAM
520 W 21st (btwn 10th&11th)
New York, NY
10011
Thursday, 3/27/07
7:30pm

William Betts's intriguing paintings View from the Panopticon will be exhibited April 13 - May 25, 2007 at the Richard Levy Gallery, in Albuquerque (New Mexico.)

The series of the paintings is inspired of course by the current rise in surveillance practice. They also make a step back in time by referring to Michel Foucault's essay Discipline & Punish and to the Panopticon, a proposal for a circular prison with an unseen guard watching from a center tower, designed by late XVIIIth century philosopher Jeremy Bentham.

What makes his work unique is not the content but the technique. Betts' paintings both reinvigorates the traditional art discipline and draws on his mastering of software technology.

The artist used advanced computer controlled linear motion technology and a custom-designed software system to apply thousands of drips of paint with robot like precision. The individual drips of high gloss acrylic paint catch the light and give each drip its own dimensionality and further mimic video. In addition, Betts developed a color palette based on RGB additive component video to create ‘black and white’ images using only colored paint. A typical painting has between 30,000 and 40,000 individually applied drips of paint.

Using and adjusting staged and found surveillance images as the source for his work, Betts' works invite the viewer to draw on their own experiences, imagination, and anxieties to provide the interpretation.

Via re-title.
See also: Miltos Manetas' Internet paintings, When art & tv meet and Cati Vaucelle's exploration into pixelated and re-composed visual art works.

Artist: Mogens Jacobsen Rhizome Terms: access, archive, Audio, audio, Database, digital, exhibition, Installation, interact, interface, MP3, public space, social space, Software Artist Terms: audio art, augmented, bar, bottles, Denmark, Environment, media art platform, Mogens Jacobsen, multiuser, Museum of Contemporary Art, responsive environment, RFID, Roskilde, social interaction

Hørbar/Audiobar is a responsive environment for natural and playful exploration of huge collection of audio art. You can interact with the sounds using a tangible interface based on RFID-tagged bottles. The environment consists of two rooms: A bar-room for collective interaction and a study lounge for more in deep explorations. The installation is located at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Roskilde, Denmark. This museum has a vast collection of international audio-art. This collection is now accessible at the Hørbar/Audiobar.

"I’d long been fascinated by George Orwell’s work, but I resisted reading 1984 until I finished the manuscript for Stasiland. After that, I devoured it, and I couldn’t believe Orwell’s prescience. When I went into Mielke’s office, I saw it had the number 101, which in 1984 is the number of the torture chamber. 1984 was banned in the G.D.R. but of course, Mielke and Honecker had access to banned material. The guide told me that Mielke wanted this number so much that even though his office was on the 2nd floor, he had the entire first floor renamed the Mezzanine so that he could call his room 101."

--Anna Funder, author of Stasiland

I don’t imply it it’s really what this title want to express but:
Location-based: because it’s something contextualized and inscribed in a place.
Ringtone: what is represented here is a short melody so, by analogy, it can be thought as a ringtone (although the person who drew it is not that literate in music annotation).
In the end, this can be described as a “physical instantiation of a location-based ringtone”, no device needed!

Yes! I agree, i love low tec Location Based stuff.! - AB

Spotted in Lyon last saturday, this looks like a real tapestry in an urban environment (next step is there?).

Urban tapestry sounds very much like Locative Media, but this is much better. - AB

Rhizome Terms: Abstract, browser, Collaborative, community, design, digital, Email, Event, game, Generative, interact, Internet, labor, live, network, nostalgia, public space, social space, space Artist Terms: collaborative art, collaborative artist, comment/quote, critical mass, email, one million pixels, one simple pixel project, onesimplepixel, onesimplepixel.com, pixel, pixels, word-of-mouth

January 1st, 2007, 4AM EST, launched the one simple pixel project (http://www.onesimplepixel.com). Attempting to create one single image, 1000 x 1000 pixels in size, through the collective contributions of 1,000,000 people. Each person chooses one single pixel and personalizes it by giving it a name, choosing its color and optionally a comment or quote for the rest of the world to see. The project's goal is to see what one million people are capable of creating voluntarily. The project's outcome would also like to answer these questions: Does a collective mind exist that influences us all? How do existing pixels influence new ones? Will people collaborative outside of the site to influence its outcome? Do people primarily add their pixels without considering others? The theories are countless. Many first thought the result will just be a collection of random pixels. However as the image slowly appears it makes one wonder “what will the image actually become?” Only one million people contributing to the one simple pixel project can answer that question. The idea of creating your own personalized pixel is a pretty interesting concept in itself. "The hope is to give people a sense of connecting world wide and being part of a brilliant work of art that has more meaning than what the eye sees. People will see how they really are one in a million," says creator and entrepreneur Joshua L. Davis from Marietta, Georgia. "It is amazing to see how small your contribution is in the current sea of unclaimed pixels," continues Mr. Davis. Add your personalized pixel today and help create one amazing piece of art.

Ups, they forgot to charge you per pixel! -AB

DJ.Riceweevil is rebuilding. Here are some of my open tabs from today.

Kate Lyons is thinking about Second Life: "When I log in [to Second Life], it feels like I'm back in 1986, at my Apple IIe, with a super-slow dial-up modem connected to CompuServe.... For special libraries that unite users by interest, I think the value of SL is clear. Comic book archives, LGBT archives-- I think you should be on SL now (or maybe last month)."

The Sarlacc Pit is alive and well. I didn't realize this was in doubt. This reminds me of the tourism industry in Tunisia, where Star Wars fans can spend the night in the Tusken Raider village.

Seth and Amy ask Michael Vick: Really!?! The funniest SNL skit no one seems to talk about.

What's up with Blackbeltjones/work? Hey Matt, Need a hand?

hello, typepad. :-)

Distance Lab and Horizon Scotland are organizing “Going Nova, New Horizons in Physics and Technology” and are running a Drawbots workshop there tomorrow, March 23rd! Drawbots are drawing robots I designed that anyone can build very easily, without having to learn electronics. It is a simple bot that mixes standard drawing materials (in this case magic markers) with weighted motors and plastic cups. When the cups vibrate, they draw circles and lines depending on their overall weight and power. The project is licensed under Creative Commons.

Really nice project! Everyday live products in a new setting. After the Open City Exhibition at Eyebeam I will meet Jonah in Spain this Week at a museum opening http://www.laboralcentrodearte.org/ AB Hey, lets hang out at the beach, Jonah!

It is the single most interesting gadget I've held all month. It doesn't feel like something manufactured this decade. It feels like something from the first blush of Walkman knockoffs, the JiLs and the like. And the sounds are really soothing and kind of haunting. There's nothing on the box that tells you how the sound is generated -- maybe it's analog, but I'm guessing digital.

At $35, it's a little steep, given that it has the hand-feel of a Happy Meal toy. But I bought one and I don't regret it. It's going in my keeper pile -- it will be no less anachronistic, weird and interesting in an age of nanocomputers than it is today.

The Buddha Machine is a modified version of a device used in Buddhist temples throughout Asia, which feature repeating loops of chanting monks or nuns. This particular incarnation is the brainchild of the musical duo FM3. It contains nine preset loops which which play individually and run continuously. The sounds can be played from the built in speaker, or by connecting headphones to the built in jack.

If you are aware of ambient music such as the works of Brian Eno (Music for Airports, Discreet Music) then this is of a similar vein. Whereas music on a CD, Record or tape inherrently has to end before being restarted, the loops of the Buddha Machine will continue for as long as the AA batteries work (or forever if you connect a 4.5v supply).

Update: Sonny sez, "GM3 is not a manufacturer but a group formed in 1999 consisting of Christiaan Virant and Zhang Jian. They have released full CDs under that band name and have also done some CDs for the excellent Sublime Frequencies record label which I suggest you check out. Also a album was released of remixes of all the loops by various artists called 'Jukebox Buddha.'"

See also: Musician releases songs in a $23 electronic gizmo

Update 2: FM3's Christiaan sez, "Here's the official English site. The Buddha machine is available in the USA for only $23 from our distributor Forced Exposure, and in the UK at Boomkat."

Update 3: Simon sez, "All nine Buddha Machine loops in uncompressed .WAV format are available for download."

Update 4: John sez, "Sonic musician Robert Henke, aka Monolake, has a great album of Buddha Machine remixes available." and Michael sez, "I live in Taiwan and have my own B-box that I bought at the NT$10 (33 cents) store down the road."

Update 5: Rob

Update 6: Mark sez, "I thought you might be interested in this (video) interview I conducted with FM3 for flasher.com at Montreal's MUTEK festival in 2005. We talked mostly about the conception and creation of the Buddha Machine and I think it's a pretty interesting look at their process. You can find it here."

I love one button, one function devices! Hey, this is my first post on the Eyebeam Reblog. Hello to everybody!