ars electronica 2008 – a new cultural economy – day 12 min read

not much to say about the first day. as usual it was a day of first impressions, a brief dip into what’s around this year. i went to a few openings – ecology of the techno mind at lentos, the featured artist group from slovenia, seems very intense, kinda dark, kinda cool; hybrid ego, the japanese students at campus impress with their haptic and playful approach -, not to the opening of CyberArts at Ok Center though. i missed that for the conference on interactiviy. to be honest, i am not too exited about much of the work shown this year at CyberArts, and with that i pretty much diss the prix ars winners, so sorry everyone. i will catch it later, but at least on paper none of the projects really have managed to grab my fancy, with the exception of bleu remix and moving mario, that i look forward to see. but i am open to surprises.

the conference on interactivity, titel : Interaction, Interactivity, Interactive Art – a buzzword of new media under scrutiny, sounded interesting, however it also kinda went past me. i must have been a little bit too tired (after just one hour sleep the previous nght) for the sometimes heady debates (or too engrossed in the interactive capabilities of my ipod touch interface ^^). this is what my notes looked like at the end: “ludwig boltzmann institute conference interacticvity”. not much, i agree.

i did however notice something, that i can’t really decide yet, how to feel about. i noticed that when i listen to british people give talks, i tend to get very impressed, even though often when i think about what they said a little bit further, it might turn out to be quite obvious, banal even. but they tend to deliver their arguments with such weighed words, that it gives the impression of being very thoughtful and deep. spinning this further, americans i tend to dismiss much too quickly, because they give their talks with such gung-ho over-enthusiasm, like yapping puppies, yet often what they do say is actually right on. now with germans, it’s the worst for me. they often say very profound things, but it may do it in such a snide way and in such elitist language, that i might miss it, because i either get stuck in my defenses against their arrogance or in my feelings of inadequacy because of their language. not good. i wish there was a bullshit-filter for such cliches that lets me hear just the essence of what people are saying, not influenced by how they deliever them.

ok, enough words. let the images do the talking:

my flickr set: ars electronica 2008