The first International Conference on Transdisciplinary Imaging at the Intersections between Art, Science and Culture.

“New Imaging: transdisciplinary strategies for art beyond the new media”.

Takes place on 5 - 6  November at Artspace, 43/51 Cowper Wharf Rd, Sydney, NSW 2011.

Deadline for Abstracts:  June 25,  2010

A profound shift is occurring in our understanding of postmodern media culture. Since the turn of the millennium the emphasis on mediation as technology and as aesthetic idiom, as opportunity for creative initiatives and for critique, has become increasingly normative and doctrinaire. Mediation and the new media arts have in fact become the new medium of critical and pedagogical discourse: like water is for fish, like culture is for cultural studies, mediation is a concept that is taken for granted now because it is itself the medium in which we think and act, in which we swim. We need a concept that is amphibian, and that can leave its medium. The concept we propose is a remediated apprehension of the image: an active image and activity of imaging beyond the boundaries of disciplinary definition, but also altering the relations of intermedia aesthetics and interdisciplinary pedagogy. This concept will need to incorporate a vibrant materialism of the image’s sensory and cognitive strata and an evanescent immaterialism of its affective qualities. Rather than locate our conference in the space of negotiation between disciplines or media (the “inter-“), we propose the opposition, transit and surpassing of the interdisciplinary by a “transdisciplinary aesthetics”, and its conceptual and physical practice of a “transdisciplinary imaging.”

The aim of the conference is to bring together artists, scholars, scientists historians and curators.

The conference will explore areas related to: Painting, Drawing, Film, Video, Photography, Computer visualization, Real-time imaging, Intelligent systems, Image Science.

Participants are asked to address at least one the following areas in their abstract:?-

• remediated image

• hypermediacy and  the iconic character of the image

• politics of the image and/or image making in a transdisciplinary context

• life sciences and bioart in relation to the living image

• distributed and networked image

• table top scale to nano

• machines and computer vision

• perspectival image

• image as speculative research and critque

• illusion, process and immediacy

• aesthetics and the proliferation of imaging

Proposals

You are invited to submit an abstract for an individual paper relevant to a conference theme as described above. The deadline for abstracts is June 25, 2010. Abstracts for individual papers should be no longer than 250 words. Please provide full contact details with your abstract.

Refereeing of papers will be done by members of an expert review panel (to Australian DEST refereed conference paper standards). All selected peer reviewed papers will be published in the online conference proceedings.

Please submit by email to conference organizer Julian Stadon transimageconf@gmail.com

Conference chairs:

Associate Professor Su Baker and Associate Professor Paul Thomas

Conference Committee

Brad BUCKLEY :: Brogan BUNT :: Ted COLLESS :: Ernest EDMONDS :: Petra GEMEINBOECK:: Julian GODDARD :: Ross HARLEY :: Martyn JOLLY :: Daniel MAFE :: David THOMAS

Timeline

March 31  call for abstracts; June 30  deadline for call; July 31  peer reviewed abstracts notified; November  5  -  6  Final papers for conference 3000 words; January 6  Final Papers for refereeing; ?1  March  refereed papers returned to be published.

Conference Partners

College of Fine Art, University of New South Wales;  University of Melbourne, Faculty of the VCA and Music; Artspace

Conference Sponsors

Australian National University, Curtin University, Queensland University of Technology, RMIT University, University of Sydney, Sydney College of the Arts, University of Technology Sydney, University of Wollongong.

The study’s aim to provide baseline data as to how media/electronic art curriculum has developed within the university sector has been realized. The networked study assists in the contextualization of emerging technologically mediated arts practice curriculum into the future, while developing further definitions of the sector for universities to manage the development of this area of study.

http://www.altc.edu.au/resource-scoping-national-new-media-electronic-arts-cut-2009

Leonardo Education Forum

Federation Theatre
Victorian College of the Arts, Melbourne
Wednesday, 26th November, 2009

The LEF workshop was conducted as part of the Re:live Media Art History 09 conference held in Melbourne, Australia, from the 26th to the 29th November 2009.  The 2009 Forum was focused around three strategic themes:

1) The role of research in media art, science and technology

2) The role of curricula: Mapping the terrain.

3) The role of institutions: Institutional/Organisational capacities and benchmarks.

Three working groups discussed these items separately after focused, introductory presentations by Oliver Grau, Ross Harley and Ian Clothier respectively.   Summaries of the outcomes of these working groups, as well as the presentations, have been tabled separately.  The following summary was complied by Darren Tofts and constitutes a series of concentrations of key themes, priorities and ideas developed during the day, rather than a summary of resolutions and outcomes.  These will be addressed in the specific group summaries.

A common theme of the “need for a network” emerged in preliminary remarks by both Nina Czegledy and Oliver Grau.  This theme emerged in response to the shared feeling of a loss of momentum and consolidated international engagement with respect to media art and media art histories.  The idea of a network presumed the development of key goals with respect to an educational forum, a research platform for discussion as well as vision and leadership.  In this respect Paul Thomas’ and Jeremy Blank’s reports on the status of the Australian-focussed NOMAD (National Organisation of Media Arts) and MASS (Media Arts Scoping Study) projects represented important, exemplary initiatives to be benchmarked internationally.

Oliver Grau asserted that it is not self-evident that media art “needs histories and archives”.  This cautionary point was made with respect to his concern that despite that fact that media art is the “art of our time”, it still struggles to be exhibited in mainstream art institutions.  The concern shared by all members of the Forum was that media art had not yet arrived on to the international scene as a vital and conspicuous branch of contemporary art.  Oliver argued that we “still need” to integrate media arts into culture.  This was reinforced by Ross Harley who characterized media art as a cultural “outsider”.

This led to the question of the space of media art; where is it to be situated/where is it best situated? Ian Clothier adopted a vectoral approach to thinking about its situatedness, describing it as “within, between and beyond the art institution”.  Ian talked of the need to specialize art institutions for the presentation of art (on the model of the initial vision of the Australian Centre for the Moving Image in Melbourne; however as Darren Tofts had commented, ACMI had increasingly moved away from prioritizing media art work as part of its curatorial mission.  When such work is exhibited, it is usually situated as a sub-branch of the moving image).

The idea of a network of media art historians, academics, practitioners, curators and dedicated funding bodies emerged as the strongest theme of the Forum.  This idea hinged on the condition of networks being of necessity decentred, as well as the caution that they must not be disconnected.  Darren proffered the motto of “decentred but not disconnected” as a motif for future thinking on the idea of an international network galvanized around media art.

Some of the factors and constituencies essential to such a network were identified in the three plenary papers by Oliver, Ross and Ian: the integration of research, University curricula and other forms of expert and popular knowledge, the role of dedicated publishing, criticism and review, exhibition and curatorial policy.  The importance of institutional support, governance and mentoring was discussed, but the question as to which ones were appropriate and necessary was seen to be open-ended.  One key question emerged from Ian’s presentation: are there as yet unfamiliar, unexpected or emerging institutions to be considered?  The emphasis on galvanizing these key factors was underlined by Ross in his presentation.  Darren made the point in his summation of the day that what Ross had identified as the “meshing of research, educational and institutional imperatives” is exactly what Julianne Pierce had described in a 2001 issue of Artlink devoted to the evolution of media art as an “active circuit”. [1]  This, too, became a working motif for the Forum for the way forward.

Darren Toft

[1] Julianne Pierce, “An active circuit”, Artlink, 21, 3, September 2001, p.14. The other thing of interest with respect to Pierce’s observation is that her commentary was looking back at a previous issue of Artlink published in 1987 devoted to art and technology. For Pierce, this historical perspective was crucial in thinking about the “current Australian art and technology scene” (14).

Dr Darren Tofts
Professor of Media & Communications
Faculty of Life & Social Sciences
AS423
http://darrentofts.net/
92148441
Mail H31
Swinburne University of Technology
John Street, Hawthorn, 3122
Victoria, Australia

Third International Conference on the Histories of Media Art, Science and Technology.The next iteration of the Media Art History conference is Re:live which is to be held in Melbourne, Victoria in 2009. The event follows the success of the two previous Media Art History conferences, re:fresh (Banff 2005) and re:place (Berlin 2007). The conference series is supported by the Database of Virtual Art and Leonardo/ISAST (International Society for Art, Science and Technology) whose International Advisory Committee will publicise the event and referee papers.

Conference refereed proceedings

Conference chairs: Dr Paul Thomas, Professor Sean Cubitt

http://mass.nomad.net.au/media-arts-congress

Media Art Scoping Study Symposium

MASS Study Keynote

MASS Symposium Program

positive initiatives, problematic implications

lisa gye: era, artstart & media arts responses

NY NEW FUNDING OR INCREASED RECOGNITION FOR THE ARTS AND THOSE WHO LABOUR IN THEIR SERVICE IS CERTAINLY TO BE ENCOURAGED AND APPLAUDED. SO ARTS PRACTITIONERS AND ACADEMICS WILL WELCOME BOTH THE RECENTLY ANNOUNCED FEDERAL GOVERNMENT INITIATIVE, ARTSTART, AND THE INCLUSION OF CREATIVE WORKS IN THE 2009 ERA (EXCELLENCE IN RESEARCH FOR AUSTRALIA) DATA COLLECTION TRIAL CURRENTLY UNDERWAY IN AUSTRALIAN UNIVERSITIES. ALTHOUGH THEY ARE TARGETED TOWARDS DIFFERENT COHORTS OF THE CREATIVE ARTS COMMUNITY, BOTH SCHEMES WILL HAVE AN IMPACT ON THE EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTIONS THAT ARE OFTEN RELIED UPON TO PROVIDE A REFUGE FOR ARTS PRACTICE IN THIS COUNTRY.

http://www.realtimearts.net/article/92/9523

curated by Daniel Kojta

Exhibition runs:               Friday 7 August to Sunday 20 September 2009

Venue: Bathurst Regional Art Gallery, 70-78 Keppel St, Bathurst, NSW

Bathurst Regional Art Gallery (BRAG) is pleased to present Showing Off, a large-scale New Media survey exhibition curated by one of Australia’s most exciting emerging curators, Daniel Kojta.

In 2008 BRAG was one of only three galleries to receive an Arts NSW grant under their Emerging Curators Pilot Program. BRAG invited Daniel Kojta, an artist and curator based in Wentworth Falls, to develop a New Media exhibition which would showcase emerging and established, regional and metropolitan artists.

Artists in Showing Off are:

Keith Armstrong, Ella Barclay, Kirsten Bradley, Cash Brown, Ben Denham, Leah Heiss, Soda_Jerk, Janice Kuczkowski, Alexandra Gillespie & Somaya Langley, Sofie Loizou, Jordana Maisie, Peter Newman, David O’Donoghue, Jasper Streit & Rene Christen, Justene Williams.

This visually and intellectually engaging exhibition will demonstrate diverse trends within current New Media Art including wearable technology, locative media and video arts says Curator Daniel Kojta.

While referencing both obsolete and cutting edge technologies, Showing Off will offer regional and metropolitan audiences a unique experience of New Media Art.

Thanks to everyone that attended the Media Arts Scoping Symposium on Saturday. We are currently in the peer review process for the papers accompanying the presentations and these will be published on this site shortly. Thank you to the VCA and all contributers to what was a successful day.

(more…)

To coincide with the launch of NOMAD (National Organization of Media Arts Database), Real Time Arts have drawn together a digest of RealTime articles addressing education in the media arts.

http://www.realtimearts.net/feature_contents/Media_Arts_Education_Digest

Processpatching Defining New Methods in aRt&D

Art and Technology Conference 1985

Australia 2003