24 - 27 Sept 2015

Bright Collisions: Symposium

Creative explorations on the border of natural elements, technology and humanity

Bright Collisions Symposium

The fourth edition of the Bright Collisions symposium program takes place on the 25th and 26th of September, in the framework of the TodaysArt.NL Festival on The Pier in Scheveningen.

Bright Collisions aims to form a meeting point with a cross-sector focus aiming to promote transdisciplinary and creative explorations. The main concept lies in its paradoxical title, Bright Collisions refers to a specific moment in time in which people from usually disconnected backgrounds gather out of either necessity or curiosity. Through these ‘collisions’, either directed for this occasion or displayed, the event aims to contribute to developing a greater understanding of, or initiating alternate perspectives on, a range of contemporary and urgent topics in society.

Bright Collisions 2015 is focused on creative explorations on the border of natural elements, technology and humanity. The program is composed of several themed sessions staged in collaboration with many partners, networks, participants and audiences. Some of the world’s leading thinkers and practitioners meet, discuss current developments and urgent issues, present challenging ideas and foster holistic approaches.

The 2015 program sessions are entitled:

  • ZEROnow: Beyond the White Cube
  • Hack the Body
  • Sensory Experience and Enhanced Realities
  • Sound, Heterogenous Art and Performance in Europe
  • Failed Architecture: Excavating the North Sea
  • Thinking with the Sea
  • Space Science in the Arts

Date
24, 25 and 26 September

Venue
The Pier, Scheveningen + Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam

Tickets
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Agenda

Thursday, 24 September

Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam - Teijin Auditorium

10:00 - 12:30 ZEROnow session 1: Curating ZERO
Participants: Beatrix Ruf, Margriet Schavemaker, Colin Huizing, Mattijs Visser, Johan Pas, Renate Wiehager, Marga van Mechelen, Petra Heck

13:30 - 15:00 ZEROnow session 2: The Artist as Curator
Participants: Bruce Altshuler, Tiziana Caianiello, Margriet Schavemaker

15:30 - 17:00 ZEROnow session 3: Topicality of ZERO
Participants: Rem Koolhaas, Daniel Birnbaum, Beatrix Ruf

Friday, 25 September

The Pier - Zuid +1

13:00 - 16:30 ZEROnow session 4: Beyond the White Cube
Participants: Antoon Melissen, Caroline de Westerholz, Dirk Pörschmann, Gwyneth Wentink, Petra Heck, Berndnaut Smilde, Dmitry Gelfand, Evelina Domnitch, Lisa Park, Lotte Geeven, Natalie Jeremijenko, Zoro Feigl, Onno Dirker + Peter Zuiderwijk, Margriet Schavemaker

13:00 - 16:30 Hack the Body - Expert Meeting

13:00 - 15:30 SHAPE workshop: Jonathan Reus + Judith van der Elst - Surfing the Semiosphere

16:45 - 18:00 Sensory Experience and Enhanced Realities
Participants: Marco Altini, Marco Canevacci (Plastique Fantastique), Leslie Garcia + Paloma Lopez, Lisa Park, Baltan Laboratories

16:00 - 18:00 Creative Industries Fund NL - Q&A

E.ON Electriciteitsfabriek

11:00 - 12:00 4DSOUND: Circadian - Robert Jan Liethoff - Space Body Intelligence: Sound Lecture

14:00 - 16:00 4DSOUND: Circadian - Musica Mundana: Artist Panel and Talks
Participants: John Connell, Robert Jan Liethoff, Kazuya Nagaya

17:00 - 18:00 4DSOUND: Circadian - Michelle Lewis-King - Artist Talk: Pulse and Chinese Medicine

Saturday, 26 September

The Pier - Zuid +1

11:30 - 14:00 Thinking with the Sea
Participants: Natalie Jeremijenko (xCLINIC), Patrick Healy, David A. Garcia (MAP Architects), Špela Petrič, Eric Geboers

12:00 - 16:30 Failed Architecture workshop: Excavating the North Sea (participation free)

13:00 - 15:30 SHAPE Workshop: Leslie García + Paloma López - Non-human Rhythms

14:00 - 16:00 Space Science in the Arts
Participants: Dr. Bernard Foing, Ewen Chardronnet, Evelina Domnitch, Dmitry Gelfand, ArtScience Interfaculty students (Katarina Petrovic, Alexander Winther, Ronald Schelfhout). Workshop support: Oscar Kamps, Houssem Laroussi, Annalisa Galeone, Daniel Schultz, Balazs Fejes, Jolanda Preusterink

16:00 - 16:30 Failed Architecture presentation: Excavating the North Sea

E.ON Electriciteitsfabriek

14:00 - 16:00 4DSOUND: Circadian - Musica Mundana: Artist Panel and Talks
Participants: Marco Donnarumma, Michelle Lewis-King, Lisa Park

17:00 - 18:00 4DSOUND: Circadian - Michelle Lewis-King - Artist Talk: Pulse and Chinese Medicine

ZEROnow: A Symposium on the Topicality of ZERO

Bright Collisions Symposium

‘ZEROnow: a symposium on the topicality of ZERO’ is a collaboration between TodaysArt, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, the ZERO Foundation and Stedelijk Museum Schiedam. In this two-day symposium in Amsterdam and The Hague, practitioners aim to re-read the history of ZERO and address the topicality of its legacy today.

Halfway through the fifties, an influential, international art movement was born, called ZERO. Exactly fifty years ago, ZERO planned the event ‘ZERO on Sea’ on The Pier, but it never took place. With the event, they aimed to stage large-scale installations and performances that would respond to the elements of nature and the context of The Pier. About 50 participating artists including Lucio Fontana, Yayoi Kusama, Yves Klein and the Dutch Nul group, proposed site-specific works challenged by the building and the natural elements of the seashore.

The iconic Pier and the ‘ZERO on Sea’ plans, in relation to current tendencies in art and society, are the main sources of inspiration for the eleventh edition of the TodaysArt.NL Festival.

Recently there has been a lot of attention regarding the ZERO movement. From the 4th of July until the 8th of November 2015, a large exhibition is set in the Stedelijk Museum, titled ‘ZERO – Let Us Explore the Stars’. Recently, ZERO exhibitions were presented in the Guggenheim Museum, New York and Martin-Gropius-Bau, Berlin.

Even though ZERO reached its zenith in the art world more than half a century ago, it was not until a few years ago that this international artist’s network was established as a fixed feature in art historical scholarship. Why did it take so long for ZERO (roughly active between 1957-1966) to be accepted into the canon of twentieth-century art? And why did it happen, of all times, at the outset of the twenty-first century? How are the contemporary returns to ZERO (re)shaping the artistic legacy of this international network? And last but not least: What does the legacy of ZERO mean to contemporary artists?

These probing questions fuel this two-day symposium, via which the organizing partners hope to critically frame and contextualize their current curatorial practices related to the ZERO network.

ZEROnow Session 1: Curating ZERO in 21st Century
Date: Thursday 24 September

Time: 10.30 – 12.30
Location: Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam – Teijin Auditorium

Participants: Beatrix Ruf, Margriet Schavemaker, Colin Huizing, Mattijs Visser, Johan Pas, Renate Wiehager, Marga van Mechelen, Petra Heck and other participants

 

After a welcome by Beatrix Ruf (Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam), the first session of the symposium showcases a series of short presentations by curators of recent ZERO exhibitions.

 

ZEROnow Session 2: Topicality of ZERO
Date: Thursday 24 September

Time: 1.30 – 3.00
Location: Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam – Teijin Auditorium

 

Participants: Rem Koolhaas, Daniel Birnbaum, Beatrix Ruf

 

Renowned architect Rem Koolhaas (OMA) provides a keynote lecture on the topicality of ZERO and the inspiration he found in the visual and conceptual practises from the 50s/60s. Afterwards Koolhaas engages in a roundtable discussion with Daniel Birnbaum (Moderna Museet, Stockholm) and Beatrix Ruf (Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam).

ZEROnow Session 3: The Artist as Curator

Date: Thursday 24 September

Time:  3.30- 5.00
Location: Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam – Teijin Auditorium

Participants: Bruce Altshuler, Tiziana Caianiello, Margriet Schavemaker

Most of the historical ZERO exhibitions were curated by the ZERO artists themselves. Bruce Altshuler (Professor of Museum Studies, New York University) contextualises in his keynote lecture the ZERO practices in the larger field of artist curated shows in the 20th and 21st century. Tiziana Caianiello (ZERO Foundation) launches the brand new publication ‘The Artists as Curator: Collaborative Initiatives in the International ZERO movement, 1957-1967’. Margriet Schavemaker (Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam) poses questions for the two academics in a conversation that follows on their presentations.

 

see more at Stedelijk Museum.  

ZEROnow Session 4: Beyond the White Cube

Date: Friday 25 September

Time: 1:00 – 4:30
Location: The Pier – Zuid +1, Scheveningen

Participants: Antoon Melissen, Caroline de Westerholz, Dirk Pörschmann, Gwyneth Wentink, Petra Heck, Berndnaut Smilde, Dmitry Gelfand, Evelina Domnitch, Lisa Park, Lotte Geeven, Natalie Jeremijenko, Zoro Feigl, Margriet Schavemaker

After an introduction by Gwyneth Wentink (TodaysArt), the ‘ZERO beyond the white cube’ session sheds light on the original 1965 concept for ‘ZERO on Sea’, the circumstances of its cancellation at that time, and the interpretation of the characteristic venue that still exists today. Caroline de Westerholz (art historian) did extensive research on the organizational network, the participants and their proposals from 1965. Antoon Melissen (art historian) focuses on ‘ZERO on Sea’ within the context of other benchmark presentations in the Netherlands. Dirk Pörschmann (ZERO Foundation) elaborates on the utopian philosophy of ‘ZERO on Sea’. Afterwards there will be a panel discussion moderated by Margriet Schavemaker (Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam).

In the second part of the session, Petra Heck (TodaysArt) introduces a new generation of artists who talk about their site-specific work for The Pier at TodaysArt. Afterwards there is a closing debate with Margriet Schavemaker, Petra Heck, and artists Berndnaut Smilde, Dmitry Gelfand, Evelina Domnitch, Lisa Park, Lotte Geeven, Natalie Jeremijenko and Zoro Feigl.

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Sound, Heterogenous Art and Performance in Europe (SHAPE)

Bright Collisions Symposium

SHAPE is a platform for innovative music and audiovisual art from Europe. It consists of 16 festivals and art centres and aims to support, promote and exchange innovative and aspiring musicians and interdisciplinary artists with an interest in sound. SHAPE is a three-year initiative, co-funded by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union. As a partner of SHAPE, TodaysArt and Bright Collisions provide audiences and professionals with insightful lectures, talks and workshops in various fields related to sound and performance.

Workshops:

1. Surfing the semiosphere – Jonathan Reus and Judith van der Elst

Artist Jonathan Reus collaborates with an anthropologist Judith van der Elst to research geospatial effects on mental states. They host a workshop in which sensors are used to track sympathetic nervous system responses through different environments. Please register for this workshop in advance on  info@jonathanreus.com.

 2. Non-human rhythms –Leslie García + Paloma López

Leslie Garcia and Paloma Lopez will host a workshop in the framework of their ‘Interspecifics’ project, focusing on the relationship between waveforms, living matters and the way in which electromagnetic phenomena can be used to create a sonification (frequency) and visualization (cymatics). Please register for this workshop in advance on  tena@todaysart.nl.

Artist talks:

4DSOUND: Circadian – Musica Mundana

TodaysArt will host the world premiere of 4DSOUND: Circadian. From the 24th to the 27th of September you’re able to experience interactive spatial sound performances in the impressive E.ON Electriciteitsfabriek. 4DSOUND is a fully omnidirectional sound environment exploring Spatial Sound as a medium. 4DSOUND: ‘Circadian’ investigates how spatial listening influences conscious states throughout the day and night. Performances explore how to physically connect the listener with the surrounding space through movement, bio-physical media and psycho-acoustic stimulation.

The program features sound and movement workshops, immersive sonic meditation, participative spatial performances, overnight collective dreamstate by John Connell and Florence To, Kazuya Nagaya, Lisa Park, Marco Donnarumma, Michelle Lewis-King and Robert Jan Liethoff.

As a part of the Circadian program and related to the SHAPE program, there will be two artist panel and talk sessions. Already in his time (~570 -500 B.C.), the Greek philosopher Pythagoras distinguished a particular category of music as ‘Musica Mundana’, also known as the harmony of the spheres. This music distinguishes the everlasting harmonic order between numbers, tones and the cosmos. ‘Musica Mundana’ encompasses the incessant but inaudible tones and rhythms that the body produces, like a continuous question and answer between the body and the mind. In the present we witness an emerging field of technologies and methodologies that allow us to capture those inaudible streams in the body and the mind, and make them audible in ways we might not have held possible.

In the artist panel on Friday the 25th of September John Connell, Robert Jan Liethoff, Kazuya Nagaya and others discuss concepts and practices that investigate cosmic forces on our consciousness, like the effect of frequencies on our mental and physical state and the relationship between intuition, dreams and space. On Saturday the 26th of September Marco Donnarumma, Michelle Lewis-King, Lisa Park and others discuss different approaches, both old and new, how to musically read the body.

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Participants
Venue
The Pier, E.ON Electriciteitsfabriek

Partners
SHAPE Platform, Creative Europe, 4DSOUND

Type
Workshops, Artist Panels

Time
25.09.2015, 25.09. 2015 from 13:00 - 15:30

Reservation
info@jonathanreus.com

Sensory Experience and Enhanced Realities

25 September
Bright Collisions Symposium

The ‘Sensory Experience and Enhanced Realities’ session is focussed on the rapidly increasing amount of applications of processing bodily feedback, virtual and augmented reality devices and applications and imaging technologies. The session builds further on the previous ‘Sensory Experience’ programs during Bright Collisions in 2012, 2013 and 2014. For this edition, we team up with Baltan Laboratories’ Hack the Body program as co-host.

The increasing development and deployment of sensors and hand­held electronics in recent years are allowing artists, scientists and other practitioners to design new ways of interaction that were practically impossible in the past. We as humans are using, understanding and even extending our senses in ways never done before. Immersive audiovisual environments are playing with the senses and materialising the immaterial. With this program we aim to give insight into different approaches in the developments of new sensory experiences.

In addition to the symposium session there is a lounge where you are able to experience innovative sensory and enhanced reality experiences on The Pier on Friday and Saturday (continuous). The lounge features a variety of makers who present existing projects, new works as well as experiments which deal with immersive audiovisual environments, augmented and virtual reality devices and applications and the processing of bodily feedback are presented in an interactive living lab setting.

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Failed Architecture workshop: Mapping the North sea

26 September
Bright Collisions Symposium

Research studio Failed Architecture is returning to this year’s edition of TodaysArt with an exciting one-day mapping workshop on the North Sea.

This year’s edition of TodaysArt will take place on the Scheveningen Pier, whose predecessor was originally built to walk into and subsequently enjoy the ’emptiness’ and ‘purity’ of the North Sea. These ideas were rooted in 19th century romanticist (and naive) perceptions of being immersed in wild, endless and ‘uncontrollable’ nature. Over the years, the pier has been rebuilt, closed and reopened a few times and still offers spectacular views on a seemingly empty sea. Failed Architecture, always trying to open up new perspectives on a variety of spaces, wonders if the North Sea is really devoid of anything. Who owns and controls the North Sea? What flows, borders, connections and obstacles can there be found? Who and what inhabits the North Sea? What plans have been made for its future?

Using the Pier as a panopticon for the North Sea, Failed Architecture will host a 5-hour workshop (concluded with a public presentation) on the 26th of September. In the workshop they aim to demystify this foggy part of northern Europe and map the North Sea’s current realities, together with you. Participation is free, but make sure to reserve your place by e-mailing to info[at] failedarchitecture.com

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Participants
Venue
The Pier

Partners
Failed Architecture

Type
Workshop

Time
12:00 - 16:30

Reservation
info@failedarchitecture.com

Thinking with the Sea - towards a Wet Onthology

26 September
Bright Collisions Symposium

In the course of this program speakers reflect on several subjects concerning the relations of humans to the sea and its geographical, environmental and symbolical perspective. The main questions raised in the session are “How do we think from the sea and with the sea?”, “How does this help us engage differently with spaces around us?”, “What is the role of humans in relation to environment?”, “How does the sea define our existence?”and “Can human existence be defined by a natural phenomena?”.

The first part of the session is inspired by the ideas of wet ontology, a specific direction in – contemporary philosophy which advocates the notion of the sea as a crucial part of the definition of human existence and perception of the world. The second part of the session addresses progressive technological strategies for inhabitation in extreme environments, biomimetic attempts to create architecture using seawater or developing complex socio-ecological systems. Furthermore, philosophers, artists and makers bring forward ideas on how they are currently using creativity and science to work towards solutions for global environmental and ecological challenges related to the sea.

Patrick Healy is an Irish writer and philosopher who works as senior researcher Delft School of Design, Faculty of Architecture, TU Delft. He has published extensively in the area of aesthetics, art, and philosophy and is titular Professor of inter-disciplinary research of the Free International University in Amsterdam. Healy will give an introduction lecture in which he presents one of his essays related to the topic.

Natalie Jeremijenko’s practice develops the emerging field of socio-ecological systems design (or xDesign) crucial in the anthropocene, using attractions and ongoing participatory research spectacles that address the challenge of the Centre for 21st Century Issues to reimagine and redesign our collective relationship to natural systems. For TodaysArt, she has created the newly commissioned project ‘Pier 2 Pier’.

David Garcia, the founder of Map Architects, travels two times per year to places in the Arctic and North Sea to explore issues such as sustainability, technologies and architecture in extreme environments.

Eric Geboers is working on ‘The Salt Project’, a biomimetic attempt to create architecture using seawater in the desert. By using locally available resources we can grow plants and create architecture without producing waste.

Spela Petric will give a presentation explaining her piece “Naval Gazing”  that discusses the many ambiguities attached to ocean colonisation.

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Participants
Venue
The Pier

Type
Lectures

Time
11:30 - 14:00

Space Science in the Arts

26 September
Bright Collisions Symposium

We are entering the next era of human presence beyond Earth. The European Space Research and Technology Centre (ESTEC) and ArtScience Interfaculty representatives, together with artists Evelina Domnitch and Dmitry Gelfand and author and curator Ewen Chardronnet trigger the audience’s imagination by merging art, physics, chemistry and computer science with uncanny philosophical practices in a quest for new outerspace realities.

Even before the space age began, already in the 1910s, artists such as Kazimir Malevich envisioned art laboratories orbiting the Earth and traveling to other celestial bodies. Though such laboratories have yet to be launched, a vast variety of art experiments are being conducted in preparation for future missions.

Today, the ‘Moon Village’ as proposed by the new chief of the European Space Agency would consist of a settlement using the capabilities of different space-faring nations in the fields of robotics as well as human activities. The ‘Moon Village’ project would be a prime driver of technological advancement as well as basic scientific research and the initiation of this next phase of humanity’s foothold in space. The International Lunar Exploration Working Group (ILEWG) and experts at the European Space Agency (ESA) and European Space Research and Technology (ESTEC) have been studying concepts for a ‘Moon Village’, and precursor steps.

We call for ideas, concepts, demos, prototypes, art projects coming from the explorers at large: artists, designers, innovators, art-scientists and audiences. The session ’Space Science in the Arts: Towards Moon Village’ consists of a 1-hour lecture program and a 1-hour ‘jam session’ interactive hands-on workshop “Space Science in the Arts & Moon Village” with three sub-groups. 

Workshop support: Oscar Kamps, Houssem Laroussi, Annalisa Galeone, Daniel Schultz, Balazs Fejes, Jolanda Preusterink

Artscience team: Katarina Petrovic, Alexander Winther, Ronald Schelfhout

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Participants
Venue
The Pier

Partners
European Space Research and Technology (ESTEC) / International Lunar Exploration Working Group (ILEWG) / ArtScience Interfaculty The Hague / Convener: Prof. Bernard Foing

Type
Lectures + Workshops

Time
14:00 - 16:00

Hack the Body

25 September
Bright Collisions Symposium

Baltan Laboratories, together with its partners, critically reflects and explores emergent developments and blurring boundaries between intimacy, privacy and technology. The subject focuses on how artistic ideas and innovative projects explore the relationship between the human body and technology. The program consists of a private expert meeting and a public presentation in Sensory Experience session.

‘Hack the Body’ is a program on the intersection of art, science, technology and society. Artistic ideas and innovative projects explore the relationship between the human body and technology. These cultural approaches can offer a radically different perspective compared to the traditional market oriented technological R&D approach and believes that these can benefit from each other.

 Next to inspiring artistic installations, this program generates new technological and scientific practices and new ideas for tools, products and services. The program generates both quantitative and qualitative data: valuable information for everyone connected to big-data studies and algorithms. The program aims to translate gained insights into the development of new and existing hard- and software platforms that can be used in real-life situations as well as other contextual research trajectories.

EXPERT MEETING

As part of the Baltan Laboratories “Hack the Body” program, a number of invited experts will enter into a dialogue and in depth discussion on the following topics:

1)    Biometric synchronization: theories and observations

Can two or more people synchronize their biometric signals (heart beat, respiration, gsr-sweat) with each other? Can synchrony of these signals be induced? What measure of synchrony can be established? How can synchrony be represented, modeled within the environment and used as a catalyst for feedback?

2)    Hardware for biometric sensing and feedback

ECG, EEG, GSR.. sensors; lights, speakers, tactile vests… What are the devices and platforms readily used within the program? What other options are available commercially or as developer’s kits? What are the pros and cons of each of them? How can we exchange (knowledge about) this hardware?

3)    Software: algorithms and platforms

Which software platforms do we use to collect and analyze data? Which filters do we apply in our algorithms? What requirements do data sets have to comply with in order to analyze them? Where and how can we store and exchange software and data? Which strategy, rules and regulations do we follow regarding data collection and privacy?

Places are limited in number and to those who can have an active contribution to one or more of the topics. Do you feel you should be part of this? Please send an e-mail to tena@todaysart.nl explaining why we should invite you.

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Venue
The Pier

Partners
Baltan Laboratories, Holst Centre, Fourtress, Philips, TNO

Type
Expert Meeting (Invitation only) + Public Lecture

Time
13:00 - 16:30

Reservation
tena@todaysart.nl

The Creative Industries Fund NL

25 September
Bright Collisions Symposium

The Creative Industries Fund NL is again present at TodaysArt on the 25th of September to provide information and advice on funding possibilities for E-culture projects.

The Creative Industries Fund NL is the cultural fund for architecture, design, e-culture and every imaginable crossover. A meeting with the representatives from Creative Industries Fund NL can be reserved in advance. More information about the fund can be found on their website: www.stimuleringsfonds.nl

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Participants
Venue
The Pier

Partners
The Creative Industries Fund NL

Type
Q&A

Time
16:00-18:00

Reservation
J.vanBallegooijen@stimuleringsfonds.nl