Keynotes2018

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Ode to Christus Hypercubus

As resonances from walls and arch of Cathedrals, computer-generated sounds, a pianist, a mezzo-soprano and a virtual choir perform an Ode to Salvador Dalí’s Christus Hypercubus. A diffused acoustic field generated with music fragments invites the audience to discover and recreate meanings for the Catalan’s masterpiece. It is sought to take the audience to immerse in resonances that would still persist from walls of Cathedrals. The sound space is fulfilled with multi-sources of sacred music alliterations.

Constructed via computational support, it orchestrates sixteen compositions in miniatures called “stanzas of the Ode”. These are described here as the reconstruction of the Medieval Organum that is a constant electroacoustic drone accentuates resonances in which time is expanded to re-expose fragmented chants that still linger on the walls and in the arches. Using interactive techniques the Ode attempts to explore human cognition and understand how creativity operates in a multimodal performance.

Bio notes

Jônatas Manzolli combines contemporary musical creation and cognitive sciences focusing on the dialogues between music and science. The interdisciplinary study results in electroacoustic, instrumental, and multimodal works. A composer and mathematician, full professor of the Institute of Arts, University of Campinas, Brazil, he is a pioneer in the Brazilian research in computer music. He has been a guest researcher at the Institute for Neuroinformatics, Switzerland, and the SPECS Group (SPECS) at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Barcelona. He is also a collaborator of the CIRMMT, McGill University, Montreal.

Jônatas Manzolli’s most notorious achievements have emphasized the delicate relationship between man and machine, including the use of artificial intelligence as digital interfaces such as Ada: Intelligent Space (2002) and the Multimodal Brain Orchestra (2009). His compositions also include large orchestral settings such as the multimodal opera Descobertas (2016). He has received numerous grants and awards including the recent Rockefeller Foundation “Arts & Literary Arts” Award to be an artist resident at the Bellagio Centre, Italy in April 2018.

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«Trans» Approaches: from Myth to Realities

The conference will highlight the work and guiding ideas of transdisciplinarity specialists, emphasizing their current relevance. The speaker will propose a methodology for recognizing how the notion of a “hidden third” makes itself apparent within theory, practice, and the arts. The “hidden third” is particularly visible at the crossroads of personal, professional, and collective development actions. The presentation will thus explore the question of «subjects» and «objects», those acted and those acted upon, in the context of how digital and technological tools (i.e., technontologies) are evolving, in order to determine whether each of us should favor transdisciplinarity or instead take a step further by embodying newer paradigms.

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Bio notes

Following his university studies in social and human sciences, Florent Pasquier specialised in communication sciences, new technologies and educational sciences. This interdisciplinary approach facilitates his current global analysis of contemporary issues, including digital media creation and related teaching methods. After several years spent in consulting and research engineering activities, he is now Associate Professor at Sorbonne University (Paris, France) and particularly involved in the formation of future teachers. His current research emphasises transdisciplinarity, transpersonal psychology, and digital humanities.

pasquierflorent.wixsite.com/pasquier

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The Magic Trick of Vanishment:
why the term “future” no longer suits a medialab

This talk will argue that the creative and cultural fields currently face a lexical paradox: key terms in our core vocabulary have, in recent years, been dislocated towards contexts of efficiency and productivity in opposition with the original intent and impact of those terms. Innovation, creativity, participation, community, sustainability: all point towards a desire for the fulfilment of a vague utopia that would enmesh art and technology in a kind of subjective determinism, tending to both prosperity and emotion.

The term “future” has often been at the forefront of this benevolent and legitimate intent; however, outside of strategic agendas, it has come to congregate and reveal deep insecurities and anxieties, a further paradox where, on one hand, we are invited to subscribe to deterministic technological wonderment, while on the other hand worrying at the volatility and uncertainty of the various impacts of said technology: social, economic, existential, neurological.

For ten years, “FuturePlaces” acted as a festival/medialab operating under the belief that a strengthening of the bonds between technology and contextual use could help dissolve the above dilemmas and paradoxes; we will present various instances where these dilemmas were felt, and discuss how they were addressed. In parallel, we will make a case for the abandonment of the original designation of the festival/medialab, arguing that the term “Future” is currently unable to transcend a paradox of ominous optimism.

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Bio Notes

Since 2000, Heitor Alvelos develops audiovisual work with Touch, Cronica Electronica, Ash International and Tapeworm. He is the Ambassador in Portugal of the KREV project since 2001. Projects include Autodigest (since 2002), 3-33.me (since 2012) and Antifluffy (since 2013). Current research interests include the lexical implications of new media, the ecology of perception, and cultural criminology.

Professor of Design and New Media at the University of Porto. Director of the PhD Program in Design (U.Porto / U.Aveiro/ UPTEC / ID+). Director, on behalf of U.Porto, of the Institute for Research in Design, Media and Culture / Unexpected Media Lab. Chair of the Scientific Board (HSS) at the Foundation for Science and Technology (2016-present, member since 2010).

Member of Academia Europaea, Executive Board Member of the European Academy of Design and Advisory Board Member for Digital Communities, Prix Ars Electronica. Former outreach Director of the UTAustin-Portugal Program for Digital Media (2010-2014). Curator, FuturePlaces medialab for citizenship, since 2008.

PhD (Royal College of Art, 2003).
MFA (School of the Art Institute of Chicago, 1992).

www.benevolentanger.org