Artists and Scientists at Music Tech Fest
The exciting formula for championing future creative and technological collaboration in music. We interview Andrew Dubber, Music Tech Fest's Director.
Soft Revolvers by Myriam Bleau
Andrew Dubber, Music Tech Fest’s director, explains to me the freedom Music Tech Fest fosters in joining creative musicians and technological minds in an all-inclusive environment – the aim is to ultimately liberate the music technology scene and revel in the mayhem that ensues.
How and why was 'Music Tech Fest' conceived and what developments has it gone through to make it the internationally-reaching community it is today?
I wasn’t there for the first Music Tech Fest. It was something that came out of the European Road Map for the Future of Music Information Research. Michela Magas was the scientific director for that project - and was the founder of the Music Tech Fest. The idea was to bring together artists and scientists, academics and industry in a ‘hands on’ experimental environment - rather than just a conference. I came along to the second one and, like most people who now work for MTF - I basically just never went home. I was asked to take on the role of director of the festival, and we have had invitations - sometimes through some of my own professional connections - to bring the event to different cities. It’s different everywhere we do it, and we learn a lot by doing each one. But what makes it work is the fact that it brings together such a diverse range of brilliant and interesting people. It’s not a matter of controlling the outcome. You put them together in a room and watch what happens.
Why do you think it is important for musicians working with technology to meet face to face in a world saturated by online ‘music technology’ content?
I don’t think it’s necessarily important for musicians to meet each other face to face. It’s nice, just as any personal human interaction is nice. But there’s a lot that can be done through online collaboration between people who have the same language and mode of working. What’s important is that they meet *other types of people* with different skills and frames of thinking. People who aren’t musicians, but bring something else to music. And to make that work, people need to build something together. If you want to innovate in music, you need creative technologists, designers, hackers, musicians, artists, product designers, music industry people - a whole range of different minds. That’s what the face to face stuff is for. You get people working collaboratively and it opens up all sorts of unimagined possibilities.
‘Music Tech Fest’ seems different in that you pride yourself on being ‘a community with a festival, not a festival with a community’ - why is it important to 'bring down' the hierarchy that a lot of creative ‘festivals’ have and somewhat ‘level the playing-field’ for musicians working with technology?
There are a few important things here. First - we want to remove barriers to participation. Anyone who wants to play music, make technologies, hack, research or find out about music technologies should not be prevented from doing so because of financial restrictions. Second, it’s important to us that things that happen at Music Tech Fest have a life beyond the festival. New projects begin, new businesses are formed, new art installations are imagined, new performances planned - that sort of thing. That’s what Music Tech Fest is for. It’s a catalyst for the community. Where people come together, get exposed to new concepts and experiences, meet new people, have interesting discussions, make new prototypes and so on - but then go off to develop those further and maybe come back and showcase those things on the main stage at a later Music Tech Fest.
A lot of the creative developments in the ‘music tech’ world aren’t solely to do with music anymore - how and why is cross-collaboration in artistic mediums important and how does ‘Music Tech Fest’ foster these concepts?
The edges where music stops and other stuff starts has always been blurred - but now more than ever. We’re interested in music for its own sake, because music is amazing - and we’re also interested in music as a tool for other things (social change, industrial innovation, education…). Music is something pretty much everyone has a relationship with in one way or another. It’s the bit that connects the tech-heads with the artistic people, the academics with the industry. We’re working with Volvo trucks and Philips lighting. Those organisations might not be thought of as music related, but they see the value of a transversal approach to innovation, and music as a galvanising force that gets young people interested in technology and engineering. The cross-collaboration in the arts is especially important in an age of computing because the artificial barriers between storytelling, music, film, visual arts - even taste and touch - are broken down in our increasingly synaesthetic and multi-modal world.
The improvements and accessibility of technology in general is something that is obviously allowing more people to engage with it. How has the festival engaged with the issues of inaccessibility to technology to allow a wider engagement with music tech?
It’s a really important strand of what we do. For instance, we’re working closely with a number of organisations who are focused on using technology to remove barriers to participation for people with disabilities. We encourage our hackers to keep accessibility in mind when developing any new projects and we showcase projects that are about making music available to more people in more places - for instance, the One Handed Musical Instrument (OHMI) Trust, Drake Music and Human Instruments. It’s also a key part of our #MTFResearch network principles. The Manifesto for the Future of Music Technology Research, which came about as a response to the Music Tech Fest we held at Microsoft Research in Boston. See: http://musictechifesto.org
All images courtesy of Andrew Dubber
We interview the CEO of FutureEverything Drew Hemment
A 20-year ‘art project’: Drew Hemment’s journey through digital art and innovation with FutureEverything leads him to Singapore.
A 20-year ‘art project’: Drew Hemment’s journey through digital art and innovation with FutureEverything leads him to Singapore
The FutureEverything festival began 20 years ago in Manchester as a hub for digital collaboration and innovation in the arts. This September, the festival lands in ‘the city of the future’, Singapore, ready to blow minds and challenge perceptions of digital art. FutureEverything CEO, Drew Hemment, discusses the implications of our ever-expanding digital culture surrounding the arts.
FutureEverything. Credit WeAreTape
How did you find your way into digital art and what led you to transition to focus more on curating it in a large festival setting?
I came across Internet art in the early 1990s, when I spoke at and helped organise the Virtual Futures conferences. Before that in the 1980s I got fascinated by networks when I was DJing and organising acid house parties. I set up the festival in 1995. I’d hung up the decks in ‘92 and in ‘95 I ditched the literary agent and book deal and threw myself into festival curation full time.
This was an incredibly creative moment but there was nowhere people could come together. I wanted there to be an event that was about new work and practice as well as ideas. In secret, the festival itself has always been an art project to me, or at least an arts enquiry.
It seems to me that digital art is a lot more accessible for members of the 21st century public than more traditional or current experimental art forms. What is it about digital art that makes it more accessible and do you think its accessibility promotes or encourages accessibility in other artistic mediums?
Accessibility is a good thing, but it can also be a ruse. Many digital artists working today consume and replay interaction forms and images that saturate our lives, through advertising, social media etc. So digital art can be instantly familiar and accessible, in the same way pop art was before it. Any sense of a single ‘thing’ called digital art is decisively over. I am mostly interested in art, and design, which asks questions about the underlying codes that makes changes, leaving the world and the audience different to how it found them.
How do you focus on encouraging digital art and culture that creates a ‘moment’ or ‘event’ in a digital world that allows for instant access to a variety of archived artistic material and ideas? In other words, how can one innovate artistically and digitally in a world that uses technology to access an infinite amount of ideas and artistic endeavours?
We can access everything instantly; it is at our finger tips. This can create a challenge, however, because we have this overabundance of content and connectivity, people need to meet face to face. We need to focus really hard on one thing that is amazing and profound. We’ve seen music gigs explode because people need the live experience to give meaning to streaming and downloads. It’s the same in art, and ideas events, it’s a symptom of our time.
How important do you think artistic collaboration between individuals is in digital art and culture?
Collaboration, sharing and openness are central to the DNA of digital culture. People can collaborate with tens or thousands of strangers across networks to create original and beautiful media objects in which the results of individual creativity can be seen. Mobile networks enable swift and spontaneous collaboration across loosely connected groups. There are always new ways to collaborate with people from other disciplines using them as tools for new development. Having said this, collaboration does not always lead to good art. Solo practice and isolation can create exceptional things.
How has the FutureEverything festival developed since its conception to the upcoming festival in Singapore? Are you witnessing significant changes in the way technology is being used in collaboration with art?
FutureEverything Singapore does feel like something of a culmination of our journey. We have been on this 20 year rollercoaster, imagining the near future, making it and mucking around with it. Then we rock up in this city that is a city of the future, in so many ways. We have never done two festivals the same, we keep on reinventing it. In Singapore my ambition is that we hit the mark, we tap into deep and unexpected currents there and I feel like we can do something beautiful and profound.
Drew Hemment. Image courtesy FutureEverything
Future fossils, the art legacy of the internet
With rapidly evolving technological advances, post-internet art discusses how humanity goes forward alongside machines.
With rapidly evolving technological advances, post-internet art discusses how humanity goes forward alongside machines.
Still in the process of being shaped and defined by artists, post-internet art is a movement referring to the way society interacts with the widespread use of the Internet and how this affects society and culture. A successor to internet art, post-internet refers to state of mind rather than the explicit use of the internet itself. We discuss artists working now who approach this issue by their own means.
Eno Henze explores the relationship between humans and machines, between organic and synthetic and the complexities of organic creativity. His work frequently uses machines to interpret human activity such as drawing or producing an original ‘good’ piece of art. In this respect it is difficult to assign authorship or originality to the work, made by a machine programmed by a human. The machine is capable of making a ‘perfect’ image but cannot make a judgment call on ‘good’ or ‘bad’ art. In a world where images are more available for editing and appropriating than before, this brings us back the ever debated question What is called Art and does not qualify?
Henze’s work asks what the rapid evolution of technology means for human creativity leading us to question what will become obsolete in the future as technological advances are made. Will human creativity become to digital drawing as analogue photography has become to digital?
TIMELAPSE/(MNEMOSYNE)
Set Design for a ballet by David Dawson
RANDOMCONDITION(ARABIDOPSIS)
Dimensions variable (ca 6 x 3 x 0,5 m)
48m laser-exposed photo paper
Wall mount: wood / aluminum
TSCHERENKOWS TRAUM (Cerenkovs Dream)
Technological objet trouvé with 4 Led Panels, power adaptor and image processor.
Approx. 5 x 1 x 1 m.
Amy Brener creates sculptures using plastic and remnants of technology to create light sensitive sculptures reminiscent of natural geological rock and crystal formations. Laptops, phones and computers, the tools we use to access the internet, are quickly made obsolete with rapid advances in hardware and buyer preferences in our current consumer culture, going quickly from the most connected and important object in one’s life to a antiquated piece of plastic and metal.
The materials used in Brener’s work subtly combine many components of these machines into human height crystals, which suggest an imagined future and allude to the merging of nature, humans and technology. Perhaps this realizes a now, eerily more precise vision of prophetic 20th century science fiction films.
However, though many artists are making work about the ongoing and always changing overlap of human and machine, Flavie Audi’s work completely moves away from the cyber connection and comes back to direct connections with objects. Audi uses glass and light in her work to create experiences in which humans can form a relationship with materials. Her art is about making a space for this to happen because, in a world of industrial production and virtual realities, she believes that humans have a desire to return to materiality.
If this is the case, it would appear that we have made a journey full circle. In the early boom of consumer capitalism the more objects one owned the higher status they had in society. More recently there is an attempt to escape this consumer culture; the word materialistic has become negative. It is therefore, somewhat alien to hear Audi talk about humans desire to return to materiality, due to the evolution of the word. Though, the use of this word does not imply that humans’ deepest desire is to own the latest sound system but that they wish to have a physical connection with an object in a space away from digital tools, and this is what her work aims to do. It is about creating social emancipation from technology.
Post-internet art has a self awareness of the networks it exists within, including influences of imagery that is for profit, advertising and merchandising, because of this aspects of design will continue to cross over into art that concerns itself with the virtual. The term post-internet is still developing but these artists approach the themes it encompasses in ways that independently question where the progression of technology will lead us, whether we should be allowing it, resisting it or if we have no choice at all. Whatever we should be doing, humanity is so entrenched in the virtual world, it seems certain that there is a long way to go before the Internet and it’s accompanying state of mind could ever become history.
Daniel Keller : An omnipresence of the digital in our daily lives
Berlin-based American artist Daniel Keller creates spatial and sound installations that fuse art and technology to speak to the visibly forming prognosis of a culture where technology replaces manpower
At a time when technology seems to be filling the minds of a generation that has become so accustomed to being constantly connected, Berlin-based American artist Daniel Keller creates spatial and sound installations that fuse art and technology to speak to the visibly forming prognosis of a culture where technology replaces manpower. Mixing the urban city with the suburban landscape, Keller also uses the internet as a platform to display his performances and interventions.
Central to the work of Keller is the concept of the ‘prosumer, an idea put forward by Alvin Toffler who in examining the progression of new pioneering technologies, recognised the increasing similarities between the roles and objectives of the producer and consumer. These ideas of progress and technological disruption sit at the forefront of Keller’s most recent works and successfully consider the views of the ‘prosumer’ artist.
I was drawn to Keller’s Freedom Club Figure (2013), the elegantly poised figure of a female mannequin and hand-made rucksack of technophobic mail bomber Theodore Kaczynski. Serving as a visual representation and exploration into the seminal essay published by Sun Microsystems founder Bill Joy on, ‘Why the Future Doesn’t Need Us’ (2000), Keller skillfully merged natural forms with man-made materials to highlight the opposing values of a mass producing, consumer driven society and a non-materialistic, nature-fixated self-consciousness.
Personally, I think that Keller’s overlaying of a rucksack onto the female body could also reference nature’s undervalued contributions to the dynamics of modernity. These spaces for technologies derived from nature’s landscapes, after all.
Keller’s juxtaposing of natural forms and technology is also evident in his mixed media, sculptural installation for the ongoing project Absolute Vitality Inc. Created by the Aids-3D duo Daniel Keller and fellow artist Nik Kosmas, the project provided a series of pioneering initiatives that challenged man’s relationship with nature and his surroundings. The result was a scintillating display of LED back-lit chrome lettering planted in a growing wall of shrubberies, analogous to the man-made structures that delineate the spaces of our otherwise natural landscapes.
Daniel Keller is currently exhibiting his new series of works titled The Future of Memory at the Kunthalle Wien in Austria. The exhibition explores the omnipresence of digital media in our lives and draws upon the modern methods of communication that are increasingly becoming shaped by the virtualisation of our interactions.
Exhibition February 4 – March 29
Technology is driving the future of fashion
How the fashion industry implements technology and functional design into their accessories, plus a list of cutting edge accessories.
How the fashion industry implements technology and functional design into their accessories, plus a list of cutting edge accessories.
Wearable technology is not a new phenomenon, nor is it a fad, and it isn’t just happening in the tech-hub of Silicon Valley. It is a global trend on the rise which is actively being adopted by leading fashion brands who are paving the future of fashion with avant-garde designs, which merge style with functionality.
Arguably the meeting of fashion and technology was only a matter of time. Wearable technology is projected to become a consumer norm in the not so distant future. According to a report from The Business of Fashion, the current market of $3 to $5 billion is predicted to skyrocket to $10 billion by 2016. A further report carried out by Credit Suisse estimates in the next two to three years the industry could skyrocket to $30 to $50 billion.
We are increasingly seeing designers using technology either as a source of inspiration for their collections and concepts, or physically in their design and production processes.
From heat sensitive materials and radio frequency shielding fabrics, to 3D-printed garments and accessories grown with magnets and bracelets which connect to your phone via Bluetooth, there is no denying that the fashion industry is greatly influenced by developments and innovations from the tech world.
In order for the collaboration of the industries to succeed and flourish, designs must not sacrifice fashion for function, they must boast a stylish aesthetic with a visual appeal for the tech savvy. The key component in the image driven fashion industry is to design with an eye for style, whilst finding new ways of adding utility to what we wear.
The fitness industry was to first to adopt wearable technology with the Nike+iPod Sports Kit in 2006 pioneering the tech revolution as one of the earliest products on the market. The future of the tech industry is now in the hands of fashion, and designers are working to creating products tasteful and versatile enough to wear every day.
Exploring the potential of 3D printing to create clothes and accessories, innovative Dutch fashion designer Iris Van Herpen is recognised as one of the first fashion designers to establish wearable technology as a reality. Using 3D printing, her 2010 Crystallisation collection featured dramatic printed items resembling body armour whilst her recent SS15 fused nature and technology, further pushing the boundaries with the garments “grown” with magnets which explored the interplay of magnetic forces.
Rising star in Japan Kunihiko Morinaga (Anrealage) is also noted for creating revolutionary garments. His forward-thinking fashion concept “Focus: Life Gear by Trident” is a futuristic collection which exhibits the scope of combining technology with everyday wear. Pioneering the tech-sphere, his 12-piece collection is made of radio frequency shielding fabrics that block mobile connectivity when the phone is placed in the garment’s pocket. The collection has been developed to protect you from the virtual world, so you can “keep your life in focus.” The collection is a similar concept to “Stealth Wear” designed by New York designer Adam Harvey who has created a range of anti-drone clothing to hide the wearer from heat detection technologies with metallic fibres that reflect heat, masking the wearer's thermal signature and rendering them undetectable.
The influence of high-tech fabrics on fashion is huge. Ralph Lauren has also introduced high end wearable tech, claiming to be the first luxury lifestyle brand to offer apparel that tracks and streams real-time workout data directly to your smartphone or tablet. The fashion house has created “The Polo Tech shirt”, an innovative new product that merges biometrics into active lifestyle apparel, featuring sensors knitted into the core of the product to read biological and physiological information.
Collaborations are booming between tech giants and fashion designers, putting aesthetics first to produce desirable every day wear for the fashion conscious. From Diane von Fursenberg’s stylish take on google’s smart eyewear - “Made for Glass”, to Opening Ceremony’s “MICA” bracelet, not much more sophisticated to the Apple Watch but much more attractive - groundbreaking wearable technology is all around us.
The influence of technology on the fashion industry could not be more prevalent, technology truly is driving the future of fashion.
Here are some of the world’s most cutting edge accessories to date:
emPOWERED - Patented phone-charging luxury leather bags
Charge on the go. “A forward-thinking leather goods and accessories brand for the modern woman.” Made from luxe leather with a sleek and minimalistic design, emPOWERED bags is the latest to fuse fashion and technology, creating a chic clutch that can bring your iPhone from zero to 100 per cent with battery to spare.
The Bags That Talk: O2 Upcycle
Part of an O2 campaign which will be able to highlight the possibilities of gadget recycling instead of merely throwing away old handsets. O2 recently unveiled a series of designer handbags that double as phones as part of a project that illustrates the possibilities of gadget recycling.
The inventions, dubbed the “Bags That Talk” are created by combining iconic designer handbags including a vintage Celine box handbag, a Chloe shoulder bag and an Alexander McQueen clutch bag, with old Nokia and LG handsets sent in by O2 Recycle customers who no longer had a use for them.
Strvct Shoes - Continuum Fashion
Using medical grade Nylon, the founders of Continuum Fashion 3D print shoes that are the next big thing in fashion tech innovation. The 3D printing process means that the shoes are intricately built layer-by-layer and all in one piece of nylon. From a digital model, the product is built additively instead of the traditional manufacturing process that removes material by drilling and cutting. The 3D-printed shoe collection,"strvct", uses innovative materials to create fantasy-inspired designs.
Erogear - The Tweeting Shoe
A black high-heeled shoe that not only lights up pink, but can stream live Twitter feeds, came out at CES. Designed by Erogear, the shoe has LED lights build into its ankle strap, which gives it a low-resolution screen that will light up even in the darkest of nightclubs.
Mezzi: Handbag
The future of luxury. Each MEZZI product has an integrated Bluetooth beacon, allowing wireless connectivity between your bag and smartphone, plus further functionality that can be levered through the MEZZI application. The first technology they launched was a unique crowd-sourced GPS tracker, which ensures peace of mind against loss and theft. This smart technology allows you to track your bag from your smart phone – at any time – if you’ve misplaced it.
Adidas have created Real-Time Tweet Shoes, using a pair of their red adiPower Barricade shoes complete with a mini LED screen and processor so athletes can receive tweets of support straight into their shoes. Adidas claims the social sneakers are “the future of athlete connectivity.”
Ducere: Lechal Shoes
Shoes made for innovation. Indian startup Ducere Technologies Pvt has developed shoes that will sync up “with a smartphone that uses Google Maps and vibrate to tell users when and where to turn to reach their destination.” This company makes inner soles and shoes that link up to a smartphone and vibrate under your feet to provide notifications.
The shoes themselves might need some style direction, but it’s a fantastic idea. Ducere Technologies focuses on creating intuitive, unobtrusive and user-friendly wearable technology innovations. Ducere is expected to start selling its Bluetooth-enabled Lechal shoes for more than $100 a pair in September. The company already has orders for 25,000 pairs and expects to sell 100,000 by March. Ducere initially developed the shoes to help the blind who rely on walking canes.
Richard Nicoll and Vodaphone: Re-charging tote bag
For Autumn/Winter 2012, designer Richard Nicoll took a more practical approach, partnering with Vodafone to develop a tote bag that can recharge a mobile phone and features a Bluetooth-enabled charm that alerts users to incoming calls or texts and displays remaining battery life.
The exclusive re-charging tote bag was developed in partnership with Vodafone’s innovation team and merges practicality with beautiful design. Charged magnetically by induction, the battery powered bag holds enough charge to power the most demanding smartphone for a couple of days.