OPEN PLATFORM_7 17 November 2016 @algomech 2016 - Performances

RAP(s) - Random Access Performances - TwT.algomake

In November 2016 OPEN PLATFORM_7 returned as part of AlgoMech 2016 - the first Festival of Algorithmic and Mechanical Movement in Sheffield!

AlgoMech seeks to examine the complex relationship between technology and performance, with the first edition of the festival celebrating the resurgence of making in performance, where creative processes are made visible during a live event.





At the heart of OPEN PLATFORM/RAP(s) - TwT.  lies the idea of making performance from algorithmic processes and translating computational processes into physical presentations and performances. Here are the 5 performers who took up the challenge to re-think the digital at OPEN PLATFORM_7/RAP(s) - TwT.algomake!  


Susanne Palzer - On/Off (core performance)

With On/Off (core performance) Susanne Palzer radically reduces 'performance' and the 'digital' to the act of going on/off and binary machine code of ones and zeros. A performer steps on and off a platform saying 'on'/'off' and thus embodies computational processes in physical performance by 'writing' and 'executing script' simultaneously. All 'live coded' performances are improvised but draw on a pool of 'samples': (emotional) mental images are accessed semi-randomly to create a dramaturgy for the live performance. Human and machine labor become tangible through the performer's exertion which transmits to the audience. At the center of On/Off is the body, highlighting that both performance art and digital technology are about information exchange, communication and connection.



Lou Hazelwood - The Rendering of Digital Memory

The temporality of memory and its fragility is now stored in many mainframes and we are reminded of moments in our lives not by our senses or our relationships with people but by algo-rhythmical data. Facebook reminds us in date order of our memories; the fluidity of experience lost to time. 
Lou Hazelwood presented a timehopping reading performance compiled from snippets of overheard conversation. With contributions from Toni Buckby, Brain G Gilson, Rachael Hand, Susanne Palzer and others.

Michael Borkowsky - Pixel Poetry

Michael Borkowsky performed a number of poems from the zine 'Pixel Poetry'. Pixel Poetry is a series of poems designed to extend our experiences and perceptions of video games by pulling them out of their original context and examining them from the context of poetry. 

Brian G Gilson - Title Yet To Be Confirmed

Brian G Gilson presented a reading performance generated by audience throwing dice.
Having appeared at previous events this time Brian brought his own platform because now that Hull is going to be UK City of Culture 2017 he thought they should have one, too.


The first OPEN PLATFORM event in Hull will take place on 30 March 2017 at Ground. OPEN PLATFORM/RAP(s) - TwT. B2Gat60.Hull is part of Mobile Platform and a collaboration between OPEN PLATFORM/RAP(s) - TwT. , Sheffield, and B2Gat60.Hull.2016/2017: open events at Ground organised by Brian G Gilson. 




John X. Moseley - Readings from Towers' International Transistor Selector: The divine poetry of semiconductor specification

Most people that own a modern computer or telephone are familiar with the idea that such devices are full of billions of transistors. Most people, quite rightly, never consider the function of billions or individual transistors. Why would you? Today anyone can search and retrieve transistor specifications directly from manufacturers. However, internet browsing does not adequately convey the optical aura and pattern serendipity of the gaze on a page of data in a physical book. The poet Paul Valéry declared that "a book is a machine for reading". In the case of Towers' International Transistor Selector it is a machine that is made of transistors unlike any other.
http://johnmoseley.co.uk/



AlgoMech 2016 took place in various locations around Sheffield, UK, from 12-19 November 2016. The festival featured talks, hand-on workshops, concerts, performances and an Algorave, all exploring algorithmic and mechanical movement. AlgoMech was organised by FoAM Kernow and LoveBytes, in collaboration with Millennium Gallery, Access Space, and Sheffield Hallam and Sussex Universities. AlgoMech 2016 was part of Year of Making Sheffield 2016.

AlgoMech 2017 will take place from 8-12 November this year. The Facebook event is here.

OPEN PLATFORM_7 17 November 2016 @algomech 2016 - OPEN CALL

RAP(s) - Random Access Performances - TwT.algomake - OPEN CALL 
AlgoMech 2016, Access Space, Sheffield, UK

Thursday, 17 November 2016, 6-9pm

OPEN PLATFORM - Lego robot by John X. Moseley

OPEN PLATFORM/RAP(s) - TwT. returns as part of AlgoMech 2016 - the first Festival of Algorithmic and Mechanical Movement in Sheffield - and we invite you to contribute to another quirky evening of digital randomness! 

AlgoMech seeks to examine the complex relationship between technology, widely defined, and performance. This first edition of the festival will celebrate the resurgence of making in performance, where creative processes are made visible during a live event. Rather than presenting technology as seamless, AlgoMech will pick at the seams, exposing its innards as human made and reconfigurable. algoMech goes beyond fashionable notions of technology by taking the long view and bringing together mechanical, kinetic, electronic and software arts. Spanning the stone age to present day AlgoMech builds a picture of the human maker as both digital and analogue, thinking and feeling, embodied yet reaching beyond what is bodily possible.

At the heart of OPEN PLATFORM/RAP(s) - TwT.  lies the idea of making performance from algorithmic processes and translating computational processes into physical presentations and performances. We invite you to experiment, perform, express, make things, dance, present, sing, rap, read, or just tell us about your digital project or work - but without using anything digital! Anything goes as long as it is about or related to digital technology, 1 to 10 minutes in duration and happening on some sort of platform. You can use the wooden platform provided (65x95cm) or make your own.

OPEN PLATFORM_7/RAP(s) - TwT.algomake is open to anyone interested in re-thinking the digital and not limited to artists or professional performers/presenters. 'Technology without Technolggy' (TwT) performances are a creative, playfully serious strategy to negotiate the 'unknowable' of digital technology and the constant information overload in our contemporary world.

OPEN PLATFORM/RAP(s) - TwT.  is a micro event series that explores the digital with physical means by asking performers to present digital work without using anything digital. Five performers take up the challenge of re-thinking the digital with free interpretations that are 1 to 10 minutes in duration, about or related to digital technology and happening on some sort of platform. OPEN PLATFORM/RAP(s) - TwT. originated at Access space in 2012 and is curated by Susanne Palzer.

AlgoMech 2016 takes place in various locations around Sheffield, UK, from 12-19 November 2016. The festival will feature talks, hand-on workshops, concerts, performances and an Algorave, all exploring algorithmic and mechanical movement. AlgoMech is organised by FoAM Kernow and LoveBytes, in collaboration with Millennium Gallery, Access Space, and Sheffield Hallam and Sussex Universities. AlgoMech 2016 is part of Year of Making Sheffield 2016.

To submit please fill in the APPLICATION FORM.

APPLICATION DEADLINE: 03 November 2016.

Please note there will be a small fee to cover expenses.
For further information please contact Susanne Palzer.
 

More information about OPEN PLATFORM/RAP(s)-TwT. and previous events here.

The Facebook event is here.

Like us on Facebook or send us a tweet!

@Open_Platform  @algomech  @AccessSpace 

Access Space

Unit 1, AVEC Building

3-7 Sidney Street

Sheffield

S1 5RG

OPEN PLATFORM_6 @DoItAnyway2015 16 May 2015 at Access Space - Performances

RAP(s)- Random Access Performance(s) - TwT.doitanyway

In May this year OPEN PLATFORM_6 returned as part of Do It Anyway Festival 2015 - the first digital arts festival at Access Space and the first Pixel Network festival in the UK.

Do It Anyway Festival concluded Access Space's larger EU Grundtvig supported project Open Sourcing Festivals (in collaboration with other Pixelache Network nodes - more info below).

Following on from OPEN PLATFORM_5 last year Access Space and OPEN PLATFORM/RAP(s)-TwT. once again welcomed artists, curators and cultural producers from Finland, Iceland, France, Norway, Latvia and the UK, introducing a new audience to our evenings of digital randomness!







Susanne Palzer - 256x256x256

OPEN PLATFORM/RAP: Susanne Palzer
Photo: Nathalie Aubret

Susanne Palzer opens the event with a performance which emulates a colour picker screen for web designers running in the background. While moving a cursor across an invisible screen Susanne Palzer vocalizes RGB codes in random combinations. The performance intends to highlight how familiar digital processes only exist through hidden code and numbers - the vocalized colours remain unseen. At the same time the analogue performance allows for a combination of RGB codes which may produce 'impossible colours' and positions colours in random locations on the spectrum.






Leila Johnston - A Talk about Fantasy and Technology 

"Old people, who can make clothes, fix cars and build furniture, think young people are good at technology because they can click on a picture. ..."

OPEN PLATFORM/RAP: Leila Johnston
HDV still: Richard Bolam/Susanne Palzer

Not without humour 'A Talk about Fantasy and Technology' is a thought provoking and reflective call for adventure and fantasy. Looking at the past and future of digital technology Leila Johnston from Hack Circus demands to bring magic back into technology, "to empower it to be unpredictable and useless - to make it interesting to us again." 
A full transcript can be found here.


Silvia Champion - Search Engine: What is home for you? 

OPEN PLATFORM/RAP: Silvia Champion
HDV still: Richard Bolam/Susanne Palzer

Silvia Champion 'uses' the audience as a search engine by inviting everyone to access the platform and share their thoughts on the questions "What does home mean to you?" and "What can the word home mean?". She copies all researched info by hand to "process it later". At the end of the performance Silvia gives away soap houses made by the artist so everyone can "take a house home".

OPEN PLATFORM/RAP:
Silvia Champion/Mathieu Marguerin
Timelapse still: Richard Bolam

With contributions by Egil Paulsen, Hlöðver Sigurðsson, Mathieu Marguerin, Nathalie Aubret, Susanne Palzer, John W. Fail, RíkharðurH. Friðriksson, Maite Cajaraville, Chella Quint, Jonathan Cook, Richard Bolam and many others.














Chella Quint - Analogue Tweets  

Breaking news! Live! 

OPEN PLATFORM/RAP: Chella Quint
Photo: Susanne Palzer

Chella Quint analogue tweets stories that took place in a time and place without Twitter. Reducing known fairytales to 140 characters, 'typed' with a pen and 'backspaced' by rubbing out, for 10 minutes the audience is only allowed to "tweet with their eyeballs and scroll past by looking up and down". 


Richard Bolam - Dystopian Conference/Work in progress

OPEN PLATFORM/RAP: Richard Bolam
HDV still: Richard Bolam/Susanne Palzer

"The client arrived late but wanted to start early."










Drawing on his real-live experiences as an AV professional at conferences, award ceremonies and corporate events, Richard Bolam describes to us the ultimate Dystopian Conference. "It's all true."



The Facebook album for OPEN PLATFORM_6 is here.

Pixelache Network is an international network of cultural organizations enaging with art, technology and social change. Access Space is the UK hub of Pixelache Network.

Do It Anyway Festival ran from 15 to 17 May 2015. Over the weekend the festival featured free performances and workshops. Do It Anyway 2015 was developed as part of a larger EU Grundtvig supported project called Open Sourcing Festivals, co-produced by five experimental art, design and technology organizations from the Pixelache Network and focused on open source culture. Open Sourcing Festivals was a mobile circuit of workshops and seminars organized across Europe during 2013-2015 by Piksel (NO), Pikslaverk (IS), Mal au Pixel (FR) and Pixelache (FI). In the process the partners have been gradually working towards 'open-sourcing' the knowledge embodied in their respective workshops and festival production, in order to share it with a broader range of users. A database of resources and documentation is accessible here.