Video Vortex, an artistic network concerned with the aesthetics and politics of online video, gathered again in Malta for a two-day conference. We were in particularly focussing on bringing new research, theory and critiques of online video– in addition to questions around its integration with social media – to Malta. These proceedings are an edited collection of assembled and annotated video essays living in two instantiations: an online version – located on the web at https://vv12.org, and an offline version – stored on a server inside a VHS case.
The Mahalla Festival 2020 was scheduled to take place in Arbil, Iraq, with screenings, performances, talks, round tables and concerts. The festival wanted to bring together artists, academics, institutions and stakeholders from different fields and different backgrounds to support an intercultural understanding in times of increased mobility and search for identity.Under the critical circumstances and in the light of the objectives of the destabilization in Iraq we had to cancel the Mahalla festival in January 2020. The new escalation of violence in Iraq and Syria is more than a slap in the face of its citizen.We were planning to shift the Mahalla Festival 2020 to Cyprus. But then in February not online China but the whole world was confronted with the COVID-19 pandemic which changed the way we communicate and keep our creative narration alive for the time being.We are now globally faced with the measures that are necessary to control the pandemic and staying in self isolation to slow the spread of the pandemic. Following the global lockdown all cultural and community events and any kind of mobility are suspended and the economy stands still. Many cultural actors and creative initiatives try to survive not only artistically but also existentially. Under these circumstances the Mahalla Festival 2020 will take place as a remote festival to overcome self-isolation, demobilization and paralysis.
On December 26 & 27, 2020, the Unfinished Art Space based in Malta is organizing a 2-days exhibition entitled “Us”- Clubbing Report, with photos from artist Charlene Galea.
Curated by Margerita Pulè – who has participated in the Mahalla Festival 2018 with the installation, TheCement Bakery at the Palazzo in Zabbar –, the exhibition “Us” brings us close to moments and situations that are made possible by clubs and their atmospheres, the people constituting them and the soundtracks invading our ears.
In a time when clubs all over Europe are closed, artist and photographer Charlene Galea presents the exhilaration, intimacy and beauty of the clubbing scene through 35mm photographs dating from 2012 to 2020 and covering clubbing scenes in Barcelona, Berlin, France, Ibiza, London, Malta, Morocco, the Netherlands, Romania, and Tunisia.
In the 2-day exhibition, the physical and emotional intensity created, transcending generational and social constructs will be documented closely and truthfully, and hopefully make us travel in our memories of warm clubbing nights…
Excerpt from the Mahalla Festival News post: No later than one week ago I was standing in the queue of the KitKatClub in Berlin, not waiting for my turn to enter the dancefloor but standing in line like the others to get a quick-corona-test.
While jumping from one foot to the other, trying to get rid of the cold, I was reading the signs of the Clubcommission Berlin, calling for an equal treatment of the clubbing scene within the cultural area, especially in times of COVID-19. It almost sounded like a manifesto and made me think of these empty spaces and their significance in today’s world.
But Berlin is not the only place where club culture is defended and questioned. Currently active in her hometown in Malta, photographer and performance artist Charlene Galea has been taking photos of the clubbing phenomenon since 2012 and is reminding us of the multitude of experiences one is usually able to live in such a place.
Under the title “Us” Clubbing Report, she will exhibit a selection of these photos on December 26 & 27 in cooperation with the Unfinished Art Space, pointing out how important clubs are for people as spaces of freedom, of movement, of fluid identities…
Charlene Galea is a Maltese artist who likes to stand on both sides of the camera. As an observer, particularly in numerous clubs around Europe where she first started to watch human bodies in action, and as a performer, an artistic approach she works with to guide people through concepts, using Instagram “stories” as a medium.
During her time at the London College of Fashion she started taking photos while going to clubs asking herself “Why are they here? What are they doing? Why is this occasion so special?”, while confessing that her favourite spot in clubs is the cloakroom area, a space of transformation where bodies rid themselves of their outer layers before getting on “stage”, a term we both agree upon – clubs are stages of freedom.
This diversified and international “field study” and the three-day takeover of a hotel in Malta this summer – which lead to strong blame from the government regarding COVID-19 outbreak on the island – were the triggers for this exhibition. Never having wanted to publish these images before, in fear of disappearing in the monotony of posts and pictures of weekend parties, “now is the right time”, she says, as clubs have closed again around the world.
Nevertheless, for Charlene Galea this moment of pausing and shutting down is having a positive impact as an anti-capitalistic act, making us aware of the former over-consumption of clubbing experiences. She is aware of what she calls a “loop”, arising when going out to a club: first dressing up, meeting up with friends, getting a drink beforehand etc. A loop that is affecting our club experience. “The hugs could be longer, one could start a conversation with someone who maybe really needs to talk”. We now have some time to think of the value of those spaces in our life and how we want to use them in the future.
Whilst diving further into our conversation, I was impressed by the multitude of layers she looks at while “analysing” and choosing clubs as a motif for her artistic practice. The clubbing experience is vast, constituted by arrangements made between people before and after, a social experience in itself. The economic aspect also plays a role in her observations as the clubbing industry employs a huge number of staff. A cultural layer also surrounds clubs and their locations.
Indeed, Charlene Galea has been travelling to festivals in foreign countries, realizing that people tend to forget that there is a place outside of the club that can be visited, looked at, interacted with. Instead of consuming the event and flying back to their country the artist invites people to have a look around themselves, to be more aware of their physical presence in a new cultural area.
A section of the exhibition will be dedicated to her travel experiences, juxtaposing photos of parties and of villages she visited.
Regarding the way Charlene Galea dives into a topic and deepens concepts and practices under an anthropological and performative eye, it is not a surprise that the exhibition was curated by Margerita Pulè who manages the Unfinished Art Space. In comparison to the commercial art market in Malta, the Unfinished Art Space gives space to political art and concepts creating thoughts, in a more underground way. “It is the right moment to come out with those photos: in a safe space that is not taken for granted”.
The exhibition will be composed of 40 to 50 images organized in 8 different spaces. “Entering at their own risk”, people will have a first insight into the club experience. In a second room, a space will be reserved for pictures of outfits, statements, preparation for the club. The third room will be dedicated to travel experiences in Tunisia, Ibiza, Marseille, and Morocco where globalization has made clubs homogeneous in the inside, standing in stark contrast to the outside world of those cities and countries.
In the kitchen there will be kissing portraits, in the bathroom some shots of girls in club toilets, before walking to the outside area presenting photos of festivals as well as portraits of sleeping people. The 7th room will include intimate photos and the last room will show after party pictures which are, for the artist, always full of surprises.
A travel around times and spaces with colourful flashbacks…
“Probably people will have to queue outside because of the corona rules, but at least it will be a metaphor for the queuing moment when going to a club”, says Charlene Galea as we start shifting our discussion towards her position as an artist in Malta. During COVID-19 times it is difficult to get support from the state as the government ranks artists on a marking scheme which creates a feeling of competition.
“Being an artist in Malta is not so easy”, she states explaining that numerous people criticize her performances and her way of presenting herself on Instagram. A part of the population is still shocked by the clubbing scene, open air parties and liberated bodies.
Women in Malta are also still attached to numerous beauty standards which Charlene Galea tries to overcome through her work, liberating movements when “modelling” herself on her photos. She wants to shoot women as they are, in a more organic way.
Through her Instagram account she already connected to a big network and considers stories as a good way to engage and communicate with her audience, but also to know it and produce art for groups that are interested. “Who is my audience?” is a constant question she asks herself in order to stay flexible and open – surely not a bad quality for artists who today, more than ever, have to adapt to survive and preserve their art in unequal societies.
Our friend Luka is performing in Image Snatchers: Technoburlesque is a mute comedy of the body that mocks rigidity of social roles. It uncritically appropriates, copies and glues together femininity, masculinity, family relationships, machismo and other degenerated social roles that are unrighteous considered to be normative. When Image Snatchers totally expose themselves — and remove their social dresses layer by layer — they do not find the essence, but realize that the essence is nothingness, and the performed travesties opium that makes living bearable. This amusing play in cross-dressing and their behavior are a result of great sexual and bodily liberation from social bands. Satisfied in eclectic noise of media images they stretch popular snap-shots and bite them to their unheard-of forms that provoke burst of laughter or despair. Image Snatchers don’t seek for meaning but pleasure. As pleasure is the hedonistic polish with which they smeared everyday objects and made something exceptional out of them. Technoburlesque is an intersection of (program/cybernetic) code and subjectivity; a laying bare of the physical and emotional body indivisibly bound up with the information matrix of contemporaneity.
“I am riddled with ambivalence. I am both the rule and its exception, the law and its outcast, the doctor and the hysteric, I cannot be one without the other. I do not reject the images that consume me. I become them.” (Mady Schutzman)
We took part in the YAWYB workshops. Excerpt from Times of Maltaabout YAWYB: An artistic research project held between 2016 and 2017 questioned the effects of consumption on buyers. This year, a second edition is delving deeper into the subject and is particularly looking at the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on our production, shopping and consumption habits.
You Are What You Buy (YAWYB) reacts to current issues on consumption and consumerism, offering an alternative artistic experience. The first edition was a year-long transdisciplinary project that departed from a reflection on our need to affirm ourselves as consumers. The research process and final presentation were set in a supermarket in Malta, offering a different possibility of where and how to experience art − away from the art institution.
Since then, the team continued thinking on how they could develop the project further.
“In the wake of the pandemic, it felt like a natural progression to revisit the project − it almost felt like a responsibility not to ignore all the changes in our production, shopping and consumption habits resulting from the impact of the pandemic. This is how YAWYB ‒ A Remote ReVisit came about,” artist Kristina Borg says.
“Also, YAWYB has always anticipated to catalyse change in our production, shopping and consumption habits, specifically inviting us producers and consumers to engage in more intelligent thinking processes while we produce and shop, with the aim of contributing to a new normal that guarantees responsible production and consumption for sustainable cities and communities. And what better time, when we’re affected by the pandemic, to reflect on this?” she continues.
In answering the research question (see box on right) and more, YAWYB – A Remote ReVisit moves outside and beyond the supermarket space to incorporate other spaces and places of production and consumption in our neighbourhoods. These include, but are not limited to, the local grocery store or the mini-market, the open markets, the supermarket, the household store, the clothes store, the coffee place, the restaurant and online platforms.
This second edition focuses mainly on research; however, the outcomes are presented through artistic and creative means.
Similar to the first edition, this second edition also collaborates with a group of community co-creators as well as with service providers. This was done remotely due to the pandemic, hence the ‘remote’ in the title. In the wake of the pandemic, it felt like a natural progression to revisit the project
“With this in mind, it is important to mention that such remote means allowed the project to widen its audience to a European-based one, attracting survey respondents and community co-creators based in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, The Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland, Turkey and the UK,” Borg enthuses.
“This has also provided a wider spectrum of shared experiences as affected by different degrees and levels of the pandemic in different countries.”
Introducing: the ‘Storbju Noise Monger’ – a simple electronic noise generating device designed by Mike Desira and Frank Cachia.
Mike and Frank will be presenting a workshop on how to build the Storbju Noise Monger – a DIY synthesizer kit built around the Texas Intruments CD40106 chip. The chip consists of 6 Schmitt-trigger circuits and with it, our designers managed to invent a 6-oscillator noise device – with 3 high speed and 3 low speed oscillators.
This baby can be powered by a range of DC voltages of up to 9 volts. Its oscillators can be connected in a modular fashion; using small jump leads in a series of small connectors. A series of 7 potentiometers are used to control the main and individual oscillator frequencies and an optical detector can also be used to change the overall frequency.
The aim during the workshop will be to provide users with basic soldering skills as well as the knowledge of how to build this specific kit. So, participants will be required to bring with them their own Storbju Noise Monger kit.
With their exploration of logistics infrastructures, !Mediengruppe Bitnik provides insights into systems that usually work invisibly. From the investigation of algorithms that evaluate our social media profiles in their workFlagged for Political Speech to interference with the greatly automated mail system in Decisions Decisions Decisions the artistic duo observes the anatomy of these fully optimized automated systems that assist our daily lives and reveals their gaps and flaws.
Now it’s time for you tojoin the workshop with !Mediengruppe Bitnik and explore the hidden, unmapped networks of the world around you. Using five mini GPS trackers as tactical tools we will explore the service networks, waste management, transport networks of the city while the position data generated by the trackers will allow us to make visible movements as maps.
The two-day workshop in the form of a presentation and planning on the first day, and practical work on the second, will take place via Zoom. All participants will be able to follow the movement of devices on the map online for a continuous period of 5 to 10 days. Participants will work in teams of 3 and can either enroll as a group or individually. No special skills are required, however all partakers should have access to an end device and a good internet connection.
A 1500-page ‘Black Book’ that documents the horrific violence suffered by over 12,000 people at the hands of authorities on the EU’s external borders has been released today – International Migrants Day – by The Left in the European Parliament. Compiled by BVMN and printed over two volumes, the ‘Black Book of Pushbacks’ is a collection of hundreds of testimonies of migrants and asylum seekers who have experienced human rights violations at external borders.
December 2020 the New Normal artistic research book has been co-published by Strelka Press and Park Books. The New Normal publication encompasses the breadth, diversity, and intensity of activity that has taken place throughout the three-year project. From 2017–2019, The New Normal think-tank at Strelka Institute investigated the impact of planetary-scale computation on the future of cities in Russia, and globally. The work was conducted by ninety interdisciplinary researchers from thirty different countries and over forty faculty members, drawn not only from the field of architecture but also from the areas of computer science, philosophy, art, cinema, economics, and more. Projects ranged from short-form cinema and software design to proposals for new political systems and economic models. At stake for the work is not only what the urban future looks like, but also how it works; how it circulates ideas, value, and power. The twenty-two interlinked projects which were developed show how speculative urban design can move upstream in the decision-making processes.
Coined by Carl Schmitt and expanded by Giorgio Agamben, a “state of exception”—the exhibition’s Chinese title—refers to a political situation in which the normal laws and regulations of a society are abruptly suspended, replaced by temporary conditions that in turn become a new status quo. States of exception have been imposed at moments of crisis throughout modern history. Crisis today is constant, as ideals of freedom, equality, and openness, once held by some as universal values, give way to mass shootings, aborted ceasefires, violated norms, and tainted elections. In 2015, the Chinese leadership introduced “the new normal,” a way of talking about economic growth rates that, while lower than during the exuberant years of the early 2000s, continue to trump those of most other major economies. China’s assertively capitalist, internationalist response to these increasingly acute dynamics—recently typified by President Xi Jinping’s address to the World Economic Forum in Davos—might also be considered a “state of exception,” one that runs parallel to the new patterns of globalization that inform artistic cosmopolitanism today.
In order to lay the foundations for a discussion around the argument that the adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies benefits the powerful few, focussing on their own existential concerns, the paper will narrow down the analysis of the argument to social justice and jurisprudence (i.e. the philosophy of law), considering also the historical context. The paper explores the notion of humanised artificial intelligence in order to discuss potential challenges society might face in the future. The paper does not discuss current forms and applications of artificial intelligence, as, so far, there is no AI technology, which is self-conscious and self-aware, being able to deal with emotional and social intelligence. It is a discussion around AI as a speculative hypothetical entity. One could the ask, if such a speculative self-conscious hardware/software system were created at what point could one talk of personhood? And what criteria could there be in order to say an AI system was capable of committing AI crimes?The paper will discuss the construction of the legal system through the lens of political involvement of what one may want to consider to be powerful elites. Before discussing these aspects the paper will clarify the notion of “powerful elites”. In doing so the paper will be demonstrating that it is difficult to prove that the adoption of AI technologies is undertaken in a way which mainly serves a powerful class in society. Nevertheless, analysing the culture around AI technologies with regard to the nature of law with a philosophical and sociological focus enables one to demonstrate a utilitarian and authoritarian trend in the adoption of AI technologiesThe paper will then look, in a more detailed manner, into theories analysing the historical and social systematisation, or one may say disposition, of laws, and the impingement of neo-liberal tendencies upon the adoption of AI technologies. The regulatory, self-governing potential of AI algorithms and the justification by authority of the current adoption of AI technologies within civil society will be analysed next. The paper will propose an alternative, some might say practically unattainable, approach to the current legal system by looking into restorative justice for AI crimes, and how the ethics of care, through social contracts, could be applied to AI technologies. In conclusion the paper will discuss affect and humanised artificial intelligence with regards to the emotion of shame, when dealing with AI crimes.
The conferences “Taboo – Transgression – Transcendence in Art & Science” include theoretical presentations and artists’ talks focusing (a) on questions about the nature of the forbidden and about the aesthetics of liminality, as expressed in art that uses or is inspired by technology and science, and (b) on the opening of spaces for creative transformation in the merging of science and art.A brainchild of Dalila Honorato, Assistant Professor at the Ionian University, the first two conferences, TTT2016 and TTT2017 were held in Corfu, Greece, organized by the Department of Audio & Visual Arts and supported by public and private institutions, mostly local. In the first two years the conferences were attended by Stelarc, Roy Ascott, Adam Zaretsky, Manos Danezis, Polona Tratnik, Gunalan Nadarajan, Irina Aristarkhova, Marta de Menezes, María Antonia González Valerio, Andrew Carnie, and Kathy High as guest speakers. The third TTT conference, TTT2018, took place in Mexico City, hosted by the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (UNAM) and the Centro de Cultura Digital as part of the N Festival. At the invitation of Marta De Menezes, Ana Ventura Miranda, and María Antonia González Valerio, the conference was co-organized by the Research and Creation Group Arte+Ciencia, UNAM (MX), Arte Institute (USA), Cultivamos Cultura (PT) as well as the Department of Audio & Visual Arts, Ionian University (GR).Since its beginning TTT seeks to provide a comfortable setting for the interaction of its participants and the students of the academic institution hosting it. This is accomplished through coordinating the conference’s agenda with the development of other activities such as art exhibitions, screenings, live performances, book presentations, poster exhibitions, and workshops developed within the hosting institution in collaboration with other organizations.In 2016 and 2017, among other events, TTT teamed up with the Audiovisual Arts Festival and the Municipal Gallery of Corfu to host the exhibitions “Stelarc: Alternate Anatomies”, “iGMO: Adam Zaretsky”, and “Body Esc” which included works by artists Andrew Carnie, Alkistis Georgiou, Marne Lucas, Joseph Nechvatal, Kira O’Reilly & Manuel Vason, Nikos Panayotopoulos, Ayse Gul Suter, Hege Tapio, and Adam Zaretsky. TTT2018, coordinated in partnership with the program of the FACTT 2018 – Festival Art & Science Trans-disciplinary and Trans-national within the N Festival, included in its agenda the opening of the exhibition “Espacios de Especies” with artworks, among others, by Brandon Ballengée, Andy Gracie, Bios ex Machina, Jaime Lobato, Kathy High, Lena Ortega, Marta de Menezes, Plataforma Bioscénica, Robertina Šebjanič, and Victoria Vesna. The conference in Mexico was preceded by the TTT Satellite Physiological Bioart – Body Performance Live Art Event “BioCuerpos Perfor|m|ados”, organized by the Grace Exhibition Space in collaboration with Casa Viva Gallery, Paranoid Visions UTA, and Anemonal, with performances, among others, by Boryana Rossa, Alexander Romania, Praba Pilar, Adam Zaretsky, Alejandro Chellet, Marita Solberg, Jacco Borggreve, Margherita Pevere, Cecilia Vilca and Lorena Lo Peña.The conference proceedings of 2016 and 2017, available as free e-books published by the Department of Audio & Visual Arts – Ionian University, can be accessed via the official TTT website. Both are edited by Dalila Honorato and Andreas Giannakoulopoulos, Associated Professor at the Ionian University and webmaster of the conferences’ webspace. Selected texts from the TTT2017 and TTT2018 were published in the Special Issue vols. 15:2 and 16:3 of the journal Technoetic Arts: A Journal of Speculative Research, at the invitation of Roy Ascott (editor-in-chief) to Dalila Honorato (guest-editor). The free digital edition of the proceedings of TTT2018, edited by Dalila Honorato, María Antonia González Valerio, Marta de Menezes and Andreas Giannakoulopoulos was released in November 2019 by the Ionian University Publications.The fourth international conference “Taboo – Transgression – Transcendence in Art & Science”, taking place November 26–28, 2020, would be in Vienna, hosted by the University of Applied Arts Vienna, at the invitation of Ingeborg Reichle, Professor and Chair of the Department of Media Theory. Due to the COVID-19 crisis the conference will be exclusively online: TTT2020 Vienna/Online.The TTT conference series is supported by its Steering Committee whose members include Roy Ascott, Plymouth University (UK), Andreas Floros, Ionian University (GR), Dalila Honorato, Ionian University (GR), Gunalan Nadarajan, University of Michigan (USA), Melentie Pandilovski, Riddoch Art Gallery (AU), Stelarc, Curtin University (AU), Polona Tratnik, Alma Mater Europaea (Slovenia), and Adam Zaretsky, Marist College (US).
Adnan Hadzi presented the Immersive Lab University of Malta (ILUM) project at the ELIA Biennial. In the Immersive Laboratory University of Malta (ILUM), as well as in the Visual Narratives Laboratory (VNLAB) of Lodz Film School, researchers, artists, and filmmakers investigate and create different kinds of immersion. Researchers from Malta will focus on the insights with state-of-the-art immersive experience (IX). After the presentation, participants will be invited to join the walk-through of Lost in a garden of clouds, virtual show of works that are engaging with aspects of the climate emergency and its negationism, with the places where natural or urban ecosystems connect with the digital ones and with the exploitation of natural resources and chemical pollution.
Expanding the Arts
An online extravaganza that will energise, inspire and kindle connections throughout the entire arts education community. In partnership with Zurich University of the Arts, thought leaders from the arts and academia, producers and practitioners, will explore the brightest, boldest transdisciplinary ideas, question the art of the possible and where boundaries lie. Be part of a rich tapestry of provocation, interrogation and co-creation crossing over 40 presentations, walk-shops, workshops and a myriad of opportunities to connect with collaborators. Together let’s re-imagine Arts Education as a catalyst for change in the post-COVID world.
