DMZ: Media Arts Festival

DMZ: Media Arts Festival


PRESS RELEASE

Admission: Free
Date: Friday 14th November 03 – Saturday 15th November 2003
Opening Times: 11am – 6pm each day
Location: Limehouse Town Hall, 646 Commercial Road, London, E14 7HA

Participants include: ambientTV.net, Desperate Optimists, Digital Guild, Hi8us, Low-Fi, MAP, Pete Gomes, Mervin Jarman, Mute Magazine, PirateTV, SPC, Talkaoke, Thomson and Craighead and many more.

DMZ is a unique two-day festival showcasing the activities and achievements of media arts organisations in London, taking place at Limehouse Town Hall on Friday 14th November and Saturday 15th November. Through screenings, discussions, exhibitions, performances, DJs and practical workshop activities, this event will provide the opportunity for new audiences to explore and participate in the diverse and fascinating field of media arts culture, as well as providing an open environment for practitioners to exchange ideas, resources and create new collaborations.

The media arts field has emerged and grown over the last ten to twenty years. It comprises aspects of art, technological innovation, social research, cultural production and political and social (community) activism. Its title, DMZ, can refer to its creation of a "Digital Media Zone", while also echoing the nature of de-militarised zones, away from the colonial powers of e-commerce and corporations and one that invites inhabitation, appropriation and creative expression. As James Stevens, a DMZ participant and one of the initiators of the Deckspace media lab and consume community wireless network says:

"In military terms, a DMZ or 'demilitarised zone' is an area forming a buffer or boundary where military activity is forbidden. Some demiltarized zones are held in place for decades, and become appropriated to become wildlife preserves, public parks and markets. In Computer network terms, the DMZ is an area without the Firewalls protecting more critical systems. Typically, the DMZ is publicly accessible and carries our unrestricted Internet requests and responses. The event and activities at Limehouse Town Hall are offered in a DMZ. It is the public environment we most often inhabit and operate on a day to day basis, when we use 'the internet', articulate community, contest authority, consume and create."

DMZ offers a great diversity in its content, involving well over 30 groups, and will encompass activities ranging from multi-media production and training for young people; internet art; the reuse of old computers for creative and community groups using free operating systems; home-made solutions for wireless communications and media channels on the internet that are maintained by volunteer collectives.

Highlights include Amy Cunningham’s live singing performance intriguingly using the delay inherent in live webcasts; Thomson & Craighead will screen their acclaimed ‘Short Films About Flying’, a networked installation combining live video feed from Logan Airport, Boston and randomly loaded net radio; Hi8us and Digital Guild use digital technology for social engagement and both will showcase their alternative media networks which link under-represented communities; ambientTV.net’s ‘Telejam’ involves audiovisual artists and musicians exploring the possibilities and limitations of streaming media and its interaction with other media and physical spaces. Plus there will be much, much more.









Useful Links
www.ambientTV.net, www.desperateoptimists.com, www.digitalguild.org, www.low-fi.org.uk, www.hi8us.co.uk, http://mediaartprojects.org.uk , www.mutantfilm.com/wireless , http://www.container-project.net/Container, www.metamute.com, www.piratetv.net, www.spc.org, www.talkaoke.com, www.thomsoncraighead.net

A free publication edited by Armin Medosch will be launched to coincide with the festival.

For press information and images please contact:
Sandra Ross on 07946 576 206 or Simon Gould on 07779 340004
Or email: [email protected] or [email protected]

DMZ Media Arts festival is supported by Arts Council England and Film London. The full programme will be available from http://dmz.spc.org

Transport
Nearest Tube: Limehouse (Dockland Light Railway - 5 minutes from Bank)
Bus Routes: 15, 115, D6, D3
Parking: Pay and display area behind town hall.


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