Tim Devine and I made 4 improvisations for the radiospotting project in Linz, Austria which is taking place Sep 11 – Oct 31 2009.  Small radio transmitters tuned to 103Mhz are situated at multiple locations around the city and participants are encouraged to bicycle about the city with portable radios.

Writers and musicians collaborated on each space, with the writer’s text used as inspiration for locational compositions.

We developed and improvised 4 pieces for Pure Data, Roland drum pad, and electric guitar:

Pics from the opening expedition, Sep 11 2009:

In the meantime, I’ve been busy with robotcowboy:

• May 16 Altavoz Electronic Music Festival, Venice, IT
• Apr 25 Liwoli FLOSS Hacklab 09, Kunst Uni, Linz, AT
• Apr 04 STRP Media Arts Festival in Eindhoven, NL

Also, I’ve been invited to present and perform at the New Media Meeting in Norrköping Sweden, May 28-31 09.

How much does the new Ars Electronica Center cost?

AEC New Years facade show part 3

DJ Sniff on Turntable Night at the Smart Project Space, Amsterdam NL

Here is my visual take on turntablism …

Alex Nowitz on Concert 2 Night at The Smart Project Space, Amsterdam NL

I took part in the openFrameworks Lab at the Ars Electronica Festival 08:

Zachary Lieberman and Theo Watson, originators of openFrameworks, an open source, C++ toolkit for artists and creative technologists, are transforming the 1st floor of the Brucknerhaus into an experimental laboratory: OF lab. The idea is to build a space where a dozen or so hackers, tinkerers and researchers will hang out and experiment, make art, create guerrilla exhibitions around the festival and document their progress and discoveries. The”OF lab”will focus on creating new works that come directly out of suggestions from the festival audience members, and over the course of the event, create a feedback loop between suggestions, experimentation, making projects, exhibiting the results and most importantly, exposing the process.

Before the festival began, the OF Lab team built the software and installed the hardware used during the festival. I built an automated security camera system with 3 monitor displays and a hardware video switcher.

People visiting the lab proposed projects using up to 5 words and were photographed holding their idea. These pictures were printed and transported to the 2nd floor where the laboratory members processed the idea and created new media project. The idea submitters were then contacted and shown the resulting project in a small public exhibition. Image and video documentation were taken and finished projects displayed in the first floor exhibition.

Pierre and I made 2 projects:

Veski is a better man?!

Project id: 34
Time: 6 hrs
Lines of Code: 945
Description:

We don’t know who Veski is so we did a Google search and discovered Anne Veski, an Estonian singer and a weird baby picture from “veski.com”. We then Googled “better man: and arrived at “betterman.com”, a penis enlargement website.

Wo, without further ado, we have the singing sensations …

Download the Code (zip)

a good art sniffer

Project id: 73
Time: 6 hrs
Lines of Code: 259
Description:

sense = smell

art = good, mediocre, or crap

behold the art sniffer, kind of like a geiger counter but for talent

Download the Code (zip)

The project was part of the Double Take Exhibition at Eyebeam from Jul 12 – Aug 8 08

Check out the official project wiki

UPDATE Sept 08: soundMetal will be in Nick Collin’s Hand Made Electronic Music and the video on the accompanying dvd!

Proposal

This is my proposal to the Eyebeam Interactivos? call for project proposals, May 2008. The workshop theme is :

The theme of this workshop is centered around exploring the tension of real versus fake. What is authentic in the realm of the digital? Can something be so fake that it moves into the realm of the real?

Abstract:

This paper proposes the project SoundMetal: An Unreal Touch Experience to the Eyebeam Interactivos? call for proposals, May 2008. SoundMetal is a simple system to turn any conductive surface in the city into a conduit for unexpected sound generation. Users simple grasp a subway pole and any further skin contact influences the system to create sound, creating a unique experience to those not accustomed to the concept of body conductance. It is hoped that this simple concept could lead to a moment of “unreality of the everyday” for those involved.

soundMetal: An Unreal Touch Experience proposal (.pdf)

Finished Project

The paper proposes the Wearable Audio/Visual Unit project which
aims to provide a uniform embedded wearable computer platform for
live audio/visual performance. Targeted at the “do-it-yourself” per-
former with limited technical expertise and resources, this device will
be designed using commercially available hardware, utilize open source
software, and be made available as plans, software downloads, and
collaboration through an online community. It is hoped that such an
alternative to both the laptop computer and stacks of audio gear will
change the nature of future live performance.

The Wearable Audio/Visual Unit: A Platform for Embodied Computer Performance (pdf)