conferences – DARTS Research Group

Internet Culture(s) – Resistance and Options panel at Videonale.17

2019-02-232019-03-14Liv Raphael

Videonale, the Festival for Video and Time-Based Arts took place at Bonn (Germany) from February 21 to 24, 2019. As part of its program, it organized a series of lectures, panels and workshops related to video art and digital cultures.

DARTS member Dr. Pau Waelder was invited to moderate the panel Internet Culture(s) – Resistance and Options with the participation of Dr. Tatiana Bazzichelli (director Disruption Network Lab, Berlin), Zach Blas (artist/lecturer in Visual Cultures, Goldsmiths University London), Vera Tollmann (cultural scientist/writer, Berlin), and Liz Haas from UBERMORGEN (artists/professors Academy of Media Arts Cologne).

The panel examined the influence of internet culture on visual art, placing a focus on artworks produced for the internet as well as alternative models to the status quo. What democratizing potentials does the internet possess, how does it alter our notions of reality, individuality, originality, identity, and truth? It also addressed questions related to surveillance and resistance, as well as the control of images and information.

Curator of the City-Science Biennial

2019-02-042021-02-18

Pau Alsina and Irma Vilà are part of the Biennial Ciutat i Ciència curatorial to be held in Barcelona from February 7 to 11.

Increasingly, science is part of our lives and, increasingly, citizens have more weight in deciding which paths to advance the search. And in Barcelona there is a lot of science and a very high level. So much so that the city is one of the European referents in various fields of research. In order to facilitate the dissemination of scientific knowledge that is generated in Barcelona and strengthen its link with the public, from 7 to 11 February, the City and Science Biennial will be held in numerous facilities in all districts. It will employ a total of 138 participating specialists.

The Biennial has seven objectives in the field of science: reflecting, participating, connecting, reinforcing equality, transmitting knowledge, enhancing transversality and complementing the Barcelona City Council’s Science Plan. In order to achieve them, it has designed a wide range of activities of very diverse formats: conferences, debates, conferences, hackatons, performing arts, music, cinema, workshops … An extensive offer that invites reflection and with which the public can Find answers to many of your concerns, understand the processes of science and actively engage in research. At the same time, it also aims to promote new scientific vocations on equal terms and bring science closer to children through an offer aimed at families.

In this line, the activities of the Biennale provide keys to form opinions and to make decisions with scientific criteria. A part of the program is framed in concepts such as citizen science or citizen laboratories, where non-specialized people participate in research projects and in the generation of new knowledge based on the real demands of society. Other activities, such as debates or a film series with a later discussion, analyze the limitations of science, methodologies, ethics, and social issues. And it goes without saying that many of the activities have a future-oriented look at the challenges that we face and how science can help us achieve them.

In short, five days to focus on the future, the challenges we face and participate in scientific thinking.

Here (web) and here (pdf) you’ll find the complete program.

Paper presentation: “Qualified self: verdad y subjetividad en la visualización del Quantified Self”

2018-11-302021-02-18

Laia Blasco presents “Qualified self: verdad y subjetividad en la visualización del Quantified Self” at Interface politics II, After post-truth. Gredits, Barcelona.

Quantified Self is today a technical reality that structures datasets of all kinds of interfaces that are created to establish, build and transform the relationship with the self, data and society itself. In a “datified” world, data visualization challenges traditional representation systems opening up a vast world of analytical and graphic opportunities. As user interfaces that are, data visualizations are artificial devices that transport cultural messages in a great variety of forms and supports; Furthermore, they are never neutral mechanisms of data transmission, but rather they affect the messages, providing a model of the world of their own, a logical and ideological scheme. The fascination with Big Data and the creation of increasingly sophisticated user interfaces pave the way for the proliferation of diverse mutations in the semiotic production of truth. A truth that springs up on the false transparency of the quantitative representation of the world and of the self. This paper analyzes the implications of the Quantified Self and its visualizations, showing its mechanisms, deceptions and fallacies behind its apparent neutrality, and demonstrating its qualitative quality inscribed in the underlying logics.