02 Apr 2013

Request for Submissions: AppArtAward 2013 of the ZKM, Karlsruhe

Awarded will be works of art in App-format for Smartphones and tablets, which represent creative software solutions in the designated fields. Apps may be submitted from March 11 on; the deadline is May 12, 2013.

The presentation of the AppArtAward will take place on Friday, July 12, 2013, at the ZKM | Karlsruhe.

Apps have meanwhile developed into a popular medium, and have become an integral part of our mobile culture. The sheer volume of them in diverse online shops is growing exponentially. In addition to purely service applications that contribute to easing our everyday lives, the artistic potential of the applications has also been exploited: established, artistic genres are transferred to the App medium and transformed there. New forms of art emerge, innovative ideas are implemented in aesthetic forms, and subversive intellectual games find application in the mobile medium. Possibilities for the new technologies are sounded out in a creative approach.

The ZKM | Center for Art and Media, the CyberForum and its partner seek to provide an account of these developments. Apps that have distinguished themselves as advanced, artistic applications are sought in the following categories:

Prize for Artistic Innovation
This comprehensive category is directed at all creative, innovative App-developments that make use of the artistic design scope of the media.

Special Prize for Crowd Art
Crowd Art refers both to deterritorialized networked Cloud Computing, as well as to the collective creativity made possible as a result. Furthermore, Crowd Art marks the shift from the analog age of production (mass commodities manufactured by mechanical means, mass culture etc.) in the age of digital distribution (data, media, personalization: the masses as a collective of individuals). Apps on mobile terminal devices are the global testing stations for this new art form.

Special Prize for Augmented Reality Art
Applications of Augmented Reality introduce to our perception the reality of another dimension: the idea, as well as the current possibilities of application – an overlaying of reality by way virtual objects – augment our possibilities enormously. Against the background of the wealth of information, and in the spirit of an intelligent visualization of information – and not least one of flow-control – what is revealed here is a challenge to creativity.

The ZKM in collaboration with partners from the economy and science awarded the first AppArtAward worldwide in 2011 and 2012. The best works of art to be distinguished in App-format were those distinguishing themselves as advanced artistic software solutions. The reactions in politics and society, as well as in particular media response on ARD and ZDF, in Deutschlandfunk or in well-known print media such as Focus, demonstrate that with the AppArtAward an innovative event with an international orientation has been established. With the award ceremony 2012, we also managed to launch the event as a special forum of IT technology, economy, science and culture.

AppArtAward – Highlights are presently on tour as an exhibition, and in the near future they will be on show in Peking, Seoul, Montréal and Sao Paulo. Present inquiries by international institutions show that interest in the innovative developments in this artistic field is not subsiding, and is poised to make a significant impact.

The following prices to be awarded this year are:
Prize for Artistic Innovation to the sum of € 10.000
Special Prize for Crowd Art to the sum of € 10.000
Special Prize for Augmented Reality Art to the sum € 10.000

Further information: www.app-art-award.org