17 Aug 2015

3D BioLab: Transformative Ecologies in Mons 2015

The TRANSFORMATIVE ECOLOGIES exhibition takes place from August 19 to August 30, 2015 in la Maison du Design gallery in Mons 2015 – European Cultural Capital. Curated by Riga based artists and curators – Rasa SMITE and Raitis SMITS, the exhibition features innovative art science works by Latvian and Belgian artists, who are envisioning sustainable future scenarios with regards to food and energy. The artists of TRANSFORMATIVE ECOLOGIES have used innovative methods to create sonic, visual and 3D representations of various environmental and biological data collected during their long term 'techno-ecological' researches.

Gints GABRANS, well-known Latvian contemporary artist, in his new artwork METABOLIC DOMINANCE offers a vision on the future of food by proposing to use cellulose disintegrating enzymes, which allows obtaining nutrients from grass, wood, paper... RIXC artists Rasa SMITE and Raitis SMITS together with Martins RATNIKS keep exploring human-plant communication by analyzing and mapping the words out from 13 000 messages received during their TALK TO ME art project: what exactly do people say to the plants so they grow better, taller and more beautiful? 'Interspecies' communication is also explored in the work of the Belgian artist AnneMarie MAES: TRANSPARENT BEEHIVE – a living sculpture with bee colonies that have been monitored, measured and visualized. Likewise, sound artist Voldemars JOHANSONS has observed the movement trajectories of an ant colony in his artwork from the ATTRACTORS series, creating a 3D object from selected data. Negotiations with micro-size species – the bacteria, have been used in two other works from the BIOTRICITY series by Rasa SMITE and Raitis SMITS: together with Voldemars JOHANSONS and Janis JANKEVICS they have made real-time sonifications and visualizations of the bacteria-electricity generation process. And together with video artist Martins RATNIKS – Rasa SMITE and Raitis SMITS have created new video and data visualizations of the POND BATTERY, which is an outcome of a seven-month long artistic and scientific research, observing an out-door 'bacteria battery' installation in the botanical garden of Riga.

The exhibition also includes artworks by two young Latvian artists: Paula VITOLA has made with her PRIVATE ATMOSPHERE a costume that helps people to create their own 'ideal' and very private environment, yet – not escaping, but rather being a part of a society. And last but not least, Rihards VITOLS proposes to launch a unique agricultural field – 'cloud-farming' with his 'aKa' (Well) project by using helium balloons to collect rain water.

The TRANSFORMATIVE ECOLOGIES exhibition is complemented by the 3D BioLab symposium that will take place the days following the exhibition opening – August 20th and 21st in Cafe Europa. The Day 1 will offer a workshop on 3D data visualization, using as a point of departure the data from two artistic science research projects – BIOTRICITY by Rasa SMITE and Raitis SMITS, and 'Intelligent beehive' by AnneMarie MAES. During Day 2 the artists Gert AERTSEN and David DE BUYSER will introduce their approach to 3D object generation by conducting a workshop on WIND, SPEECH, SOUND AND MOVEMENT.


PRELIMINARY SYMPOSIUM PROGRAMME at CAFÉ EUROPA, Mons, Belgium

Wednesday, 19.08.2015

18:00 > 20:00
Exhibition Opening with Bacteria Battery art-science public show by Rasa Smite and Raitis Smits / RIXC and audiovisual performances by Rihards Vitols / Trihars and Martins Engelis / VADi.

Thursday, 20.08.2015

12:00 > 16:00
Symposium Day 1: BIOTRICITY, a poetics of green energy, INTELLIGENT BEEHIVE research and 3D DATA VISUALIZATION: workshop conducted by Rasa Smite, Raitis Smits by AnneMarie Maes.

17:00 > 20:00
3D BioLab Public Program: Renewable Futures lecture, artist presentations and participatory discussions (Playing Fields I).

Friday, 21.08.2015

12:00 > 16:00
Symposium Day 2: WIND, SPEECH, SOUND AND MOVEMENT RESEARCH, AND 3D OBJECT GENERATION: a workshops conducted by Gert Aertsen and David de Buyser
David De Buyser will present and perform with his bio-electronic synthesizer called FUNGUS-BOX. It's an instrument of which the sound changes according to the life cycle of a mould culture. The technique used to create this synthesizer is what could be seen as the inverse of data visualisation: images of the mould culture are transcribed into midi-data and subsequently used for sound synthesis.
stateofstability.org/
Gert Aertsen will guide us through the mechanics of speech. His artistic research project AARGH explores the possibilities of a site specific sound installation in which wind is used as a force or input to generate sound that is perceived as speech.
atkn.org/wiki/index.php/Aargh

17:00 > 20:00
3D BioLab Closing Program: lectures and participatory discussions (Playing Fields II), workshop result demos and art science performances.

Sunday, 23.08.2015

15:00 > 18:00
FAMILY 3D BIOLAB (for local participants): VIRTUOSO workshop – introducing experiments from the 17th century scientists–amateurs and how artists today work with science: building battery from mud, using bees as living 3D printers, 'harvesting' drinking water from the clouds.

Exhibition opening hours: Tuesday to Friday – 10:00 to 17:00, Saturday and Sunday – 10:00 to 18:00

More info: rixc.org

Contact: rixc (at) rixc.lv, rasa (at) rixc.org (Rasa Smite), +371-26546776

Organized by RIXC in collaboration with Mons 2015, Technocite and OKNO/Brussels Urban Bee Laboratory.

The project is a part of Mons 2015 – European Capital of Culture – Digital projects. It is co-financed by Latvian Ministry of Culture of Republic of Latvia, and European Economic Area Financial mechanism.