CONFRONTATION

ANNIE ABRAHAMS & CLÉMENT CHARMET

2003

"A man and a woman continue to discuss without understanding the other. Each uses his/her own invented language. The words on hope, left on the site by the visitors, confront the images on war found on the web. 'confrontation' leads to an incapacity to define war and hope as opponents, but let them see more as striving forces that appear on everly level of our live. Up to a point that sometimes we can find hope in the image of war and war in the hope phrases."

Annie Abrahams is a multimedia artist born in the Netherlands and living in France. She obtained a Ph.D. in biology at the university of Utrecht and has a diploma of the Art School of Arnhem. Her most important project "being human", which concentrates on the possibilities and limitations of communication on the net, can be viewed from www.bram.org. Clément Charmet is an art student from France. Interested in computer art since 2002, he mainly uses Internet ressources, code capabilities, and random functions to generate multimedia contents. His work deals with the perception of informations and reality through medias.

TWICE-TOLD TALES

NICHOLAS ECONOMOS

2003

"A diaristic and 'open' composition comprised of sound bits culled from various recordings. The notion of 'frozen sounds' cited in Noise Water Meat, A History of Sound in the Arts by Douglas Kahn (MIT Press, 2001) served as inspiration, specifically the references to a peculiar storyline in which sounds were somehow material and silenced when frozen by extreme cold. Upon thawing the sounds could be heard but were no longer held to their original temporal sequences. In this work, various times and places mix via altered field recordings and re-recorded broadcast media. The minimal interface allows for a random combination of up to seven loops to sound together. Adjustments to the composition are made by dragging and releasing the circular graphic elements. Vertical positioning sets the volume and horizontal positioning sets the pan of each loop in the composition set. Clicking the "++" resets the screen."

Nicholas Economos is a digital media artist and educator living in rural Western New York. His art practice involves work in interactive media, sound, video, animation and prints. His work is in the archives at www.soundtoys.net and rhizome.org where he is also a SuperUser, editing content for the front page of the web site and the rhizome Rare email list. An excerpt of his sound work, "daybreak" is featured online in DRUNKEN BOAT #4, SPRING 2002 at http://www.drunkenboat.com/db4/ . He has recently exhibited at Art in General in New York City, the Visual Studies Workshop in Rochester, NY, the Chiangmai First New Media Art Festival in Thailand, DigiFest 2002 at DXNet in Toronto, the Cyberarts Festival in Boston and Net_working in Bristol and London. He is a frequent artist-in-residence at the Experimental Television Center in Owego, New York and is a visiting professor at the Electronic Integrated Arts Division of the S.U.N.Y School of Art and Design in Alfred, New York.

HIDDEN

ISABEL SAIJ

2002

"'Wienerwald', the forest surrounding Vienna. The photo is real but monochrom when the paintings of G. Klimt were coloured like a scenery. Question: what is hidden? The work is a thought about the scenery and its 'behind'. Reflection, magnifier, sliding, secret moving hiding place, background noises all signs of the "nature" of our day life. By the way, forest swarms with animal and vegetal life. Have you already seen and heard?"

Isabel Saij, originally from France, lives and works in Cologne, Germany and Vienna, Austria. She holds PhD in Visual Art and Science of Art from Sorbonne, Paris. Between 1983 and 1999 she has had solo and group exhibitions in Austria, Belgium, Germany, the Netherlands, Italy, Japan and Slovakia. She started using computer for her work, which led her to computer generated art and net art. Her net art has been shown world-wide, including soundtoy.net in UK, Digital Vision in Canada and Iceca in Thailand. She was one of the winners of Golden Pixil Award (Wales 2003) in the category "European". Her interview with soundtoy is available on the net.

SOLENOÏDES CYBER POEMS

TAMARA LAI

2002-2003

"SOLENOÏDES cyber poems (serial (9) shockwave movies and CD-Rom) -Solenoïdes : small cylinders traversed by electric wires and which create magnetic fields. This word which comes from Latin solen, shell living in the sea half inserted in sand (knife), evokes loneliness; it is employed here like metaphor of incommunicability but also of the potential possibility to create a connection. + guest solenoïdes (serial / shockwave movies) networked project / invited artists  : Guillaume Vivier (France), Pierre Rabardel (France), Eugène Savitzkaya (Belgium), John Paul Bichard (England), Fast Forward (N-Y USA), Eric Van Hove (Japan), Ralph Lichtensteiger (Germany), Emanuel Dimas Di Melo Pimenta (Portugal)"

Tamara Laï is an italo-belgian media artist working with net / web art, multimedia, computer design, video -  and writer. Video director since 1985 (PRIX ARCANAL (Arts du Spectacle) au F.I. de Video du C.A.S.B. Paris 1992), Tamara Lai converge in 1993 to the digital techniques and the writing of interactive tales and poetry (CD-ROMS). Since 1997, she centres her researches on Net - web Art (sites, cam_and_chat performances, videoconferences...), and especially on the creation of networked collective spaces. Her works were a part of main worldwide festivals and events. Web ring : TELL A MOUSE http://www.tellamouse.be.tf

STOP MOTION STUDIES

DAVID CRAWFORD

2002

"The 'Stop Motion Studies' extend my long standing interest in narrative and, in particular, look at the subway as a stage upon which social dynamics and individual behavior are increasingly mediated by digital technology. As one of the most vibrant and egalitarian networks in our cities, subways bring people from a wide range of social and cultural backgrounds into close contact with each other. This process plays a significant role in shaping both the character of a city as well as our individual identities. It is said that 90% of human communication is non-verbal. In these photographs, the body language of the subjects becomes the basic syntax for a series of Web-based animations exploring movement, gesture, and algorithmic montage. Many sequences document a person's reaction to being photographed by a stranger. Some smile, others snarl, still others perform. Some pretend not to notice. Underneath all of this are assumptions and unknowns unique to each situation." Hz shows here the first site of his series - a site on Gothenburg, Sweden. The other sites of the series can be viewed from http://www.stopmotionstudies.net/

David Crawford was born in Riverside, California in 1970. He studied film, video, and new media at the Massachusetts College of Art and received a BFA in 1997. In 1999, his "Here and Now" project was commissioned by New Radio and Performing Arts with funds from National Endowment for the Arts. In 2000, Crawford's "Light of Speed" project was a finalist for the SFMOMA Webby Prize for Excellence in Online Art. In 2003, his "Stop Motion Studies" project received an Artport Gate Page Commission from the Whitney Museum of American Art and an Award of Distinction in the Net Vision category at the Prix Ars Electronica.