The outdoor space atop the main gallery and before the future lab space seems to tie the old architecture of the church to the futuristic style of the Ars Center. Click on the image below for a larger size, the church is to the left of the future lab stairs.

It is one of those buildings that people either love or hate…I loved it. At night, the LED lights that line the outer glass wall change color. Something like a nocturnal visual surprise every time you glance at it.

The festival itself is something to experience. Since its now over, i would highly recommend visiting the Ars Electronica center to see some of the pieces that formed a benchmark of the festival. Besides, I am convinced that Linz would make a perfect location for any techy, futuristic or even a good action movie. Be it Minority Report 2 or next Bond 007, I can totally vouch for the stunning imagery it would evoke if someone like Daniel Craig would rappel down the Ars Center and straight into a boat on the Danube. (Spielberg, Soderberg, Wachowski brothers and whoever produces 007 – you are welcome )

Ahem, pardon my digression. Back to nerds needing art.

This has admittedly been a very busy year for me, and I have to admit that I did not expect it to be. With time, I’ve realized that being in the tech space can sometimes sap your sense of wonder. Or maybe its just me. If you are one of those people who feel mired in tech and sometimes feel like the ‘wow’ factor is gone when you see new innovations…and it elicits a bland ‘hmmm’ reaction and god forbid ‘meh’ – Well you need a healthy dose of art. Attending Ars Electronica helped me marvel again at what artists, architects, performance artists and idea mongers have to share. Below I will share afew of the pieces i particularly enjoyed, and provide some links to blogposts by the other wonderful speakers and friends from the Cloud Symposium.

Quartet.cc

Quartet is a Web-interactive robotic music installation. The machine you see in the live video feed is housed at an innovative museum in Linz, Austria, ARS Electronic. Seeing the machine live, inches away is an visceral experience that shows the real power of live music… and that robots can be a part of that experience. Visitors at the museum are able to enter melodies from a laptop in the museum for immediate interactivity

You play a short melody on the site Quartet.cc then you see the music interpreted onto the machine. Try it…

Since I have a thing for mobile phones (Nokia) I greatly enjoyed the robot controlled by bluetooth.
This is a picture of the phone.

This is the little robot it controls. How fun!

The Anoto pen

This is basically the livescribe pen on steroids. You can write and record audio which is digitized and transferable pdf docs or uploaded online. The steroids bit: The Anoto pen can be used to navigate a map, displaying relevant data on a big screen. For example, if you click on a specific point on the map of Linz, and would like to know the demographics of the region, you can tap on the legend provided on a page to give you stats on number of divorced people between the age of 21 and 45. This was preety cool because it combines maps, tactile input of using a pen and a digital display to add more data.

I got to play the loopscape game with the renowned tech journalist Cyrus Farivar. I really could claim victory, but really…it was a draw.

“loopScape” is an innovative video game for two players that blurs the conventional distinction between good and evil, between “my side” and “the opposition.”

The action doesn’t take place on a flat display but rather on a 360° band arrayed around the edge of a ceiling-suspended metal “doughnut” that’s circumnavigated during play. The object is to shoot down the opponent. But be careful! If a fired missile misses its target, it continues on its trajectory and threatens to strike from behind the game figure that launched it.

This loopscape game is a form of interactive device art, and for some reason, it brought to mind the idea of participatory art. Something that Wambui, Sciculturist and I were discussing at RAMOMA gallery in Nairobi. Check out this ‘Watoto Wa Kwetu’ piece by Wambui. More pics are on this flickr set. I think the loopscape game has participatory qualities just like the Watoto wa kwetu paintings, because both pieces are best experienced with others. There are some observations that Wambui made on the Watoto wa kwetu paintings that I would not have noticed. Do note that the paintings are done by a group of children, and not one artist. So, there is that aspect too.

This is just but a sampling of what was in store at Linz. I havent even touched on the animations. I hope you enjoy the perspectives shared by the others on the Cloud Symposium blog, videos posted there and the following links too.

Kristen Taylor – Mosaics, food and the cloud If you are wondering about her cool dress, its vintage. I had to ask I am not much of a beer drinker, so her suggestion to get some Secco (Austrian white sparkling wine) with our dinner was just invaluable.

David Sasaki – An outsider’s guide to Linz Indispensable. His talk about cloud intelligence provided the framework for discussion that day.

I keep digressing from this nerds need art theme, but hopefully i can tie it all together.

In the quest to not lose your sense of wonder, sometimes you need to look inward, be quiet and just think about the bigger picture. To find the creative place. If you’ve ever used the words ‘code is poetry’ ‘Math is elegant’ or ‘no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should’. There is this need to look inward, to find that inner muse and embrace the imagination. I think whenever you need to go to such a place, art can provide that gateway.

The Thinking Chair by Arthur Ganson

Where does inanimate material end and where does life begin? Arthur Ganson lets his “Thinking Chair” straddle the boundary between those two states. Through its movements—which resemble the gait of a human being walking on two legs—the chair exhibits animate traits. Arthur Ganson had the idea that led to this work while taking a walk. Near his studio, there is a small rock outcropping on a trail, which he likes to walk around in slow circles, deep in thought. During this walking meditation, each cycle finds him back in the same physical place but in a slightly different emotional place

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Spotted in Nairobi, January 2008
At Lagoon, a bar/nyama choma (roast meat) joint.

Got more in your archives? If so, please comment?

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Natalie would like imagine a future where environmental matters are not framed as something ‘other’ something far away. When a storm hits and a city is flooded, the act of nature can be framed as something that is part of climate change, yet it could be a failure of infrastructure.

There was a time when there were 350 industrial chemicals in breast milk, because of industrial pollution.

Children in America now have increased rates of Asthma, developmental delays, childhood diabetes and cancer. All these diseases can be traced to environmental contaminants yet peadiatricians are not trained to deal with these diseases, they were trained to deal with mumps and the like.

The environmental health clinic ‘office’ was set up using left over plastic bottles with a polyresin-like ‘floor’. she had it floating on the Hudson river.

She uses performance art to make a point about environmental issues. Case in point, she came up with a name-a-tadpole project where she assigned names of local EPA(Environmental Protection Agency) reps to the tadpoles. She then made a plastic container to ‘walk’ the tadpole. so when someone asks her “Why are you walking a tadpole?” or “what is your tadpole’s name?’ She can initiate a conversation about the environment, that could even lead to the discussion on why there is a 2 1/2 year drop in the age of puberty in young girls. All these things can be tied to environmental contaminants.

Mice are great biosamples. Your urine sample may not really give you much info about your contaminants, but if you had a mouse in your house, checking its bio-profile would give you information about lead levels and other environmental counters.
She set up a mouse trap and set up sections for mice to have a choice for drinking water with zoloft, plain water, vodka or gin. The mice drank the vodka. (please check her site for a better description of this project)

The greenlight is a solar awning powered suspended domestic lighting fixture that uses vegetation to diffuse light and reduce indoor house pollutants.

In the past when nuclear threats were a big issue, there were designs for bomb shelters, which were then included in building plans. What would a bomb shelter for the climate crisis look like?

*If you have the Best of Technology Writing 2007, there is a good piece about her. Fascinating work.

A 650 KiloWatt Solar Array Completed in Hawthorne, California: “

Lithographix, Thinksolar, and Pacific Solar Energy
There are many green things you can do with a giant commercial building’s roof. From painting it white to reflect the sun’s rays, to building a green roof, to installing a solar array to generate electricity. Lithographix, a printing company, went for this last option and now has the first commercial solar array in Hawthorne, California.
…

I can only dream of doing this one day… However, last month during the holidays, my uncles & aunts put together some money for a solar system for Granny C, pics and a more detailed post is forthcoming.

PS: Happy new year, may 2009 be truly brilliant.

Song of the Day: Nairobi by Sauti Sol, featuring Stan. Why? one line…’Nairobi, kuna solar sana! kijijini ni ku poa sana’