MediaLabMadrid’s DIGITAL CULTURE program.

For three months, the Centro Cultural Conde Duque (Conde Duque Cultural Center) will be an international hub of new media and tendencies in art. Four large exhibitions, performances, meetings, workshops, debates and symposia, developed by MediaLabMadrid, will fill every exhibit hall and area in the Center.

Visual, sound, and stage arts, city planning and education, science and new technologies will be represented by innovative, dynamic artists and projects.

These independent but complementary exhibits will show the multiplicity of today’s art, increasingly influenced by computer and communications technology.

Persona. Rastros, apariencias.
An intermedia, interactive installation by Concha Jerez and José Iges.

Co-production: Centro Cultural Montehermoso de Vitoria and MediaLabMadrid, at the Centro Cultural Conde Duque.
Exhibition Curator: Fernando Illana.
Dates: from January 27 until April 2, 2006.
Venue: Pedro de Ribera Exhibit Hall at the Centro Cultural Conde Duque.

Official opening: Thursday January 26th, at 7 p.m.

At 8 p.m. SOCIEDAD SECRETA, performance by Concha Jerez and José Iges.

Persona. Rastros, apariencias is the new intermedia installation by Concha Jerez and José Iges. This exhibition explores the paradoxical relationship among identity, personality, and appearance. Audience participation and interaction play an essential role.

As the word the Greeks used to mean “mask”, Persona both shows and hides things. As in all subtle games, what is shown also reveals what is hidden, through what it evokes or suggests. Perhaps as they contemplate and take part in the installation Persona, visitors will wonder: Are things the way they are or the way we see them? Are we the way we see ourselves or the way others see us?

Resonancias. Cuerpo electromagnéticos. Austria at ARCO ’06.

Exhibition Curators: Nina Czegledy and Louise Provencher.
Dates: from January 27 until April 2, 2006.
Venue: Salón de Actos at the Centro Cultural Conde Duque.

Official opening:Thursday January 26th, at 7 p.m.

Resonancias. Cuerpos electromagnéticos presents a selection of works by Canadian artists working with electromagnetism. The exhibition explores the nature of vibratory energies and the invisible but real impact they have on our bodies and sensorial perception.

The artists who created Resonancias focus on electromagnetic phenomena and their impact on organic bodies, especially on human beings. These works reflect different aspects of electromagnetism, from the visualization and “soundification” of the electromagnetic field that surrounds us to a physical examination of its possible influences and effects. The starting point for this interdisciplinary collaboration is taking the human body (and, by extrapolation, all other living organisms) as the source, reflection, and transmitter of electromagnetic waves while it also has resistance to them.

Digital Transit.  Austria at ARCO ’06.

Co-production: Ars Electronica Center of Linz (Austria) and MediaLabMadrid at the Centro Cultural Conde Duque.
Exhibition Curators: Karin Ohlenschläger, Manuela Pfaffenberger, Luis Rico and Gerfried Stocker.
Dates: from February 8 until April 16, 2006.          
Venue: Galería del 98 at the Centro Cultural Conde Duque.

Official opening: Tuesday February 7th, at 7 p.m.

Concert by Christian Fennesz (electronic music). Tuesday February 7th, at 8 p.m.

Digital Transit is a project that is a collaboration between the Ars Electronica Center of Linz (Austria) and MediaLabMadrid, at the Centro Cultural Conde Duque. It moves through the interconnections among art, science, and the social dynamics generated around them. It connects today’s computer and telecommunications technologies with visual, sound, and stage arts, architecture and city planning, science, education, citizen participation and the environment. It includes a wide range of activities in its program: exhibitions, performances, workshops, screenings, and meetings.

Digital Transit describes an environment woven out of processes and projects taking place at different scales and in different contexts: a bacterial culture, a human body, an urban fabric, a telecommunications network, or an ecosystem. Taken as a whole, it offers a systemic view that goes from genetics to city planning, computer science to education, including the new digital communities existing on the World Wide Web.

The exhibition brings together some of the most remarkable projects in digital culture, from Austria and international sources, that won awards recently at the prestigious international Ars Electronica festival.

Postmedia Condition. Austria at ARCO ’06.

Production: Neue Galerie of Graz (Austria).
Exhibition Curators: Elisabeth Fiedler and Christa Steinle.
Scientific Advisor: Peter Weibel.
Dates: from February 8 until April 16, 2006.
Venue: Galería del 98 at the Centro Cultural Conde Duque.

Official opening: Tuesday February 7th, at 7 p.m.

At 8 p.m.Concert by Christian Fennesz (electronic music).

Centro Cultural Conde Duque will present the Postmedia Condition exhibition from February 8 until April 16, 2006, in the context of the International Contemporary Art Fair, ARCO ’06. It offers a selection of 34 works by prestigious Austrian artists and young creators showing how traditional and current media influence each other, mix together, and are related to one another.

The POstmedia Condition exhibition shows how different media in today’s art influence, condition, and reflect each other. There is no longer one predominant medium. Interdisciplinary processes among drawing, painting, sculpture, photography, cinema, video, literature, architecture, design, art on the World Wide Web, and computer science language become methodological principles in this exhibition that highlights Austrian contemporary art and its international contribution.