Pixelache Helsinki . Press Release, 13.1.2020 . [suomeksi alas, sammanfattning på svenska nedan]

ENGLISH:

BioSignals project is a series of site-specific cultural events based in the Nordic-Baltic region that has explored the overlaps of sound art, narrations and nature-based data streams by human and non-human cultural producers. It has involved Pixelache members, partners and other invited guests, beginning in Spring through to the end of Summer 2018, curated outcomes which were presented at Pixelache Helsinki 2019 Festival. This current phase of introductory activities closed with newly commissioned sound artwork-as-mixtape, and an, both published in the project’s online archive during Winter 2019-2020.

The artistic content of the project focused on creative and actual interpretations of bio- semiotics, energy as media and communication. Biosemiotics is an increasingly influential paradigm of thinking which brings together biology and com- munication, signs and signals of life in its myriad forms. In particular it offers conceptual tools to consider communications and environmental meaning-making from a non-human perspective, including plant and lichens, animal, bacterial, elemental interactors, via tactile, aural and signal-based biochemical means.

The aim of the event series (7 in total) was to explore this subject through art and culture production, festival gatherings which hosted artistic and hybrid sound, dance and art-science practices, and Internet radio broadcasts or streams (including afterwards via online archive).

 
The 1st event began in Helsinki with a lecture and a curated radio broadcast with the topic ‘battery (energy) is the message’. The 2nd and 3rd events moved to the Baltic windy-coastal locations with partner organisations: In West Latvia (Sounds Days, with Art Research Lab, Liepaja University), South-west Estonia (1st Toortuumik festival, produced by Maalabor in Virtsu) during May-June 2018. Reflections took place with an internal and public seminar as the 4th event at Art Laboratory Berlin in late Autumn 2018. 

The project was presented as a 5th event in Pixelache Helsinki 2019 Festival at Finnish Bioart Society’s SOLU Gallery in Katajanokka, Helsinki, with a selected audio archive featuring sound based pieces and documentation by 2018’s contributors: Laura Beloff, Krista Dintere, Juan Duarte, and Antye Greie-Ripatti. BioSignal's physical performative presence which culminated on Saturday 25.5. with a programme themed as ‘Augmented Listening for The Bio-Community’ featuring presentations by Teemu Lehmusruusu, Krista Dintere, as well as Juan Duarte, with a picnic style outdoor listening event on Katajanokka shore, Helsinki, featuring his Aeolian Artefacts project, a wind-electromagnetic-atmosphere-based recording instrument that converts elemental date to electroacoustic signals.
 

The second-last and last events (6 & 7) announced the online archive of audio recordings made or curated in earlier events in 2018. We also commissioned a new sound artwork by Antye Greie-Ripatti, aka AGF, poemproducer, who made a BioSignals ‘Mixtape’, 56 minutes long. It is a creative composition of many of the audio samples, field-recordings and interviews we collected and curated in the whole process. It will be broadcast by Korppiradio on Monday 13th January from 18.00-19.00, completing this cycle of BioSignals 2018-2020.

We (Pixelache & Maalabor) hope to continue the project in the future (2021-2022) with further fieldwork in Virtsu & West Estonia, near the grounds of the historical grounds of dwelling of the Estonian-Baltic-German Von Uexküll family. The natural scientific work of Johann Von Uexküll and his son Thure, conceived the concept of Umwelt, the communication sphere of any given organism, which gave the theoretical basis for biosemiotics as a scientific field.
 

Programme curated by co-producers: Andrew Gryf Paterson & Mikko Lipiäinen

Project webpage: pixelache.ac/projects/biosignals

Online listening archive (in progress): archive.org/details/@biosignals

Media archive (coming soon): archive.org/details/@biosignals-process

Festival 2019 info page: pixelache.ac/festivals/breaking5thwall/biosignals

Technical support for Festival event from Aalto University ARTS.

Supported by Nordisk Kultur Kontakt Culture & Art programme 2/2017.

SUOMEKSI:

BioSignals-hanke on pohjois- ja Baltian maihin sijoittuvien paikkasidonnaisten kulttuuritapahtumien sarja, joka tarkastelee ihmisen ja muiden elämänmuotojen tuottamien äänitaiteen, kertomusten ja luontoperäisten tietovirtojen rajapintoja. Hankkeeseen osallistui kevään ja kesän 2018 aikana Pixelachen jäseniä ja yhteistyökumppaneita sekä vierailevia taiteilijoita, ja sen tulokset esiteltiin näyttelynä osana Pixelache Helsinki 2019 -festivaalia. Yhteenvetona tästä prosessista tilattiin myös mixtape-äänitaideteos, joka julkaistiin hankkeen verkkoarkistossa talvella 2019-20.
 

Projektin taiteellinen sisältö keskittyi luoviin ja tieteellisesti vakiintuneisiin tulkintoihin biosemiootikasta sekä energiasta mediana ja viestinnän muotona. Biosemiotiikka on kasvavassa määrin arvovaltaa saavuttava tieteen paradigma, joka yhdistää biologian ja viestinnän, elämän merkit ja signaalit lukemattomissa muodoissaan. Erityisesti se tarjoaa käsitteellisiä työkaluja ymmärtää viestintää ja sitä, mikä tekee elinympäristöistä mielekkaitä muusta kuin ihmislajin - kuten vaikkapa kasvien, jäkälien, eläinten, bakteerien ja luonnonvoimien - näkökulmasta tunto-, ääni- ja muun signaalipohjaisen biokemiallisen kommunikoinnin keinoin.

Tähän mennessa yhteensä seitsemän järjestetyn tapahtuman tavoitteena on ollut tutkia tätä aihetta taiteen ja kulttuurin tuotannon avulla sekä festivaalitapaamisissa, jotka ovat tuoneet yhteen monialaisesti taidetta ja tiedettä keskittyen erityisesti tanssi- ja äänitaiteeseen sekä Internet-radiolähetyksiin.

Ensimmäinen tapahtuma koostui Helsingissä järjestetystä luennosta ja sen yhteyteen kuratoidusta radiolähetyksestä, jonka aiheena oli Akkuenergia viestinä. Toinen ja kolmas tapahtuma järjestettiin touko-kesäkuussa 2018 kumppanitahojen kanssa Itämeren tuulisilla rannikkoalueilla: Länsi-Latviassa (Äänipäivät yhdessä Liepajan yliopiston Art Research Labin kanssa) ja Lounais-Virossa (Maalaborin tuottamalla Toortuumik-festivaalilla Virtsussa). Näiden tapahtumien tuloksia pohdittiin neljännessa tilaisuudessa seminaari- ja näyttelymuotoisesti Berlin Art Laboratoryssa syksyllä 2018.

Projekti esittäytyi viidennen kerran Pixelache Helsinki 2019 -festivaalilla Suomen biotaiteen seuran SOLU-galleriassa Katajanokalla, Helsingissä. Tilaisuudessa oli kuultavana kuratoitu ääniarkisto, joka sisälsi ääniteoksia ja -dokumentaatioita vuoden 2018 osallistujilta Laura Beloffilta, Krista Dinterelta, Juan Duartelta ja Antye Greie-Ripatilta. Esittäytyminen huipentui lauantaina 25.5. Laajennettu kuunteluharjoitus bioyhteisölle -ohjelmalla, joka sisälsi Teemu Lehmusruusun ja Krista Dinteren esitelmät sekä Helsingin Katajanokan rannalla järjestetyn piknik-tyylisen ulkokuuntelutapahtuman, jossa Juan Duarte esitteli Aeolian Artefacts -hankkeensa esiintymällä kehittämänsä tuulienergiaa ja ilmakehän sähkomagneettisia ilmiöitä sähköiseksi muuntavan instrumenttinsa kanssa.

Kuudentena ja seitsemantenä tapahtumana julkaistiin vuoden 2018 aiemmissa tapahtumissa toteutettujen tai kuratoitujen äänitteiden online-arkisto. BioSignalsin kauden 2018-20 päätteeksi tilasimme vielä Biosignals 'Mixtape' ääniteoksen myös AGF:na ja poemproducerina tunnetulta Antem Greie-Ripatilta. Tämä 56 minuutin mittainen äänikollaasi, joka koostuu koko prosessin aikana kerätyistä ääninäytteistä, kenttätallenteista ja haastatteluista, on mahdollista kuulla Korppiradiossa maanantaina 13. tammikuuta klo 18.00–19.00.

Toivomme (Pixelache & Maalabor) jatkavamme hanketta tulevaisuudessa (2021-2022) tekemällä lisää kenttätyötä Virtsussa ja Länsi-Virossa, lähellä virolais-balttialais-saksalaisen von Uexküllin perheen historiallista asuinpaikkaa. Johann Von Uexküllin ja hänen poikansa Thuren luonnontieteellinen työ hahmotteli Umwelt-käsitteen, joka loi teoreettisen perustan biosemiotiikalle tieteenalana.

BioSignals-ohjelman kuraattorit ja tuottajat: Andrew Gryf Paterson & Mikko Lipiäinen

Ohjelman verkkoarkisto: pixelache.ac/projects/biosignals

Ohjelman verkkoarkisto (meneillään): archive.org/details/@biosignals

Ohjelman media-arkisto (tulossa pian): archive.org/details/@biosignals-process

Pixelache Festival 2019 -sivusto: pixelache.ac/festivals/breaking5thwall/biosignals

Pixelache Festivalin tekninen tuki: Aalto University ARTS.

BioSignalsia on tukenut Nordisk Kultur Kontaktin kultuurin ja taiteen ohjelma 2/2017.

PÅ SVENSKA: 

BioSignals

BioSignals projektet är en serie av Nordiska-Baltiska platsspecifika kulturella evenemang som har forskat hur ljudkonst, narrativ och naturbaserade mänskligt och icke-mänskligt producerade data strömmar överlappar varandra. Projektets konstnärliga innehåll fokuserade på kreativa och aktuella tolkningar av bio-semiotik, energi som media och kommunikation.

Projektet har involverat medlemmar av Pixelache, partners och inbjudna gäster med början på våren 2018 till slutet av sommaren 2018, vilket utmynnade i i kuraterade verk som presenterades på Pixelache Helsinki 2019 festivalen. Denna inledande fas slutade med ett nytt mixtape-ljudkonst-arbete som beställdes av Antye Greie-Ripatti, aka AGF, poemproducer, och publicerades på projektets hemsida under vintern 2019-2020. Korppiradio sänder ljudkonstverket på måndag 13.1. från 18:00-19:00. och avslutar samtidigt BioSignals perioden 2018-2020.

Biosignals -evenemangsseriens (sammanlagt 7) mål var att utforska ämnet genom konst och kulturproduktion, festivalmöten som presenterade konstnärlig- och hybridljud, dans och vetenskapskonstpraktiker, samt internetradiosändningar och streams (som har inluderats i online arkivet). BioSignals -evenemang har ägt rum i Finland, Estland, Latvien och Tyskland och vi (Pixelache och Maalabor) vill fortsätta arbetet i Virtsu och västra Estland nära den tyska von Uexküll -familjens historiska boplatser.

BioSignals kuratorer: Andrew Gryf Paterson & Mikko Lipiäinen

Projektwebbplats: pixelache.ac/projects/biosignals

Online arkiv (under arbete): archive.org/details/@biosignals

Media arkiv (kommer snart): archive.org/details/@biosignals-process

Festival 2019 hemsida: pixelache.ac/festivals/breaking5thwall/biosignals

Tekniskt stöd på festivalen av Aalto universitet ARTS.

Med stöd av Nordisk Kultur Kontakt kultur & konst program 2/2017.

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COLLABORATORS & PARTNERS – SHORT BIOS

Andrew Gryf Paterson (Scotland/Finland) "Artist-organiser", cultural producer, educator and independent researcher. He specialises in developing and leading inter- and trans- disciplinary projects exploring connections between art, digital culture and science, cultural activism, ecological and sustainability movements, cultural heritage and collaborative networks. He is currently chairperson of Pixelache Helsinki, was the initiator of Biosignals project, acts as coordinator/exec producer. http://agryfp.info

Antye Greie-Ripatti (Finland) is a sound sculptor, poetess, composer, music producer, gender activist, sound curator. She initiated Hai Art, an art platform that integrates experimental arts into Hailuoto island life. New media, sound art, environmental, ecological and participatory arts crossover to science and education and intertwine international and local programs in Hailuoto. http://antyegreie.com/ - https://vimeo.com/channels/haiarthailuoto 

Laura Beloff (Finland/Denmark) is an internationally acclaimed artist and researcher who functions in-between academic leadership & research with a core in the arts and in artistic methods. She has been actively producing art works and exhibiting worldwide in museums, galleries and art events since the 1990’s. Research interests, art–technology–science, practice-based investigations into a combination of technology, biology, IT, biotechnologies, biosemiotics, in connection to art, humans, non-humans, and society. http://www.realitydisfunction.org/ 

Juan Duarte (Mexico/Germany) is a media artist who uses interactions as a tool for generative art experiments . The exploration of digital and analog platforms as agents to transform that express sonically and visually materials. The exploration of sonic experiences put in public space may bring an opportunity for a ludic and cultural approach on technological exploration. His work has been presented in CTM Festival 2015, Spiral Gallery,, AAVE Festival, Bonniers Konsthall, Rundum Showcase, ICLI 2014, Ljudmila, Radio and TV Museum of Lahti, Centre for Contemporary Art - Ujazdowski Castle, Mänttä Art Festival. Whithin BioSignals project, in particular Aeolian Artefacts is featured aims to create an installation of sonic objects which respond to wind force to produce sound. These sonic objects will combine electronic and mechanical techniques, each offering different possibilities of expression and dynamics to consider. http://juanduarteregino.com - http://juanduarteregino.com/Aeolian-Artifacts 

Mikko Lipiäinen (Finland/Germany) is an artist-activist who´s work is mainly socially engaged and multi-disciplinary varying from community organizing to problematize gentrification, challenging art world and mainstream media to touch issues related to migrant labour through open source product design processes and reflect the discourses and roles adopted by media-activists through performance and participatory drama. He has been working mainly in Finland, co-designing and facilitating many local and international activities in a Tampere based DIY cultural center Hirvitalo together with its politically and culturally active public. Lately he´s been slowly developing informal learning and citizen science activities in rural Bahia, Brazil through the experimentation of hackerspace form. He is currently studying in MA of New Media Art programme in Liepaja University, Latvia. http://mikkolipiainen.weebly.com/ 

Interspecifics. "We are a nomadic multispecies collectivity experimenting in the intersection between art and science. We embrace hybridized practices among different disciplines and living organisms, open knowledge and precarity as a challenge. Our current lines of research are based in the use of sound to understand the bioelectrical activity of different bacterial consortiums, plants, slime molds and humans using DIY and custom-made sets of hardware we call ontological machines." http://interspecifics.cc/

Kristjanis Rijnieks (Lativa/Finland) is a creative technologist working within the intersection between art, design and engineering. He likes to write code in more than one programming language as well as to experiment with digital fabrication and run workshops related to projection mapping. Currently Krisjanis spends most of his time developing ofxPiMapper–an open source projection mapping tool for the Raspberry Pi mini-computer. Running workshops and using the software for projects are parts of the game. Follow the ofxPiMapper Facebook page for details. Krisjanis is also teaching the Digital Fabrication Studio course at the Aalto Fab Lab in Helsinki. https://rijnieks.com/ 

Samir Bhowmik (Finland) is an architect, artist and designer, with a practice focused on the past and the future materiality of museums and media infrastructure and how that affects and shapes material resources and environmental responsibility. In early 2017 he was a visiting scholar at Humboldt University Berlin, and is currently working as a post-doctoral researcher, supported by Finnish Cultural Foundation, under the title:‘The Museum is the Message: An Archaeology of Power, Media and Materiality of Digital Heritage’. http://samirbhowmik.cc/ 

Krista Dintere is an artist from Latvia working between the fields of Sound Art, Experimental Composition, Media arts and creative research. In her works she focuses on Sound as a material in Arts, explores the borders of physicality of sound and how sound is communicated. Recently she is focusing on site-specific installations and experimental compositions which try to reveal the relationship between factuality of  field recordings and fictional sonic worlds created by means of artistic interpretation. Krista Dintere has participated and her works have been presented in media art and sound art exhibitions, projects and light festivals in Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Germany, Italy, Poland, including RIXC Gallery and “Staro Riga” lights festival in Riga, Art Research Lab MpLAB in Liepaja University, Art Laboratory Berlin, project "Swamp Radio" Lithuanian national pavilion in Venice Architecture Biennale. For more information about Swamp Radio see: http://smitesmits.com/SwampRadio.html - https://soundcloud.com/dintere 

Teemu Lehmusruusu (b. 1981) is a Helsinki-based media and installation artist whose works examine and test the basic conditions and causalities of life in our common environments. Lehmusruusu completed a Degree Programme in Photography at Aalto University and also studied at the Berlin University of the Arts. He is currently working on Trophic Verses, a four-year artistic exploration into the life of soil. He is working on his PhD in artistic research at Aalto University. https://www.tellingtree.fi/ 

Sarah Hermanutz is a Canadian artist working at the intersections of performance, technology, and ecology. She conducts personal performance experiments, and collaborates with dancers to explore the complex and often unspoken social assumptions between the minds and bodies of audiences, performers, and props (both human and non-human). Her artistic research is concerned with vulnerability, survival, horror, terror, and the dangerously seductive power of myth-making. She currently splits her time between graduate studies (Media Environments) at the Bauhaus University, Weimar, and a Berlin-based art practice at Lacuna Lab, an art and technology collective she co-founded in 2015. Her performances and projects have been presented in Canada, the USA, Germany, and the Netherlands, at venues such as Art Laboratory Berlin and the Martin-Gropius-Bau. http://sarahhermanutz.com/about/

Nenad Popov is a media anarchist whose interests lie in, or better, between art and plain research. The output of these processes are live cinema pieces, sound installations, film installations, weird sound making contraptions, impossible collaborations and occasional parasitism on public cultural funds. Not just that: huge amount of written code, public and private, interfacing this with that, embodied algorithms, alleged bar fights, organizing workshops and giving classes. He has collaborated with many artists working in similar fields, such as Daan Brinkmann, Electronic Opera, Thomas Köner and Lillevan/Rechenzentrum. Solo performances include Dis- Patch, TodaysArt, E-Pulse and Share. His latest research topics are possibilities of collaborating with non-human entities. http://morphogenesis.eu/about.html

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Event Partners & other contributors to the project

KorppiRadio (Finland) on ruohonjuuresta kasvava kyläradio, joka kuuluu maailmanlaajuisesti. Tarkoitus on luoda yhteisöllinen media jossa on tilaa kriittiselle keskustelulle, ihmisten väkivallattomalle kohtaamiselle, yksilöiden vapaalle ilmaisulle ja marginaalisen kulttuurin, musiikin ja taiteen esiintuomiselle.

Korppiradio tutkii ja tarkkailee, kritisoi ja tarinoi, laiskottelee ja leijailee, vastustaa ja elämöi. Se tuo esiin musiikkia ja taidetta kulttuurispektaakkelin takaa, ajattelua nykyisen valtavirran sisä- ja ulkopuolelta sekä kuulemisia toistemme todellisuuksista. Korppiradiota tekee yhteisö, jonka muodostavat ohjelmien tekijät ja kuuntelijat. Korppiradion poliittinen tavoite on, että ruohonjuuriradio on osa laajempaa yhteiskunnallista muutosta, joka perustuu tee-se-itse toimintaperiaatteeseen ja yhdistää ihmisiä rakentamaan oman elämänsä – tässä kohtaa viestinnän ja median – perusteita uudestaan omaehtoisesti. Korppiradio on vapaa toimija jonka on mahdollista käsitellä luovasti ja kriittisesti aihepiirejä, jotka eivät esimerkiksi marginaalisuutensa, epäkaupallisuutensa tai epäasiallisuutensa takia pääse esille suuremmissa medioissa.

Korppiradion yhteisöllisesti koottava ohjelmavirta (live stream) on kuultavissa internetin välityksellä. Korppiradion nettisivuilla kuuntelijat ja tekijät voivat reaaliaikaisesti kommunikoida keskenään kirjoittamalla raakkulaatikkoon (Shout Box). Tietoa eri ohjelmista sekä lähetysnauhoitteet ovat ohjelmien omilla sivuilla, jotka löytyvät yläpalkin valikosta. FM-lähetyksiä naapurustoon tehdään satunnaisesti väliaikaisilla FM-lähetysluvilla ja pienellä omalla lähettimellämme.

Korppiradiossa on mahdollista haastaa itsensä ja omat käsityksensä. Radio on myös mahdollisuus itsereflektioon ja kollektiiviseen luovuuteen. Tekijänä voit määritellä itse sen missä määrin haluat esille vai haluatko tulla asia edellä esiin. Radio luo yhteyden, kommunikaatiota ja vuorovaikutusta niin kauas kuin pieni FM-lähettimemme ja sen lisäksi internet sekä jaettu kieli kantavat. Tekijät ovat kuuntelijoita ja kuuntelijat voivat olla halutessaan tekijöitä – kommunikaation kenttä on elävä ja rajaton.

Korppiradion lähetykset käynnistyivät Helsingin Kalliossa vuonna 2013. http://korppiradio.net 

Parasite Radio (Finland) is a collective project that builds new connections between new media art organizations and groups as well as upholds already established connections in a global level by the means of radio and telematic art. Evolved from the Pixelache network, Parasite Radio is based on the experiences of the first attempts to produce common programme among three distant locations: Transitio MX in New Mexico, City Links in Copenhagen and Pixelache Festival in Helsinki during Pixelache Festival in September 2017. It will also utilize the technical base and know-how experience of Korppiradio internet radio. Production team: Mikko Lipiäinen (lead producer in Biosignals), Juan Duarte, Jon Irigoyen (2017), and Kalle Kuisma.

Maalabor (Estonia) is a new cultural association founded by interdisicplinary artist Lilli Tölp and Karin Lasn from Pärnu, which aims to facilitate very-local culture and learning environment that brings together experimental and body-based art practices, with natural science study, craft heritage, and outdoor phenomenon appreciation. https://archive.org/details/@maalabor

Toortuumik (raw core) is the first interdisciplinary nature and art festival event from Maalabor project, in Virtsu, West Estonia, that will take place in June 2018. 3-hectare area of land bounded by sea coast, juniper and mixed tree plantation, meadow and wind-turbines is offered as site containing raw material, inspiration and experience for exploring overlaps in live and performance art, new media and eco+sustainable craft-maker culture. https://www.ev100.ee/et/kunstifestival-toortuumik 

 In 2018, Toortuumik will focus on artistic-research exploration of the Maalabor nature park area, including a 5 day artist residency program for Nordic-Baltic Dance and Media Art (DAMA) Network. 10 dance and media art students involved. http://www.medialappi.net/dama/, coordinated by Henri Hütt (Tallinn/Viljandi). 

Skanas Dienas (Latvia). Sound Days is the annual public event focusing on Sound Arts organised by Electronic art and media center E-Lab in cooperation with MPLab (Liepaja University Art Research Lab), and also is a focal point for international workshops in sound art and design to their BA and MA study programme. Estimated 10 students involved. http://skana.mplab.lv 

Art Laboratory Berlin (Germany) was founded in Autumn 2006 by an international team of art historians and artists. As a non-commercial art space, it was established as a platform for inter-disciplinary exhibition projects in an international context. Our main focus is the presentation of contemporary art at the meeting point of art, science and technology. http://artlaboratory-berlin.org/ 

Pedro Soler (Catalonia/Ecuador), working on Upayakuwasi project & curator of Transitio 2017 festival in Mexico, he collaborates in Parasite Radio project 2017. Ongoing advisor with Signals from the South programme. http://word.root.ps/ - https://upayakuwasi.hotglue.me/ 

Aura Seikkula (Finland/Sweden) is a curator and researcher based in Stockholm. With her own international art agency Agency Auteur, Seikkula provides for the variety of artistic practices. Her extensive international practice comprises of process, production and theory. Using epistemological analysis as her tool, Seikkula’s recent PhD research in philosophy discusses the social and cultural sustainability of artistic practices from a process perspective. http://agencyauteur.com/ 

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