25
August
2006
|
09:34 AM
America/Los_Angeles

ZeroOne San Jose & ISEA2006 Symposium: Final Wrap Up

By Lucaso for Silicon Valley Watcher

The ZeroOne San Jose & ISEA 2006 Symposium happened this past month in San Jose, CA. Some of the world's top international electronic artists traveled to Silicon Valley to share their latest and greatest exhibits as this arts festival and academic symposium took over the city.

The SVW team was there to film the highlights and take you for a visual ride through the festival. Here are three videos from our week in San Jose, as well as a wrapup from SVW friend Sara Kramer.




















Wrap up!





Opening Night Reception.



















MashUp!

ZeroOne San Jose Wrap Up

By Sara Kremer for Silicon Valley Watcher

I had the pleasure of spending last week at the ZeroOne San Jose electronic arts festival in San Jose, meeting multi-media artists representing all corners of the globe, and soaking in some of the most cutting edge new media I've witnessed to date in the intersection of art and technology. It was easy to be overwhelmed by over 100 artworks on display, the multitude of video projections, audio installations, robots, and interactive art.

From Pia Tikka's Obsession to Morten Schjodt's Switching, I was quite impressed by these artists attempts to transform a passive movie watching experience into "interactive cinema." With biosensors hidden in chairs and remotes handed out to the audience, the viewer was enabled both consciously and subconsiously to act as a participant in "directing" the order that scenes played and looped.

Douglas Edric Stanley's Concrescence and Game Machine + (^3) was my favorite interactive sound installation. Composed of a rubix-cube and complex sensors that can detect the various configurations of the colors on the cube, the audience was able to "play" with the cube, trigger various sound samples, and participate directly in making music. This tool is evidence of amazing new technologies that are currently redefining the way laptop music producers can perform their music in more interesting ways in front of a live audience.

The climax of the festival occured on Friday night when the internationally acclaimed Bay Area based group Survival Research Labs put on an impressive display of their large scale kinetic robot creations. The performance was an intense sensory experience, requiring audience members to wear earplugs to safely allow them to hear the orchestra of booming sounds. The robots created futuristic landscapes complete with a motif of destruction, fire, and explosions!