when one thinks of composting, the first thing that comes to mind is garbage disposal. this is actually not that far fetched:Upon entering the big conference room K1 at HKW the first thing that leaps to the eye is a huge basin with soil is set up next to a set of gloves, equipped with sensors, entangled with tons of cables which are connected to controllers: the heavily improvised looking equipment mounts up to a complex cycle, connecting four artists through states of matter.PLATOON team visited this jar dropping installation at transmediale 2013: composting the net/composting the city.
Shu Lea Cheang, artist, conceptualistkicked of this almost poetic approach to composting. together with audio earth recorder Martin Howse, Ayumi Matsuzaka, renown composter and Tikul, multimedia artist and platoon artist resident 'composting' is taken in its most expanded sense. not only actual compost is transformed at this years transmediale, but whole data archives are "composted" into soundscapes and all visitors were invited to join the succession by donating their waste, may it be hair, nails or even urin.While Ayumi was collecting the waste and planting it into the soil, Martin reverberated the moisture and electricity and Tikul and Shu Lea translated web data into frequencies and voices. Outwardly dead data was, through the action of digital worms, transformed into fresh sprouts that refused to be buried.
Shu Lea is certainly a pioneer in the field: her collaborative approach creates a durational, repetitive and generative cycle, a natural process, recycling historical representation to create something new. The outcome of this undertaking is jarring through the room, resulting in general speechlessness among the audience, once again reconfirming the extraordinary nature of the festival itself.
another special is the installation set up in the main hall of HKW: big yellow cylindrical tubes are intertwined with the impressive architecture of Haus der kulturen der welt. Together with the Telekommunisten the transmediale team has set up a huge pipe post system, connecting the different rooms and locations with each other. The best thing about it? You can literally see and hear the messages floating and slipping through the system.
undoubtedly, this years transmediale was ambitious as ever: BWPWAP- Back When Pluto Was A Planet is the extraterrestrial subline of this year festival for media and and digital culture. we are in the year 2006: the international astronomic union officially reduces the number of planets to 8, making pluto a dwarf planet with the official name 134340. BWPWAP instantly became an analogy for things that have recently changed. but transmediale is not motivated by nostalgia, it is about the discovery of untapped possibilities of analog media that has been forgotten in the glimpse of an eye.
being part of resource: transmediale vorspiel the architecture of PLATOON was turned into an urban projection unit, developed by Tikul and Jendrek (Pussykrew visual collective) during their residency. what a strangely beautiful experience, we are already excited about whats awaiting us at next years transmediale!
CONTRIBUTED BY JOHANNA T. WALLENBORN
