Exploring the interplay
of human and artificial creativity
Faced with the opportunities offered by the Fourth Industrial Revolution, Austria has set the course to leverage its immense cultural capital and long-standing artistic practices to positively shape the development of new technologies in Silicon Valley. Wavering trust among consumers has created a window of opportunity for Europe to present Silicon Valley with alternative models of collaboration among engineers, artists, policy makers, and humanists that strengthen the core of our transatlantic community of values. As a global pioneer in digital arts, Austria can lead this endeavor with confidence and vision.
Open Austria’s Art + Tech Lab was launched in October 2020 to investigate the blurring border between technology and human creativity. Set out as a laboratory for open and interdisciplinary collaboration, we encourage art projects that redefine what it means to be human in the age of artificial intelligence. Artists in their capacity as futurists and storytellers are best equipped to identify and promulgate both the potential and pitfalls of frontier technologies. In concert with Austria’s efforts in tech diplomacy, the Art + Tech Lab is working with policy makers from Europe and the US to advocate for a new digital humanism in tech. The Lab’s transdisciplinary approach paves the way for the future of cultural diplomacy.
First VR Graffiti by Austrian street artist Nychos, with HTC VIVE and Unbound Technologies
Holiday Networking Event, Dec 13, 2018
The Grid
Art Powers Technology
L
The Grid is a global network connecting artists and technologists. It was launched in Silicon Valley and has since transformed into a global multi-stakeholder platform of artists, technologists, cultural institutes, global art institutions, policy makers, and tech companies.
Emerging technologies are both local and global. Tech innovation coming out of Silicon Valley and elsewhere has major ripple effects throughout the entire world, dominating our lives in both positive and negative ways. By placing artists within tech R&D teams at the heart of the global tech industry we allow art thinking to positively influence tech development processes.
The Grid was spearheaded by Open Austria (EUNIC Silicon Valley Presidency 2019 and 2020) together with our European colleagues and local art + tech partners.
L
The Grid: Exposure - Art + Tech + Policy Days
Blurring Borders between Art + Tech + Policy
“The Grid: Exposure - Art + Tech + Policy Days” explores innovative ways to reconnect the world in our current state of isolation. Exposure is The Grid’s new annual festival format, an art + tech expo in San Francisco. It showcases the vast creative potential of Silicon Valley, exposing the global community to its ideas. Technologies are not mere artifacts, but dynamic systems entwined with culture and policy.
Mobilizing artists, technologists, and policy makers from around the world, Exposure reimagines interdisciplinary and international collaboration to overcome deadlock and siloed thinking. Through art, panels, performances, interactive experiences, talks, and workshops, Exposure works towards shaping technological development for the benefit of all: 4 days, 26 events, 100+ speakers and artists from 12 countries,16 partner organizations.
The first Edition of Exposure deploys the visual phenomenon of “Blurring Borders” as an artistic strategy. It creates a platform for technology to make itself vulnerable to artistic practices rooted in humanism that expose the essence of our digital reality. We will blur the artificial boundaries between the worlds of art, technology, and policy, creating a shared experience within and among different communities.
Festival Curation by Open Austria.
No-Place Like the Future
Artists evoke a world after corona
Art excels in times of crisis. Deep societal changes propel the greatest generational minds to envision a utopia, a ‘no-place’ beyond the realities they are facing.
The COVID-19 pandemic has put our entire way of life into question. Artists in their capacity as futurists are now needed more than ever. But they need us too. With no perspectives to show their art and engage with their audiences, artists are existentially threatened.
Thus, the Austrian Embassy and the Austrian Cultural Forum in Washington, D.C., the Austrian Cultural Forum in New York, the Austrian Consulate General in Los Angeles and Open Austria, Austria’s innovation office in Silicon Valley, have created this project “No-Place Like The Future” with the aim to bring Austrian and American artists (back) together, invite them to jointly work on a new piece of art – and thereby create a brighter future for all of us.
