Ars Electronica

Ars Electronica Linz GmbH is an Austrian cultural, educational and scientific institute active in the field of new media art, founded in 1979. It is based at the Ars Electronica Center, which houses the Museum of the Future, in the city of Linz. Ars Electronica’s activities focus on the interlinkages between art, technology and society. It runs an annual festival, and manages a multidisciplinary media arts R&D facility known as the Futurelab. It also confers the Prix Ars Electronica awards.

History

Ars Electronica began with its first festival in September 1979. Its founders were Hannes Leopoldseder, Hubert Bognermayr, Herbert W. Franke, and Ulrich Rützel. The festival was held biennially at first, and annually since 1986. The Prix Ars Electronica was inaugurated in 1987 and has been awarded every year since then. Ars Electronica Linz GmbH was incorporated as a limited company in 1995. The Ars Electronica Center, together with the Futurelab, opened in 1996, and was remodelled in 2009.

Prix Ars Electronica

The Prix Ars Electronica is one of the most important yearly prizes in the field of electronic and interactive art, computer animation, digital culture and music. It has been awarded since 1987 by Ars Electronica (Linz, Austria).

In 2005, the Golden Nica, the highest prize, was awarded in six categories: "Computer Animation/Visual Effects," "Digital Musics," "Interactive Art," "Net Vision," "Digital Communities" and the "u19" award for "freestyle computing." Each Golden Nica came with a prize of €10,000, apart from the u19 category, where the prize was €5,000. In each category, there are also Awards of Distinction and Honorary Mentions.

The Golden Nica is replica of the Greek Nike of Samothrace. It is a handmade wooden statuette, plated with gold, so each trophy is unique: approximately 35 cm high, with a wingspan of about 20 cm, all on a pedestal. "Prix Ars Electronica" is a phrase composed of French, Latin and Spanish words, loosely translated as "Electronic Arts Prize."

SNL Digital Short

An SNL Digital Short is one in a series of comedic and often musical video shorts created for NBC's Saturday Night Live. Generally produced and written by The Lonely Island (Jorma Taccone, Akiva Schaffer and Andy Samberg), the series was originated by Adam McKay, in collaboration with SNL hosts, writers, and cast members. The segments were originally recorded with consumer grade digital video cameras and edited on personal computers. It is usual for the episode's hosts and musical guests (the latter on rarer occasions) to take part in the episode's short, and several shorts have included celebrity cameos.

The shorts generally took fewer than five days to complete. Akiva Schaffer has directed a majority of them, with Taccone as occasional director or co-director. In early 2010, Schaffer took a break from SNL to work on a film, and Tim and Eric Awesome Show, Great Job! director Jonathon Krisel joined the show as a regular Digital Short director. Taccone, along with his brother, Asa, have produced music for the shorts as necessary.

Interactive art

Interactive art is a form of art that involves the spectator in a way that allows the art to achieve its purpose. Some interactive art installations achieve this by letting the observer or visitor "walk" in, on, and around them; some others ask the artist or the spectators to become part of the artwork.

Works of this kind of art frequently feature computers, interfaces and sometimes sensors to respond to motion, heat, meteorological changes or other types of input their makers programmed them to respond to. Most examples of virtual Internet art and electronic art are highly interactive. Sometimes, visitors are able to navigate through a hypertext environment; some works accept textual or visual input from outside; sometimes an audience can influence the course of a performance or can even participate in it. Some other interactive artworks are considered as immersive as the quality of interaction involve all the spectrum of surrounding stimuli. Virtual reality environnements like works by Maurice Benayoun and Jeffrey Shaw are highly interactive as the work the spectators - Maurice Benayoun call them "visitors", Char Davies "immersants" - interact with take all their fields of perception.