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Arse Elektronika 2010 / September 30 thru October 3!

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monochrom: Tribbles are masturbation...




(monochrom's Raw Image Format)

Posted by johannes, Friday, July 23, 2010 ( General )



Gizmodo features monochrom's Arse Elektronika @ #thenexthope

Check it out!
The idea began over beers. Johannes Grenzfurthner (of monochrom) and friends wondered if the notion that porn drives technology really was true or urban myth. So, they decided, why not organize a public event and find out?

Arse Elektronika, a conference about technology and sex, came screaming into the world. "It was true," says Grenzfuthner. Everything he's seen in three years has confirmed that we do use sex to drive tech. "Mankind is a tool-using species and a sexual species and we can't forget that," he says, "Innovation has always been tied to porn." He went on to say that Gutenberg supported his bible printing habit with the next thing he printed—pornographic texts.

Link

Posted by johannes, Saturday, July 17, 2010 ( General )



Arse Elektronika @ The Next HOPE Conference in NYC

monochrom presents a talk about Arse Elektronika at 2600's "The Next HOPE" Conference (July 16-18, 2010) in New York City. Check it out!
Arse Elektronika: Sex, Tech, and the Future of Screw-It-Yourself

We may not forget that mankind is a sexual and tool-using species.

From the depiction of a vulva in a cave painting to the newest Internet porno, technology and sexuality have always been closely linked. New technologies are quick to appeal to pornography consumers, and thus these customers represent a profitable market segment for the suppliers of new products and services.

Currently, all factors show that high-tech developments owe a great deal of their success to the need for further sexual stimulation. One could cite the example provided by the science fiction concept of a full-body interface designed to produce sexual stimulation. But it isn’t science fiction anymore. It's DIY.

As bio-hacking, sexually enhanced bodies, genetic utopias, and plethora of gender have long been the focus of literature, science fiction and, increasingly, pornography, this year will see us explore the possibilities that fictional and authentic bodies have to offer. Our world is already way more bizarre than our ancestors could have ever imagined. But it may not be bizarre enough. "Bizarre enough for what?" you might ask. Bizarre enough to subvert the heterosexist matrix that is underlying our world and that we should hack and overcome for some quite pressing reasons within the next century.

Don't you think, replicants?
The complete schedule of "The Next HOPE" can be found here.

Posted by johannes, Tuesday, July 13, 2010 ( General )



Flickr Photo Pool for Techno(Sexual) Bodies / Arse Elektronika Hong Kong

Opening of exhibition at Videotage was a huge success.
Please add your images!









Link

Posted by johannes, Saturday, April 03, 2010



Arse Elektronika Hong Kong: Twitter

Hash tag for Techno(Sexual) Bodies/Arse Elektronika Hong Kong: #arsehk

Posted by johannes, Friday, April 02, 2010



Setting up Techno(sexual) Bodies / Arse Elektronika in Hong Kong

We are setting up Arse Elektronika in Hong Kong! All goes well so far!




Posted by johannes, Wednesday, March 31, 2010



Techno(sexual) Bodies / Arse Elektronika in Hong Kong

Arse Elektronika goes Hong Kong!



Techno(sexual) Bodies: Arse Elektronika X Videotage / Artist Talk @ Dorkbot-HK
Speakers: Johannes Grenzfurthner (founder of monochrom and Arse Elektronika), Heather Kelley (media artist and video game designer), Karen Marcelo (founder of dorkbot-sf), Bonni Rambatan (media theorist).

Date: April 1, 2010 (Thu) Time: 6pm-7pm Venue: Osage Soho; Address: G/F, 45 Caine Road, Central, Hong Kong.
Techno(sexual) Bodies / Arse Elektronika X Videotage / Exhibition
Co-curated by Johannes Grenzfurthner (Austria) and Isaac Leung (HK)

From the simple electronic vibrator to the complex assemblages of cybersex, sex and technology have always intersected. The dynamic relations between sexuality and technology are constantly changing along with the ways in which human beings achieve psychological and bodily pleasure through these devices. By inviting artists who're dealing with various issues of technosexual bodies, we aim not only to examine the unexplored technicalities, functionalities and interfaces of the new technologies and sexualities, but also to formulate a broader understanding of the meanings of the "technosexual".

Participating Artists: Timothy Archibald (USA), Shu Lea Cheang (USA/France), Paul Granjon (UK), Katrien Jacobs (Belgium), Heather Kelley (USA/CAN), Kyle Machulis (USA), monochrom (Austria), Ellen Pau (HK), Stephane Perrin (Japan), Rainer Prohaska (Austria), Allen Stein (USA), Morgan Wong (HK)

Opening Reception: April 2, 2010 (Fri), 6pm
Exhibition Period: April 7-27, 2010
Opening Hour: 12pm-7pm (Tue-Sun except public holidays)
Venue: Videotage (Unit 13, Cattle Depot Artist Village, 63 Ma Tau Kok Road, To Kwa Wan, Kowloon, Hong Kong)

Posted by johannes, Tuesday, March 02, 2010



Arse Elektronika: Review of "Do Androids Sleep with Electric Sheep?" on The SF Site

Very detailed review of our Arse Elektronika anthology "Do Androids Sleep with Electric Sheep?" featured on "The SF Site":
Like good science fiction, the material collected in Do Androids Sleep With Electric Sheep? leaves us with more questions than we arrived with; if you can stomach the subject matter (which shouldn't really appall anyone but the most prudish and conservative, to be honest, though my perceptions may be somewhat skewed), this is prime fuel for your imaginatory engines. The focal character of James Tiptree, Jr.'s story "And I Awoke and Found Me Here on the Cold Hill's Side" suggests that, as humans, "we're built to dream outwards" [pp 239], to project our desire onto "the other", whoever or whatever it may happen to be. It's an insight that makes more sense each time you read it, and serves to underline the basic commonality between sex and science fiction, or indeed art in general -- they are both ways in which we try to subsume ourselves into (or control and dominate over) that which we are not.
Love makes us do strange things, after all.
Link

Posted by johannes, Friday, February 05, 2010


Current Archive   Archive before May 2010
Arse Elektronika‘s Terabyte Gloryholes:

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main group, events 2009
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2009, 2010 (Hong Kong), 2010 (SF)
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2007, 2008, 2009, 2010 (Hong Kong)
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Arse Elektronika 2009 was supported by:























Arse Elektronika 2010. September 30 thru October 3, 2010 in San Francisco, USA.

We may not forget that mankind is a sexual and tool-using species. And that‘s why our annual conference Arse Elektronika deals with sex, technology and the future. As bio-hacking, sexually enhanced bodies, genetic utopias and plethora of gender have long been the focus of literature, science fiction and, increasingly, pornography, this year will see us explore the possibilities that fictional and authentic bodies have to offer. Our world is already way more bizarre than our ancestors could have ever imagined. But it may not be bizarre enough. "Bizarre enough for what?" -- you might ask. Bizarre enough to subvert the heterosexist matrix that is underlying our world and that we should hack and overcome for some quite pressing reasons within the next century.
Don't you think, replicants?