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Report PureData workshop AgitMedia Italy

Marco Donnarumma — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 17:01:01 +0000

I just came back from Brescia where I held a two-days PureData workshop. Our class featured 16 students from North Italy and for almost all of them was the first time they get their hands dirty with a graphical programming environment.
I introduced the Pd language, therefore we went through an introduction to sound creation with sonic dataflow processes.

The most interesting aspect of the workshop has been to open up the student’s minds to the unknown field of free creation. Some of them were already doing music and few experiments in sound with proprietary softwares, but none of them was actually aware of the potential of a free environment for sound design and music production and the completely different approach it requires.

Their reactions has been diverse, but in general most of them were pretty excited about the idea to be – so unexpectedly – free to practically draw on a canvas the ideas they had in their mind. One becomes aware that he doesn’t have to do what Ableton or Reason tell one can do, instead one can take over these closed paths and re-think from scratch his own concept of “creation”.

These two days were only the first half of the whole workshop we planned together with Husk (Italian Pd developer and hacktivist). On 5 and 6 December he’s going to introduce the Pd video libraries, i.e. GEM, PDP and Gridflow. In the end of the four days participants should have a basic, solid knowledge about Pd environment and hopefully some of them will bring forward the project they started during the course.

Special thanks to Davide Anni and Anna Guzzi (Ualuba Association and LABA) for their awesome hospitality and their great efforts in making this workshop happen. Unfortunately most of the italian educational institutions still seems to be allarmingly blind towards open/free tools for artistic creation, even though they are nowadays commonly used by many artists in different fields of research. I hope someone “up there” will finally open his eyes from now on, setting italian students free to learn.

Report roBOT Festival 2009 Bologna

Marco Donnarumma — Wed, 23 Sep 2009 18:11:48 +0000

Thanks Bologna!
I had definitely great days in there. The roBOT festival – organized by Shape Association – took place at Palazzo Re Enzo – Bologna – one of the most beautiful ancient building in Bologna and probably in whole Italy.

Look at the ‘Sala del Podestà’ picture below to get a glimpse about the rest of the building. Something awesome.
The festival is more clubbing oriented, but since this year they established a call for works located in the experimental audiovisual field.
That’s how i got to participate alongside with Ape5+Eraser, EricaIlCane, Saul Saguatti, Teatrino Elettrico and Pixelnoizz.
I could enjoy a warm and quiet atmosphere and nice chats with the technical staff (in the picture).
You know? one of the best thing that can happen to an artist going to perform somewhere is to get in touch with professional, friendly technicians who understand his needs… and that’s what has happened.

On Wednesday, the opening was reserved to Carl Craig and his SHAPE project. Highly acclaimed musical project connecting and blending techno and classical musical languages. On Thursday has started the experimental section of roBOT with the first three performances including me, Pixelnoizz and EricaIlCane.
I made a shorter performance, trying to understand how to relate with the space of the huge concert hall. It hasn’t been easy to understand how to play in such a space, where the sound jump from one side of the roof to another, like playing in a big Gothic church.
EricaIlCane and his crew has showed ‘Piove, Governo Ladro’ an evocative imagery, sometimes more decorative sometimes more dreamy. Playing inside of a semi-transparent box they have spread some interesting noise with four audio channels surrounding the installation.

In between on Friday i had the chance to get to know the american artist John Duncan. Incredibly he was holding an informal meeting with some young artists at the same place where i’ve been hosted (Nosadella.2 – residency for artists and curator).
So i participate to the meeting with him and Melissa Pasut and in the end we spent the night together with a lovely dinner and other friend Elisa DelPrete. It’s useless to say it has been an inspiring meeting.

Finally on Saturday I’ve met a lot of old friends and I’ve also met for the first time the Italian artists Ape5 and Eraser. They proposed their latest performance ‘Future sounds like Past Toys’ mixing the ethereal music of Eraser (heavy circuit bending on old toys) with a glitch visual imagery provided by Ape5.

Then i repeated my performance ‘I C::ntr::l Nature’ - audiovisual improvisation for augmented electric bass guitar, butterfly and self-designed software C::NTR::L, Pure Data based - and i have to say it has been one of the best performance I’ve ever made since I’m traveling around with this project.
I was feeling this kind of emotive tension who often push a creative mind to get out his best.
The sound was finally as i wish it would have been and a lot of people showed up to attend to the concert.
I’m usually really critic towards my concerts but this time I’ve felt something too good around, maybe the presence of many friends, maybe the great location, maybe the proper astral plane connections… anyway the show was strong and impressive.

My friend Carlotta Piccinini from Visuallab has been so kind to shoot almost all the performance with an excellent camera, so be patient and expect a new video reel from the performance.

After the performances (including also Byetone who was performing at my same time, I would have loved to attend) everybody has moved to the Link for the last club night of the festival. Nice time in there supporting old good friends Vj Hash and Sapo during their vj set, and around 5am everybody has jumped in the car driving back home.

Once again Sunday has come and I’ve taken the last tour around the city, sitting in a park and enjoying the last rays of sun – because in Milan the rain was waiting for me.
I end the report with this picture: a public park in Bologna dedicated to the 11st September 2001.
I’ve the maximum respect for that event (and also a lot of doubts and anxiety), but could you tell me why in Italy we should dedicate a park to this date???
Sorry but i cannot agree with that.

Thanks to all the people from roBOT staff – Marcella, Federica and all the technical staff – and thanks also to all the people who showed up for my concert. It means a lot to me, especially here in Italy.

Report Pd Convention 09, Sao Paulo

Marco Donnarumma — Thu, 06 Aug 2009 11:47:21 +0000

Online the pictures from the third international Pure data Convention in Sao Paulo, Brasil, where i performed the audiovisual piece ‘I C::ntr::l Nature’ and presented the free, open source software C::NTR::L – Pd-based.

Much thanks to Alexandre, Paloma, Cristiano, Palm, Cybelle and all the staff for the big efforts to make this happen. Great experience for all of us and relevant effort to enhance the free culture in Brasil.

Check the gallery here: ../pics

More infos: www.pdcon.org

Report S-Block Festival

Marco Donnarumma — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 19:20:26 +0000

Here you are with a bit of delay the report about S-Block Festival.
The event has been organized by Plattform fuer aktuelle Musik and it took place at Interventionsraum in the very heart of Stuttgart. It has been my second time in the city and also this time i had the pleasure to enjoy a good dose of high quality experimental music.

Antenna Research opened the event with their concrete concert based on antennas and old radio. Pure noise eclectism and sane irony deadful mixture!

I definetely love spending days in Germany at experimental music events ’cause i always see things that i’m sure i won’t be able to see anywhere else. Don’t know if it’s all about my “mith” of Germany, but i can assure the”experimental” matter there has really a deep sense and clear imprint. Maybe it’s all about originality and the way to express it…

Coming next we had the DuoB – free, improvisational jazz duet from United States. They provided a huge concert, impossible to describe it, but just imagine 1.5 hour of free improvisation on drums (played in every way you can imagine) and double-bass, supported by impervious and theatrical readings by Pedro Cofrè from Chile.

We didn’t have the time to recover our mind from the intuitional free reading/jazz of DuoB, and Christine Sehnaoui started her solo performance/radical improvisation at saxophone. She’s one of the most professional improvisers i’ve ever seen playing live, i highly suggest to check her work. Great presence on stage and awesome confidence with her instrument.

On the second day of the event, after having a beautiful breakfast with the other artists, we reached again the venue for another session. This time Ezramo opened the night… It has been a lovely experience, from subtle mystic moments to ethnic derivations and electroacoustic breackdowns.

Following we had Experimentelles Musiktheater: „The International Besetztzeichen“. An experimental theater/live noise piece for three actors, performed by Oliver Prechtl and Philipp Golm (Stuttgart). Unfortunately i didn’t get any picture of their show.
I had the hard duty to close the festival with the audiovisual work “I C::ntr::l Nature” - solo piece for augmented bass guitar and self-designed software C::NTR::L. It has been a pleasure to play in front of the many people came to see the performance. The tiny and cosy venue of the festival was overloaded of people all around me… lovin’ it!

Thanks Stuttgart and thanks once again to Ezramo and Wendelin Buechler who organized such an inspirational event, and good luck guys for your future projects!

LINKS:
http://www.thesaddj.com/s-block-festival-advanced-music-and-live-audiovisual-art/
http://www.thesaddj.com/icontrolnature
http://interventionsraum.de/sblockfestival.html
http://interventionsraum.de
http://www.myspace.com/maxexperimentell

Report Pure Data Workshop, Gotland University, Sweden

Marco Donnarumma — Fri, 17 Jul 2009 19:16:29 +0000

Here you are the photo report from the Pure Data workshop i held with Deftoo at Gotland University, Institute for Technology, Art and New Media in Sweden.

It has been an intensive experience, 10 participants, 2 days, 16 hours and a lot of lab sessions.

I had the pleasure to show the potential and the basic dataflow strategies of Pure Data to the professors of the wellknown swedish Game Development & Design department, infact the workshop was focused on real-time audiovisual processing for Game Development and Narrative Media.

Special thanks to Iwona Hrynczenko for organization and to UlfBen for additional pictures

Click here to see the photo gallery: http://www.thesaddj.com/pics/

Report Ausklang Festival

Marco Donnarumma — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 14:04:44 +0000

Here i am, after a long stop. Many unexpected events didn’t allow me to keep on writing continuosly.
So i had the pleasure to spend few days in Hamburg in the end of the 2008 to take part in the annual Ausklang festival. The festival is the reference meeting point for the local experimental scene. Every year some representative artists from the Hamburg scene plus two foreigners artists play their shows at Hoerbar, an old cinema out of use, recycled in a unique way by the organizators. The Hoerbar is one of this cultural spaces that are slowly disappearing in Europe.
They organize concerts every week and a real community of artists and passionate of experimental music and media is living and sharing ideas and ispirations in a familiar and warm atmosphere. totally out of any kind business mentality, but only focusing on the pure passion for the sound. I remember some places like that in Italy a long long time ago, some old memories which makes me nostalgic.

During the Ausklang Festival you can also enjoy and taste one of the best experimental music collection i’ve ever seen out there, thanks to some kind guys running their own music distribution service. They come at Hoerbar and build there this unique exhibition of incredibly rare materials, cassettes, cd, minitapes, dvd, minicd … you’ll find there every kind of support you can imagine, and every kind of experimental music you have always dreamed of. I was embarassed for two days cause i didn’t know what to buy,… i would have bought everything!!

The line-up of the festival show an excellent quality. Many different approaches to experimental music made this festival a little but amazing showcase of arts.

Trautonia Capra (voce, synth, gothic electronics)

Napalmed (historical free-jazz, noise, harshcore duo from Czech Rep.)

Felix Kubin (Futuristic experimental pop musik from Hamburg)

Unfortunately i wasn’t able to make pictures of his show. He created a nice atmosphere with his hyper-delicate electronic music and a live score of an ancient black&white movie.

On the second day…

The SAD (nowave/visual/noise free audiovisual improvisation from Italy)

Bruno&Michelle are smiling (hironic high-speed pop from Hamburg)

Asmus Tietchens (Electronic music, soundscape)

Special thanks to Stefan and Robert at Hoerbar for taking care of me and to Kera&Andrè from Incite!! great times in Hamburg thanks to you all…

more infos: http://www.hoerbar-ev.de/en/

Report Cinesthesy 1.0

Marco Donnarumma — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 15:51:11 +0000

Via: Cinesthesy Blog

SATI

Petite scène – installation Eile (Yroyto)

Démolécularisation (project singe)

Etichettadiscografica

REP

THE SAD

Olivier Moreau (Directeur Adjoint Centre Rebérioux), Yroyto (Directeur Artistique)

Présentation de Digital HipHop – création avec les jeunes du quartier avec le vidéaste Jesse Lucas et la cie de danse Masala

EILE (Yroyto)

CINEMASSAKER

OTOLAB

INCITE/

RAFAEL

Entre deux performances.

Yroyto – coordinateur des Pixels Transversaux

SOLU&ARBOL

Amélie Dessaux

Gildas & Yroyto (préparation du streaming)

BOULEZ REPUBLIC GRAND ENSEMBLE

Présentation du Monome avec Iduun

IDUUN

WORKSHOP RESOLUME 3

JUSTE ALICE 02

Présentation Codanova

Pics LPM Mexico ‘08

Marco Donnarumma — Thu, 09 Oct 2008 18:49:49 +0000

In september 2008 we were in Mexico, organizing the first latino-america edition of Live Performers Meeting – international meeting focused on audiovisual live performances, new sounds and vjing. It was “our” 6th edition but the first one outside of Italy, a great challenge for us of FLxER Team.

Trought many difficulties and a lot of energy and passion we finally built the event and we can consider ourselves pretty satisfied of the final result. The answer of the Mexican, Latino-American audiovisual artists has been amazing and we already accepted the help of many of them to build toghether the next mexican edition. Above all we are glad that all the artists and passionate involved in the developing of the meeting have experienced a unique time-space where to share knowledges, techniques and much more. Everyone showed us a great love, energy and will to build a network that can reach all the other countries over the ocean.

The content of the event has been really good, we had to manage an incredible amount of great projects, but take a look by yourself at the pics of the event and all the infos about the artists at this link:

http://www.liveperformersmeeting.net

http://www.liveperformersmeeting.net/2008mex/gallery/

…and remember that the 7th edition is coming next year!
i’ll keep you updated..