By Li Xinyi, compiled and reported
With the rapid development of new media technology in Taiwan in recent years, the art world has also gradually seen a trend of integration with new media. Taiwan’s first “Future Media Arts Festival” will open on the first day of the new year at the Guandu Museum of Fine Arts. This marks the first large-scale event in Taiwan centered around new media, featuring a rich collection of exhibits. Works by Nam June Paik, known as the father of video art, and Bill Viola, who pioneered the peak of video art combined with social critique, are among those on display.
Opening ceremony musical performance “Collage Landscape.” (Photo provided by Taipei National University of the Arts, Guandu Museum of Fine Arts)
Future media art takes various forms including interactive application creations, an animation zone, workshops, and multimedia and music performances. This year’s festival incorporates animation creation, which has always maintained a unique identity within new media art. A special selection of “Canada’s Outstanding Animation” will be screened, curated with the assistance of the National Film Board of Canada, showcasing a collection of animations produced in recent years. The public will have the opportunity to view short animated films created using a variety of techniques and narrative methods. In the workshop activities, those interested in the creative process can also explore the creativity of brainwave devices together with Italian artist Mattia Casalegno.
Future art using interactive installations, “The Realm Is Not Outside the Mind, Nor Is the Mind Inside the Realm.” (Photo provided by Taipei National University of the Arts, Guandu Museum of Fine Arts)
On the opening night, Canadian artist Herman Kolgen, the first-prize winner of the Ars Electronica Festival in Linz, Austria, will join forces with the percussion ensemble of Taipei National University of the Arts faculty and students to kick off the celebration with “Collage Landscape.” The Future Media Arts Festival will run from January 1 to February 19, 2012.