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WORLD-INFORMATION.ORG @ Brussels 2000
June 30 to July 30, 2000
Centre Brussels 2000
Rue de l’écuyer 50 Schildknaapstraat
1000 Bruxelles / Brussels
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INTRODUCTION
WORLD-INFORMATION.ORG
EXPLORING THE INFOSPHERE
“Who owns the Internet?” “How does it work?” “How can society benefit from it?” “How do information and communication technologies change everyday life, work, arts, politics, economy and society?” “How does public opinion emerge?” “How do artists work with information technologies?” “What will be the cultural heritage of our future?”
Under the patronage of the UNESCO, World-Information.Org explores the fascinating and complex sphere of information production, -manipulation, -distribution and –control to provide the public with cultural intelligence: clear, high-quality and easily accessible information on the cultural, societal, economic, and technological foundations of the globalizing Information Society.
From June 30th to July 30th, World-Information.Org will be publicly presented for the first time. As the lead project of the New-Media-programme of Brussels 2000 – European City of Culture for the year 2000, World-Information.Org will turn the Centre Brussels 2000 in its temporary headquarter.
As an international network (initiated by the Viennese Institute for New Culture Technologies / Public Netbase), World-Information.Org cooperates with a variety of renowned partners in the fields of cultural work, art, media theory, -economy and –policy. Among others, global communication expert Cees Hamelink (NL), Privacy.Org-founder Simon Davies (UK), investigative journalist Duncan Campbell (USA) and media theoretician Edward S. Herman (USA) regularly contribute to the research work.
Artistic input will be given by artists such as “Documenta X”-participant Marko Peljhan (SLO), media-camouflage specialists RTMark (USA) or Ingo Günther (GER/USA), famous for his cultural and political world maps.
WORLD-INFORMATION.ORG @ BRUSSELS
From June 30th and July 30th, World-Information.Org presents a three-part exhibition at the Centre Brussels 2000 in co-production with Brussels 2000 – European City of Culture for the year 2000.
In the heart of the city, visitors can sensually discover the world of information:
an environment assembling exhibits and visual diagrams explaining the complex nature of information technologies, interactive installations, and artistic works.
EXHIBITION
WORLD-INFOSTRUCTURE
From the Alphabet to the Internet – a journey into the World of Information
The transition from the Industrial to the Information Society has dramatically changed the role and function of information. Today, Information has become one of the most valuable economic goods and the development of the Information Society has created both a new, global technical infrastructure and – along with the New Economy – a historically unique power structure. World-Information.Org presents a close-up of the economic, technical, and political foundations of the globalising Information Society.
The World Infostructure Exhibition focuses on the development of communication technologies and their societal, cultural, and economic impacts. Beginning with the alphabet, the exhibition visualises and describes the development of media: communication codes, tools, and increasingly sophisticated technical instruments.
Media have diversified and have become global – the media and IT sectors currently being among the most prominent in a trend towards large-scale mergers. Ownership of media equals power and influence. To demonstrate this, the exhibition features the big players of the global media market, who control literally thousands of newspapers, online services, TV and radio stations: the production, manipulation, distribution and control of information is concentrated in the hand of few media oligopolies worldwide.
The question as to who owns and controls the electronic networks is one major issue covered by the exhibition. The technical information infrastructure is another. Satellites and cables provide the world’s central nerve system of information. The exhibition gives an overview on the complex interrelations of technology, private investments and the public interest.
The displays show the distribution of information and power: the winners and losers of information globalisation, the information-rich and the information-poor.
Finally, the exhibition points out the problem of human rights in a digital world. A democratised society is based upon a broad understanding of communication processes and the underlying technologies. Therefore universal human rights have to be extended to incorporate the Information Society. Basic digital human rights mean the right to access the electronic domain, the right to freedom of expression and association online, and the right to privacy.
Research, Content & Design: World-Information.Org
FUTURE HERITAGE
Arts for the digital Millenium
World-Information.Org invites you to discover the cultural heritage of our future. The Future Heritage Expo presents works of artists experimenting and operating with information and communication technologies.
Artists have always been among the first to explore the potentials of the new media as modes of expressing their work. Some of these media - such as electronic information processing and even the Internet itself - actually have a military origin. In supporting the process of accepting and discovering new forms of communication, artists have concentrated on appropriating these new media as their means of artistic expression.
The artistic exploration of multimedia and the electronic domain has generated a shift in contemporary arts toward digital, net-based, interactive and multimedia creation and distribution of art. Information itself has become a raw product of artistic production. In essence, artists have turned into "informers". The Future Heritage Expo, therefore, introduces artists who present the most important aspects, ideas and artistic experiments in the digital domain.
The digital electronic cultures - so rich, diverse and vital - represent a testimony of our time. A testimony that helps us to understand the complexity of life and cultural identities.
Digital art of today is the cultural heritage of tomorrow.
Artists & Exhibitors:
Ingo Günther-GER&USA, Marko Peljhan-SLO, Critical Art Ensemble with Faith Wilding & Paul Vanouse-USA, RTMark-USA, Oliver Ressler-A, Mongrel-UK, Jason Skeet & Andi Freeman-UK, Matthew Fuller, Simon Pope & Colin Green-UK, e-lab-LV, Constant-BE, Apsolutno-YU, Volkstanz-A, Heinz Nixdorf MuseumsForum-GER, a.o.
WORLD-C4U
Command, Control, Computer Communication
Total Security and the Virtual Doppelganger
Enterprises and corporations, military and governmental bodies, online service providers and secret services employ an impressive arsenal of high technology for control and security purposes. Under the pretext of national security, intelligence services have built up huge eavesdrop systems like Echelon, which allow them to intercept all electronic communication such as telephone calls, fax messages or exchange of e-mail worldwide. In a growing number of cities, the public and private areas are controlled by CCTV (Closed Circuit Television). Electronic voice, fingerprint recognition and other biometric technologies allow or deny access to bank accounts, to buildings, or to information.
Internet service providers track individual data, identify a user’s favourite site and special interest, and create individual customer profiles – valuable personalised data for marketing professionals and e-commerce enterprises. Data mining and data tracking technologies transform information on personal shopping behaviour or fields of interest into the virtual doppelganger.
The World-C4U-Exhibition highlights state-of-the-art security and control technologies. The exhibition allows hands-on experience and presents live demonstrations of eavesdropping and information interception.
For detailed and update information on the exhibitions and all related events, please visit our website –  http://world-information.org - or look them up in the World-Information.Org “Magazine”.
Artists & Exhibitors:
Cinema Nova Video Library-BE, Max Moswitzer-A, Monochrom-A, The Association of Autonomous Astronauts-INT, Namebase-USA, SYNREAL-INT, Anita Witek-A&UK, Technisches Museum Wien-A, a.o.
Centre Brussels 2000, Schildknaapstraat 50, B-1000 Bruxelles/Brussels
June 30th – July 30th 2000, daily 11.00 – 21.00, Sundays until 19.00, closed on Mondays.
ARTISTS
Among the artists whose works are presented in the Future Heritage Expo respectively in the World-C4U-Exhibition there are:
Marko Peljhan (SLO)
In his work, Marko Peljhan frequently employs technology from the military industrial complex. This includes the examination of practical and theoretical possibilities of telecommunications interception of satellite based networks such as satellite scanning.
With the projects “Projekt Atol” and “Makrolab”, Peljhan started to create an autarc communication and distribution system as an apocalypse tool in 1992. “Makrolab” is designed to survive any possible infrastructure breakdown.
In the World-Information.Org exhibition Peljhan will present two sets of works: One presenting plans for the conversion of tactical cruise missile into a tactical media platform. The other based on Makrolab, consisting of a monitoring and analysis system for high frequency radio and processed radar data, news feeds and financial information displays.
The electronic media monitoring platform will be at different times accessible also for private lectures and consultation with the operator on site. As part of the project, there will be a series of three lectures, covering the fields of satellite construction, data protection, design and policy issues and satellite telecommunications monitoring issues.
Marko Peljhan, born in Nova Goricia (SLO) in 1969, started to experiment with amateur radio communication and technology at an early age, and has continued working with information and communication technologies.
http://makrolab.ljudmila.org holds a lot of information on both “Makrolab” and the artist.
Ingo Günther (GER / USA)
Defining the role of the artist as an informer, Günther combines artistic, journalistic and scientific approaches to make secret information accessible to the public. Since 1989, globes have become one of his central means of artistically impacting and stimulating political processes.
A series of articles and interviews stemming from his visits to refugee camps in Thailand became the foundation for his ongoing project “Refugee Republic”.
Ingo Günther, born 1957, studied Ethnology, Cultural Anthropology and Art in Frankfurt and Düsseldorf. Since the 1970ies, numerous travels took him to Northern Africa, North and Central America and Asia. Günther has participated in diverse international exhibitions such as the German “Documenta” and has taught at several renowned universities.
A collection of his works can be found via http://www.worldprocessor.com
Critical Art Ensemble – CAE (USA)
Critical Art Ensemble (CAE) respond to recent developments in the biological sciences by creating a faux cult in collaboration with Faith Wilding and Paul Vanouse - The Cult of the New Eve (CoNE). CoNE corresponds to the Human Genome Project as the attempt to decode the human DNA. The Human Genome Project is based on the DNA of a single woman. For the Cult, she is the New Eve.
Currently, scientists involved in new biological developments are pitching their work in very theological terms like “new universalism” or “discovery of immortality”.
With CoNE, CAE relays these promises back to the public through the filter of an obscure cult. Combining a website, electronic information systems and performance techniques of street theater, CAE extols the utopian promises of biotechnology and provokes engagement in critical discussions on biotechnology.
Critical Art Ensemble (CAE, founded in 1987, is a collective of five tactical media artists of various specialization including computer art, film, video, photography, text art, book art, and performance. CAE’s focus has been on the exploration of the relations and intersections between art, critical theory, technology, and political activism.
http://critical-art.net
http://critical-art.net/cone
FUTURE HERITAGE EVENTS
Along with the exhibitions, World-Information.Org offers a series of events: expert and public meetings, presentations and an international conference.
July 5th: RTMark (USA)
“Captain Euro versus Leonardo Finance”
A performance-lecture event staged by the US-American artists group RTMark, who became famous with their fake website of the World Trade Organisation’s Summit in Seattle (http://www.gatt.org). For more than five years, RTMark has been funding acts of sabotage with activist or aesthetic aims. The group succeeded in generating more than twenty acts of ‘creative subversion’ that were directed against Mattel (“Barbie Liberation Organization”), the World Trade Organization, Novartis or George W. Bush among others. In their lecture RTMark will introduce their new campaign on “Captain Euro”.
July 8th: CONSTANT vzw (BE)
“Surveillance Camera Roundtrip”
The Belgian partner CONSTANT vzw will organize a roundtrip through the city of Brussels to explore the numerous surveillance technologies implemented to control the flow of people in the city. Based on an old TV episode of the famous Columbo crime series, CONSTANT will explore the legacy of the Cold War control systems and invites the audience to join: “It has no become impossible to go out into the street in sloppy clothes, you star against your will” (CONSTANT vzw).
July 2nd: Hugh Daniels (USA)
“Secure Wide Area Network Protocols, Problems, Solutions, Implementations”
and
July 18th: Marko Peljhan (SLO)
“Independent Satellite Development: Policy, Design & Construction, Launch Issues”
In the framework of Marko Peljhan’s Makrolab platform in the exhibition, various guest speakers will present their work in the fields of independent media work: covering issues of satellite & space communications and privacy & data-protection among others, these two events are targeted at the interested community of artists and IT specialists.
WORLD INFOCON
The central conference being World InfoCon on July 13th and 14th at the Centre Brussels 2000: Artists, experts, intelligence agents, scientists and politicians gather to discuss the issues of digital ecology, future culture heritage and media economy.
Well-known experts such as Cees J. Hamelink (NL, University of Amsterdam, author of various UNESCO reports on communication), Steve Wright (UK, Control Technologies Omega Foundation), Edward S. Herman (US, University of Pennsylvania), Simon Davies (UK, Privacy.Org) or Saskia Sassen (famous media theoretician, US & UK, LSE) will take part in this major conference.
World InfoCon:
July 13th, 10 a.m. – 1 p.m. and 3 – 6 p.m.
July 14th, 10 a.m. – 2 p.m.
World InfoCon – Workshops and Seminars with the World InfoCon-participants:
July 15th, 11 a.m. – 9 p.m.
Centre Brussels 2000, Rue de l’écuyer 50 Schildknaapstraat, B-1000 Bruxelles / Brussel
For detailed and update information on the World InfoCon issues, participants, lectures and dates please visit our website – http://world-information.org - or look them up in the World-Information.Org “Magazine”.
SPONSORS & PARTNERS
The World-Information.Org team wishes to express its thankfulness for the kind support of the following Corporate Sponsors, Partners & Institutions:
Patron
UNESCO
Co-Producer
BRUSSELS 2000 – European City of Culture for the year 2000
Corporate Sponsors
// Platinum Sponsor
EXCALIBUR TECHNOLOGIES
// Supporting Sponsors
BLUE-C
KEYWARE TECHNOLOGIES
BERGDATA
AKG
ACOUSTICS
ESRI
GEOSPACE
NETWORK INSTRUMENTS
SCHAUER MASCHINENFABRIK
Supporters
City of Vienna – Department for Cultural Affairs
City of Vienna – Department for Planning and Future Developments
Austrian Federal Chancellery – Department for the Arts
Partners
Constant
Cinema Nova
European Cultural Foundation
Heinz Nixdorf Museums
Forum Paderborn
Kender Thijssen
VIDISQUARE
Independent Media Center Belgium
FreeSpech Internet Television
De Balie
European Cultural Backbone – ECB
Technisches Museum Wien
National Museum of American History – Smithsonian Institute
Public Information Research
Iridium Communications Germany
Media Partners
De Standaard
Roularta
Der Standard
Canvas
Radio 1
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