DRU Seminar 03
Four Commissions: Tom Betts, Michael Atavar, Alexei Shulgin, Rachel Reupke

The DRU initiates, supports and disseminates creative research and production activities in digital, interactive, and network media, linking artists, researchers, academics, and creative networks. The DRU delivers a dynamic and challenging range of work from artists at the forefront of digital media practice, bringing new ideas and working practises to the fore.

Location
The Media Centre
7 Northumberland Street
Huddersfield
HD1 1RL

The DRU Seminar 03 is a free event, open to everyone, but places are strictly limited, so please register interest by emailing us at:

[email protected] or telephone Clare Danek on 0870 990 5007.

The Digital Research Unit opened on 17 October 2002. This event marks the first anniversary of the facility and creates a platform for us to present and discuss the four artists’ commissions produced in the past 12 months. The DRU Seminar 03 is a day long event built around presentations by the four artists commissioned: Tom Betts; Michael Atavar; Alexei Shulgin; Rachel Reupke.

The seminar will take place in the Conference Room on the first floor of The Media Centre in Huddersfield. The schedule described below will be followed as closely as possible, so that we all get the opportunity to meet and talk outside of the seminar itself. Lunch will be held in the Café Bar at The Media Centre, which is downstairs from the Conference Room, and will be taken with all the attendees, and should be a good time to chat/network etc.

+ The Café Bar at The Media Centre is now a free wireless zone, so if you're wireless enabled you can now use the internet for free in that space.

The artists' presentations will address the development, production and publication/exhibiton of their commission. Some artists will contextualise the commissioned work in relation to their other practice, and will present other work. Each artist has been allocated 1 hour, which includes 15 minutes for a Q&A session at the end of their presentation, leaving about 45 minutes to present the work.

At the end of the day there will be a panel discussion, Chaired by Derek Hales [Director of Research, Department of Architecture, Huddersfield University] including Tom Betts, Michael Atavar, Alexei Shulgin, Rachel Reupke and Tom Holley [Creative Director, The Media Centre] to discuss general issues relating to the Digital Research Unit Commissions, and how we might evolve and improve what we do. We also hope for a lively audience led Q&A session to round off the day.




The Commissions

Tom Betts | QQQ 2002 | http://www.q-q-q.net Originally exhibited at the Evolution Festival, Leeds 2002. In collaboration with Lumen. The digital arenas of Quake are manipulated using generative programming techniques to produce abstract architectural forms. Players paint afterimage trails and motion smears, creating a continuous stream of glitched and distorted images. http://www.nullpointer.co.uk

michael atavar | [four walls] 2003 | http://www.druh.co.uk [four walls] architecture and virtual reality 2002/3 where a wall is a window and the sky a tree where a house is a car and a barking dog a door http://www.atavar.com

Alexei Shulgin & Victor Laskin | WIMP 2003 | http://www.wimp.ru WIMP is a program for creating visual animations synchronised with sound in real time. WIMP exploits the Graphical User Interface [GUI] of the Windows Operating System. http://www.easylife.org

Rachel Reupke | Pico Mirador 2003 | http://www.picomirador.com Three webcams look out over the spectacular Pico Mirador region, each view presenting an unremitting report of the ebb and flow of life and the seasons.