City Noises

is a three country (Finland, Hungary, UK) artistic research project supported by EU Culture Programme. It uses different creative practices to explore the interaction between local and global identities in the age of dramatic social change in urban environments.

The project creates at least three investigative art works (below) to explore the hopes, dreams and challenges faced by different communities in European localities. The works are shown in three promotional events between Aug-Sept 2012 in the partner cities:

London 4 Aug 2012 Intervention

As a part of the cultural celebrations surrounding the London 2012 Olympic Games, the coordinating partner Stream (UK) creates an evening and late night intervention in a small park between Glenister Gardens and East Greenwich Pleasaunce. Artists present their work as a part of the East Greenwich Community Festivals. City Noises will also collaborate with the Peninsula Festival, which has the strap line “Get in touch with the Dutch,” as est. 4500 Dutch visit the local area then.

Helsinki 23–24 August 2012 Intervention & Seminar

As a part of the World Design Capital Helsinki 2012 programme and the Helsinki Festivals’ Night of the Arts, Crucible Studio (Finland) organises a media art intervention and urban media seminar together with m-cult and City Sets. On Thu 23 Aug evening artists’ work takes over the Bear Park (Karhupuisto) in the Kallio district of Helsinki. The seminar runs through 23-24 Aug in the Media Centre Lume Sampo Hall.

Budapest 21-23 Sept 2012 Intervention

As a part of the Placcc International Arts Festival 2012, Szövetség’39 (Hungary) arranges artists’ showing. The motto of the ten-day festival is “Art that takes you by surprise:” the festival presents works of art that can be realised outside the walls of galleries and theatres, e.g. in public spaces and other unusual sites. The site for the City Noises showing is the Erzsébet Square in the downtown of the city.

Artworks

‘Hey Homo’ by Jaakko Pesonen & Mika ‘Lumi’ Tuomola / Crucible Studio

The installation offers a tragicomic experience of people’s stereotypes about minorities in urban communities. Three archetypically Finnish women of three successive generations comment passers-by with homophobic notions, varying between clichés drawn from media, “science” and various belief systems. ‘Hello Homo!’ consists of three flat screens and computers mounted on a metal structure. The work senses the presence of the people passing by and reacts accordingly: the women try to catch the people’s attention in order to share their thoughts.

‘London Tree’ by Evan Raskob & Rob McNeill / Ravensbourne (UK) & Stream

London Tree is an interactive art installation investigating the lack of communication across different social groups and classes in London’s public spaces. Modelled on the territorial songs of city birds such as sparrows, the installation consists of a modified tree in a public space suspended with a collection of sound-emitting sculptures representing real London citizens of contrasting socioeconomic backgrounds. The sculptures sing territorial songs to one another in response to sounds from the environment around them, and to one another, in patterns modelled on the dispersion of birdsong in the wild.

‘No Distance. No Contact.’ by Anna Baróthy, Melinda Bozsó, Csenge Kolozsvári & Ágoston ‘Stc’ Nagy / Szövetség ’39

The interactive sound-installation aims to present the changes of non-perceptible energy field between persons via aural perception. People who take part in the installation will experience a complex, sensual sound field that has a special, constantly changing pattern. Participants can influence this pattern through proximity to other users and elements in the space. The installation consists of customized headphones, smartphones and a server that will manage the network.

CITY SETS & MEDIA FACADES International Seminar on Urban Media

Is organized in the context of two urban media art events, City Noises and Media Facades Festival, both opening on the Night of the Arts (23.08). The seminar is targeted to artists, designers, architects, researchers and others working within the urban and media spaces. We look forward to lively debates with participants during the two seminar days. Welcome!

Organized

The seminar is jointly organised by:
– Aalto University School of Art, Design and Architecture / City Sets project as part of World Design Capital Helsinki 2012 program with the City Noises project funded by the EU Culture Programme

http://citysets.net/

– m-cult / Media Facades Festival 2012
as part of Helsinki Festival program with the European Urban Media Network for Connecting Cities project funded by the EU Culture Programme

http://m-cult.org/projects/media-facades-festival-helsinki-2012

Registration form:

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/viewform?fromEmail=true&formkey=dGtYUXZUM1d0ZHEwSW1ENXJfeXVid2c6MA

Watch the presentations by City Noises participants in the City Sets and Media Facades Festival youtube

CITY NOISES. PLACCC

City Noises presence at PLACCC was very much noticed, the works presented were recieved with excellent reviews and a welcoming audience. For more images please visit our Facebook page

Photo by Ádám Dörögdi

The City Noises blog and web site: http://blog.citynoises.org/

The work programme has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication [communication] reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.