:: WHAT IS PUNTO Y RAYA FESTIVAL? Abstract Art in Motion www.puntoyrayafestival.com Punto y Raya Festival is the brainchild of the Barcelonan non-profit association MAD [Moviment D’Alliberamen’t Digital], and explores experimental expressions in animation, filmmaking, installation and live performance through the use of pure Form, Colour, Motion and Sound, avoiding direct representation. The proposal is as simple as universal: “Only Dots and Lines. Can you take it?”. To our amazement, in the first call we received near 90 dot·line films from 20 countries. The participants turned out to be animation students, renown animators, filmmakers, videoartists, special FX designers, scientists, architects, composers, Vj’s, anthropologists, graphic designers... We soon realised that the concept’s universality had aroused the interest of various collectives; it was self-evident that the dot and the line affected the way everybody interested in the creative process thinks of representation. Since 2007 we have been overcoming intercultural barriers and bringing together people from all over the world under the motto Back to basics! With five editions under our belt (and the title of “Most abstract Festival in the World”, given by the Japanese press in 2008), Punto y Raya arrives for the first time in Germany, the land where Abstract Art in Motion was originated back in the early 1920s.
WHAT IS PyR? 2014 - 07 (2’) https://vimeo.com/99272710
A comprehensive video archive of PyR activities https://vimeo.com/puntoyraya/albums PyR 2016 Idents and Teasers created by KinoManual in Wrocław, Poland http://www.kinomanual.pl
:: PUNTO Y RAYA FESTIVAL 2016 The sixth edition of Punto y Raya Festival, dubbed “the most abstract in the world” in its nine-year trajectory, arrives at the place where Absolute Cinema and Abstract Animation originated back in the early 1920s: Germany. Hosted and coproduced by one of the most relevant institutions in the fields of avant-garde art & new technologies, ZKM (Centre for Culture and Media Technology) in Karlsruhe, the event will run from October 20th through 23rd 2016 with free admittance, offering its traditional meeting point for artists and fans of the most refined experimental audiovisual art, and promising four intensive and wonderful days of pure Abstract Art in Motion. The International Short Film Competition (with a record number of 842 entries from 54 countries) features the selected 117 films, exploring the most diverse techniques and styles. The live PyRformances section features Yro (FR) with his intimate Eile; Robert Lippok (DE), with the most radical minimalism of his 50 cent. 50 cent., and filmmaker Dirk De Bruyn (AU) with his overwhelming session of immersive Expanded Cinema. Guest Screenings include a German Panorama curated and introduced by Robert Seidel; Dirk de Bruyn’s Retrospective (1979-2016), and FIVE: Visual Music produced by the School of Creative Media at the City University of Hong Kong and introduced by Max Hattler. Larry Cuba (USA) returns to PyR presenting his Two Space Installation. And in our Academy programme we’ll explore the filmography and creative process of our guest artists Jodie Mack, Dirk de Bruyn, Holger Lang and Max Hattler.
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:: ZKM | OUR PARTNER & VENUE Founded in 1989, the ZKM | Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe is a cultural institution which, since 1997, has been located in a historical industrial building in Karlsruhe, Germany that formerly housed a munitions factory. The ZKM organizes special exhibitions and thematic events, carries out research projects, produces works in the field of new media and offers public as well as individualized communications and educational programs. The ZKM houses under one roof two museums, three research institutes as well as a media center; in this way it groups research and production, exhibitions and events, archives and collections. It works on the interface of art and science, and takes up cutting-edge insights in media technologies with the objective of developing them further. Since the death of founding director Heinrich Klotz (1935-1999), the ZKM has been directed by Prof. Peter Weibel. In addition to the ZKM, the associated Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design, as well as the Städtische Galerie Karlsruhe [Municipal Gallery Karlsruhe] are likewise housed in the former munitions factory.
:: LOCATIONS : MEDIENTHEATER (Screenings + Academy Activities) Located in Atrium 6 on the ground floor and adjacent to the main foyer. The stage construction and seating in the space can be arranged as desired, and is ideal for congresses, customer events, and multimedia productions and performances. · 345 sq. m · Length x width x height: 23 x 15 x 9 m · Audience seating up to max. 200 persons · Row seating up to max. 300 persons 3 | www.puntoyrayafestival.com
: FOYER / BAR (PyRformances + Award Ceremony) An exclusive location for receptions and banquets, the Foyer is located in Atrium 7 of the former munitions factory. · 756 sq. m (total usable surface 1000 sq. m) · Length x width x height: 42 x 18 x 15 m · Standing receptions up to max. 800 persons · Banquet up to max. 600 persons · Seating up to max. 400 persons
: VORTRAGSSAAL (Junior Activities)
Located on the ground floor in Atrium 6. The space is especially well-suited for lecture events, press conferences, production presentations, and similar events. · Permanently installed spectator gallery up to max. 100 persons · 153 sq. m. · Length x width x height: 17 x 9 x 5 m
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:: ACTIVITIES PROGRAMME :: INTERNATIONAL SHORT-FILM COMPETITION
This year we received the record number of 842 films from 55 countries. These section features the 117 films selected for the 2016 Official Competition. Presentations and Q&A sessions with artists in attendance and open to audience participation.
* PyR 2016 Statuettes are courtesy of ASIFA Austria.
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:: GUEST SCREENINGS : FIVE: HONG KONG VISUAL MUSIC
A visualisation of Gustav Mahler’s Symphony n.5 Thursday, October 20th | 20.00h | Medientheater Five is a collaborative visual music project created with 36 student animators from the School of Creative Media (City University of Hong Kong) under Max Hattler's direction. The result is an abstract visualisation of Gustav Mahler’s Symphony No. 5 (1904). Through the movement and rhythms of colours and shapes, Mahler’s musical world is brought to life on screen. Introduced by Max in person. We’ll conclude with a Q&A session. City University of Hong Kong’s School of Creative Media is recognized to be an international center for discovery and innovation in Asia. Here creativity is nurtured as a cornerstone of Hong Kong’s social and economic advancement in the 21st Century. Our teaching and research facilities are housed in a stunning, one-of-a-kind, building designed by the world renowned architect Daniel Libeskind. http://www.cityu.edu.hk
Max Hattler | Project Artistic Director
Animator and director, he also performs live visuals, and has collaborated with music acts like Basement Jaxx, Julien Mier, Jovanotti, Pixelord, The Egg, and Jemapur.
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Dirk de Bruyn (1979-2016) Friday, October 21st | 21.00h | Medientheater Ever since his first experiments in 16mm film using a LOMO processing tank, working with abstract moving image gave de Bruyn a space to process the dilemmas and incongruities of daily life, and to escape its clutches. Very much like knitting. He would never throw anything away; new scratching, painting, taping or bleaching strategies could be added later, in an intensive cluster editing of single frames, which soon became an obsession. This intense retrospective encompasses most of his abstract filmography, produced from found footage film and his own archive of discarded data and unfinished sentences.
Dirk de Bruyn | Melbourne, Australia Senior Lecturer and Head of Discipline of Animation and Motion Capture at Deakin University in Melbourne. His 2014 published book The Performance of Trauma in Moving Image Art maps the history of Experimental film in relation to traumatic experience. He has made numerous experimental, documentary and animation films and videos. He was a founding member and past president of MIMA (Experimenta), been involved with Fringe Network and been a member of the Melbourne Super 8 Film Group. He has written about and curated various programs of film and video art internationally and written extensively about this area of arts practice
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: GERMAN SHORT-FILM PANORAMA From the origins of the genre up to this date Sunday, October 23rd | 13.00h | Medientheater We Goodbye with a very special selection of abstract films produced in the land where Absolute Cinema originated back in the early 1920s. Curated and introduced by filmmaker, media artist and researcher Robert Seidel, the programme offers a fascinating journey through a variety of works, spanning various techniques and styles from the very origins of the genre to this day.
Robert Seidel
1977 | Germany Robert Seidel began his studies in biology before transferring to the Bauhaus University Weimar to complete his degree in media design. His projections, installations and experimental films have been shown in numerous international festivals, as well as at galleries and museums such as the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp, ZKM Karlsruhe, LACMA Los Angeles, Art Center Nabi Seoul, Museum of Image and Sound SĂŁo Paulo and MOCA Taipei. His works have been honoured with various prizes, including the KunstFilmBiennale Cologne Honorary Award and Prize for Best Experimental Film at the Ottawa International Animation Festival. In his work Seidel is interested in pushing the boundaries of abstracted beauty through cinematographic approaches, as well as ones drawn from science. By the organic interplay of various structural, spatial and temporal concepts, he creates a continuously evolving complexity. Out of this multifaceted perspective emerges a narrative skeleton, through which viewers connects to the artwork on an evolutionary-derived and phylogenetic-fixated symbolic level. Seidel lives and works in Berlin and Jena as artist, filmmaker and curator. www.robertseidel.com
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:: GUEST PyRFORMANCES : MATERIAL DAMAGE | DIRK DE BRUYN (Australia) Thursday, October 20tt | 21.00h | Medientheater
Dirk de BRUYN’s expanded cinema performances engage the æsthetics of process at a number of levels. At the core of these performances are several of three- or four-screen, essentially abstract films of the same duration which comment upon and echo each other in a constant interplay of flicker-like positive and negative imagery. The soundtrack of the films works in a related way: the same or similar words and sound fragments are overlayed, or are repeated in an absurd call-and-answer pattern running from one speaker to another. This overall design or formal system is then set into play and relativised in the live event through a number of treatment-techniques. The light beam of each projector is filtered, distorted, split and multiplied using hand-held colour gels, plastic bottles, prisms and mirrors, or else silhouetted or blocked completely with the artist’s own hands and body. The projectors themselves can be inverted, turned around or physically transported across the space, mixing and overlaying the imagery, animating different areas of the performance environment and transforming the body of the audience itself into a screen medium.
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: EILE | ELIE BLANCHARD_YRO (France)
Friday, October 21st | 23.30h | Medientheater Eile is a live cinema performance in which Yro makes, before your eyes, the sound and the image using a camera, microphones and small objects: paper, balls, cotton, plastic, light and photos. These materials enable him to create video and sound loops, which he assembles, samples and manipulates. They are aesthetically close to abstract cinema and object theatre. In this way, manipulating, shimmering and using other synesthetic connections, he composes a land of primary and concrete forms. The process of fabrication is a part of the staging as much as the projection of the resulting film. The cinematographic form is put to the test by the arrangement, each time unique, of images and sounds, and also by the important place given to improvisation and accident. A shifting and autobiographical performance, Eile (anagram of his first name), is an exploration of childhood terrain where events and objects take on dimensions that are subjective and sometimes magical. http://www.yrostudio.com
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: 50 CENT. 50 CENT. | ROBERT LIPPOK (Germany) Saturday, October 22nd | 24.00h | Medientheater
Avant-garde German visual artist and composer Robert Lippok has been an influential player in Berlin’s thriving experimental music scene from a very early age. In 1983, he co-founded dissident punk band Ornament und Verbrechen with his brother Ronald, inspired by industrial trailblazers Throbbing Gristle. Known for his expansive imagination, inventive rhythmic reflexes, and layers of fuzzy tones, Lippok’s solo work is just as wide-ranging – from funky, glitch-y, twisted techno record Redsuperstructure for Raster-Noton (2011), to stage design for operas, gallery exhibitions, and notable collaborations with Italian harpist Beatrice Martini, Canadian percussionist Debashis Sinha or brother Ronald and Italian composer Ludovico Einaudi. http://www.raster-noton.net/artists/robert-lippok
:: ACADEMY PROGRAMME - MASTERCLASSES 11 | www.puntoyrayafestival.com
: Artistic Strategies in Austrian Abstract Animation by Holger Lang (Vienna, Austria) Friday, October 21st | 10.30h | Vortragssaal This masterclass provides a historical and conceptual context to study the realm of abstract animation produced in Austria, and the role that ASIFA has played as promoter of this type of artwork, illustrating with excerpts from various works. Coming from a background in fine arts, and active as an experimental filmmaker, curator, researcher and professor, Holger Lang will also discuss his own approach to abstract film, both in his research and practice, discussing the creative process behind them.
Holger Lang | Austria Lang’s artistic focus reaches from abstract and conceptual work to experimental and interdisciplinary projects. Traveling extensively he has been invited to numerous lectures, presentations, conferences and festivals in Europe, the US and Japan. For over 20 years he's been teaching animation, media arts and aesthetics for an American university at one of their satellite locations in Austria and also their main campus in St.Louis. Holger Lang is organising academic symposia in Vienna and Zagreb and he is curating programs of European and Austrian animation and experimental films for various venues. In addition he is managing and curating an independent gallery in Vienna and for several years he is one of the board members of ASIFA AUSTRIA where he is supporting, promoting and distributing contemporary Austrian animation.
: Austrian Short-Film Panorama Vol. 2 by ASIFA Austria Friday, October 21st | 12.30h | Vortragssaal Complementing Lang's Masterclass, this section was curated by ASIFA Austria to help illustrate the various artistic strategies for the creation of abstract films in that country. It also includes some of Lang's own works. We'll conclude with a Q&A open to audience participation.
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: A Cavalcade of Erasures by Dirk de Bruyn (Australia) Saturday, October 22nd | 10.30h | Vortragssaal Dirk de Bruyn has been creating film works for over 35 years; mostly in the hand-made, 'direct animation' mode. He also performs live with multiple projections of his films in a highly embodied mode of expanded cinema performance. His work is renowned for its intricate, suggestive layering of sound and image, and use of sumptuous, blooming fields of colour.
Dirk de Bruyn | Melbourne, Australia Senior Lecturer and Head of Discipline of Animation and Motion Capture at Deakin University in Melbourne. His 2014 published book The Performance of Trauma in Moving Image Art maps the history of Experimental film in relation to traumatic experience. He has made numerous experimental, documentary and animation films and videos. He was a founding member and past president of MIMA (Experimenta), been involved with Fringe Network and been a member of the Melbourne Super 8 Film Group. He has written about and curated various programs of film and video art internationally and written extensively about this area of arts practice
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: Absolute Animation by Jodie Mack (Dartmouth·NH · USA) Saturday, October 22nd | 12.30h | Vortragssaal Experimental animator and composer Jodie Mack has gained worldwide recognition thanks to her unique approach to handmade films, which playfully push the boundaries between genres. Mack’s peculiar perspective unleashes an irreverent exuberance for the possibilities inherent in all manner of everyday things—tie-dye shirts, wallpaper, rock posters, holographic knick knacks, junk mail… via a rigorous formalism set on exploring the cosmic wonders lurking in the space of the frame, the rhythms of cuts. In this masterclass, she will submerge us into her fascinating mind and body of work, which – with only 33— encompasses over a dozen films.
Jodie Mack | 1983 · b. London, UK Experimental animator who received her MFA in film, video, and new media from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago in 2007. Combining the formal techniques and structures of abstract/absolute animation with those of cinematic genres, her handmade films use collage to explore the relationship between graphic cinema and storytelling, the tension between form and meaning. Musical documentary or stroboscopic archive: her films study domestic and recycled materials to illuminate the elements shared between fine-art abstraction and mass-produced graphic design. The works unleash the kinetic energy of overlooked and wasted objects and question the role of decoration in daily life. She currently works as an Associate Professor of Animation at Dartmouth College, where she co-organizes an experimental media series, EYEWASH, and serves as the 2015-16 Sony Music Fellow. http://www.jodiemack.com
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: Principles of Neo Media Art by Max Hattler (Germany ¡ Hong Kong) Sunday, October 23rd | 11.00h | Medientheater Max Hattler is an artist interested in the space between abstraction and figuration in the moving image, where storytelling is freed from the constraints of traditional narrative. He works across the fields of experimental film, video installation and audiovisual performance, constantly seeking new formats for each of his projects. In his Masterclass, Hattler will introduce us to his creative process and the impact of music, technology and new media formats in his work, illustrating with some examples of his ample abstract filmography.
Max Hattler | 1976 ¡ Ulm, Germany Award-winning animator and director, Hattler also performs abstract live visuals, and has collaborated with music acts like Basement Jaxx, Julien Mier, Jovanotti, Pixelord, The Egg, and Jemapur. His work has been exhibited at numerous galleries, festivals and museums around the globe, including multiple retrospective. After teaching Animation for over three years at the Royal College of Art in London, he is currently a professor of Creative Media at the City University of Hong Kong. http://www.maxhattler.com
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:: PyR JUNIOR SCREENINGS PyR strongly vindicates sensitisation campaigns regarding experimental art and the promotion of cultural diversity amongst the youngest audiences. So every year we host screenings, workshops and other playful activities for children. These short films curated specially for family audiences, explore the tight relationship between image and sound, and how these boost each other (through balance, contrast, synchrony, counterpoint...). The selection also includes the finalist and awarded films created by children aged 6 to 12 for the first edition of Punto y Raya JUNIOR (November 2012, Barcelona).
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:: TWO SPACE INSTALLATION by Larry Cuba (Santa Cruz·CA, USA)
One of the pioneers of computer animation in art, Larry Cuba continues his exploration in the realm of Absolute Cinema by creating immersive audiovisual experiences based on seamless geometric mosaics, which can be adapted to practically any surface. 3D animation (sometimes in combination with dome projection) is also often used to transport his audience to a different dimension of thought and perception. At Academy, he will present his installation TWO SPACE, based on imagery from the multiawarded short film created in 1979.
Larry Cuba | 1953 · Atlanta·GA, USA Larry Cuba is widely recognised as a pioneer in the use of computers in animation art. His four films First Fig (1974), 3/78 (Objects and Transformations) (1978), Two Space (1979) and Calculated Movements (1985) explore the visual perception of motion and musical structure, and are already classics. He’s also worked in the blockbuster Star Wars, creating one of the earliest 3D animations in feature films. In 1994, he founded the iotaCenter, a non-profit arts organization dedicated to abstract animation and visual music. His ongoing software development project continues his research into the connection between algorithmic and choreographic patterns. http://www.iotacenter.org
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:: ACTIVIES SCHEDULE : THURSDAY, October 20th > PYR FESTIVAL
: Foyer 18.30: RECEPTION / MEETING POINT FOR ARTISTS IN ATTENDANCE : Medientheater 19.00: OPENING CEREMONY 20.00: GUEST SCREENING: FIVE: HONG KONG VISUAL MUSIC [21.45 – 22.30h supper break] : Medientheater 22.30 GUEST LIVE SESSION #1: Dirk de Bruyn (Australia)
:: FRIDAY, October 21st > PYR ACADEMY
: Vortragsaal 10.30: MASTERCLASS HOLGER LANG (Austria) 12.30: ASIFA AUSTRIA SCREENING (Austria) [14-15 lunch break]
> PYR FESTIVAL
: Medientheater 15.00: SHORT-FILM COMPETITION #1 17.00: SHORT-FILM COMPETITION #2 19.00: SHORT-FILM COMPETITION #3 21.00: GUEST SCREENING: DIRK DE BRUYN Retrospective (Australia) [22.30 – 23.30h supper break] : Medientheater 23.30: GUEST LIVE SESSION # 2: YRO (France)
:: SATURDAY, October 22nd > JUNIOR ACTIVITIES
: Black Box / Screening Room 11.00: JUNIOR SCREENING
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> PYR ACADEMY
: Vortragsaal 10.30: MASTERCLASS DIRK DE BRUYN (Australia) 12.30: MASTERCLASS JODIE MACK (USA) [14.00-15.00 lunch break]
> PYR FESTIVAL
: Medientheater 15.00: SHORT-FILM COMPETITION #4 17.00: SHORT-FILM COMPETITION #5 19.00: SHORT-FILM COMPETITION #6 21.00: SHORT-FILM COMPETITION #7 [22.30 – 23.30h supper break] : Foyer 23.30: AWARD CEREMONY : Medientheater 24.00: GUEST LIVE SESSION #3: LIPPOK (RASTER NOTON) (Germany) : Foyer 1.00: AFTER HOURS PARTY
:: SUNDAY, October 23rd > JUNIOR ACTIVITIES
: Black Box / Screening room 11.00: JUNIOR SCREENING
> PYR ACADEMY
: Medientheater 11.00: MASTERCLASS MAX HATTLER (Germany · Hong Kong)
> PYR FESTIVAL
: Medientheater 13.00: GUEST SCREENING: GERMAN SHORT-FILM PANORAMA : Foyer 14.30: CLOSING CEREMONY with participating artists + snacks
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:: THE ORGANISERS :: MAD | Moviment d’Alliberament Digital [Spain] MAD is a non-profit association based in Barcelona. For over eleven years we've been working on cultural engineering through projects development involving art, science and technology around the globe. :: We promote all the stages in the cycle of education, production, exhibition, distribution and commercialisation of experimental works in various formats. :: We facilitate the access of general audiences to resources and tools related to experimental creation through the development of multi-sectoral networks and crossplatform applications. :: Cultural diversity and contextualization are fundamental for the better appreciation and analysis of experimental works, so we also organize guest sections from various countries, and retrospectives contrasting contemporary and classic authors in a creative and playful way. :: We digitally release documents/works through the development of a creative and collaborative platform addressed to all audiences. :: We seek to organically create a sustainable model for the creation and promotion of experimental art, working in a collaborative, multidisciplinary and international manner in ALL THE STAGES of the project. This is how we have partnered with over 40 institutions including festivals, universities, teachers, curators and artists across Europe, the US and Latin America.
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MAD are:
: Co-Director & Head of Production Ana Santos
BA in Graphic Design and Photography. She works as a freelance art director and web designer. Founder member of MAD.
: Co-Director, Head of Executive Production & PP.RR. Nöel Palazzo Screenwriter and novelist. She has directed a couple of internationally awarded films and also lectures and writes essays as a film critic. Since 2008 she's been a member of the iotaCenter’s Advisory Council (Los Angeles, CA) and coordinator of the Spanish speaking community at the Visual Music Village. She acts as a juror for international film & animation festivals, and has curated special programmes focused on avantgarde animation.
: Technical Producer Kike Ramírez
BA in Telecommunications Engineering from the UMA. Responsible of International Communication at vjspain.com. Author of Visual, Interactive & Augmented Reality installations. Hardware & Software Designer / Generative Graphics and Creative Coding programmer http://vjspain.com/usuarios/kike
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:: WITH THE SUPPORT OF
AND THE KIND COLLABORATION OF
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