Vision 2020

VISION2020 Leicester - Ideas for the future

 

 

Vision2020 was the BIG discussion in Leicester organised by De Montfort University, Amplified Leicester and the City Council. It discussed how innovations could influence business, social and family life in the future . More than 200 creative thinkers shared ideas on how technology, networks and communities will shape the societies and businesses of tomorrow.

A vision for 2020 was created from the predictions, aims and aspirations of participants for the coming decade. These ideas were taken from the wish-lists written by attendees on the day of how Leicester could improve, without relying on major Government funding. This vision for 2020 is available to view here, and we plan to update you with those ideas already in action in the city and the new actions as they start to emerge.

Keynote

John Thackara - How to make less, more

A green, restorative and steady-state economy is not a future vision - it already exists, at least in embryo. Social innovation is all around us in a million grassroots projects. Connected citizens, and new kinds of business, are taking practical steps to re-make our cities places, and tools. By innovating services for daily life that use far fewer resources, they help to rebuild natural and social assets. Many of these projects use new technologies in creative ways - but their positive energy derives most from the skills and imagination of the people involved. What is the opportunity here for Leicester?
John Thackara is a writer, speaker, and event producer. Described by Business Week as "one of the great voices on sustainability", he is the author of In The Bubble: Designing In A Complex World (MIT Press) among thirteen books, and of a widely-read blog about design for resilience, doorsofperception.com. As director of Doors of Perception, John organizes festivals and encounters around the world in which communities imagine sustainable futures – and take practical steps to realize them. John Thackara lives in France.
Useful Links:

• doorsofperception.com
• sustainable-everyday.net
• energybulletin.net/node/16859
• transitionnetwork.org/about
• openfarmtech.org/weblog/
• steadystate.org/discover/organizations-that-support-steady-state-principles/
• artsandecology.rsablogs.org.uk

Vision2020 The Wishlist
All the wishlists collected from the Unconference session at Vision2020 were gathered together. People were working very hard and there are dozens of items! The first cut for discussion and refining.

It’s up to Leicester to decide which to choose and how to implement them.

Growing Knowledge: The evolution of research

An exhibition at the British Library showcasing new and innovative research tools and techniques

12 October 2010 - 16 July 2011

The British Library have filmed a series of thought provoking discussions about the evolution of research, see our very own Professors Andrew Hugill and Sue Thomas share their thoughts.

Andrew Hugill: Digital Research, The Modern Library
Sue Thomas: Scholarly Communications, Search for and Analyse Data

Link: www.growingknowledge.bl.uk

Inside Out Opens in Manchester

Inside Out  was hosted by Miriad Research Centre at the Pavement Gallery Righton Building  at Manchester Metropolitan University. It will be on through November and move to Falmouth in the Spring.

‘Inside Out – Sculpture in the Digital Age’ is a compelling international touring exhibition featuring 46 miniature sculptures produced in resin using 3D printing technologies, the title is also the theme for the exhibition which focuses on emerging digital design techniques - and features an exchange of objects with Australian artists via the internet. Co-curated by Professor Martin Rieser and Claire Smith (Melbourne University and Art Technology Coalition)

The exhibition is the result of collaboration between the Art Technology Coalition, the University of Technology Sydney and RMIT University in Australia along with De Montfort University, Manchester Metropolitan University and University College Falmouth,(incorporating Dartington College of Arts) in the United Kingdom.

ICIDS 2010 Edinburgh

Martin Rieser was invited to participate on an expert panel in lively day workshop at Edinburgh University as part of ICIDS 2010: The third International Conference on Interactive Digital Storytelling. Janet Murray author of Hamlet on the Holodeck joined the workshop: Towards a Shared Vocabulary for Interactive Digital Storytelling via Skype link from Atlanta. 

The workshop addressed the diversity of theoretical concepts and associated critical terminology used to describe digitally mediated forms of interactive narrative. Scholars and practitioners in the interdisciplinary area of Interactive Digital Storytelling, who originally trained in a specific field often continue to use the terminology they are familiar with, which often causes misunderstandings - both in the internal discussion in the field of Interactive Storytelling Design and the external one with researchers from more traditional fields within the humanities and computer sciences. 

Specifically the workshop addressed this topic by:

• reviewing some particularly ambiguous terms – such as story and plot – and their specialized meaning according to the disciplinary context
• applying them to a mini-corpus of works,
• discussing possible avenues for establishing a shared vocabulary.

The results of the workshop was presented to the panel of experts who reacted to the results and contributed their take on the problem..

Organisers:

Hartmut Koenitz, Georgia Institute of Technology, USA

Mads Haahr, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland

Gabriele Ferri, University of Bologna, Italy

Tonguc Ibrahim Sezen, Istanbul University, Turkey

Ocean of Light at Ars Electronica

Ocean of Light : A Squidsoup Project
 

Ocean of Light was a joint research project with the IOCT , funded through two TSB grants. It was shown this year at Ars Electronica and then moved to an extended display at the centre until January 2011. This year’s Ars Electronica festival took place in a massive old tobacco factory, much of it with an art deco feel, and all of it with the strong smells of tobacco still lingering in the air. It made for an interesting event. The enormous available floor area meant that each project and event on show could live and breathe in its own space; projects were generally unencumbered by anything else nearby. This, combined with the labyrinthine structure of the layout and warehouses meant that the overall experience was more like a treasure hunt – you wander around, usually hopelessly lost, down long corridors and empty spaces and then suddenly come across an unexpected gleaming treasure of media art.

Images of some of the projects on show HERE
More images of Ocean of Light HERE
Ocean of Light moves to the main gallery at the Ars Electronica Centre itself in the next week, where it will be on show until 9th January 2010.

The Ocean of Light project explores the creative and immersive possibilities of light-based visualisation in physical space. It uses bespoke hardware to create dynamic, interactive and three-dimensional sculptures from light.

Surface is the first artwork to be exhibited using the Ocean of Light hardware. It uses minimal visuals and sound to evoke the essence of character and movement. Autonomous entities engage in a playful dance, negotiating the material properties of a fluid surface.

 

The Ocean of Light project is a collaborative research venture, led by Squidsoup and supported by the Technology Strategy Board (UK). Partners include Excled Ltd and IOCT (Martin Rieser) at De Montfort University. Additional support and resources have been provided by Oslo School of Architecture and Design (Norway), Massey University, Wellington (New Zealand) and Centre for Electronic Media Art, Monash University (Aus).

Squidsoup is a digital arts group specialising in immersive interactive installations within physical 3D space. Their work combines sound, light, physical space and virtual worlds to produce immersive and emotive headspaces. They explore the modes and effects of interactivity, looking to make digital experiences where meaningful and creative interaction can occur. 

Contributors: Anthony Rowe, Chris Bennewith, Gareth Bushell, Liam Birtles, Ollie Brown.

Inside Out at Phoenix Square

http://www.insideoutexhibition.com/

‘Inside Out – Sculpture in the Digital Age’ is a compelling international touring exhibition featuring 46 miniature sculptures produced in resin using 3D printing technologies, the title is also the theme for the exhibition which focuses on emerging digital design techniques - and features an exchange of objects with Australian artists via the internet. Co-curated by Professor Martin Rieser and Claire Smith (Melbourne University and Art Technology Coalition) , it is showing at Phoenix Square Leicester through September and October 2010. Rapid Prototype production by Guy Bingham

The exhibition is the result of collaboration between the Art Technology Coalition, the University of Technology Sydney and RMIT University in Australia along with De Montfort
University, Manchester Metropolitan University and University College Falmouth, (incorporating Dartington College of Arts) in the United Kingdom.

Exhibition procedural soundwork: Ron Herrema

Slideshow

Created with Admarket's flickrSLiDR.

Riverains at Illumini Festival Shoreditch

'Riverains'
Martin Rieser with Collaborating artists Ximena Alarcon & Kasia Molga 
Programming in Layar: Gareth Howells
Programming for Empedia locative system: Cuttlefish Multimedia, Phil Jones and Sean Clarke

Riverains creates a story trail along Old Street and Shoreditch High Street, accessible through user's mobile phones. It maps both the imaginary underground world of the Riverains and London's history onto the urban landscape.

Notionally, Riverains are souls tied to watery energies, running under our cities in rivers, cables, sewers, tunnels and caves. They travel unseen by these invisible routes and cluster around sites of their past experience.

Through GPS location sensing and QR barcode code reading, participants can use their mobile phone to discover this hidden underground world, which will correspond to real locations in Shoreditch. These align with the sites of past events such as the Ripper murders. Participants can use the Riverains voices to find those sites and fully experience these narratives.

Two new applications were developed by the Pervasive group at the IOCT for this event including a Layer tour and an new iphone app: Empedia , which will soon have a specific Riverains tour.

Kasia Molga especially revised her Mirror of Infinity mobile texting installation (Pictured) to complement the project.






http://www.pervasive.org.uk/projects/riverains