Elevate Festival News Feed

The Politics of Data in a Quantified Society

Mon, 26 Oct 2015 13:17:00 +0100

“Are you a robot?” says the disembodied telephone voice. “You sound so much like a robot. Will you say 'I am not a robot?'” So begins a presentation from Marek Tuszynski and Stephanie Hankey from Tactical Tech, a presentation that lurches easily from the surreal to the terrifying, but ends with a full bodied embrace of evil. The central question Tactical Tech pose is: what does it mean to live in a data-ised society, for individual and for corporations? The luckless telemarketer on the end of the disembodied question refuses to confirm that she is not a robot. That's the point: when we've automated ourselves to the eyeballs with algorithms, how do we still know that we are not being controlled by robots? Balthasar Glattli, a Swiss national councillor, gave away his smartphone data so that everyone who had voted for him could see exactly what he was doing. From the data that leaked freely from the phone, analysts were easily able to track where he was, who he was talking to and what he was likely to be doing. Over time, it was simplicity itself to build up a network map of all his friends and colleagues. Marek makes the point again: This is not a hacked phone. This is information that you all have agreed to share with the network provider - and with anyone else who buys that data. “Data is not a carrot,” Marek helpfully points out. “You can't eat it and it's gone.” And if you're thinking that “vintage” phones are the answer, Marek will swiftly disabuse you of the notion. Non-smart phones still broadcast meta data – location, movement, times, connections – from which you can build up a very detailed profile of a user. Marek shows us a tool called Trackography, which shows tracking data for media websites all over the world. Every time you browse for your daily news, you are inadvertently sending data to third parties all over the world. Some of these companies you already know, like Google, Amazon or Facebook; but some are completely masked and anonymous. Marek shows us what happens when we browse through 7 local and national Austrian media sources: Trackography counts 95 unintended connections with institutions all over the world, curious about your clicking behaviour. Next, Stephanie Hankey introduces us to the marketing concepts of geo-targeting, geo-fencing and geo-conquesting. Geo-targeting is pushing people content based on their location. Geo-fencing is about marking out 100m² areas and targeting adverts at people who are in those areas right now, or who have been there within the last 30 days, say. Geo-conquesting takes it to a new level. This is when a company can see when you're on a competitor's territory and pushes you an advert to attempt to lure you away. Stephanie herself was a victim of geo-conquest just yesterday. As she arrived at Frankfurt airport, she was pushed an ad by Easyjet, innocently asking if she wanted to buy a flight. Easyjet don't operate from Frankfurt, but they knew she was there and they knew she hadn't flown with them. But, as Stephanie says, “Paranoid is okay, paranoid is good.” Furthermore, while older tech companies do have a slightly different business model – Apple and Microsoft also make money from selling soft and hardware – as data reaches further into our lives, more and more companies are joining the data model, including the car industry, to take one notorious recent example. But Stephanie and Marek aren't here only to terrify people with the reach of data into our lives. They are also here to encourage us to take control back from the algorithms. Life insurance companies have started giving customers a discount for wearing a device that tracks your physical activity. The discount is worth about €50 per year. These devices track your geo-location, of course, but also your exertion. Using those two data streams, it is easy to tell, just for example, who is having sex, with whom and how much they're both enjoying it. Is that worth €50? But why not take the €50 discount and subvert the business model: fix your device to a metronome, to the wheels of a taxi cab, on the end of a drill or to your dog's collar. These comedy subversions belie serious questions, like what constitutes political autonomy in the quantified society? Stephanie questions whether “Big Brother” is even the right metaphor. “Big Mama” might be better; these data-driven surveillance intrusions seem utterly banal, rather than sinister. Churchix, for example, is a surveillance tool that uses facial recognition software to track which of your flock regularly attends your mass. How do these things become normal, even for a church? Even if Churchix doesn't take off, how did it come to pass that someone thought this was a good idea? Corporations have been leading the way, of course. Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook, has spent $14m buying the 3 houses around his property so that he would have no neighbours. Contrast that personal decision with Facebook's real name policy and business model that encourages us to make the private public. And let's not forget that it's a business model that made a $3bn profit last year, paid UK staff bonuses of £35.4m, yet only £4,327 in UK tax. According to Stephanie, these huge data corporations are going around government. They see themselves are being “uber government” and it seems unlikely that they will be pulled into check now. Microsoft have developed a chip the size of Scrabble tile that can be implanted into women and control their fertility. Calico are in the business of “radical life extension”, curing death. Google are building a space rocket so they can mine the moon. These are not the things we think of when we think of our favourite Silicon Valley apps. Marek ends with a provocation to action: How can we counter the creativeness of these uncompanies? Tactical Tech have a number of projects to help people answer this question:

Me and My Shadow for understanding the digital environment.
Security in a Box for tools to protect yourself from data mining and surveillance.
Exposing the Invisible for understanding more about meta data.

Lightful! Yes!

Mon, 26 Oct 2015 13:18:00 +0100

First, Mike Bonanno from the Yes Men took us on a magical mystery tour of creative protest, from the suffragettes dressing up as Ancient Greeks and Gandhi's salt march, to bread helmets in revolutionary Egypt and the KGB's flying penises.

“Big campaigns are won by small numbers of people,” Mike says, pointing to the US Civil Rights movement. “It wasn't even the majority of the minority that was involved.” This is why being creative and making a big noise in the media is important: you can have a disproportionate influence on the political process. “The tendency of the media is to re-tell the same story the whole time,” Mike says. “Keep reminding them what the real story is.”

You can find a lot of Mike’s inspiration through these three resources for creative action: beautifultrouble.org; actipedia.org; and the book Small Acts of Resistance.

Ksenia Ermoshina brings a creative perspective from a very different part of the activist world: Russia. Ksenia describes the Russian activist environment, where the police have a tendency to over-react, arresting people who protest by dancing in cathedrals, for example. This has the pleasing effect of amplifying the activists' message. Equally, however, Russian civil society has no repertoire of action, as you find in Europe or the States. In France, where Ksenia currently works, the activists can immediately draw on a palette of actions, from die-ins to occupations, that everyone is familiar with. They don’t have to reinvent protest every time.

Ksenia describes her adventures in adbusting, creating speech bubbles for inanimate objects like bricks: “Only for throwing at cops.” Ksenia's inspiration is Hakim Bey, who declared that, even if only one or two people are awoken, the action is still a success. She also always insists on filming the whole process of preparing the action, whether it’s printing and posting photos of Syrian children or making a Vladimir Putin puppet, so that other people can see exactly how it was done and how they too can protest.

Ksenia's action has a very immediate and personal element, however. Her mother, a journalist, recently lost her job at one of the few remaining independent publications in Russia. Her question for the workshop: How can we talk to more people, reach more people, in countries where regimes are becoming more authoritarian?

Bruno Tozzini comes from the very different background of advertising, a $137bn industry in the US. And yet he shows us a series of creative responses to social problems, some created by advertising agencies and all using corporate platforms, including an intercultural language exchange over Skype, an online street art exhibition using Google Maps, and the sharing through Facebook of the “invisible” stories of homeless Brazilians.

Bruno then takes us through his “four steps of making” and, in the afternoon, we launch into a workshop focussed on generating creative responses to the refugee crisis in Graz. We brainstorm together and formulate half a dozen actions that could be implemented today, from wifi sharing, a refugee hackathon and SMS skillsharing, to the simplest imaginable creative response: “Just go and say hi”.

Christian Payne is a networked storyteller. It wasn't always thus, as he shows us through his journey from Alpine pastoralist to newspaper photographer and finally encrypted multimedia archivist. “All media is social,” he says. Christian himself promiscuously shares, not only text, but audio, video, geographic data and photos to tell the stories he encounters from Sudan to Iraq, from Twitter to Storify - from a man holding a smartphone to our ears, eyes and hearts.

Christian is a particularly big proponent of unobtrusive, lightweight, multitasking audio storytelling. He is usually to be found in some quiet corner of the Elevate festival, deep in conversation with some bright philosopher, hacker or DJ, seamlessly sharing their words and thoughts with an audience far away in time and space. He describes audio as an intelligent and intimate storytelling form, akin to reading a book, rather than watching a film.

Christian finishes with a warning about posting online. "You don't own your image, your image belongs to popular opinion,” he says. “You can attempt control your content, but not the way people react to it.” When it comes to protecting yourself online, his advice is simple: “Connect with kindness.”

The final input of the workshop came from Charles Kriel, founder of Lightful and former game designer and circus performer. Lightful is an app that attempts to solve a problem Charles has encountered when advising NGOs on how to share their stories and get access to funding.

Charles opens, however, by discussing the tragic death at a Turkish airport of journalist Jacky Sutton, a former colleague working in the Middle East. The Turkish authorities claim that she'd missed a connecting flight, been unable to afford a new ticket and had, as a consequence, gone into the ladies’ toilet and hung herself. Charles points out that such a course of action would be ridiculous for a seasoned journalist like Jacky, who'd been working in the region for a decade.

Besides the fact that Jacky had €2400 in cash on her person when she died, enough for a dozen new plane tickets, Charles himself has experience of that same fateful flight. “I've missed that connecting flight,” he says. “Everybody misses that connecting flight. It's a guarantee.”

That starting point shows how dangerous is the work of promoting a free press, particularly in the Middle East. “The region is in even more turmoil than is being reported at the moment,” Charles says. His dream is to create an app that will do some of the dangerous work that puts journalists, NGO workers and activists in such mortal danger. Lightful is that app.

Charles and his small team hope to launch Lightful in stages, starting with registered NGOs in a limited geographical space in the next three weeks. The start may be small, but his aim is quietly ambitious: “I'd like people to get into the habit of doing good work.”

Interview: Sophie Magon

Mon, 26 Oct 2015 13:18:00 +0100

ELEVATE: Creative Response is the main topic of the Elevate Festival in 2015. What role does creativity play in your line of work and the context you are active in?

I think creativity is very important because it is a source of pleasure! Pleasure comes from the thing you imagine, and then create, and when you do it in a group it is even better. Wouah we’ve done it! I think I am not happier than when I am doing something new, something original, something I never dared to make before. I can be organizing an event, a party, a new original dinner. It can be a new way of travelling. For example, this summer with my son, we imagined to make a tour in Brittany with our bicycles and we’ve done it, and it was a bit difficult but we were so proud! For me creativity is very linked to daring. Daring to do, and daring to share, to give. I think that at the end of our life, we will remember the things we have realized and particularly those in groups. On est ce que l’on fait. We are what we do.

ELEVATE: What strategies and activities are most effective for resisting the current failings of society and for facilitating pro-active emancipatory change?

Read books, listen to the radio, find some role models. Educate yourself and then contribute to educate others. Learn to transmit!

When you read an interesting book, try to make a resumé and post it on facebook to share it with your friends and relations. Dare to share points of views that seem to be different. I must say I never did that up to now, but I want to do it, e.g. for Naomi Klein’s book [This Changes Everything] that I recently bought, I would like to make a résumé in order to be able to use her arguments when I try to convince people about the necessity of acting.

Try to look at the world with new eyes, child’s eyes or Martian’s eyes. How would a total stranger consider people in Paris, Graz, New-York, Berlin, driving alone in their car, each car behind each other, queuing for kilometers to go in the same direction, maybe at the very same place? They would probably think we are crazy or idiots! So be introspective when it comes to your own life, your own work, how could I change it to make it more sustainable?

Writing (if possible on a daily basis) is, according to me, a very good way of taking some distance with what we live, and understand who we are and be honest with oneself and try to progress. Psychonalysis is also a good exercise.

ELEVATE: Which creative actions, initiatives and movements have inspired you most and given you hope and courage?

Pierre Rabhi, with the Colibris, is still a very inspiring person. He has always been promoting frugality. He went back from the city to the land while everybody was going exactly the other way. He transmitted and continues to transmit about his knowledge in agriculture, he is not only talking, he is implementing real actions to improve things as well.

I think Dominique Loreau’s books also inspired me a lot to begin to change my life (l’art de la simplicité, l’art des listes). I have been a very good customer of the consumer society and with these books I discovered how differently I could act and that all the products I bought where more often a burden than a blessing.

The AMAP movement.

Artists who present us a reflexion on the world.

And people who suddenly decided that it was no longer possible to continue like that, like Rosa Parks who dared not to leave her place in the bus. I think this is the most significant example, how a single unknown person contributes to make things move with a courageous action. I think we are threatened by two dangers: thinking we cannot change a lot, and thinking we have no power!

ELEVATE: What do you recommend for people who want to get active themselves? Where and how can they participate in the process of change?

“Be the change that you want to see in the world.”, Gandhi said.

The first place where you can change things is your own life!

If you consider all aspects of your life with honesty, you will surely find ideas to improve it, make it more in accordance with your own ideas, sticking as much as possible to nature and to your own nature and make it lighter, brighter, easier, happier…

For example in the area of „FOOD“: you can decide to reduce junk food, dead food, and to begin to eat organic food, eat less meat, or no more meat. You can also compost your food waste in a shared garden (it is possible even in Paris!). It is known that the way you eat, i.e. the type of things you eat is one of the human actions that has the biggest impact on the environment.

Clothes: try to buy clothes from companies that respect human beings or buy 2nd hand clothes. You can write to your favorite brand, it is easy, they all have a customer service, and tell them how keen you are on their clothes, but that you want them to improve the working conditions and salaries of their employees. Maybe instead of buying three clothes, you will buy two… You can try to select clothes which are more natural, in cotton, linen and that tend to last longer and that are produced locally or at least in your country.

Day to day commute to work: you can decide to use a bicycle instead of a car, or public transport, it will be good for your budget, you will be fitter, and you will be happier, because cycling is a soft drug…You will discover your city from a different point of view, you will be happy to belong to this new elite community of cyclists!

Energy: try to use it with frugality. In winter add a pullover instead of increasing the heating.

Dare! Dare! Dare! Dare to speak, share, be different, say you disagree. I say as a mantra to me also of course, because I am not such a daring person! I am very dominated by fears!

Try to fight our human behaviour to have more and more, to consume more and more - often in comparison to someone, neighbour, father, colleague.

I think we can all improve and alleviate the very simple aspects of our lives.

If you begin to have this reflections and to actively make changes in your life, I think it is important to meet people who try to make the same changes.

You can find them in associations:
AMAP [called Gelawi or Solawi in Austria, CSA in the USA and the UK]: places where you can get organic vegetables and support a local farmer.

Association de quartier: I belong to la Commune Libre d’Aligre. It is what we call a café Associatif, a place where people come and cook for other people. There are also conferences, films, exhibitions, debates, all kinds of activities that develop the citizenship, awareness, feeling of belonging to a group with common values and ambitions. It is a very vivid place!

You can also try to travel by bicycle. In 2013 I discovered the association Altertour, which organizes tours in France and sometimes abroad. It is such an amazing thing, and it is really a clever way of travelling!

So look at your life as if you’ve discovered it for the first time, with new eyes, loving eyes but also habit changing eyes. What if I would do it differently? Life will just become even more exciting!

ELEVATE: Elevate juxtaposes diverse topics and tries to emphasize the connections and relations between them, so that the challenge of how to change the status quo becomes more clear. Where can you see relations between your work and the work of other guests of the festival? Are there any synergies, and what could future collaborations look like?

I think the urgency is to convince people, i.e. our friends, our family, our parents that they have to change some aspects of their lives. I don’t believe in the power of a state or cop 21 to change things. Changes have to come from the bottom, from the man in the street. I would like to find a very simple website where I can find arguments for changing habits.

The key question is how to communicate to a maximum of people and give them the desire to change.

Maybe a very simple way of connecting people who participate to this festival would be to publish the list of persons, with their names, mail contacts, and eventually skype contacts, and a very short sentence explaining their actions and what they are involved in and what they are willing to help for. What do you think?
If somebody is wishing to have information about how to create an Amap, I will be happy to give information.

ELEVATE: What kind of society would you like to live in? What visions of the future give you the courage to contunue your work?

Today I think lots of people admire people who are very rich, who own serveral houses, cars, clothes, have thousands of friends on Facebook…

I think there will be a time when the people we admire the most will be those who use the fewest resources of the planet, those who own very few things. Because the resources will decrease, are decreasing, and up to now the population is increasing, so we will have to do with less, and there may be a time when having thousands of things will be considered as vulgar and almost disgusting, selfish, irresponsible. If I was active in an environmental NGO I think I would try to pull this string! Less is more, too much is vulgar… It is probably difficult to accept this point of view for a very poor person/country but we people of rich countries, who have had access to this wealth, must now give an impulse towards using less at least in our countries, in order to allow poorer countries to have a bit more…

Actually it is all a question of love. Maybe it is a very idealistic point of view, but I think we have to give more room to love and spirituality in our life and less room to the material world. If our world is full of love and positive action, we will have less need for material things.

I also think that the property notion is going to evolve. Today we begin to share cars, bicycles. Maybe in the future, the property notion will evolve for something more common, less individualistic.

As far as work is concerned, I would be interested to work less, but to learn more. Ideally I would like to have my day life split in three parts: 1/3 for working, producing for society, 1/3 for learning, creative action, 1/3 for contributing to improving the world by actions with NGO and associations. That would be my ideal vision of how to use my time!

Creative Response/Ability

Mon, 26 Oct 2015 13:19:00 +0100

Creative Response is the theme of this year's Elevate festival. Fittingly, this was a vast, sprawling session that spread over two hours, with six guests and more than a dozen contributions from the audience. Unfortunately, that means this blog post can only be a short introduction to a small part of the stimulating discussion.

Creative response is the brain-child of film-maker and writer Antonino D'Ambrosio. He starts the session by trying to capture some of the main ideas behind the concept.

“It's how we've survived as human beings since the beginning of time,” Antonino says. “It's a rejection of the things that hold us back and advancing systems that bring people together. And you do that through creativity, not just film, music, art, photography, but economics, science, in every way we can break down these barriers socially, politically, culturally.”

For many on the panel, Antonino's definition of “creative response” was not one they had come across, but the ideas were, of course, already embedded in their personal creative philosophies.

DJ Ripley finds the idea “very appealing”, but makes the point that not everyone is struggling for survival – under the current system, some people are doing very well, often through exploiting others. For her, therefore, “creative response is particularly rooted in people whose survival is and has been challenged right now.” As a DJ from New York, Ripley is aware of her great privilege and must herself consciously resist the temptation to exploit the musical resources of other cultures, which she describes as a “delightful buffet” - a short step from the cruel domination of colonialism.

Cultural researcher Elisabeth Mayerhofer picks up on Antonino's comments about creative response being a tool that brings people together. Tracing the history of the artist in the western world, she makes the point that eighteenth century emergence of The Artist was “very intertwined with the concept of capitalism”. It was only when capitalism emancipated the artist from feudalism, through the financial independence afforded by the market and intellectual property rights, that they were able to rise out of the community and into the position of cultural Genius.

Today, however, Elisabeth sees the slow erosion of the role and self-perception of the artist as genius. New forms of intellectual property, including the Creative Commons, are acknowledging that everything is created out of what has gone before. “The artist is moving back into society,” Elisabeth says. “In the end, the production and the consumption of art both have a very strong aspect of collectivity. You can't think of arts without community.”

Mike Bonanno from activist collective The Yes Men tells a story that illustrates what's possible when a little creativity is stirred into the pot. He was in Australia at a conference for accountants - “These are people who are not usually associated with creativity,” Mike notes - and announced the shutting down of the World Trade Organisation, to be replaced by the Trade Regulation Organisation. He wasn't expecting what came next, however.

“They were so thrilled with the idea that the framework had changed and they'd be able to do something good with all of their expertise that, without us asking them, they formed working groups at the luncheon that followed the speech and started to rebuild the World Trade Organisation themselves – and they started by redesigning the logo.”

When the laughter falls away, Mike tells how these high-powered accountants, who'd spent their lives off-shoring money for the super rich, discussed where they could site the headquarters of this new organisation so that the least developed nations could have full representation.

“The point is that lifting that weight gave them this moment where they suddenly felt incredibly creative and spontaneously became these incredibly creative accountants.”

For Elevate moderator Daniel Erlacher, this perfectly encapsulates creative response at its most powerful: activism combined with creativity to create a new world.

Interview: DORN COX

Mon, 26 Oct 2015 13:19:00 +0100

ELEVATE: Creative Response is the main topic of the Elevate Festival in 2015. What role does creativity play in your line of work and the context you are active in?

Agriculture represents the most basic form of how we, as people, understand and interact with our environment to support ourselves. I believe that creativity is an essential part of managing the complex biological, mechanical, social and economic systems that create infinite possibilities for expression, exploration and collaboration. Farm Hack community has been created to foster the the joy of creation and sharing, and to give every farmer the benefit of sharing their creative response anywhere on earth.

ELEVATE: What strategies and activities are most effective for resisting the current failings of society and for facilitating pro-active emancipatory change?

The most important strategy is to illustrate that the current models of extraction of human and environmental resources are only one possible expression, and that humans and agriculture also have the potential to regenerate, diversify and recarbonate our soils, and create a system based on regenerative abundance rather than scarcity. The abundant building blocks of atmospheric carbon, nitrogen and water can be assembled using the tools of global genetic diversity. The complexity of the task is not trivial, but it is the project of the unfinished enlightenment.

The first land based economists and natural philosophers, the Physiocrates (meaning Govenernace of Nature), believed that increasing the productivity of soil was the basis of increasing wealth, and that all other activity is a form of extraction or transformation of that original wealth. They also believed in the free exchange of all agricultural knowledge.

We make progress towards this goal by publicly placing our ideas into the creative commons, and inviting others to join in that action. This act is critical for illuminating alternative possibilities for a just, regenerative and resilient agricultural system. The dialog and process of collaborative development and free exchange of ideas resulting in democratic tools is a byproduct of the individual act of sharing ideas, and building on others accomplishments and creating positive deviance from the status quo of protection and extraction.

ELEVATE: Which creative actions, initiatives and movements have inspired you most and given you hope and courage?

The Public Laboratory, The Quiviara Coalition, The Soil Renaissance, Holistic International, Rodale Institute and the Photosynq project have provided organizational inspiration. The writings of Donnella Meadows, CS Holling, Herman Daly, Kevin Kelly, EF Schumacher, BM Fuller, David Graber, David Salt, Brian Walker, Jo Guli, David Bollier, Bill Coperthwaite, Denis Diderot, Marquis de Mirabeau and Francis Quesnay and poet Kate Tempest have also provided inspiration and courage.

ELEVATE: What do you recommend for people who want to get active themselves? Where and how can they participate in the process of change?

The first step is to participate directly in some form of agriculture, at any scale, and personally witness the improvement of natural resources at their hands. Agrarianism, and human’s power to improve diversity and productivity is the most inspiring and crucial building block of a society built on regeneration rather than extraction. The most basic economic equation is that two blades of grass can grow where one grew before, and that each of us has the means to exercise that basic economic process of wealth creation. Each person can prove that this is possible in their own window box, backyard, or field. The second step is to share ideas, observations, seeds, and inspiration directly with others. Farm Hack was founded to foster this exchange. The rest is just follow through.

ELEVATE: Elevate juxtaposes diverse topics and tries to emphasize the connections and relations between them, so that the challenge of how to change the status quo becomes more clear. Where can you see relations between your work and the work of other guests of the festival? Are there any synergies, and what could future collaborations look like?

Marquis de Mirabeau, the 18th century natural philosopher, proposed that civilization is like a tree, with agriculture as the roots, the population as the trunk and arts and commerce as the branches and leaves. The health of and resilience of the branches (commerce) and leaves and fruit (arts) is an indication of the health of the roots and the soil. The fruiting of the tree is an expression of a healthy system that we are all part of and in which we participate in all levels, but if the root system is weak the entire tree will wither and die. If we share our values and understanding of healthy soil and roots, we will be able to grow a flourishing, nourishing, and fruitful tree together. Arts in all its forms is not just an expression of whole systems health, but provides feedback necessary to build a resilient root system that will weather storms and droughts. Farm Hack, as a social platform, aims to be a commons where those shared values and interdisciplinary action can be expressed.

ELEVATE: What kind of society would you like to live in? What visions of the future give you the courage to continue your work?

I believe that through open knowledge exchange we can shift the balance from those who derive their power from protection and extraction of scarce resources to those who mix their labor with nature to create abundance. Freedom and liberty are possible through a process of mutually dependent independence. I believe in the promise of the enlightenment that we can provide every citizen on earth with access to the knowledge to understand their environment and the scientific tools and curiosity to explore and improve the systems that support us all, and transform carbon, nitrogen, water and sunlight into a deep topsoil future. A society of global knowledge, but local production. Farm Hack builds on the tradition of the Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers (Encyclopaedia, or a Systematic Dictionary of the Sciences, Arts, and Crafts).

I am inspired by the evidence I see in our own improved soil health that has built on the strength of nature, and the cross pollination, adaptation, and hybrid vigor of ideas resulting in dramatic and measurable improvements. I am encouraged and humbled by the networked power of open source technology and complex reciprocity. In spite of the obfuscation to knowledge exchange built by the hegemonic forces of the status quo, our ability to build on the accomplishments of those who have come before us has accelerated in our lifetime and this gives me hope for the future.

Red Bull Music Academy Stage

Tue, 20 Oct 2015 05:12:00 +0200

But whatever, fickle opportunists and flaky individuals have never been hard to come by in the club scene. The problem with said opportunists however, is that they continue to water down the genre with cascades of irrelevant and mediocre releases, and have been doing so for years. They'll sample an old jazz record, slap a vocal snippet from a soul record on there and just layer a fat kick drum under it. Cultural appropriation means nothing to them. Nor are they interested in it because all they want to do is make awesome, deep tracks without wasting too much time thinking about it.

That said, if these people ever feel the need to educate themselves they needn't look any further than The Black Madonna. She has been a resident DJ at the legendary Chicago house club Smart Bar alongside Derrick Carter and Frankie Knuckles since 2012. Her toe-tapping house tracks like “Exodus” are anthems in spots like the Panorama Bar in Berlin. The Black Madonna exudes a certain level of political awareness in her music, and subsequently demands it in the club world. In her pamphlet (which you should read) she states: “Dance music should always raise questions, it needs salt in its wounds. Dance music needs Riot Grrrls and women over 40.” Amen!

The second headliner of the Red Bull Music Academy night is Osunlade. Back in 1999, the US musician and priest of the West African Ifá religion started his label Yoruba and quickly rose to fame as a beacon of afro-centric dance music. His DJ sets work as séances during which Osunlade takes his audience on spiritual journeys. His vehicles of choice are latin jazz, afrobeat, soul and deeper house, the latter of which really deserves that attribute.

Suzanne Kraft takes a similar approach, at least as far as his rich tapestry of work goes. Upon arriving on the scene under his given name Diego Herrera in 2011, the Californian producer released hushed house tracks, warped disco records, lo-fi funk and hissing ambient tracks on acclaimed labels like 100% Silk and Running Back. His current album “Talk from Home” is a small masterpiece, chock-full of stripped down sunset anthems meandering between Balearic house and handyman electronica.

The German-Venezuelan Viennese resident Moony Me – who's disco opus “Magergarten” is in the running for track of the year on the Dresden-based label Uncanny Valley - will be rounding out the night alongside Etienne Jaumet. Etienne will be performing a live set which in his case does not mean unenthusiastically pushing buttons on a midi controller. The Frenchman is known to travel with a boatload of analogue equipment that includes a modular synth the size of a suitcase. As a result of all this heavy lifting, Jaumet's music sounds like Todd Terje edits of lost John Carpenter scores.

Text: Florian Obkirchner

Editions Mego 20 Showcase

Wed, 21 Oct 2015 17:19:00 +0200

Euphoria was at an all-time high when the phenomenon called techno started making waves. Musicians were quick to switch out their guitars for synths and samplers in an effort to hunt for new sounds. Amidst the turmoil, Mego was born. Upon rising from the ashes of Mainframe, founders Andreas Pieper, Ramon Bauer, and Peter Rehberg made a point of not only focussing on techno releases but also making unconventional and jarring examples of electronic music available to the public. A shining example of that idea is their recently re-issued first release entitled “Frigde Trax” - an oblique compilation of fridges buzzing – which was diligently arranged as an ambient record and even performed live back in the day. 1995 saw the entire crew (the label bosses were also active musicians) perform at the Phonotaktik Festival and that occasion put Mego on the map for good. An array of musicians that were zoning in on digital production in the advent of laptop and computer music, found a home in Mego. The label took on a leading role in the movement which is why they are associated with the vague term “laptop music” to this day. Wrongfully so, as Peter Rehberg tirelessly underlines. After all, the undaunted curiosity behind progressively enriching one's musical vocabulary and transcending conventional guidelines is not linked to tools or genres. After Bauer and Pieper left the collective roughly a decade ago, the British Rehberg took the helm by himself.

The label has since changed its name to Editions Mego. Rehberg, the consumate all-rounder, does an excellent job of accommodating styles like techno, ambient, noise, improv, sound experiments and folk. His main interest is the individual, idiosyncratic expression of the musician. It's not surprising that his back catalogue boasts names like Christian Fennesz or Jim O'Rourke, Merzbow or Japanoise berserker Keiji Haino, digital superfiddler Florian Hecker, Marcus Schmickler, or even giants of the young electronic scene such as Oneohtrix Point Never and Emeralds. For years now, the mother label has gathered a number of sub labels around it. Sunn O)))'s cult figure Stephen O'Malley (who plays alongside Rehberg in the duo KTL) runs the label Ideologic Organ. Former Emeralds member John Elliot linked up with Spectrum Spools - a label that directs its focus to the US synth scene, while the French label RE-GRM makes sure of representing the Editions Mego catalogue by reissuing GRM-Studio cuts of musique concréte pioneers Iannis Xenakis and Bernard Parmegiani.

The Editions Mego showcase at this year's Elevate Festival shows great variety and aims to highlight the label's diverse aspects. You will hear not only new acts but also musicians who have been with them since the label's inception. One of those people is Christina Nemec aka Chra. The Viennese comfortzone Label boss (who by the way also performs with Rehberg and Christian Schachinger in the band Shampoo Boy) is known for her immersive and deeply resonating drone scapes. Nemec paints dystopian sonic pictures using bass guitar, effects and field recording-samples to great effect. These images oscillate between existential trance and industrial wastelands. The second local act on the bill is the keyboard improv madman Philipp Quehenberger. His solo sets combine off-kilter melodies with relentless, pounding bass drums. Psychedelic and quirky techno that has been causing a stir in the Viennese underground scene for a good 10 years now. The two international acts are from the Spectrum Spools roster: Steve Hauschildt should probably ring a bell for most people, not lastly since his involvement in Emeralds. His gentle synth modulations sound like an eclectic mix of trance-induced krautrock, meandering, neon-coloured cosmic daydreams that bring back vivid images of the 80s. His colleague James Donadio does quite the contrary. He is known for cranking up synth modules with Verve and his nasty and noisy project Prostitutes manages to fuse Detroit techno with harsh noise while staying effortlessly restrained and that way creating a type of radical aesthetic that has attracted labels like Diagonal or Opal Tape over the years. The DJ line is also promises to be confrontational at the very least. Berlin's own Peter Votava aka Pure has been rolling with Mego since the 90s. He has worked with them as early as Mainframe, releasing joint efforts with Christopher Just under the Ilsa Gold moniker. Later on he re-emerged as Bolder on Editions Mego. His DJ set will be an exhibition of 20 years of performance and production experience with electronic music of all shapes and sizes – this is akin to his latest Editions Mego release (Bolder – Hostile Environment) which combines experimental elements with danceable ones. DJ Pita aka Peter Rehberg himself will be on site and might surprise with new releases and other acoustic intransigency.

Text: Shilla Strelka

Full Programme online!

Fri, 18 Sep 2015 12:12:00 +0200

We are very happy to welcome Matthew Herbert and his band to this year's Elevate Festival. On 25 October, he will close out the Music & Arts part of the festival alongside Jimi Tenor at the Orpheum Graz. There he will be presenting his brand new album „The Shakes“. As if that weren't grand enough, Dorian Concept is set to kick off the festivities on 22 October at Dom Im Berg, backed by his terrrific band consisting of Cid Rim and The Clonius.

The lineup is complete, here are the latest additions:

Herbert (UK) Jimi Tenor (FI) Bok Bok (UK) Dorian Concept ft. Cid Rim & The Clonious (AT) MikeQ (US) Rhythmic Theory (UK) Ventil (AT) Tara Transitory aka One Man Nation (SG) Fontarrian & Jupiter Live (AT) DJ Ripley (US) Eartheater (US) Moony Me (AT) Pure (AT) Solo Premium (AT) Ash My Love (AT) SEDVS (AT) Fam. Geschrey (AT) Bitz & Bogdo (AT) Liik (HR) Simon/off (AT) A:lex & Florian Scheibein (AT) other worlds (AT) Inou Ki Endo (AT) Adriana Celentana & Columbush (AT) Hedonismus Hacienda (AT) RiHi DJ Heroines of the Universe (AT)

Tickets!

The Early Bird Tickets are entirely sold out, which launches our regular presale. The full festival ticket is available for 54€ (+ additional presale fee). The day passes for Friday, Saturday and Sunday are 20€ (+ additional presale fee). The ticket for the opening on Thursday is 10€, doors only.

Discourse & Activism

Elevate Creative Response!

Creative Response is not just the impulse that makes an artist create art, it is also alive within all of us, throughout history, embedded with compassion, our greatest human talent. It is the embrace of emotion and passion, bound together with thoughts and ideas, which operate in the free space between public and private, permitted and prohibited. Creative Response is about embracing imagination to see us connected as one people, which allows us to make everything possible.

The Elevate Festival aims to inspire people and engages in community-building for the growing social movements of our time. The program focuses on new forms of democracy, creative artistic support for migrants, convivial technology, ground-breaking innovations in agriculture and cutting-edge climate justice activism.

Collectively generated creativity, solidarity and courage are the quintessence of Creative Response. Elevate invites you to get active and to participate with the festival´s speakers and artists.

Participants:

Vandana Shiva (IN) The Yes Men (US) Andrea Vetter (DE) Jacob Appelbaum (US) Antonino d'Ambrosio (US) Larisa Mann aka DJ Ripley (US) Charles Kriel (UK) !Mediengruppe Bitnik (CH) Marek Tuszynski (PL) Tadzio Müller (DE) Addie Wagenknecht (AT/US) Ulli & Scott Klein (AT/US) Farmhack (US) Haus Bartleby (DE) Chiara Badiali (UK) Daniela Gottschlich (DE) Essbare Gemeinde Andernach (DE) Christian Payne (UK) Sophie Magon (FR) Fabian Scheidler (DE) Magdalena Heuwieser (AT) Gabi Sobliye (UK) Fieke Jansen (NL) Bruno Tozzini (BR) Tamara Ehs (AT) Florian Sturm (AT) Jacqueline Cramer (US) David Steinwender (AT) Tamara Mona Ussner (AT) and many more...

Free admission to all talks, discussions, workshops and film screenings!

Sexy Vegan Chocolate & Sweet Crowdfunding

Wed, 09 Sep 2015 19:32:00 +0200

Sweet and sexy - this is Mitzi-Blue chocolate developed especially for this campaign, lactose- and gluten-free and, of course, 100% vegan. Zotter's unique vegan coconut chocolate is topped with soya-raspberry titties, candied ginger and a small dark 70% chocolate disc. All ingredients are organic and fair-trade - even the wrapping is 100% compostable. The sexy vegan initiative is not just about healthy and climate-friendly vegan nutrition, but also "Sweet Crowdfunding". One Euro from each chocolate sold contributes to the prize money for the annual Elevate Awards. The chocolate is available in shops and restaurants in Graz as well as online:
At Ecco-Verde and the Zotter Onlineshop. More information about the campaign: https://sexyvegan.at

Elevate Festival 2015 - Programme Preview

Wed, 05 Aug 2015 10:24:00 +0200

Elevate Festival - 22.-26.10.2015 in Austria

Dance music, experimental sound art and world improvement – this unique European festival in Graz, Austria, is taking place for the 11th time this October. Lectures, discussion panels, film screenings and workshops during the day, awards show, concerts, performances and DJ-lineups in the evening - with this concept the Elevate Festival became one of the most influential forerunners for the synthesis of intelligent participation and progressive club culture.

Music & Arts

The eleventh edition of the Elevate Festival once again aims to deliver fresh cuts of various electronic musics, literature and performance inside the uniquely intimate caves and tunnels of the Schlossberg.
This year's offering includes house & techno by Osunlade (US), Sigha (UK), The Black Madonna (US), John Heckle (UK), Suzanne Kraft (US), Heatsick (UK) as well as French musicians Etienne Jaumet (Zombie Zombie) and Low Jack. Synth/kraut/voodoo/drones and a variety of experimental material will be featured at the Uhrturmkasematte. Live sets and concerts by Steve Hauschildt (US), Suuns & Jerusalem in my Heart (CA), HHY & The Macumbas (PT), Prostitutes (US) and Helm (UK) will be held in the bowels of the city's former dungeon. As always we'll be exploring the hardcore continuum in the Tunnel with a very special set by Demdike Stare (UK) who will be debuting a hybridised DJ/live performance of their Test Pressings releases. Paradox (UK) will also grace us with a special live set revolving around his early Reinforced material on his Amiga. We'll obviously make sure that there's plenty of bass in the place courtesy of Chicago dance music Pioneer DJ Funk (Dance Mania) and the critically acclaimed founder of Juke RP Boo. Venus X from New York will be stopping by for a set in Dom im Berg too. Last but certainly not least, we're happy to announce the Austrian heavyweights Bulbul, Chra and Philipp Quehenberger! Line up so far:

Bulbul (AT), Chra (AT), Demdike Stare / Test Pressings Set (UK), DJ Funk (US), Etienne Jaumet (FR), Heatsick (UK), Helm (UK), HHY & The Macumbas (PT), John Heckle (UK), Low Jack (FR), Osunlade (US), Paradox / early Reinforced Set (UK), Philip Quehenberger (AT), Prostitutes (US), RP Boo (US), Sigha (UK), Steve Hauschildt (US), Suuns & Jerusalem in my Heart (CA), Suzanne Kraft (US),
The Black Madonna (US), Venus X (US)

Discourse & Activism

Elevate Creative Response! Creative Response is about creative thought and action in regard to the central socio-political issues of our time. While there will be a focus on inspiration and community-building, the Elevate Festival will also invite its audience and guests to take creative action: socio-political visions and concepts will be hatched and tangible opportunities for direct action will be developed. Inspiration will catch fire! Artists show creative response and thematic engagement and activists trigger change by shifting consciousness. Creativity as a means to overcome the crisis. Creativity as the initial impetus of change. Participants (current status/early August): Vandana Shiva (IN), Jacob Appelbaum (US), Antonino d'Ambrosio (US), Mike Bonanno / The Yes Men (US), Christian Payne (UK), Larisa Mann (US), Andrea Vetter (DE), Fabian Scheidler (DE), Tadzio Müller (DE), Daniela Gottschlich (DE), Marek Tuszynski (DE), Gabi Sobliye (UK), Fieke Jansen (DE), Bruno Tozzini (BR), Haus Bartleby (DE), Magdalena Heuwieser (AT), Tamara Ehs (AT), Florian Sturm (AT) Elevate@UNI: Helga Kromp-Kolb(AT), Ulrich Brand(DE), Fabian Scheidler (DE)

Tickets!

The first batch of early bird tickets is sold out. The second run is now available for 44€ (+ additional presale fee). Day passes will be made available at the beginning of September.
Click here: https://ntry.at/elevatefestival2015 The entry for the discourse & activism part is free!