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ESPRONCEDA – Institute of Art & Culture, through its platform IMMENSIVA, is once again organising in Barcelona a fantastic Festival combining international creative residencies, exhibitions of artists working with advanced technologies, collaboration with international festivals and citizen participation laboratories for the co-creation of interdisciplinary projects in Art, Science, Technology and Humanism.

Although the Covid pandemic is still present this year 2021, this has not diminished the energy of Espronceda/ IMMENSIVA to generate new international and local partnerships to create activities and opportunities for artists, creatives, coders, designers, makers and citizens.

Like last year IMMENSIVA FESTIVAL 2021 is an expanded event, starting in May 2021 and ending in November 2021.

 

The programme is summarised below:

IMMENSATHON, into the human labyrinth. From 3 to 16 May 2021

Through a call for designers, makers, artists, creatives, coders and citizens, a Worldlab and Hacklab are organised. In the first phase designers and makers collaborate to create an immersive physical space, following the human values of the call and the objectives of the New European Bauhaus initiative.

The hacklab starts on the 14th of May with an inspirational lecture by Andreu Belsunces and a workshop by Teatro de los Sentidos. The co-creation process during the weekend will be coordinated in collaboration with Garage Stories and Be another Lab.

IMMENSIVA International residences 2021. From 1 May to 20 June 2021

Following the collaboration with international partners: universities, art centres and leading professionals, and this year expanding the network, a process of pre-residencies has been organised in 12 international cities: Barcelona, Paris, London, Milan, Istanbul, Innsbruck, Helsinki, Rotterdam, Montreal, NYC, Atlanta and Los Angeles. During the period from May 1st to 15th, the artists selected in the Open Call will be able to participate online in three workshops on Creative Sound/ 3D (IRCAM), Sound and Artificial Intelligence (Sussex University) and Interactive and Immersive Technologies (Kimatica Studios), as well as participate in a collaborative VR platform designed by IMMENSIVA to be a virtual residence for artists. In parallel, in each city the artists will have a contact/mentor who will assist them in the ideation of their projects and will also accompany them in the collaborative creative laboratories.

The second phase of the residency is in Barcelona, from May 17th to June 20th.

During this period, live workshops on Creative Sound/3D sound by IRCAM (Centre Pompidou) and on interactive and immersive technologies (Kimática Studios) will be organized again.  They will also attend the AI4Future days, organized in the framework of the European project of the same name and that will take place on 3 and 4 June with workshops and round tables on artificial intelligence and creation of worlds, in collaboration with the UPC, as well as a day dedicated to New European Bauhaus with institutional representatives, artists and experts, ending with a workshop/ think tank on activism in social issues of projects carried out in Barcelona, organized in collaboration with Transit Projectes. During this week the artist Refik Anadol exhibits in our space the work “Melting Memories”, generated by artificial intelligence and using data from electrical brain signals obtained by Neurescape Laboratory. https://refikanadol.com/works/melting-memories/

In addition, residents will attend the virtual reality festivals hosted by Espronceda: XR3 (Cannes, Tribeca and New Images) from 9 to 20 June and the dance show in virtual reality and real-time from different cities: La Comedie Virtuelle by Gilles Jobin Cia, 12,13, 19 and 20 June.

The artists will work in teams of 2, 3 or 4 people, and at the end of the residency, they will create an exhibition of the prototypes and projects that will be inaugurated on 22 June, on display until 30 June.

IMMENSIVA & INTERNATIONAL VIRTUAL REALITY FESTIVALS

During the period of IMMENSIVA FESTIVAL 2021 will be shown in Espronceda, partner satellite of several prestigious festivals, the selection of the best artistic and creative works made in virtual reality:

Festival XR3 ( Cannes XR, Tribeca and New Images) from 9 to 20 June, and from 6 to 15 July 2021.

Venice VR Festival (78th Venice International Film Festival, Venice Biennale): 1 to 19 September 2021.

Galaxy Festival. Creation in VR. November 2021. Dates to be confirmed.

IMMENSIVA & SUMMER SESSIONS

The generation of synergies with other institutions is the basis of Espronceda / Immensiva’s activity. So this year we include in August three weeks of international residency in cooperation with Summer Sessions organised by V2 Rotterdam.

https://www.summersessions.net/

IMMENSIVA & ARS ELECTRONICA 2021

This year the international festival Ars Electronica invites international partners to create a programme, “Garden”, which is realized locally and through online programming that is shared by the Festival. ESPRONCEDA – Institute of Art & Culture, will be one of the partners and will offer a programme that reflects IMMENSIVA’s international residency activity and collaboration with institutions and artists locally, nationally and internationally. Espronceda is part of Barcelona Ars Electronica Garden in collaboration with Institut Ramon Llull, UOC, HacTe HUB, Hangar, Beep collection and La Caldera.

Festival credits:

International and national partners:

Helsinki XR Center, Aalto Studios, Karma Lab, IRCAM, Sussex University, University for the Creative Arts, UPC, Harddisk Museum, ./studio3, V2 Rotterdam, MEET Digital Culture Center, Dashboard, Garage Stories, Be another Lab, UPC, Venice Biennale, Forum des Images, Phi Center Montreal, Pioneer Works NYC.

Sponsors:

Ministerio de Cultura y Deporte, ICEC Generalitat de Catalunya, Ajuntament de Barcelona, Institut Ramon Llull.

Director of the Festival:

Alejandro Martín

International curators & advisors:

Camille Baker, Liz Rosenthal, Santeri Souminen, Maria Grazia Mattei, Rosanna di Nuzzo, Martin Romeo, Dr. Holger Sprengel, Solimán López, Juhani Tehunen, Lily Diaz-Kommonen, Michael Barngrover , Francisco Bernardo, Ramon Sangüesa, Boris Debackere, Sebastian Frish, Asim Evren Yantaç, Sieta van Horck, Cenk Güzelis, Paola Palumbo, Louise Enjalbert, Courtney M. Hammond, Chrissy Brimmage, Kris Pilcher, Marta Ordeig, Christian Cherene, Matthew Gantt.

IMMENSIVA VR platform:

Marc Gálvez, Mohsen Hazrati, Kris Pilcher, Alejandro Martín.

Espronceda’s management and staff:

Dr. Holger Sprengel, Dr. Henrik Sprengel, Savina Tarsitano, Alejandro Martín, María Mantzakou, Alessia Gervasone, Ovidiu Bojor, Marc Gálvez, Josep López, Andría Ric, Lluis Moreu, Daniel Díaz.