Publication: Art + Science + Policy for the Joint Research Council of the European Commission

What does it look like when art, science and policy meet?

A wealth of art + science projects are addressing topics of environmental importance. The cutting-edge ideas and experiments from the field hold great potential for transforming policy – but how does the message get across? How does art+science intersect with policy? 

In “The Art + Science + Policy Nexus”, I explore the way that transdisciplinary projects intersect with policy and policymakers. Commissioned by the Joint Research Centre (JRC), the European Commission’s science and knowledge service and edited by Caterina Benincasa in the context of JRC’s SciArt programme with Adriaan Eeckels.

The Matter of the Soul at Leaky Earth, Technische Sammlung Dresden

Kat will headline the Leaky Earth programme at Technische Sammlung Dresden with The Matter of the Soul | Symphony. For this special performance, Kat has invited Korean media artist Dongjoo Seo to perform live visuals drawing on explorations of mining landscapes and transformation of bodies. The evening begins with screenings of films by the inimitable Rosa Barba.

21st March 2024
Screenings @ 7pm
Performance @ 9pm
Free Entry

Location:
Technical Museum Dresden (Technische Sammlung Dresden)
Junghansstraße 1 – 3
(Enter from Schandauer Straße)
01277 Dresden
Germany

Techniches Sammlung website
Produced in the context of Leakage Conference / TU Dresden.

2024 Cultural Olympics Programme

Time to Break Down (Echoes of the Palaeoplasticene)
in 2024 Cultural Olympics Exhibition Program
The Fabulous Stories to Save the Green Planet
10th January – 1st February 2024
Location: Sea Gallery, Gyeongpo Beach, Gangneung, KR

More information at http://2024coep.kr/

Opening 10th January on the occasion of the 2024 Youth Winter Olympics in Republic of Korea Gangwon Province, a new site specific installation of Time to Break Down (Echoes of the Palaeoplasticene) at the Sea Gallery in Gangneung. The work includes a very special soundscape using audio recorded in an abandoned shaft #850 in Samtan Art Mine, Taebaek, KR

Time to Break Down (Echoes of the Palaeoplasticene) is situated in the Palaeoplasticene speculative past and inspired by the scientific method of taphonomy, which looks at how bodies decay in the natural environment. For Palaeoplasticence, the method of taphonomy is applied to 3D printed PLA mushrooms, exploring what evolutionary advantage there would be to a mushroom if it had evolved to grow from plastic. The site specific installation for the 4th Gangwon Winter Youth Olympic Games joins four ongoing Palaeoplasticene taphonomy installations in Berlin, Germany; Helsinki, Finland; Dublin, Ireland and Gijon, Spain.

Accompanied for this site specific installation by a soundscape drawing links between fossil fuel extraction and the slow process of the break down of plastic, Time to Break Down (Echoes of the Palaeoplasticene) helps us to realize that the enduring legacy of man-made objects like the plastic will bring about changes affecting both human and non-human beings.

Credits
Artist: Kat Austen
Initial concept: Kat Austen in collaboration with Indrė Žliobaitė, Laurence Gill
Production: Ars Electronica Andrew Newman
Palaeoplasticene was realised within the framework of the STUDIOTOPIA program at Ars Electronica Linz GmbH & Co KG with support of the Creative Europe Culture Programme of the European Union.

This site specific edition of Time to Break Down (Echoes of the Palaeoplasticene) includes field recordings from Samtan Art Mine, Gangwon Province, thanks to Director Whasoon Son and with the support of Dongjoo Seo.

Exhibition opening ceremony at 14:00 on 10th January.

Solo Show This Land is Not Mine at Cinémathèque

This Land is Not Mine
3. Nov – 30. Nov 2023
11:00-17:00 Tues-Fri

Cinémathèque Leipzig
Karl-Liebknecht-Str. 109,
04275 Leipzig, DE

The 20 channel video installation This Land is Not Mine will be exhibited as a solo show at the new gallery of Cinémathèque in Leipzig. A complementary programme of events is planned under the name Łuža throughout the month of November, starting with the This Land is Not Mine | Album performance on 3. Nov for the exhibition opening.

Entry to the exhibition is free of charge.

More information

The Matter of the Soul | Symphony at Silbersalz Festival

The Matter of the Soul | Symphony performance
28th October, 7 pm
Kaufhaus UG, Marktplatz Halle, DE

Kat will perform the full The Matter of the Soul | Symphony at this year’s Silbersalz Festival. The performance is realised in co-operation with Cinémathèque Leipzig, where Kat will perform and present the installation of This Land is Not Mine in November.

Info and Tickets for Silbersalz Performance

How to Touch a Dragonfly at ZER01NE Day

How to Touch a Dragonfly (2023)
New Media installation

Opening 19th October until 22nd October
S-Factory D, Seongdong-gu, Seoul

“When I was a child, there were dragonflies everywhere.” The summer heat is smothering us as the group of elders shelter in the shadow of the Wondumak gazebo next to the village hall. One person proffers a folded over toilet paper, which I unfold to reveal a petrified, decomposing stagbeetle. The wooden shelter, so necessary in these hot summer months, lies on a track out of the village. Almost immediately beyond, the buildings give way to an incline tracing the bank of a dry riverbed up to terraced rice fields; the Gudeuljang.

These Gudeuljang secured Korea the country’s first ever globally important agricultural heritage site. The rice here is formed without pesticides, using traditional method that date back to the 1600s. The terraces of the Gudeuljang contain a network of underground channels, which feed mountain rainwater to the crops. Farmers control the flow by moving stones to stem the water, allowing it to warm in the sun before letting it into the fields. Many of fields at higher altitudes are out of use now, the crucial channels collapsing into themselves. Farmers know what’s happening higher up the mountainside from the changing behaviour of water in the fields they tend. Compared to other landscapes, dragonflies thrive here in this pesticide-free rural idyll. Yet even here the dragonflies are fewer, and come at different times of year than before.

People notice the change from their childhood. “It used to be a game when we were kids, we would catch the dragonflies in our hands and hold them their wings feel like paper like the Hanji in my grandparents doors. Crinkly but strong. Now you just don’t see them so much anymore.”

This year I’ve seen none of the swarms I saw last year. I hear the hum of traffic from the top of the hill. The smoke turns the blue sky yellow. I reach out my hand into the open air, against the sunshine, and I return to a hillside where the trees have grown back; they were felled for survival in desperate times. Now what threatens the humans here is an exodus. I wouldn’t mind moving to Cheongsan-do for awhile. I’d even like the experience of farming but as a foreigner, I wasn’t permitted to hire a car. There are various things that make a landscape in hospitable. We didn’t have so many dragonflies where I grew up. Now I’m somewhere the way they belong but I’m in the wrong time. Which begs the question: how do you touch a dragonfly that isn’t there?

Artist: Kat Austen
Designer: Robin Andersson (RTA Studio)
Digital Artist: Daniel Hengst
Creative Technologist: Justus Erhas
Production Director: Frank Lohmoeller
Production Manager: Olive Okjoh Han
Production Assistance: Hyeonhwa Lee
Additional Filming: Sangwon Lee
Hanji Funding: Jeonju Millenium Hanji Museum (전주천년한지관)
Supported by: ZER01NE Creator’s Programme (Hyundai Motor Group)
Thanks to: UN FAO KR, GIAHS (Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Site) Cheongsan-do, R. Glowinski

Palaeoplasticene at Weather Engines, LABoral

Palaeoplasticene will open at Laboral Centro de Arte in “Weather Engines” curated by Daphne Dragona and Jussi Parikka on 6th October 2023. Until 25 May 2024.

Palaeoplasticene addresses the breakdown of plastic in the environment over a more-than-human timeframe. Addressing the ubiquity and longevity of microplastic in the environment, Palaeoplasticene is both a multimedia installation and an online Open Artistic Research Platform presenting series of distributed transdisciplinary experiments that question the agency of plastic through “Long Time”.
Exhibited at LABoral will be a recreation of our experimental Taphonomy setup which explores through a durational experience of daily documentation the persistence of PLA 3d printed mushrooms juxtaposed against biological and weather changes. The setup is placed within specially commissioned pots by ceramicist Blake Thompson.

For 18 months I developed the concept for Palaeoplasticene with my studio’s scientists in residence Laurence Gill and Indrė Žliobaitė with the production of Andrew Newman at Ars Electronica through the Studiotopia programme. The project has resulted in three installation iterations and an Open Artistic Research Platform which documents the artistic research methods.

Palaeoplasticene

Solidarity Fund Hydro published on Kazimdat Records

The compilation Solidarity Fund · Hydro is published!

We deeply hope with this compilation to receive donations to support the Volunteer Fire Fighting Society, Črna na Koroškem – from a part of Slovenia that was heavily damaged by recent floods.

https://kamizdat.bandcamp.com/album/solidarity-fund-hydro

Solidarity Fund · Hydro
In the wake of devastating floods that hit Slovenia in early August, many find themselves without homes and irreplaceable memories. In partnership with Kamizdat Label, we wish to lend a helping hand to these resilient people by curating an online audio compilation that features the generous contributions of artists who have donated their music to this cause. All financial contributions from the sale of the compilation will be sent to the flood relief fund of the Volunteer Fire Fighting Society, Črna na Koroškem. Our hearts go to those who depend on gestures of solidarity at the time of our planetary transformations.



Solidarnostni sklad · Hidro

Po uničujočih poplavah, ki so Slovenijo prizadele v začetku avgusta, so mnogi ostali brez domov in nenadomestljivih spominov. V sodelovanju z založbo Kamizdat želimo tem vztrajnim ljudem ponuditi pomoč s spletno zvočno kompilacijo, na kateri so zbrani prispevki umetnikov, ki so za ta namen darovali svojo glasbo. Vse finančne prispevke od prodaje kompilacije bomo nakazali v sklad Prostovoljnega gasilskega društva Črna na Koroškem. Naša srca so z vsemi, ki so odvisni od solidarnostnih gest v času naših planetarnih sprememb.


OR poiesis · Tsuki no jūryoku
Brandon LaBelle · Planetary Listening
Brane Zorman · The Tree Spirits I Touch (excerpt)
Bojana Šaljić P. · The Last Animal / Ujjayi *
Toni Dimitrov · A Night at Letea
Karmen Ponikvar · Look, the snowflakes are moving upwards (excerpt)
Mauricio Valdés San Emeterio · Ejarbe **
Dronišnica · It’s Time to Drink Water
Kikiriki · Drop
Brgs · Mushroom Therapy (remix)
Irena Pivka · EchoWalk
Kat Austen · Multifurcation (Movement 4 from The Matter of the Soul Symphony)
Hugo Lioret · Interchange [43.961436, 1.019804]
Lena Ortega · Dandelion
David Bilek · Intermezzo for a Confused Dragonfly
mʊdʌki · soft txt I
mʊdʌki · soft txt II
Tao G. Vrhovec Sambolec · Lost Algoritmhs
Saša Spačal · Anatomy of a Symbiosis: Slicing 12
Miha Godec · Echoing Tides
Shekuza · Stay Strong
AGF · Elemental Slovenia
Zergon · Pralik
Sujevera · River Tensions
Manja Ristić · Schwarze Aist [Austrian––Czech Borderlands, July 2023]
Luka Prinčič ·coHydrogen
beepblip · Voluminous Movement of a Watery Earth (excerpt)
Robertina Šebjanič · hydro_Agitations

* Ocean breath 

** Increase of the volume of water in rivers due to heavy rainfall.

credits

released September 1, 2023

Robertina Šebjanič, Ida Hiršenfelder · curators, graphic design
Luka Prinčič · mastering
Luka T. Zagoričnik, Luka Prinčič · executive production, promotion

City of Ljubljana · financial support

cat.no: KAM067

Produced by Emanat
Released by Kamizdat
kamizdat.si

created by
AGF — antyegreie.com
beepblip (Ida Hiršenfelder) — beepblip.org
Brandon LaBelle — brandonlabelle.net
Brane Zorman — www.branezorman.si
Brgs — jakaberger.com
Bojana Šaljić P. — www.facebook.com/bojana.saljic
David Bilek — soundcloud.com/davidbilek
Dronišnica — soundcloud.com/droni-nica
Hugo Lioret — hugolioret.com
Irena Pivka — www.irenapivka.si
Kat Austen — www.katausten.com
Karmen Ponikvar — soundcloud.com/karmen_p
Kikiriki — kikiriki.bandcamp.com
Lena Ortega — www.leenalee.net
Luka Prinčič — lukaprincic.si
Manja Ristić — manjaristic.bandcamp.com
Mauricio Valdés San Emeterio — soundcloud.com/mauricio-valdes-san-emeterio
Miha Godec — godec.art
mʊdʌki — www.works.io/polina-khatsenka
OR poiesis — orpoiesis.blogspot.com
Robertina Šebjanič — robertina.net
Saša Spačal — www.agapea.si/en/
Shekuza — soundcloud.com/shekuza
Sujevera — www.instagram.com/_sujevera_/
Tao G. Vrhovec Sambolec — www.taogvs.org
Toni Dimitrov — elanvital.bandcamp.com
Zergon — zergon.org