TEMP

Temporary media laboratory studies the essence of networks

The idea of temporary TEMP media laboratories sprang from a desire to report events, conferences, festivals and demonstrations in a specifically Internet style. Earliest examples of this are live web publications which explored unusual ways of reporting, with image, sound and text, allowing remote presence and participation before, during and after the event. The TEMP concept goes one step further. It no longer covers an ongoing cultural event, but, instead, targets the hands-on production content. Virtual networks are good at discussing and preparing but not at actual production - that has to be done on the spot, face-to-face. Only in this setting can we overcome the tensions that so easily build up in virtual worlds and thereby produce small multimedia pieces together using available resources.

The idea sprang from dissatisfaction

The idea of TEMP originates from dissatisfaction with the current forms that presentations of media projects typically take during conferences, festivals and other public events. Virtual projects lose their lively, layered complexity. Even the interactive installation is not a suitable medium to express virtual works.

In recent years much has been done to introduce new media to an ever-growing audience. But the networks themselves, their mysterious and seductive aspects, remained invisible. It is hard to even visualise what is actually happening on mailing lists, in a newsgroup, or on a chat channel. Demo design can give us a clue, but it remains soulless and empty and too easily turns flows of information into dead data.

The best way to accelerate the production process is to meet in real space, to make loose, virtual connections concrete and to engage in the complex and messy circumstances of real time-space with the aim of presenting the audience with the actual outcome.

Far-reaching effects

Conferences are known and respected as effective accumulators and accelerators of the mind. In an age of short-lived concepts, they offer ideal opportunities to recharge mental batteries. Temporary media labs are even more effective in this respect: they focus on, speed up, intensify and exert a longer-term effect on local initiatives and translocal groups. Meetings in real space are becoming more and more precious good for the way they add a crucial stage to almost any networked media projects, whether in the arts, culture, or politics. Unlike in (passive) conferences, the role of the audience remains open yet undefined. The broader public will be confronted with the issue anyway, sooner or later. The temporary media labs are experimenting with social interfaces, visual languages, and cultural/political processes. Although the immediate outcome can be presented at the end of the session, the real impacts perhaps can be seen only later.

The third Temporary Media Lab will take place in the Projekti space on the fifth floor of Kiasma from October 8 to November 14. The media lab will be open for five weeks. The space will be open to the general public a few times a week for lectures, debates, on-line conferences, net radio broadcasts etc.

Based on curator Geert Lovink edited by Piia Laita