[spectre] Tantalum Memorial

[jaromil]

-----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
Hash: SHA1


re all,

below  is the launch  of a  new project  by Mongrel  artists: Tantalum
Memorial. i think is a great  piece of media-art and will hopefully be
heard more than past  censored newspaper articles about the "high-tech
genocide in Congo"

(( for background info see:
http://www.projectcensored.org/top-stories/articles/5-high-tech-genocide-in-congo/
)) 

since spectre usually stays as an announcement list, you might want to
read more as a discussion is spawning in the bricolabs circle:
http://lists.dyne.org/lurker/thread/20080603.140246.179e2860.en.html


ciao


- - ----- Forwarded message from harwood <harwood at mediashed.org> -----

Subject: Tantalum Memorial
From: harwood <harwood at mediashed.org>
Reply-To: harwood at mediashed.org
To: g.harwood at gold.ac.uk
Organization: Mongrel


“Tantalum Memorial – Reconstruction” 

a new artwork by Harwood, Wright, Yokokoji

01SJ Biennial: “Superlight” at the San Jose Museum of Art

May 10th- August 31st, 2008


“Tantalum  Memorial –  Reconstruction” is  the  first in  a series  of
telephony-based  memorials  by  the  artists  group  Harwood,  Wright,
Yokokoji, to the people who have died as a result of the “coltan wars”
in the  Congo. The installation is constructed  out of electromagnetic
Strowger  switches  –  the  basis  of the  first  automatic  telephone
exchange invented  in 1888. The  movements and sounds of  the switches
are triggered  by the phone  calls of London's Congolese  community as
they participate in “Telephone  Trottoire” – a concurrent project also
built by the artists in collaboration with the Congolese radio program
“Nostalgie Ya Mboka”.

Since August  1998 there have been  3.9 million deaths  in the “coltan
wars” and there are currently over 35,000 Congolese refugees in the UK
alone.  Coltan ore  is mined  for the  metal tantalum  -  an essential
component of mobile phones and other communication devices that is now
coveted by dozens of  international mining companies and warring local
militias.

“Telephone  Trottoire”  is a  “social  telephony”  network that  calls
Congolese listeners,  plays them a  phone message and invites  them to
record  a  comment and  pass  it  on to  a  friend  by entering  their
telephone number. This builds on the traditional Congolese practice of
“radio trottoire” or “pavement radio”,  the passing around of news and
gossip on street corners in order to avoid state censorship.

“Tantalum Memorial – Residue” (courtesy Manifesta7) will be the second
in the series,  this time utilizing a 1938  telephone exchange rescued
from the old  Alumix factory in Bolzano, Italy. This  is also the site
of Manifesta 7  - the European Biennial of  Contemporary Art, 19thJuly
to 2ndNovember, 2008.

“Tantalum Memorial – Reconstruction” will next be shown at The Science
Museum in London UK in October 2008. This version will be triggered by
the phone  calls of a  new telephony project created  during workshops
that will  bring together  young people from  a Greenwich  school with
Congolese  asylum  seekers.  The  installation  will  then  travel  to
Chalkwell Hall in Southend-on-Sea, Essex  where it will launch the new
centre for international arts organization Metal.

“Tantalum Memorial  – Reconstruction”  May 10 -  August 31, 2008  is A
FUSE Commissioned Residency for  the 2nd Biennial 01SJ Global Festival
of  Art on the  Edge, ZERO1,  CADRE Laboratory  and the  Lucas Artists
Program, Montalvo Arts Center.


The artists  Harwood, Richard Wright and Matsuko  Yokokoji have worked
together  since  2004,  firstly  as  “Mongrel”  -  an  internationally
recognized  artists collective.  Previous projects  include  the first
online  commission  from  the  Tate  Gallery, London,  a  BAFTA  award
nomination  and work  in  the permanent  collections  of the  Pompidou
Centre Paris and the Centre for Media Arts in Karlsruhe (ZKM).


For more information contact:

Harwood,Wright, Yokokoji at 
richard at mediashed.orgor
harwood at mediashed.org 
matsuko at mediashed.org

http://www.mongrel.org.uk 
http://www.mediashed.org

Telephone Trottoire: http://www.telephonetrottoire.net

ZERO1 Biennial: http://01sj.org

Manifesta7:http://www.manifesta7.it



- - ----- End forwarded message -----


- -- 
  Jaromil, dyne.org developer, http://jaromil.dyne.org

GPG: 779F E8B5 47C7 3A89 4112  64D0 7B64 3184 [ B534 0B5E ]
-----BEGIN PGP SIGNATURE-----
Version: GnuPG v1.4.6 (GNU/Linux)

iD8DBQFIRVQPe2QxhLU0C14RAilcAKC8VF98KZdq3BhEajpunzJbdjDvKwCggarg
fRXybCRmaf+/kJsP3wJONcs=
=fdJ7
-----END PGP SIGNATURE-----