Touch and Go, Leonardo Electronic Almanac

This is another call for papers at the Leonardo Electronic Almanac in collaboration with Watermans. I look forward to working with Prof. Janis Jefferies at Goldsmiths College, Irini Papadimitriou and Jonathan Munro.

Leonardo Electronic Almanac in collaboration with Watermans and Goldsmiths College in occasion of the Watermans’ International Festival of Digital Art, 2012 announces a special issue titled: Touch and Go. The PDF is available at LEA.

The Watermans’ International Festival of Digital Art, 2012, will coincide with the Olympics and Paralympics in London, and Watermans is pleased to host a Festival of ground-breaking installations exploring interactivity and participation in New Media and Digital Art. This year long project is showcasing the work of six international artists and collectives and initiates discussions around the impact of technology in art as well as the meaning, possibilities and issues around human interaction and engagement inviting responses from artists, academics, students, art professionals and the public. The project will include a series of seminars in collaboration with Goldsmiths, University of London and a publication with the Leonardo Electronic Almanac.

This issue explores the role interactivity and participation, as well as light art and new media approaches to the public space, may play in fostering engagement and shared forms of participation.

We would like to welcome papers relevant to the following themes:

– Interactivity and audience engagement (art, technology and participation)
– New media geographies and technology
– New Media art and illusion: physical interaction & perception
– Sound and gesture in New Media Art
– Gender, sport and technology
– Art in Virtual Reality / virtual spaces and game-space as artistic medium

Contemporary art is pursuing technological modes of interaction and display that provide the audience with media rich experiences. But are these forms of interaction, interpassive pre-ordained engagements or new technologically based forms of entertainment? Or is art redefining further its relationship with the audience – following and pushing forward the experiential examples of Christo and Spencer Tunick through the aid of technology?

This special issue of LEA wishes to analyze the relationship between these different aspects that contribute to the complexity – conceptual, technological and aesthetic – of interactive installation in public space, creating the ground-breaking and complex phenomena that characterize the aesthetics and visuality of contemporary technocultures.

The Leonardo Electronic Almanac (LEA) is inviting proposals for an issue on these or related themes with Senior Editors Lanfranco Aceti (Kasa Gallery Director and LEA Editor in Chief) and Janis Jefferies (Goldsmiths College). The issue guest editors are Irini Papadimitriou and Jonathan Munro.

New Media academics, theoreticians, curators, art historians and artists that are interested in any combination of the above themes are particularly welcome to submit proposals for consideration.

The Leonardo Electronic Almanac (LEA) will produce an online and printed issue, as well as host curated images and videos online.

Proposals to: info@leoalmanac.org

a) Subject heading: Touch and Go
b) 500 hundred word abstract for articles – submission of full articles preferred for this special issue by proposal deadline February 12, 2012
c) Deadline for submission of full article: March 15, 2012
d) 2 images at 72 dpi resolution no larger than 700pixels width for artists
e) Links to previous work, videos or personal sites

Our publication formats allow for full-color throughout and we encourage rich pictorial content where relevant and possible. Note however that all material submitted must be copyright cleared (or due diligence must be evidenced). For online publication a wide variety of media content may be considered (animation, mp3, flash, java, etc…)

• For scholarly papers please submit the final paper ready for peer review. Your contribution will be reviewed by at least two members of the LEA board and revisions may be requested subject to review.
• For themed and pictorial essays please submit an abstract or outline for editorial consideration and further discussion.
• Please keep your news, announcements and hyperlinks brief and focused – include contact details and a link to an external site where relevant. We reserve the right to sub-edit your submissions in order to comply with LEA policies and formats. Where material is time-sensitive please include both embargo and expiry dates.
• In all cases specify special system considerations where these are necessary (platform, codecs, plug-ins, etc…)

We look forward to hearing from you!

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