Susa Pop - Mobile Studios

cultural operator, artist, Public Art Lab, Berlin (DE)

Keywords: Networking nomadic art projects, temporary occupation of the public space, flow of information between remote digital and analogue local exchange places, community building structures

My experience with cultural mobility and locative media is strongly connected with the creation of travelling art projects based in urban space like Mobile Museums in 2004 and Mobile Studios in 2006. Both projects temporarily possessed the public space and settled down like a no man's land. In countries where there is a lack of well-functioning art structures, these nomadic art projects provide a neutral ground for public debates and an exhibition structure to experiment new bounds in the cultural field.

They function like a remotely accessible 'zoom-in lense' to the local scenes as well as a networking format through the used urban interfaces / digital tools like webconferences, GPS projects, live streaming and broadcasting to media partners.

It supported the mobilisation of East European culture by creating a flow of information between remote digital and analogue local exchange places.

Susa Pop is managing director of Public Art Lab (PAL), a Berlin based NGO that she founded together with the artist Hans Wiegner in 2002. PAL is structured as an open platform consisting of architects, art scientists, art historians and multi media producers etc. Nomadic art projects like 'Mobile Museums' (2002-04) and 'Mobile Studios'(2004-06) have been realisied in Berlin, Vienna Barcelona, Belgrade, Bratislava, Budapest, Sofia in the last years.

As an artist and cultural operator Susa Pop is very much interested in creative community building through networking art projects that take advantage of the situatedness in the public space and catalyse artistic processes and public awareness in temporarily possessed urban settings - while utilising the new possibilities of digital media tools and their virtual public sphere.

Susa Pop is currently preparing the project of Mobile TV Studios and the Urban Screens Festival 2007 curated by Mirjam Struppek from Interactionfield. She recently initiated the Upgrade! Berlin, a network of new media curators.

www.mobile-museums.com
www.mobile-studios.org

www.urbanscreens.org

http://www.theupgrade.net/

Mobility: travelling production laboratory

Temporary occupation of the space:

• interaction with the public

• cultural-political tool to focus on issues referring to the space and the exhibition structure of the Mobile Studios

• neutral ground and no man's land

Practices of mapping

• remotely accessible zoom-in lense to local scenes: webconferences, skype

• Editorial Studio and website: artists' intereviews, newsletters

• dissemination of artists' works

• flow of information between remote digital and analogue local exchange places

Depending on the situatedness in the public space, they can be used as a cultural political tool to reanimate

I am very much interested in creative community building through networking art projects that take advantage of the situatedness in the public space while utilising the new possibilities of digital media tools and their virtual public sphere.

'Mobile Studios', was a nomadic multimedia production laboratory that temporarily settled down in the public space of Belgrade, Bratislava, Budapest and Sofia in April and May 2006. A 'Mobile Webcast Studio' in Gdansk created in cooperation with the Laznia Center for Contemporary Arts accompanied the tour of Mobile Studios on a virtual level and acted like a theme satellite. As a networking tool 'Mobile Studios' was en experiment to initiated new bounds in the art field. It supported the mobilisation of East European culture by creating a flow of information between remote digital and analogue local exchange places. www.mobile-studios.org

The Mobile Studios consisted of the 'Live Studio' for urban interventions, the 'Talk Studio' for public debates and discussions with cultural players from the local scenes as well as virtual partners that have been participating through webconferences and skype and the 'Editorial Studio' that documented and sent out the daily content to media partners like eyebeam, turbulence.org, Laznia Center for Contemporary Art etc.

Mobile Studios functioned like a remotely accessible 'zoom-in lense' to the local scenes. We also used urban interfaces / digital tools like webconferences, GPS projects, live streaming and broadcasting as a networking format.
I am very much interested in creative community building through networking art projects that take advantage of the situatedness in the public space while utilising the new possibilities of digital media tools and their virtual public sphere.

I am currently working on two new projects which explore the networking potential of public art projects through digital media:
- the concept of 'Mobile TV Studios' which could be regarded as the follow-up project of Mobile Studios
- the production of the 'Urban Screens Festival 2007' which is initiated and conceived by Mirjam Struppek from Interactionfield www.urbanscreens.org <http://www.urbanscreens.org>

These could be the issues that I would work out for your session, reflecting about my experiences with peoples reception and participation in the project.

Was Mobile Studios a locative media project? What was the used the technology?