03.02.06 Transmediale 06: REALITY ADDICTS, festival for art and digital culture.
The Transmediale 2006 edition opens on 3rd February at the Akademie der Kunste of Berlin. It is one of the major media culture festival and it has changed its payoff into 'festival for art and digital culture'. This change is not a formal one, but it reflects the necessity of this cultural domain actors, of finding out a definition broad enough, not sounding obsolete, and that would embrace all the emerging themes of choice. This year title is 'Reality Addicts', intended as a passion for the reality that thwarts the escape brought by the electronic entertainment addiction. It is place side by side to the 'Smile Machines' exhibition, curated by Anne-Marie Duguet, that from an historical perspective, reflects on the ironic side of the man / machine relationship. It includes (amongst the many), works by Paul De Marinis, Jodi, Ubermorgen, Antoni Muntadas and Nam June Paik, passed away on 29th January. After the last six years editions (2000, 2001, 2002, 2003, 2004 and 2005) the festival has consolidated its international perspective, trying to harvest the many stimuli that come from outside the Western Europe and United States. A dense, as always, schedule is spread through the day, and the night it continues on the parallel Club Transmediale at Maria Ostbanhof, in a resulting full immersion of stimuli and reflections.