hi crumb-list

this is an initiative i am involved in that seeks to open up the
curatorial process as regards new media... please come along if you
can.

sarah


Begin forwarded message:

> Invitation to Season of Media Arts gathering #1
> -------------------------------------------------------
> 21/03/05, 7pm, 5th floor Mezzanine, Royal Festival Hall
>
> We are proposing a Season of Media Arts for London (provisionally
> titled
> SMAL) in October 2005 and are inviting you to join in either by
> producing some media art in London and showing it or by becoming part
> of
> the decision making and organising team, ideally, both.
>
> The first of a series of open meetings will be held on Monday 21st
> March, at 7pm in the Royal Festival Hall, 5th floor mezzanine level.
> These gatherings will be very informal and well lubricated
> opportunities
> to present ideas, advocate for and then decide on projects you think
> should be part of the season. Subsequent decision making gatherings
> will
> be on the third Monday of each month.
>
> SMAL is hosting the open meetings, and is developing tools for
> collaborative scheduling, publicity and production of the Season and
> will be focusing on resource sharing and collaboration rather than
> 'funding' or 'selection' as such.  However, SMAL has an initial sum of
> money generously provided by Arts Council England, which we are putting
> into the 'pot' to get the resource sharing going.  We want to emphasise
> that SMAL will thrive through fostering exchange between peers and will
> be based open and consensual decision making. There will be other
> things
> on the table apart from this basic framework. Food, drink, pens, paper
> and new ideas about how a 'season' might be arranged in a distributed
> way.
>
> More info can be found on the SMAL wiki http://smal.omweb.org/, our
> co-ordination site, and we've written a few very small starting points
> for a conversation below.
>
> So far, meetings have been open but not announced like this, and have
> been attended and shaped the voluntary organisers listed here:
> http://smal.omweb.org/modules/wakka/SmalVoluntaryOrganisers
>
> If you are interested in participating in or partnering with SMAL
> please
> come along on the 21st. We look forward to seeing you there.
>
> If you can't make it, let us know and we'll send you minutes. This is
> the first meeting, but there will be plenty more if you can't make it.
>
> We are trying hard not to start *another* mailing list right now.  So
> we'll discuss it at the next meeting and hopefully come up with a
> better
> way to communicate. For now, if you want to reply to this email, use
> the
> CCd addresses of the voluntary organisers so far.. or better, CC your
> reply to [log in to unmask] - an open email account that you can check
> here: http://dodgeit.com/run/checkmail?mailbox=smal or you can watch
> via
> an rss feed here: http://dodgeit.com/run/rss?mailbox=smal. That seems
> like an acceptable temporary solution until next week! Also, there's an
> irc channel at irc.oftc.net #smal for immediate questions.
>
> Please forward this invitation to people you think should be there
> (sorry if this means you get this 5 times :)
>
> SMAL starting points : Season | Media Arts | London.
> ----------------------------------------------------
>
> Season: Meaning distributed venues, events, timetables, organisations,
> groups etc, just co-ordinating scheduling and some publicity. Also, by
> having a season it means we can co-ordinate things for when people will
> be in town.
>
> Media Art: Meaning art that interrogates the media through which it is
> transmitted - air, speech, electricity. Media Art becomes more than a
> funding category, when it gets back to its roots of artistic
> appropriation and interrogation of industrial / commercial media. This
> definition is up for debate of course :)
>
> London: The huge dirty beast of a city we know and love. Only 40 years
> ago all the buildings were black with soot and lung-shriveling clouds
> of sulphurous smog would fold in over the Thames every night. It's not
> long until we find out if London gets the Olympics or not, but whatever
> happens, the city and its image is changing, fast, and permanently.
> This
> is a chance to reveal the corner of the city you love, or to formulate
> plans to hide it away, to pull together as many venues, activities,
> people and projects as we can to show the terrifying diversity of how
> this city and its people can represent themselves.
>
>