bit international . [Nove] Tendencije – Computer and Visual Research Neue Galerie am Landesmuseum Joanneum . Graz . Austria 28 April – 17 June 2007 opening: Friday 27th April 19 h Curator: Darko Fritz (Zagreb / Amsterdam) The Neue Galerie in the Landesmuseum Joanneum Graz examines one of the most important international trends of the 1960s in the exhibition “bit international . [Nove] Tendencije computer and visual research”, which was of enormous influence at the time, but which has now slipped out of public consciousness and has virtually been lost to the history of the development of art. While numerous exhibitions have been held with the titles “New Tendencies” or “Nouvelle Tendance” in Venice and Paris, the place of origin - Zagreb, has vanished from the focus of attention. A biennial event developed in Zagreb starting with concrete and constructive art in 1961, maintained its avant-garde title by introducing the computer as a medium of “artistic research” in 1961. Simultaneous with the legendary Cybernetic Serendipity at the London ICA in 1968, which is regarded as the first major computer art exhibition, a colloquium also took place in Zagreb with an exhibition of computer generated art, tendencije 4. The Gallery for Contemporary Art – today the Museum of Contemporary Art – dedicated a series of exhibitions, symposia and publications on the subject of the ‘Computer and Visual Research’. Original projects in both art and science were presented. During the heyday of the Cold War artists and scientists from the entire world travelled to Zagreb – from Germany, France, Italy, Japan, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Russia and the USA. The multi-lingual magazine published by the Gallery in Zagreb Bit International was an initiation point for aesthetic and media theory reflection and there was nothing that could be compared with it anywhere else in the world. ‘Tendencije 4’ attempted to both accompany and mould the historic transition in which the computer as a symbol processing machine first entered consciousness as a machine for artistic creation. The arts of the electronic media were not regarded as an isolated phenomenon, but were included in the history and the discourse on the fine arts and the performing arts. A first review of the ‘Tendencije’ exhibitions and the publications of Bit International has now been assembled in cooperation with the Museum of Contemporary Art in Zagreb and with an international network of collectors and private archives in an exhibition curated by Darko Fritz. Graphic work, films, sculptures, poems, theatrical texts and artistic concepts. The English language anthology accompanying the exhibition (ed. Margit Rosen, in cooperation with Darko Fritz, Peter Weibel) has made the broad range – of both art works and theoretical writings accessible to a broader public of art and media historians and artists once again for the first in 30 years. The project also promotes an opening of awareness and sensitivity to the historical centres of the arts and culture in Eastern Europe. Exhibition in the Neue Galerie in the Landesmuseum Joanneum Graz presents 93 artists and artists groups with more than 350 artworks, alongside computer programs and other working process documents. http://www.neuegalerie.at