Prix Ars Electronica Award of Distinction

Pixar in 1987, Wikipedia in 1995, Wikileaks in 2009, apertus° in 2012 - what all four have in common is being honored by Prix Ars Electronica and then proceeding to create worldwide sensations. The Prix Ars Electronica is an international trend barometer, constantly on the lookout for what’s new & exciting, what’s radically different, what’s making an impact right now. Innovation receives support; developments are showcased. The Prix Ars Electronica has earned a reputation for measuring trends in the international media art scene. Juries composed of leading experts in their respective fields convene annually to select the most outstanding contemporary works awarding the “Oscars” of media art in their quest to spotlight the ideas of tomorrow.

In 2012 apertus° - Open Source Cinema won an Award of Distinction in the Digital Communities category. This is possibly the most prestigious international competition for Digital Culture, Computer Animation and Electronic Arts. The general topic of the 2012 Prix Ars Electronica was "The Big Picture" - how fitting for apertus°...

Prix Ars Electronica Festival

But the festival is much more: 478 artists and scientists from 40 countries exhibited their work in more than a dozen locations all over Linz, Austria. 65.000 visitors were counted in 5 days. The final showdown of the entire event was the "Klangwolke" (or "Soundcloud" translated) - an audio visual performance that uses a large part of the city as stage and has its epicenter at the waterfront of the danube river right at the city center. This years show included fifty remote controlled aerial drones in formation flights, two industrial robots, ships, over hundred firefighter trucks and five thousand LED paper letters that people were carrying around and that lit up controlled by an RC transmitter turning all participants into a social network. 90.000 visitors participated in the event.

Here is a condensed summary video of the impressions we collected a very intense week:

And the recording of our Project presentation at the Ars Electronica Everyday Rebellion/Prix Forum II – Digital Communities

Image Gallery

apertus° Project Founder Oscar Spierenburg and apertus° Project Leader Sebastian Pichelhofer attending Ars Electronica.

Thanks to Minske van Wijk for taking most of the pictures.