Salon #58: Training Utopias

Studio XX is opening its doors for a Femmes br@nchées salon next Thursday, 24 March, with a focus on the learning curves experienced by artists when they take part in training workshops. The 5 à 7 will feature six recent participants of Studio XX’s programme for professional development in MAX & PHP programming as well as Raylene Campbell, who was artist-in-residence at the studio for eight weeks last fall.

Studio XX is Montreal’s feminist art centre for technological exploration, creation, and critique. The Studio aims to provide women with the means to appropriate new communications technologies in their work. Our workshops help them to become autonomous by exploring new tools, but results are not instantaneous. The learning curve is high and a commitment to the process is essential. Discoveries result in detours, technical difficulties are a part of the challenge, and time for practicing is always an issue. Collective and individual learning processes will be under the microscope at the March 24 Femmes br@nchées. The audience will also be treated to a discussion of how artists Bernie Bankrupt, DJ Cyan, Ingrid Bachmann, Stéphanie Lagueux and Valerie d. Walker incorporated computers into their live performances. Instructor Patrice Coulombe will lend his experience to help guide the discussion.

For the evening’s second portion, musician Raylene Campbell will give an exposé on EIS (Expanded Instrument System) interface she developed to link her accordion to video while in residence at XX. Commissioned by sound art festival SOUNDplay, her multimedia performance I Dream Eye had its world premier in Toronto last November ; the Montreal community will get the chance to see it performed at the next HTMlles Festival in May 2005.

As usual, drinks and hors d’oeuvres will be offered on-site.

The presentations will be in both French and English.
All are welcome.
3$ :: free for members
Please pass on this invitation! Hope to see you there!

STUDIO XX
338 Terrasse Saint-Denis, Montréal (Québec) H2X 1E8
Just south of Sherbrooke off St. Denis
Bus 24 (Sherbrooke) or 125 (Ontario)
(514) 845-7934 / http://www.studioxx.org
Information: info@studioxx.org

_Ingrid Bachmann is an interdisciplinary artist whose work spans a range of practices and media. She is interested in the complicated relationship between the material and virtual realms. This interest is expressed through a studio practice, writing, lecturing, and organizing events and exhibitions. She is presently Associate Professor in Studio Arts at Concordia University in Montreal, Quebec and is the co-editor of Material Matters, a critical anthology and a member of Hexagram.

_Bernie Bankrupt, aka Bernadette Houde, has been involved in making music and sound for the past five years. Her most recent endeavours include Boyfriend, a project which aims to demystify electronic music technologies and production through workshops, an open studio practice and the Internet. She is also a member of Lesbians On Ecstasy, a live dance band that has seen the release of their debut album on Montreal label alien8 and has toured extensively in North America and soon to hit Europe. Bernadette is also interested in exploring alternative approaches to copyright law and free software. http://elektrolysis.com/lesbo.html

_Originally from Alberta, Raylene Campbell is an accordionist who works in the area of electroacoustic composition and performance, as well as in the exploration and creation of audio art, notably with the Expanded Instrument System. -> more details…

_Patrice Coulombe is a composer who frequently incorporates technology into his work. He has made mixed media works, sound and video installations as well as computer-assisted performances.

_DJ Cyan is a Montreal based dj, radio host and producer. Cyan, aka Corina MacDonald, has been an active participant in Montreal’s electronic music scene since 1996. She currently hosts modular systems on CKUT 90.3 fm and is also a member of the phoniq.net collective.

_Stéphanie Lagueux is a new media and video installation artist who has presented two solo exhibitions and eight collective exhibitions, all in the last several years. She is involved in visual and media arts centres including Axe NÉO-7, DAÏMON, Studio XX – where she is Webmistress. Her training in art, design, and education has since 1998 led to work as a college instructor and in a number of organisations. http://www.cliquezgenereusement.org

_Information systems consultant, Valerie D. Walker holds a Bachelor’s degree with a specialisation in electrical engineering and computer science from the University of California in Berkeley. 1st QTVR AIR @OBORO; studied textile arts incl. shibori-zomé & Indigo dyeing in Japan; has an active trans-medial art practice in Montréal; teaches workshops on textile arts & computers & aqua-colour-therapy. Of course, we know her best as an instructor at XX and the co-hostess and producer of XX Files, a weekly radio show with a technogyny view on CKUT 90.3 FM at 11h30 on Wednesday. Online archives: http://www.ckut.ca.

_The professional development workshops offer intensive training and access to the tools or software necessary to the development of a professional oeuvre. -> more details…

Acoustic Space –- MAX Workshop : MAX is a useful if not essential tool for interdisciplinary and tech artists alike. MAX is an extremely user-friendly programming environment that enables users to conceive their own computer programmes in order to carry out specific tasks. Instead of using text language (such as C++ or BASIC), objects and functions are represented by a graphical interface. -> more details

Learning the basics of PHP programming aims to give the community of women media artists in Montreal the opportunity to develop basic knowledge about programming by developing their software development, math and logic skills. PHP – Hypertext Preprocessor –is popular, remarkably functional, flexible, well thought-out and stable. -> more details

_Artist residencies at XX : http://www.studioxx.org/e/production/residencies.php

Founded in 1995, Studio XX is Montreal’s foremost women’s digital resource centre. Through a variety of creative activities and initiatives, the Studio works with women to demystify digital technologies, to critically examine their social aspects, to facilitate women’s access to technology, and to create and exhibit women’s new digital art.

Studio XX thanks its members and partners for their continued generous support : the Conseil des arts et des lettres du Québec, the Canadian Arts Council, Emploi-Québec, the Comité consultatif régional (CCR) arts et culture de Montréal, the Conseil des arts de Montréal, and McAuslan.