[artinfo] Fwd: In-Site Toronto :: Art on Wireless Networks

[Artpool Art Research Center]

Begin forwarded message:

> From: YZO <info at year01.com>
> Date: 2010. április 13. 5:29:31 CEST
> To: 01list at year01.com
> Subject: In-Site Toronto :: Art on Wireless Networks
> 
> FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
> 
> Six new art commissions across the city of Toronto presented on innovative platform 
> 
> Toronto - Monday, April 12th, 2010: In-Site Toronto is a series of six new art commissions that are available to the public through the free community wifi network operated by Wireless Toronto. Artists Dave Dyment, Swintak, Jeremy Bailey, Fedora Romita, Willy Le Maitre and Brian Joseph Davis have created works that are automatically displayed when users connect to the free wifi networks at designated hotspots. In-Site Toronto was produced by media arts organisation Year Zero One, is curated by Michelle Kasprzak, and was supported by the Canada Council for the Arts and Spacing Magazine.
> 
> Viewing or listening to the works is as simple as opening your laptop and signing in to the Wireless Toronto network. Wireless Toronto has over 35 hotspots across the Greater Toronto Area and thousands of users, ensuring the project will reach a wide range of people.
> 
> The projects commissioned for In-Site Toronto range widely in tone and style. For example, artist Swintak's work at St. Lawrence Market consists of multiple wanted posters, inviting participation from the public in tasks ranging from moving a three tonne concrete cube to using massage as a method of nonverbal communication between people of disparate socioeconomic status. Fedora Romita has created an extensive verbal description of Dundas Square, and invites the participation of the public in contributing to this cataloguing of one of Toronto's most rapidly-changing public spaces. Willy Le Maitre has developed an "art drug", which is an actual capsule that is being dispensed, along with a companion website describing the benefits of ingesting art objects. 
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> In-Site Toronto curator Michelle Kasprzak says, "Like sculptural public art, these works oblige your gaze, even for a moment. The artists have each created witty, accessible works that will reach people on their personal devices in everyday situations. I believe it's important for art to be woven into the fabric of life, and presenting these commissions in collaboration with Wireless Toronto does just that."
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> Wireless Toronto co-founder Gabe Sawhney says, "The free wifi access which our volunteers have been setting up for the past five years have helped activate public and publicly-accessible spaces in new ways.  By working with Year Zero One and the In-Site Toronto artists to use our network as a platform for exhibiting site-specific media artworks, we hope to contribute to the unique hyperlocal community in these spaces, and are combining culture and technology in novel ways -- asking Torontonians to reimagine the value that wifi networks can offer."
> 
> 
> Basic information and a map of the project locations: http://www.year01.com/insitetoronto
> YZO Blog: http://www.year01.com/wordpress/archives/224
> 
> Interview Contact: Michelle Kasprzak, curator: michelle at kasprzak.ca
> Michael Alstad, YZO: info at year01.com
> 
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> YZO [Year Zero One] is a registered non-profit organisation dedicated to the exploration of emerging and hybrid artistic practices resulting from new technologies. YZO produces, distributes and curates electronic media art through networked exhibitions and site-specific public art projects. http://year01.com
> 
> Wireless Toronto is a not-for-profit, all-volunteer community group dedicated to bringing no-fee wireless Internet access to Toronto. Wireless Toronto's aim is to encourage the growth of wireless networking and to build community in interesting and innovative ways. Wireless Toronto has over 20,000 registered users and over 35 active hotspots across the city. http://wirelesstoronto.ca/
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