OPEN CALL: Spatial Affairs Residency at HEK, MAP and Tabakalera

The Spatial Affairs: Extended Reality Experiences project invites artists or choreographers for a residency at the three participating cultural institutions to develop prototypes for performances in physical space that interweaves body, space, technology in synergetic ways to foster collective lived experiences.

The project is a two-year, joint program between the cultural institutions HEK (House of Electronic Arts) in Basel, Switzerland, MAP—Museum of Art & Photography in Bangalore, India, Tabakalera International Center for Contemporary Culture in San Sebastián, Spain, in collaboration with the technological and research partners iart, studio for media architectures, and metaLAB (at) Basel, Switzerland, and technological research center TEKNIKER in Eibar in the Basque Country in Spain.

A substantial part of the project will be to support the creation of prototypes that will be developed in the residencies in the three cultural institutions named above. The artists for the residencies will be selected by open call. The residencies will last six weeks, and will take place between June and July 2024. The duration of the residencies will be agreed with the committee and will be subject to the cultural institutions availability and its commitments with regard to its programming.

Developing prototypes will either be based on the new XR (extended reality) platform AIRE, developed by iart, a platform based on a game engine that uses location tracking to design hybrid experiences in real time, supporting the residencies in Basel and Bangalore. Tech partner TEKNIKER supports projects that are exploring contexts of collaboration between physical non-human agents in confined spaces and the humans that also inhabit those spaces (including collaborative robots, machine vision, AI, XR).

During the residencies, the residency artists will be involved in internal and public workshops at the venue of the location to present their work/process to the group as well as to local artistic communities. The technological development will be shared as well. Participating artists will be asked to do presentations with a focus on their research.

The aim of this call is to select the artists that will be hosted in artist in residency programs in Tabakalera, HEK and MAP. The program is developed in partnership with TEKNIKER and iart for the technological support, and metaLAB Basel as a research partner, with the financial support of Pro Helvetia through its Synergies Funding for Art, Science and Technology Collaborations.

The residency, which will last six weeks, will offer space, context and time, as well as technological and curatorial support to develop an artistic project that engages XR technology.

For the residencies at HEK and MAP company iart is making accessible its XR platform AIRE as a technical tool for creating dynamic extended reality artworks. AIRE is a platform based on a game engine that uses location tracking to design hybrid experiences in real time. iart welcomes artists to collaborate with their techteam to develop new works.

For the residency at Tabakalera the tech company TEKNIKER will act as supporting partner. TEKNIKER specialises in advanced manufacturing scenarios, where human workers partner with collaborative technologies, including collaborative robots, machine vision, AI, XR and natural communication technologies.

Apply now until April 19, 2024 at the insitution of your preference.

Apply at HEK
Apply at MAP
Apply at Tabakalera