Interview With The Creator of Pixelache via WMMNA

We Make Money Not Art has an interesting interview with Helsinki based Pixelache organiser Juha Huuskonen. Huuskonen is a multi-talented DJ, artist and software designer, and according to the article, also deemed one of the "Godfathers of the Finnish media art mafia". Wow!

The Pixelache 'movement' has certainly taken off successfully since its' last 6 years. There is even a Pixelache University with monthly events throughout the network.

For those of you unfamiliar, the Pixelache festival brings together media and technology creations and ideas through various events and festivals in several international cities including Paris, Montreal and New York. Like most events, there are informative seminars, concerts and related exhibits. We tried to attend the last one in Paris (Mal au Pixel) but unfortunately couldn't even though we were in the city around the same time. Let's hope we have the opportunity this year!


Here are some excerpts from the interview,
How Pixelache began:
"The first Pixelache festival in 2002 was put together in an improvised manner, with a tiny budget of a couple of hudred euros. The purpose was to bring local active people together to discuss and present experimental work that fell between the categories - not art, not design, not research, but kind of all of these at the same time. This type of work is of course shown in all kinds of international festivals (today even more than a few years ago) but the other special thing about Pixelache has been that we've focused on showing work by young, emerging creators and taking risks by showing work that is still in the concept or prototyping stage."

Pixelache in other countries:
"Our international events started in 2003, when we organised Pixelache festival in New York and Montreal. Both festivals were organised on a shoestring budget, with a lot of effort and enthusiasm from both organisers and artists. We carried most of the necessary gear and artworks as luggage, organised free/very cheap accommodation and traveled on a Greyhound bus between New York and Montreal.

The events in New York and Montreal brought together a quite unusual combination of local organisations that all had a lot of influence in planning the festival program. In addition to international guests, both events featured a lot of local artists, many of whom were later invited to Helsinki. We have maintained this way of working ever since. The model is sort of opposite to ISEA: instead of a separate international jury, the local organisations are in charge of the program, they never have to present projects that they don't consider relevant for the local context. The program decisions are aided by an on-going discussion between various partners within the Pixelache network."

Read the entire interview here at WMMNA.

Links:

Pixelache
Pixelache University
Mal au Pixel
WMMNA


- C