Last call for PIFcamp #5!

Before we close the open call for applications on May 20th we’d like to share this year’s node holders!

Kersikova bio hackers will once again join forces with Dario Cortese, our wild edible plant guru, and work on food fermentation. Dario also expressed some interest in hacking the borreliosis – he’s planning to provide an overview of making preparations for its treatment.

Lynne Bruning will continue to host daily Wandering Cafe in the mornings and e-textile workshops in the afternoons. She also wants to do explore various techniques of block printing on fabric.

Scott Kildall is a new media artist who works with datasets related to natural sciences and how they interact with human civilization, transforming these into sculptures and interactive installations. Scott’s involvement at PIF will be extension of his PIFresidency (Artist-in-Residence programme as part of Feral Labs Network) projects called Unnatural Language. He will use the Soča surroundings to make a dynamically-synthesized soundscape by setting up electronic sound sculptures across the meadows and trees and make them communicative with each other.

Last but not least – all the electronics and DIY synth enthusiasts can join a project Solder & Synonyms by John Richards aka Dirty Electronics which is combining circuit building, writing text and critical thinking.

And there is much more to come! DITOxicate yourself and APPLY NOW!

PS: Those who already applied – expect your answer on Tuesday May 21th.

PIFcamp #4 sound projects

It seems like the latest PIFcamp, well, its amazing participants, produced more  sound related projects than we anticipated! We are re-posting some of them so you can all take a sound trip down the Soča memory lane.

Juan Manuel Escalante: Sounds of Soča (Zvoki Soče)

Photo by J. M. Escalante

Zvoki Soče is a one week project made in the Julian Alps during PIFcamp 2018, featuring field recordings, electronic sounds and visual scores.

Photo by J. M. Escalante

Alexander Phleps: “Create one piece of sound every day”

Alexander made an audio collage of various sound & field recordings (also featuring jam sessions) during PIFcamp and turned them into 7 tracks – each for every day. Listen to them here:

Ina Thomann (Lino Leum): Sonance Garden

Listen the 2-minute recording from Ina’s installation Sonance Garden in which 3 sensors influenced the sound of the PIFcamp environment:

Aleš Januš Luznar (Yanoosh): Ictus Cordis

During PIFcamp Yanoosh was working on an audiovisual project where his hearth is used as an instrument. In Ictus Cordis the artist explores the application of the biofeedback method or a mutual heart reaction to the stream of a sound composition as an artistic inspiration. The project was presented in Ljubljana on 24, 25 & 26 November.

PIFcamp 2018 – Images and Sounds!

The envisioned and realizable PIFprojects are about to be completed. Another contribution to the long list is the Library of Missing Parts and Inclusive Circuits, a humorous database of missing graphic representations, which illustrate our relationship to technology. The sensor building workshop led by Hannah and Vaclav is going along nicely. We managed to build several sensors from textiles, which will sonify our work through modular synthesis.

Klemens Kohlweis is another artist who made it possible to listen to our immediate surroundings. He used several parabolic microphones to isolate and amplify selected sounds at great distances. The sound of wind takes center stage in Juan Duarte’s project Aeolian Artefact. Januš Aleš Luznar (Yanoosh, Ohm Fat) is also fast approaching the rhythm of his heart with the help of two stethoscope-looking  microphones he built at the camp.

Two participants, both working at the intersection of sound and visual art are Connor Haynes, an audiovisual artist from UK and Juan Manuel Escalante, best described as a nomad. Both were making field recordings in places around PIFcamp, manipulating them and producing accompanying visuals. Escalante envisioned a graphic album and created a series of refined artwork, which reveals various locations where he made the recordings. He considers releasing the project in a fanzine form.

The Slovenian visual artist Tisa Neža Herlec focused on the sonification of her drawing table, which she managed to accomplish with a few contact microphones. Music and sound also drive the Sonance Garden interactive installation by Ina Thomann, an Austrian artist working under the artist name Lino Leum. She will be able to manipulate the sound in the installation by changing the degree of light, moisture and temperature.

We are also trying to grasp the concept of time. For Anna Sircova, a psychologist working and living in Denmark, time has been the subject of intense research. An enticing glimpse of the future is provided by Jakob Scheite and his Fortune Telling Machine. A sample of a donor’s urine is used to measure concentrations of the donor’s hormones and these measurements collectively are used to predict an individual’s future.

Open Saturday 2018!

PIFcamp is nearly finished, which means the grand finale is at hand – the traditional Open Saturday! Join us, meet this year’s participants and check out the projects we were developing during the past week.

The programme will start around 1 PM, and will continue late into the night. Food and drinks will be available – for a small contribution you won’t be hungry or thirsty, but we would kindly ask you to find your accommodations else where.

See you!

Programme:

Urška Alič (SI) – silk printing “PIFish” workshop

Luka Frelih (SI) Distributed Sensing Dome – 3D scanning of big objects

Lynne Bruning (USA) The Wandering Cafe – morning chat in a pop-up cafe down the Soča river bank

Hanna Perner-Wilson (AT) Sense Yourself Making – performans & tattoo session

Václav Peloušek (CZ) – sonification of skateboarding using wireless shoe pressure sensors

Bernhard Rasinger (AT) – laser show

Dmitry Morozov ::vtol:: (RU) Hot Ninja – performative Wi-Fi action

İpek Burçak & Eren İleri (TR) Secure Shell – multimedia installation

Jakob Scheithe (AT) Fortune Telling Machine – A bio-hacked urin fortune teller

Juan Manuel Escalante (MEX/USA) Sounds of Soča – immersive listening session

Juan Duarte (MEX) Aeolian Artefacts –  sound installation on the bridge

Kleemar (SI) – live act

Inna Thomann (AT) Lino Leum: Sonance garden – interactive sound installation

Klemens Kohlweis (AT) – parabolic directed microphone presentation

Anna Lerchbaumer (AT) – sound installation

Connor Haynes (UK) ­– AV installation

Lavoslava Benčič (SI) – Audible Healing Pressure Points + introductory workshop of e-textiles

Maggie Kane (USA) – presentation of the smart jacket prototype (MIDI controller)

Sanja Hrvaćanin & Eva Pondrk (SI) – presentation of the smart jacket prototype for cyclists

Anna Sircova (DK) – lecture Psyhology of time & installation Space of Futurisation

Danilo Ivanuša Knedl (SI) – cooking workshop for kids

Kristijan Tkalec, Ahac Meden, Dario Corteze (SI) – fermented goods tasting

Lio Novelli & Jurij Podgoršek (SI) – presentation of Daktyl keyboard

Lovrenc Košenina (SI) – setting up a permanent DIY weather station

Jani & Niko Pirnat (SI) – Rock & roll ball

Tisa Neža Herlec (SI) – hands-on presentation of a sound instrument

PIFcamp 2018 – Unwinding…

There comes a point in the day, when each PIFparticipant has to step away from his project, let go of technology and de-stress, usually by the river. There, in a mysterious location, if you are adventurous and curious enough, you can stumble upon the The Wandering Cafe, and enter a charming world full of stories, magical delicacies, as well as receive an obligatory and invitingly comforting cup of coffee. Its proprietress and initiator is Lynne Bruning, the American maker and e-textiles innovator.

Another mandatory PIFstop is Krn Lake. There’s simply nothing better to reset one’s brain other than a two-hour stroll up to the largest of the Slovenian high mountains lakes. A simple gravel road takes you trough a luscious forest up to a mountain lodge where the prospect of surrounding peaks is simply spectacular. This view was enjoyment enough for some, but others yearned for more and went up higher to Krn’s mountaintop.

The future of mankind, the importance of mutual trust, of investing in the development of our social skills and of staying grounded in reality informs the project by multimedia artists İpek Burçak in Eren İleri. A remote location right beside the main PIFworkspace serves as a location for their installation Secure Shell. It will provide a safe space for its user. Interaction with a device providing imagery and curated texts on screen will invite him to enter into a mind-provoking solitary contemplative state. There he will ponder the possibilities of resisting and actively working against the distribution of power and capital, as we find it in today’s world.

Our fermentation team intent on preparing a diverse range of foods (kimchi, tempeh etc.) continues to provoke discussion about the food and eating habits of the future. Fermented foods should definitely be an integral part of a balanced diet, as they help digestion, strengthen our immune system and contribute greatly towards our bodily and mental well being.

PIFcamp 2018 – All Is One!

Nowadays, easy access to a Wi-Fi is a given. Connecting to one means receiving arbitrary and basic information about the of the network. What if it wasn’t so arbitrary? Could we use it to send meaningful messages? Make ones day with a beautiful verse, a humorous pun? Could we overtake the network provider’s list and incite people to think, act? The possibility is explored in this potentially highly activistic project named Hot Ninja by Dmitry Morozov.

The blazing sun doesn’t seem to mind PIFcampers, as every day they get evermore increasingly absorbed in their work. Lovrenc Košenina and his team continue work on their custom weather station, which features temperature, moisture, UV, atmospheric pressure and wind sensors. The gathered data will be readily available online.

Several textile projects are also in the course of being completed. Maggie Kane, who hails from the USA, works on her MIDI controlled smart jacket inside the house, but she’s not the only one with a smart jacket project. Another one is being built by Sanja Hrvaćanin and Eva Pondrk. It’s designed with cyclists in mind, as it features lighting and signalling devices, which will increase their visibility in traffic, as well as notify other drivers about the cyclist’s intended travel direction.

Soča remains the go to place for socializing and cooling down. The serenity of the riverbank induces one to slow down. To better cope with our daily stress and freezing water temperatures, potential inflammations, build up our energy and focus more mindfully on the present, Tilen Sepič, who is a part of the PIFvideo team, introduced breathing sessions in the daily routine of the PIFgroup. The sessions are is based on the method developed by Wim Hof.

An improvised etching station was set up by Michael Page and Staš Vrenko in the afternoon. It seems there is always somebody eager to learn and create his own unique PCB.

To facilitate and amplify our capabilities of sensing the processes at PIFcamp , be it the ones we initiate ourselves or those from our surroundings, Vaclav organized a senseMini workshop. The various sensors needed were therefore completed in no time.

When the daily heat subsided, we were pleased warm our bones and feast our eyes on a bonfire.

PIFcamp 2018 – Everything Circulates!

The fragile ecosystem PIFcamp tries to integrate in is in constant peril. It is besieged from all angles by our ever-growing needs for resource materials and the pleasure driven commodification of nature. This heavily underscores the need to rethink the modes we operate with or within it, as every mishap can have dire consequences. In nature, everything circulates and at PIFcamp this rule applies in the same degree to ideas, skills, projects, knowledge, experiences, tasks… It is an ideology. A responsibility.

PIFcamp continues to adhere to the DIY and DIWO operating methods. Cooperation, integration and collaboration is what we nerds are great at. We sure are a handy tribe! Hands and the human ability to create take centre stage in Hannah Perner-Wilson’s Sense yourself making project as she and other participants plan to capture the processes of making with sensors and transform them to music.

In the short introduction to the project, Hannah spoke about self-awareness and our awareness of other-than-self phenomenons, be it on-going processes in our environment, other beings… She also stressed how important it is to act prudently and responsibly in regards to our raw materials and our surroundings. As gathering various resources is crucial to Sense yourself making, she distributed practical gathering aprons with big pockets she made for the easy storage of potential matter to be used in course of the project.

There was no stopping us taking our first hike with the local expert on edible wild plants Dario Cortese. We were not pleased to find out that more meadows have been mown this year than any previous year. Nonetheless, we managed to gather some common yarrow flower clusters, wild carrots and wild tarragon. Some of these plants will end up in our fermentation experiments (kimchi, kefir…) carried out under the leadership of Kristijan Tkalec and Ahac Meden.

Our kindhearted and to the hidden beauties of nature wonderfully sensitive resident electrical engineer Bernhard Rasinger, who made last year’s PIFcamp truly memorable with his laser show and oscillators, started his work on an algae experiment. He uses blue and red LED lights to promote the growth and photosynthesis of the algae he gathered from Soča river while storing them in plastic water bottles. He hopes the experiment could turn out to be a working prototype that would contribute to the amelioration of the air we breathe (a byproduct of photosynthesis is oxygen), as well as help to reverse the consequences of climate change.

Another PIFproject got started when the scorching sun lost some of its power and allowed Ljudmila’s founding father Luka Frelih to begin work on his 3D Dome, which enables scanning objects. For now the team focused on the construction of its metal frame. Later on they will continue with the installation of cameras.

The evening on the second day of PIFcamp climaxed in a pleasant jam session.