Day 4: Sumo Robot Fights and the Big Concert Night

Große Konzertnacht_Titelbild_886x590,

It was already the fourth day of the Ars Electronica Festival, but the enthusiasm for media art, outstanding lectures and surprising performances didn’t stop there. No surprise – with such a comprehensive festival program, it’s impossible to see everything even after four full days! Here you can see which highlights and moments were most impressive on Sunday – day four at the 2018 Ars Electronica Festival.

BR41N.IO Hackathon / g.tec medical engineering GmbH (AT) (Credit: vog.photo)

Even before the gates of POSTCITY Linz opened again for visitors, a small group of people were already hard at work inside: The hackers, designers, scientists and creative minds of the BR41N.IO Hackathon were developing their projects. The task was to realize different ideas with brain-computer-interfaces…

BR41N.IO Hackathon / g.tec medical engineering GmbH (AT) (Credit: vog.photo)

…in a time frame of exactly 24 hours. After programming and hacking all night long, the results could finally be presented and prizes be awarded on Sunday afternoon.

ASSISIbf—Symbiotic computation of bio-hybrid systems / University of Graz — Artificial Life Lab (Project coordination) (AT), Universite Paris Diderot — LIED (FR), Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne — LSRO (CH), University of Zagreb — LARICS (HR) (Credit: tom mesic)

Right next door, visitors to the exhibition The Practice of Art & Science strolled through projects at the interface of art and science…

Space Art (Credit: vog.photo)

…and looked for inspiration in the Space Art exhibition based on space travel.

Klangschlange / Queensland University of Technology (AU) (Credit: Robert Bauernhansl)

In between, unsuspecting visitors repeatedly experienced the pop-up performance Klangschlange from Queensland University of Technology at POSTCITY, which invited them to join in.

LightTank / Uwe Rieger (DE/NZ), Yinan Liu (NZ) (arc/sec Lab) @ St. Mary’s Cathedral (Credit: tom mesic)

Not far away from POSTCITY, Uwe Rieger an Yinan Liu impressed festival visitors with LightTank – in the middle of the St Mary’s Cathedral in Linz. This year, the church once again got turned into a very special kind of festival location.

„SAY_SUPERSTRINGS“ / dastrio (KR/DE), OUCHHH (TR) (Credit: vog.photo)

There was also a lot going on at the Ars Electronica Center: At SAY_SUPERSTRINGS by dastrio and OUCHHH for example, piano music and visualizations met at Deep Space 8K.

The One that Shatters in the Air / Changyeob (C.Y.) Ok (KR) (Credit: vog.photo)

On the other bank of the Danube, the Campus Exhibition at the Linz University of Arts is once again a source of inspiration today, for example with The One that Shatters in the Air.

Impressions from the u19 Exhibition in POSTCITY (Credit: tom mesic)

Back at POSTCITY Linz, the area of U19 – CREATE YOUR WORLD was full of people who programmed, crafted, danced, tried out new things and just simply had fun.

Hebocon (Credit: Gregor Tatschl)

In between workshops and Open Labs, the first Hebocon in the history of the Ars Electronica Festival also took place. Here, badly made low-tech robots competed against each other in a kind of sumo wrestling match.

Jugend Hackt ZONE / Jugend Hackt (AT) & Jugend Hackt (DE) (Credit: tom mesic)

The robots could be crafted directly at the festival at the Open Lab of Jugend Hackt.

Abeer Seikaly (JO) (Credit: tom mesic)

The vibe at the Future Innovators Summit was a little bit more serious: The experts coming from areas like art, business, activism, or science thought about creative questions of the future.

Nahum (MX/DE) (Credit: Gregor Tatschl)

The conference hall was also full of people busy thinking: In the second part of the theme conference (part 1 already took place on Friday) discussions revolved around the error in science and space travel.

The Berlioz Project at the Big Concert Night, POSTCITY (Credit: vog.photo)

At the Big Concert Night on Sunday evening, a great festival weekend came to an end: With spectacular show interludes and the impressive live music of the Bruckner Orchestra Linz, the evening was – as always – a real highlight.

Große Konzertnacht (Credit: vog.photo)

The special location – the old train hall of  POSTCITY Linz – and the varied program made for a truly extraordinary evening.

Curious to find out how the festival continued on Monday? Follow us on FacebookTwitterInstagram et al., subscribe to our newsletter, and check us out online at https://ars.electronica.art/news/en/ to find out.

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