In no time the 5 days of the 2015 Ars Electronica Festival were over and it’s back story. However, a legendary story, because this year was the Ars Electronica Festival possibly record-breaking: 92,000 visits, 482 individual events, 946 artists, scientists, activists and participants from 42 countries. This is incentive enough to also look at the last day of the festival – the Music Monday.
Credit: Florian Voggeneder
The Music Monday began today in the former train hall. After Enrique Tomas presented the performance Sense of Place, Yen Tzu Chang amazed us with “self-luminous”. This was followed by a lecture with Werner Jauk about Post-City Sounds & Post Sounds.
Credit: Florian Voggeneder
Today took many kindergarten groups the offer of u19 – CREATE YOUR WORLD and spent the day in the City Post.
Credit: tom mesic
Credit: tom mesic
Credit: tom mesic
But even for older children there were in the children’s research laboratory a lot to discover.
Credit: tom mesic
Credit: tom mesic
This year there was again a wide range of guided tours at the Ars Electronica Festival. Besides highlight tours of the Post City and the Ars Electronica Center, there were special tours for families and children and guided tours with experts on various topics, such as the Neuroscience City Walk, the Community parcours for people with visual impairment or tours in different languages. Some tours also were on Monday, like Presentations Parcours for Music Monday in the PosCity in which all sound installations at the Ars Electronica Festival were visited.
Credit: Florian Voggeneder
As a special highlight, there was also the POST CITY Expert Tour: Post Logistics today. The Österreichische Post AG (Austrian postal service) granted a unique insight into the new ultra-modern mail distribution center in Alhaming. Packets pass through this facility many times faster than the old distribution center in Linz – which became the PostCity during the 2015 Ars Electronica Festival.
Credit: Florian Voggeneder
Something very special was the WE GUIDE YOU tour for Urban Ecology. The participants explored together with the biologist Friedrich Schwarz, the vegetation on the roof of the PostCity.
Credit: Florian Voggeneder
Credit: Florian Voggeneder
In a press conference the Ars Electronica made up the balance about the festival 2015: 92,000 visits, 482 individual events, 946 artists, scientists, activists and participants from 42 countries. Thus was the Ars Electronica Festival in 2015 one of the most visited festivals in the history of Ars Electronica.
Credit: Florian Voggeneder
After the press conference the journalists moved on in the Volksgarten – a park in front of the main train station in Linz and a popular meeting point of different national or ethnic communities. During the Ars Electronica Festival 2015 name suggestions for the road through the park were collected, which should set an example to give newcomers a symbolic place in the city. On the last day of the festival a jury decided the street name: “Weg der Begegnung” (English: Way of Encounter).
Credit: Florian Voggeneder
In the evening we strolled through the deserted PostCity for the last time with mixed emotions. We are sad, because the 2015 Ars Electronica Festival is already over, but we are already looking forward to new challenges at the 2016 Ars Electronica Festival!
Credit: Florian Voggeneder
Credit: Martin Hieslmair