Photo: Dan Farrimond, An Alternative History of Teletext, ITAF 2014
View selected works from the last two International Teletext Art Festivals: ITAF 2013 and ITAF 2014. The festival was launched by Finnish art cooperative FixC. The works have been featured on ORF TELETEXT, ARD Text (Germany), Schweizer TELETEXT (Switzerland), and arte Teletext (Europe). Minimalism as a challenge; reduction as an incentive—in the teletext format, creative artists have a mere 24 lines of 39 characters each at their disposal. Moreover, there are only six colors available in addition to black and white. But it’s precisely this retro aspect—teletext’s concentration on individual pixels and limited technical possibilities—that, amidst today’s high-definition world of viewing, exerts a particularly strong visual appeal. Thus, elements of the teletext aesthetic can be found in many other settings, such as building walls and graffiti, in videos and animated films, and on the internet. From Post-Punk to Concept Art—teletext’s artistic means of expression are nowhere near being exhausted. Used daily by millions of people over the last 40 years, teletext is the Electronic Age’s first interactive information service. And it wasn’t very long after this medium’s introduction that artists began discovering its unique design characteristics.
Photos: Juha van Ingen, Sugar, ITAF 2014 / Kathrin Günter, Lindsay Lohan’s Mugshot Cabinet, ITAF 2013
