Swarm Arena / NTT (JP), Ars Electronica Futurelab (AT) photo: Tom Mesic

Open Futurelab 2018

Following an extended period of integrating contributions from the Ars Electronica Futurelab at various festival settings, the 2018 Open Futurelab initiative in the POSTCITY was intended to create a key interface for the lab’s creative international network.

For this purpose, a branded exhibition space at the festival location was provided for the first time. Curated by the Lab’s team, the area served as a core location for demos and presentations and as a tangible hub for contact and information. At the same time, an interface to the interested festival audience has been established there.

Both ground and airspace were united into a seamless presentation space with a unique drone performance: with Swarm Arena, Japanese telecom giant NTT and the Lab’s Spaxels Research Team showed first prototypes and developments that enabled a completely new visual audience experience based on data visualization, swarm intelligence of robotic organisms and interactivity. A DIY Drone Lab invited visitors to a tricky self-experience with quadrocopters in an obstacle track. Also a presentation the QUT Lab Academy’s exhibits was part of the program.

Credits

Ars Electronica Futurelab: Roland Aigner, Julia Angerer, Friedrich Bachinger, Florian Berger, Patrick Berger, Gloria Bope, Samuel Jakob Eckl, Marianne Eisl, Peter Freudling, Matthew Gardiner, Rachel Hanlon, Roland Haring, Horst Hörtner, Peter Holzkorn, Kyoko Kunoh, Anna Kuthan, Christopher Lindinger, Elisabeth Luger, Maria Mayr, Michael Mayr, Stefan Mittlböck-Jungwirth-Fohringer, Otto Naderer, Nicolas Naveau, Ali Nikrang, Hideaki Ogawa, Benjamin Olsen, Maria Pfeifer, Johannes Pöll, Daniel Rammer, Erwin Reitböck, Clemens Francis Scharfen, Raphael Schaumburg-Lippe, Simon Schmid