in preparation for Radiotopia, a RadioNet summit at STUBNITZ, Hamburg, July 13-17, 2022

Since 2009, the Messschiff Eleonore, once a survey vessel, has been docked at the Danube harbor in Linz, powered by solar energy, equipped with radio components and modified to host artists in residency as part of Stadwerkstatt’s InfoLab activities. The radio beacons of Eleonore operate two transmitters,a 7 Mhz short-wave sending through WSPRnet, and the geostationary satellite rising star Es’hail QO100. Both transmitters operate in different frequency ranges, connecting invisible electromagnetic space directly to the haptic world only via antennas.

Cyberhacking, pandemic living, a desire for autonomy from cyber-hegemony—the Hertzian waves of the electromagnetic spectrum manifest potentials to swerve away from centralized life. Tied to the electro-dynamics of the earth-sky-solar-galactic nexus, radio transceiving can use simple circuits that engender wide-ranging effects. To prepare ourselves for times to come when our fragile digital networks may no longer function properly and the EM spectrum becomes our primary channel to signal each other, the durational radio program MAKE ME A SIGNAL – Prelude to a RADIOTOPIA materializes an experimental set of approaches on the wideband radio spectrum that make artistic concepts real and that may, in turn, become new ways of being in our possible futures.

This prelude radio transmission launches the planning for a RadioNet summit scheduled for July 2022 at the Motorship Stubnitz (stubnitz.com) that is currently docked in Hamburg and that has functioned as a moving platform for cultural research and exchange since 1992.