September is here and with it, a new edition of L.E.V. Matadero, Festival of Visual Electronics and Extended Realities. From Thursday 18 to Sunday 22, we will meet again at Matadero Madrid, the contemporary creation centre of the Madrid City Council’s Department of Culture, Tourism and Sport, to discover a diverse and contemporary vision of artistic creation developed with the latest technological tools.
With a four-day program focused on electronic and experimental music, audiovisual and stage creation, digital art and extended realities, the sixth edition of the festival will offer the public a 360º experience with which to immerse themselves in these contemporary disciplines and from which to reflect on their possibilities and impact on culture and society.
Among the leading names of this 6th edition of the festival is renowned Italian dramaturge Romeo Castellucci, who will KICK OFF the program with the av performative installation The Third Reich. This audiovisual and scenic piece proposes a critique of the stiffness and the impositions of today’s language, inviting the audience to modify their perception and power of judgmental up to unsuspected levels. Produced in collaboration with the musician Scott Gibbons, it can be seen on Wednesday 18 and Thursday 19 September in Nave 10 at Matadero.
Nave 10 will also host the AUDIOVISUAL CONCERTS AND PERFORMANCES of this edition, with two performances per day from Friday to Sunday. On Friday, September 20th, plus44Kaligula, the artistic name of English composer and performer Cally Statham, will present a show with set design by Emmanuel Biard; and percussionist, sound manipulator, and visual artist NAH, will showcase the audiovisual performance Totally Recalled. On Saturday, September 21st, Keeley Forsyth will take the stage with her unique voice and striking physical performance, presenting her latest album The Hollow live; followed by AXONTORR, a collaborative project between Oliver Torr and Axonbody, supported by the Czech Centre in Madrid. The final live session of L.E.V. Matadero will take place at noon on Sunday, September 22nd, featuring two world premieres of the most experimental techno: Matadero, by Horma (a side project of Le Parody) and multimedia artist Azael Ferrer, developed with the Matadero Madrid Center for Artistic Residencies, and Recycling Techno, by Moritz Simon Geist, n which the German engineer and producer uses discarded mechanical and electronic parts to generate repetitive sound structures and characteristic musical patterns.
VIRTUAL REALITY will again be one of the main pillars of this edition’s program. As part of the festival’s commitment to showcase long-duration pieces that fully immerse you in new virtual worlds and explore the artistic possibilities of this digital medium, the VORTEX section will consist of three interactive VR pieces to be displayed at the Central de Diseño: The Eye and I, a collaborative piece by Taiwanese artist Hsin-Chien Huang and renowned musician and composer Jean Michel Jarre exploring the notion of social surveillance throughout history from the panoptic pavilion of a prison; Namuanki, by Oscar winner and pioneer of digital and VR art Kevin Mack, transporting the user to a millennial aquatic oasis in a group guided tour format; and the interactive virtual documentary In Pursuit of Repetitive Beats, by Darren Emerson, which will take the visitor on a first-person time travel journey to the epicenter of the late 1980s rave culture in the United Kingdom, in a group experience where physical sensations and sound are amplified through the use of transducer vests.
TICKETS FOR CONCERTS, AUDIOVISUAL PERFORMANCES, AND VIRTUAL REALITY EXPERIENCES ARE AVAILABLE HERE
*Very limited capacity
Alongside the live performances and virtual reality programming, L.E.V. Matadero will offer a long list of free activities in different spaces of Matadero Madrid that will allow us to continue exploring the extraordinary artistic uses of the latest technologies.
Within the AUGMENTED CITY section, the project Slow Walker by Peder Bjurman will take over Plaza Matadero to tell the story of a tardigrade—an extremely resilient microorganism against environmental adversities—that becomes a gigantic and mystical being visible through our smartphone screens, hovering over the outdoor space, accompanied by a voice-over and a soundtrack created by Abul Mogard.
Another highlight of this edition of L.E.V. Matadero will be a circuit of four AUDIOVISUAL INSTALLATIONS: Alcove LTD in Plaza Matadero, by the Swiss art studio Encor, supported by the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia; The Alluvials at MAD Madrid Digital Arts, by Alice Bucknell; he extended version of Immersion by Robbie Cooper, at the Cineteca Soundstage; and Save the Planet by INITI Playground at Nave Una.
Additionally, as part of Focus Taiwán, a long-standing collaboration between the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Spain and L.E.V. Laboratory of Visual Electronics, L.E.V. Matadero will open the EXHIBITION PIXEL GODS. Digital Taiwan at Nave 0, a selection of works by Taiwanese artists who approach a more updated definition of the constitutive element of digital images, the pixel.
To delve deeper into the practical use of next-generation tools that allow creators to build virtual worlds, the program of L.E.V. Matadero will include the HACKATÓN Avatar VR Sculpting, led byRick Treweek, also known as MetaRick, and supported by the European project Realities in Transition and Medialab Matadero. Registrations are open at this link.
The program is completed with a series of TALKS AND PRESENTATIONS by some of the artists participating in the program, such as Hsin-Chien Huang, MetaRick and Alice Bucknell, who, under the title Designing Virtual Worlds for Possible Futures, will reflect on how virtual environments can help us imagine and build a better future.
MORE INFO ON WWW.LEVFESTIVAL.COM
L.E.V. Matadero 2024. Festival de Electrónica Visual y Realidades Extendidas
18 – 22 September | Matadero Madrid
Organized by: Matadero Madrid
Curated by: L.E.V. Laboratorio de Electrónica Visual
In a collaboration with: Nave 10, Medialab Matadero, Cineteca Madrid, Centro de residencias artísticas
Featuring: Central de Diseño, MAD Madrid Artes Digitales
Supported by: Ministerio de Cultura de Taiwán, Oficina Económica y Cultural de Taipéi en España, Fundación Suiza para la Cultura Pro Helvetia, Centro Checho Madrid, RIT (Realities in Transition)
Supported by the Ministry of Culture’s public aids to promote the video game and podcast fields, plus other forms of digital creation, within the framework ofthe Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan, and financed by the European Union – NextGenerationEU
Associated media: Radio 3, OCI Magazine, Clot Magazine
Visual identity: SHOEG
Music: AXONTORR (Mastered by Ryan Schwabe)
LINE UP
LIVE SHOWS & AV PERFORMANCES
ROMEO CASTELLUCCI & SCOTT GIBBONS The Third Reich _IT/US
KEELEY FORSYTH _UK
MORITZ SIMON GEIST. Recycling Techno _DE (World Premiere)
NAH live AV _US/BE
AXONTORR live AV _CZ/FR
PLUS44KALIGULA AV _UK
HORMA & AZAEL FERRER. Matadero _ES (World Premiere)
VORTEX. VIRTUAL REALITY EXPERIENCES
HSIN-CHIEN HUANG & JEAN MICHEL JARRE. The Eye and I _FR/TW
KEVIN MACK. Namuanki _US
DARREN EMERSON. In Pursuit of Repetitive Beats _UK
CIUDAD AUMENTADA. URBAN AUGMENTED REALITY EXPERIENCES
PEDER BJURMAN. Slow Walker_SE
AV INSTALLATIONS
ENCOR STUDIO. Alcove LTD _CH
ALICE BUCKNELL. The Alluvials _US
ROBBIE COOPER. Immersion (extended version) _UK (World Premiere)
INITI. Save the Planet_CZ
EXHIBITION
PIXEL GODS. Taiwán digital
KUANG-YI KU. The Gods of Water _TW
SIMPLE NOODLE ART. How To Improve Photo Quality by AI | Noise Reduction, Super-resolution Tutorial _TW
TEAM9. Word Game _TW
TALKS & PRESENTATIONS
HACKATON: Avatar VR Sculpting
RICK TREWEEK (MetaRick) _ZA
DISEÑANDO MUNDOS VIRTUALES PARA FUTUROS POSIBLES
RICK TREWEEK (MetaRick) _ZA
ALICE BUCKNELL _US
HSIN-CHIEN HUANG _TW
