Commission, conference speakers, workshops.CRUMB researcher Suzy O'Hara has been very busy!

PRESS RELEASE http://www.thinkingdigital.co.uk/arts

Thinking digital gets to the art of the matter

The region’s largest annual conference celebrating innovation, creativity and technology will be supported this year by a public arts programme designed to celebrate contemporary digital arts practice in the region. Thinking Digital Arts is a week-long programme happening across NewcastleGateshead.
Thinking Digital Conference introduces new ideas, attracting people from a variety of industries and functions, inspiring new insights into businesses and organisations and providing vital networking opportunities. Similarly, Thinking Digital Arts will provide a platform to investigate and celebrate the emerging area of contemporary arts where the arts, technology and digital culture collide, working in close partnership with cultural, digital and educational partners.
Suzy O’Hara, curator for Thinking Digital Arts 2014 explains:
“There is a clear aspiration within the arts world to create, share and nurture artistic and cultural works in unique ways through digital media. Thinking Digital Arts provides an opportunity for a broad public audience to participate in a forward-looking debate on the position of technology in art with some of the world’s leading innovators and critical thinkers from across the evolving, global digital art ecology.”
“The Thinking Digital Conference provides the perfect background to progress these dialogues through creative arts practice, exhibition and open discussion.”

Thinking Digital Arts, just like the conference, is both outward looking while also rooted in the North East. The programme includes a new collaborative commission for the Sage Gateshead that brings artist Dominic Wilcox, who was born in Sunderland and now based in London and North East based creative technologist, James Rutherford together to respond to the context of the NewcastleGateshead quayside. The Thinking Digital Arts Hack workshop brings 12 international artists and 12 technologists and makers together to create new ideas and projects over 8 hours, the prototype projects devised throughout the day will be exhibited for one night only at the TDA city centre Hub, Newbridge Project. We have been working with the Gateshead Arts Team to devise Future Talent, a showcase of new media artworks developed by BTEC students from Lord Lawson Academy and new media artist Victoria Bradbury will be displayed at St Mary’s Heritage Centre. And a Thinking Digital Arts Panel will platform a discussion between leading, international new media curators working within arts and technology, as part of the Digital Cultures Conference at Discovery Museum.
Sponsored by the University of Sunderland Arts Council England, it’s hoped the inaugural arts event will engage and encourage new audiences to participate in learn, and enjoy art created in this emerging field.
Graeme Thompson, Dean of Arts, Design and Media at the University of Sunderland, said: “Thinking Digital Arts is an innovative programme that brings new arts and cultural opportunities to a wide audience in the North East, which we’re delighted to be sponsoring this year.”
“We are proud to be able to support the work one of our practice based PhD students which highlights the opportunities and practical experience within creative arts that we offer at the University.”
Herb Kim is founder and director of the North East's annual Thinking Digital conference, which in only 7 years has become an important fixture on the digital media calendar nationally.
He said: “Thinking Digital Conference acts as a catalyst for new partnerships, ideas and thinking to happen. Through the Thinking Digital Arts programme, we want to provide contexts and opportunities for people working in the arts, culture, heritage and technology sectors to meet and find ways to push the boundaries of possibility through collaboration and partnership’
Thinking Digital Arts runs from Monday, May 19, to Sunday May 25. For more information on programme and how to get involved, log on to www.thinkingdigital.co.uk/arts



Thinking Digital Arts – Programme of Events
Thinking Digital Arts Commission
Binaudios 2014
by Dominic Wilcox and James Rutherford
Date: Monday 19 –Sunday 25 May 2014
Venue: Sage Gateshead Concourse
We have teamed contemporary artist and designer Dominic Wilcox with creative technologist James Rutherford to respond to the Thinking Digital Conference context in the North East of England, and more specifically, the cultural, quayside quarter of Newcastle Gateshead with a new commission. Check out the new artwork in the Sage Gateshead concourse from Monday 19th – Sunday 25 May 2014.
Dominic Wilcox: http://dominicwilcox.com
James Rutherford: Twitter @jtruk / www.creativenucleus.com

Thinking Digital Arts Hack Exhibition
Date: Tuesday 20th May 2014
Exhibition – One Night Only: 5pm-7pm
Venue: NewBridge Project and Makerspace, New Bridge Street, Newcastle

Decentralised. Redistributed. Networked. How do we move as hackers and makers in the physical and digital realms? Does the web cause us to work more globally, or does it underline the importance of the local? In what ways is decentralisation coming to the fore in global culture and how does this affect the way we think, work, and interact on and offline?

On Tuesday May 20, 24 artists, designers and hackers will take over NewBridge Project Gallery and Newcastle Makerspace for a day to explore the theme of ‘Decentralisation’ through collaborative and interdisciplinary projects. The workshop will be facilitated by the local hosts, digital media artists Lalya Gaye (http://lalyagaye.com ) and Victoria Bradbury (http://victoriabradbury.com ) of Attaya Projects. (www.attayaprojects.com )

At the end of the day, the event will culminate in a public exhibition at NewBridge Project for one night only, as part of the opening of the Thinking Digital Conference 2014.

Future Talent Exhibition
Date: Tuesday, May 20 – Saturday, May 24
Time: 10am-4pm
Venue: St Mary’s Heritage Centre
A collaboration with Gateshead Council Arts Team, the Future Talent programme is for inquisitive-minded secondary school BTEC students with an interest in art and technology, digital art and design, programming, or fine art.

Over an intensive three day residency, students from Lord Lawson Academy will work with media artist Victoria Bradbury to explore ways to use technology and new media to create interactive projects, using the history of Gateshead as inspiration.

This programme creates opportunities for young people in the North East to: Develop skills in creative computer technology, work with world class new media based artists and showcase our regions future talent to a broad and informed audience.

Thinking Digital Arts Panel
Date: Monday, May 19 2014
Time: 9am–5pm
Venue: The Great Hall, Discovery Museum, Newcastle
Thinking Digital Arts is working in partnership with Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums to co produce Digital Cultures, a conference sharing innovative approaches to public engagement for the arts, heritage and cultural sectors.

Thinking Digital Arts is delighted to welcome: Olga Mink from Baltan Lab, Irini Papadimitriou from V&A/Watermans Gallery, Marialaura Ghidini from Or-bits.com, Dr Noel Lobley from Pitt-Rivers Museum and Alan Smith from Allenheads Contemporary Arts. The panel will be chaired by Prof Beryl Graham (CRUMB, University of Sunderland www.crumbweb.org ) to form our panel of leading international curators.

Open to all, this platform will provide a compelling opportunity for the cultural sector to investigate the current position and impact of creative technologies and the rise of digital industries on contemporary art, curatorial practice and the wider arts, heritage and cultural sectors.

For more information on the full Thinking Digital Arts programme, please go to www.thinkingdigital.co.uk/arts

/ends

Media Contacts:
Suzy O'Hara
Curator and Producer
Thinking Digital Arts, part of Thinking Digital Conference
e:ohara.suzy@gmail.com
Tel: 07891719319
twitter: @suzy_o_hara



Notes for Editors
Suzy O’Hara
Suzy is an accomplished curator and arts producer with over ten years experience in the arts. Currently undertaking an AHRC funded PhD in digital art curatorship with CRUMB, University of Sunderland, key research interests include the impact of collaborative art practice between the commercial digital and art sectors on curatorial practice.
She is currently curating a Thinking Digital Arts www.thinkingdigital.co.uk/arts , which is part of the Thinking Digital Conference and takes place in May 2014 and co producing Nomadic Salon, a series of critical discussions in multiple locations across the North East with Lucy Livingstone www.nomadicsalon.co.uk .
She recently curated Dear Angel, a widely participative art commission by artist Stevie Ronnie, for Festival of the North East in June 2013.
Thinking Digital Conference
The Thinking Digital Conference is annual conference for innovators in a variety of fields that takes place every spring at the Sage Gateshead Music Centre in Northern England. The conference is themed around technology, new ideas and our future and attracts people from a variety of industries and functions. By bringing a large number and variety of some the brightest, most innovative and accomplished thinkers and doers from around the world, Thinking Digital creates a unique experience that provokes and inspires new insights into our businesses and organisations as well as connecting delegates into a vital community that lives on well after the conferences concludes.
For more information log on to: http://www.thinkingdigital.co.uk/
HERB KIM
FOUNDER, THE THINKING DIGITAL CONFERENCE

Originally from Brooklyn, NY, Herb Kim is perhaps best known as the Founder of the Thinking Digital Conference which will celebrate it’s Seventh Annual Conference in 2014. The Conference celebrates innovation, creativity and technology and has been dubbed “The UK’s TED” by The Guardian, Metro Newspaper, The Next Web and Microsoft’s Chief Storyteller Steve Clayton.

Herb lives in Liverpool, his company is based in Gateshead and he works across the North of England. In addition to Thinking Digital, Herb is the founder of..

• TEDxManchester
• TEDxLiverpool
• TEDxSheffield
• TEDxNewcastle
• TEDxGateshead
Herb’s work led to him being included in the 2011 Wired Magazine Top 100 and the 2010 MediaGuardian Top 100 of UK new media industry newsmakers. He’s also been a judge for the Big Chip Awards for the past three years. He is a mentor on the Ignite100 digital startup incubator and chairs the digital/creative company network Digital Union.

Herb earned his MBA from the Wharton School of Business in Pennsylvania in 1996 and his undergraduate degree from Princeton University in New Jersey in 1989.
Newbridge Project
Newbridge Project will be the Thinking Digital Arts Hub venue from 19 – 25 May 2-14.
The NewBridge Project is an artist-led community comprising of over 80 artist studios, an exhibition space, book shop based and social hub in Newcastle’s city centre. Currently occupying a 29,000 sq ft former office block, The NewBridge Project supports artists to investigate and challenge the boundaries of contemporary art.

The NewBridge Project was established in 2010 to provide exchange and support in an engaged and discursive community of artists. The shared workspace is a critical and collaborative environment that allows artists to discuss and develop new ideas and projects.
NewBridge Project Space is a dynamic city centre space dedicated to exploring new and diverse contemporary art practice through a programme of regular exhibitions, screenings and events, supported by responsive talks, publications and broadcasts. It provides artists with the opportunity to exhibit in a supportive space that promotes an experimental and critical approach to practice.
http://thenewbridgeproject.com
Tyne and Wear Museums
Tyne & Wear Archives & Museums is a major regional museum, art gallery and archives service. They manage a collection of nine museums and galleries across Tyneside and the Archives for Tyne and Wear. They hold collections of international importance in archives, art, science and technology, archaeology, military and social history, fashion and natural sciences. It is a Major Partner Museum funded by Arts Council England and has Core Funded Museum status.

http://www.twmuseums.org.uk
Gateshead Council Arts Team
Gateshead Council’s Arts Development delivers an Arts Programme across the borough for local residents, communities and visitors.
The programme includes performances, workshops, exhibitions, events, public art and festivals, utilising our cultural venues, schools and community settings, parks and outdoor spaces. Our programme covers all art forms, is designed to be inclusive for all ages and abilities and can focus on anything from healthy eating to raising aspiration in young people. Across the borough we have over 80 astounding pieces of public art that Gateshead proudly boasts including the Angel of the North.