*********************************** ****************************************************** Upgrade! Amsterdam: Degradable

When: Monday December 18th 2006 ||20.30 hours Where: De Melkweg, Theaterzaal, Lijnbaansgracht 234 A, Amsterdam | free admission | 

URL:www.melkweg.nl/upgrade LIVE stream: www.fabchannel.com *********************************** ************************************* *********

As the year draws to a close, the last Upgrade! Amsterdam of 2006 ponders the poetics of degradability, focussing specifically on the aesthetics of things mutable, morphable, and ephemeral. Whether it’s Steven Jouwersma’s serial destruction of personal memory and momentum in the DIA-EXIT, or whether it’s Jelte van Abbema’s time and emotion sensitive font in his “VIRTUREAL typewriter, or his bacterial prints in SYMBIOSIS, these artists show us that the wilful design of degradability yield surprising outcomes. The new performance SYNCHRONATOR by Gert-Jan Prins and Bas van Koolwijk, which combines thecharacteristic visual qualitiesof analogue and digital techniques concludes the evening.

 In sync with the festive season, we serve apple pie and punch!

|| Participants || - Steven Jouwersma [new media artist working predominantly with old media like 8mm film and photo slides. Currently completing an M.A. at the Frank Mohr Institute] http://www.mohr-i.nl/content.phtml?768 - Jelte van Abbema [graduated at the Design Academy in Eindhoven. Fascinated by the beauty and strangeness of nature. Loves cookies] http://www.zefir7.nl/archives/gasten/2006_09.php?sender=true - Bas van Koolwijk [audiovisual artist.His video works can be seen as an aggressive attack on the illusion of video itself. http://www.umatic.nl/info_bas.html - Gert-Jan Prins [electronic improvised music performer. Uses a self-developed electronic system of radio and transmitter technology] http://www.gjp.info/

|| Projects || Steven Jouwersma | DIA-EXIT In exchange for apple pie people gave Jouwersma their old slides. After collecting and watching 40.000 slides he decided to destroy them, and machine for that purpose: the "DIA-EXIT", installed at the Tschumi Pavilion in Groningen. Upon pressing a red button a slide projection appears; another push on the button would cause the slide’s destruction.

 Jelte van Abbema | Virtureal |Symbiosis | Virtureal | Virtureal explores man-machine boundaries by way of a modified old Remington typewriter, fitted with pressure sensors. The font changes according to the intensity of the keystrokes, and is susceptible to the passage of time. | Symbiosis | Due to his fascination for growth, van Abbema created prints composed by bacteria. As time passes, the image is continuously and organically transformed into something new.

Gert-Jan Prins & Bas van Koolwijk | Synchronator Since the early years of video art, works have been made which do not produce a standard TV signal waveform and therefore cannot be directly recorded or projected with current equipment. For SYNCHRONATOR, Bas van Koolwijk and Gert-Jan Prins have created their own hardware to overcome this problem,making use of the characteristic visual qualities of such techniques. http://www.gjp.info/synchronator.htm

 -- Upgrade! Amsterdamis a series of gatherings for and by new media aficionados, artists, geeks, media makers and breakers, and the generally curious. Point of departure is the premise: “No upgrade without a downgrade.” Upgrade! Amsterdam is organised by Nat Muller & Lucas Evers, is actively hosted by De Melkweg, and kindly supported by VSB Fonds and Mondriaan Foundation.

Upgrade! is an international, emerging network of autonomous nodes united by art, technology, and a commitment to bridging cultural divides. Since April 1999, a group of new media artists and curators have gathered in New York City. The first meeting took place at a bar in the east village with Tim Whidden & Mark River [MTAA], Mark Napier and Upgrade! founder Yael Kanarek. http://www.theupgrade.net/