We're excited to announce a series of workshops and events focused on world-building, generative storytelling and participatory design. At the Columbia Digital Storytelling Lab we design stories for the 21st century, drawing inspiration from creative and research practices spanning the arts, the humanities and technology. With technology as our creative partner, we explore the evolving landscape of storytelling, where the democratization of tools like code, data and algorithms has transformed the relationship between creators and audiences. Join us in this realm of speculation, creativity and collaboration, where new and unexpected stories come to life.
DSL EVENTS
Generative Storytelling
Tuesday, July 11th, 6:30pm to 9pm
Elinor Bunin Munroe Film Center. 144 West 65 Street, NY, NY
We'll be exploring generative storytelling at our July meetup. Come join us for an evening of co-creation, world-building and art making. DSL members Nick Fortugno and Lance Weiler will be leading this generative session. The evening will include a look at emerging tools and projects that are pushing at the edges of generative possibilities in art, music and cinema.
The July meetup is a special collaboration with DAM, a decentralized art zine. The evening is part of a global DAMfest series of events. For more about DAM visit https://damzine.xyz
Web3 Working Group with Sasha Stiles
Tuesday , July 25th, 2pm to 3pm
Virtual - see RSVP link below
Sasha Stiles is a first-generation Kalmyk-American poet, artist and AI researcher widely recognized as a pioneer of generative literature and language art. Her award-winning work fuses text and technology to probe what it means to be human in an increasingly posthuman era.
Stiles is author of the “instant techno classic” poetry collection, Technelegy (Black Spring Press Group, 2021), and has been named “perhaps the leading blockchain poet” by Right Click Save, as well as one of the top 10 NFT artists to watch in 2023. Her work is available via many of the world’s top platforms, including fxhash, Quantum, SuperRare, Objkt, Foundation, Nifty Gateway, Artsy, and Infinite Objects. In 2022, she became the first writer to bring AI-powered literature to a major auction house when her poem, “COMPLETION: When it’s just you,” sold at Christie’s. Other honors include a Future Art Award, nominations for the Forward Prize, Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net, and finalist status for the Christopher Smart Prize and Palette Emerging Poet Prize.
A sought-after thought leader in the arena of blockchain poetics and publishing innovation, Stiles has spoken at events and institutions including Art Basel (Switzerland), the Brooklyn Museum, SXSW, Digilogue Istanbul, Parsons The New School, Binghamton University, the University of Colorado - Boulder, the Ai4 Summit, Miami Art Week, Art Market San Francisco, Consensus, NFT NYC and NFT London, and has exhibited at venues such as Superchief Gallery NYC, SuperRare Gallery, Kunsthalle Zurich, Annka Kultys Gallery, Unit London, Galerie Brigitte Schenk, SCOPE Art Show, Art Cologne, the Museum of Contemporary Digital Art, Krasl Art Center, L’Avant Galerie Vossen, the Carousel de Louvre, CADAF Paris, Digital Art Month NYC, New York Fashion Week, the billboards of Shibuya, Tokyo, and virtual Times Square.
NEW WORK
Where There’s Smoke (Digital Dozen 2020)
ArtYard. 13 Front Street in Frenchtown, NJ
June 17–October 1, 2023
All families have secrets. Skeletons hidden in closets. Things left unsaid.
In Where There’s Smoke, Columbia DSL’s Lance Weiler unravels the secrets of his enigmatic father — a volunteer firefighter and amateur fire scene photographer — and of two devastating fires that struck the Weiler family in the early 1980s. In the final months of his battle with colon cancer, his father invites Lance to interview him, and these conversations reignite 30 years of wondering … were those fires more than tragic accidents?
Prepared to come face-to-face with mysteries of the past, Lance sits down with his father and finds himself simultaneously confronting tragedies of the present. As his father’s choices fade with his body, Lance and his family experience a profound lack of empathy in his care, and this sparks a new question: “What if this story can do more?” Out of a heartbreaking journey for answers and healing rises Where There’s Smoke.
“In 1983 our van burst into flames on a family vacation. Eleven months later our house would burn to the ground. As I explore my past I find mysterious connections to these blazes and come face to face with a closet full of skeletons. Inspired by true events in my life, Where There’s Smoke details the connections between two mysterious fires and my father’s battle with cancer.” – Lance Weiler
Where There’s Smoke is an immersive storytelling experience about life, loss, and memory that reveals itself to be both deeply personal and universally resonant. The exhibition employs elements of immersive theatre, interactive documentary and emerging technology that guides people through an abstracted and deconstructed exploration of his father’s life, offering interactive prompts along the way. It had its world premiere at the 2019 Tribeca Film Festival and has been reimagined for ArtYard by Weiler and producer Peter English. It will be on view June 17 to Oct. 1, 2023, paired with a live performance in ArtYard’s McDonnell Theater.
ArtYard is an incubator for creative expression and a catalyst for collaborations that reveal the transformational power of art. Located on the Delaware River in Frenchtown, New Jersey, it is open from 11:00 AM to 5:00 PM (Thursdays until 7:00.) Admission to the gallery is free of charge, with a suggested donation of $5 per person. Most programming in the McDonnell Theater requires advance registration or tickets. For further information, call 908-996-5018 or email contact@artyard.org.
Where There’s Smoke requires timed tickets. We encourage visitors to reserve a spot to avoid a long wait. Only a limited number of spaces will be available during the opening reception.
LINKS
Remembrance of Things Future: A Conversation with 0xDEAFBEEF, Artist Experimenting on the Blockchain
“Building upon LACMA’s historic engagements with Art and Technology, Remembrance of Things Future is an invitation to travel via the blockchain back in time through the museum’s encyclopedic collection. Utilizing tools such as generative code 0xDEAFBEEF, alongside other pioneering artists, has been invited to select objects from LACMA and make new digital editions inspired by the museum’s holdings. Released on the blockchain in phases, a percentage of proceeds from these limited Remembrance of Things Future digital editions goes to support LACMA’s Art + Technology Lab.”
How Can Universities Adapt to Web3?
“A visit to Manchester Metropolitan University’s School of Digital Arts (SODA) feels different to other educational institutions. Maybe it’s the monumental LED facade on the exterior, or the high-spec editing suites, or the green-screen studio on the second floor. Perhaps it’s the cutting-edge art gallery, Modal, that exhibits works by pioneering digital artists (currently Rebecca Allen). Or perhaps it’s just the fact that, having only opened in 2021, it still lacks the institutional freight that weighs on other universities, especially in the UK.”
What happens when music is no longer static?
“Right now, generative AI is The Big Thing. It’s going to change the world. It’s going to destroy humanity. It’s not that big a deal, just another tech helpmate; chill out. It’s a massive threat that should be paused or banned.
The conversation around generative AI in music, and by that I mean in both the creative community and the industry, is running through lots of open-ended improvisations on similar themes, all time tested, though we forgot the last time we had this conversation a few years ago. But something else, something far bigger, is happening to music, and generative AI is just a small part of it. “
Columbia DSL Newsletter
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Volunteers Wanted
We’re looking for volunteers to help with the Breakthroughs in Storytelling Symposium. If you’re interested please email us at hello@digitalstorytellinglab.com