BADco. extends an open call for contributions for the symposium

Actionable Image: Agency of Image, Performance of Body, Apparatus of Spectating

March 16-17, 2012 in Zagreb, Croatia This symposium and its topic are a continuation of BADco.'s artistic interest to relate performance and image. More concretely, it was motivated by our most recent work Responsibility for Things Seen that was presented in 2011 within the Croatian participation at the Biennale di Venezia. The work required us, in the absence of performers in the six-months exhibition, to pursue the idea of 'theater by other means' and to custom develop a database video system that unfolds a particular nexus of body, image and technology. Who can apply: If you are a scholar or practitioner working on the nexus of performance, image and technology, if you are working in or between any number of fields such as, but not exclusively: performing arts, visual arts, cinema and expanded cinema, human-machine interaction, technological performance, architecture, neuroscience, we are inviting you to present your research interests in form of a presentation and/or participate in the debates at our symposium "Actionable Image: Agency of Image, Performance of Body, Apparatus of Spectating". When and where: The symposium will take place on 16-17 March 2011 in Zagreb, Croatia. The  artistic programme will start on the 15th. What is the topic: With "Actionable Image" we propose to explore the experimental encounters between the image and the body -- two modalities of organized materiality, agency and receptivity affecting each other, two modes of expression whose encounters in our age are predominantly arranged, composed and mediated by means of visual technologies. We tend to subscribe to the critique of the domination of image and the scopic regime: the unebbing repetition of hegemonic representations, the homogenization of mediatized social experience, the habituation of sensory apparatus to technological artifice. However, understanding the encounter of image and body as a field of performance allows us to explore this encounter beyond the adequation of sensory perception to technological apparatus, of social behaviors to reproduced images. A mis-encounter where incompatibilites between technology and habit, excess of agency on the side of image or on the side of spectators, interventions in the transmission process, strange situations of viewing emerge, that encounter becomes an indeterminate field of negotiation, slippage, misperformance, deterritorialization and reterritorialization... In short, a field of divergences that are themselves frequent subject to experimentation in art. With this other scene of image in mind, we calls for contributions that will bring their analysis to bear on situations of problematic spectating, strange apparatuses and dispositifs of viewing, agency of images, strategies of performing images and other issues relevant to the nexus of body, image and technology. The symposium and attendant artistic programme will include a.o., contributions by artists and scholars such as Jonathan Beller, Maaike Bleeker, Vlatka Horvat, Stephen Zepke and BADco. What are the keywords: performance and image, performed image, image in performance, image and corporeality, agency of image, actionable image, algorithmic cinema, image and interface, iconicity of image, apparatuses and dispositifs of viewing, cinematic viewing vs theatrical viewing, image and presence/absence... How to apply and when is the deadline: We are looking for contributions of various formats, including but not limited to papers, short presentations, demonstrations and participation in the debate, up to 30 minutes in length. If you want to participate in the symposium, please send us a short note stating your topical interests, discussion points, format, etc. and a short description of your background. While we cannot cover your expenses, we can help you find convenient travel arrangement and affordable accommodation, and we will do our best to address your interests and provide an insightful debate. All proposals should be sent in by 10 February 2012 to: tom@badco.hr. You'll be notified of our decision shortly thereafter. Publication: A special issue of Frakcija Performing Arts Journal will accompany the symposium. We are looking for contributions of those taking part in the symposium, but also others who cannot join us in Zagreb but are researching the topic in academic or artistic formats. Articles, essays and artist's page(s) proposals will be considered. The submission deadline is March 2, publication June 2012. All proposals (and any questions on submission) should be sent to: ivana@badco.hr --- The symposium and attendant artistic program are organized in collaboration with Multimedia Institute/MAMA and the curatorial collective What, How and for Whom/WHW. The symposium Actionable Image: Agency of Image, Performance of Body, Apparatus of Spectating is part of LABO21 - European Platform for Interdisciplinary Research on Artistic Methodologies, a partner project of BADco. (Zagreb), BUDA Arts Center (Kortrijk), Laboratorium (Antwerp) and University of Circus and Dance (Stockholm). With the support of the Culture Programme of the European Union.