Dr. Albert Genter (FR)

Dr. Albert Genter, joined the GEIE Exploitation Minière de la Chaleur (GEIE EMC) located in northern Alsace, France in September 2007 as Scientific Coordinator of the EGS Pilot Plant project called the Soultz project (www.geothermie-soultz.fr). GEIE EMC is a European Economic Interest Grouping responsible for a pilot geothermal project currently co-funded by French and German governments as well as a consortium of French-German industrial companies. Deep geothermal energy called EGS (Enhanced Geothermal System) is currently exploited on this site. In that framework, A. Genter is responsible for the scientific activity (research, scientific monitoring, reporting, publication) and for the result dissemination to a large audience.

As Scientific Manager of the geothermal project, he is working daily on the first geothermal power plant producing electricity in France based on deep geothermal resources trapped within fractured crystalline rocks. A. Genter is responsible for the current research phase dealing with a scientific and technical monitoring of the power plant over the period 2010-2012.
Before joining the GEIE EMC, Mr. Genter has been working for 23 years to the French Geological Survey, i.e. BRGM in Orléans, France.

Mr. Genter produced about 60 technical reports, 50 scientific and technical papers, and more than 200 presentations in national and international conferences and workshops. He teaches in several High Schools and Universities in France and Germany. He was responsible for several Ph.D. students and diploma thesis in Earth Science. He won an award on the best presentation at the Geothermal Resource Council in Rena (Nevada) in 2009.

His main skills are in structural geology applied to geothermal energy projects, petroleum reservoirs, sedimentary basins, volcanic areas, nuclear waste storage as well as in cliff coastal erosion; borehole logs interpretation, well logging data in crystalline, and borehole monitoring of deep wells. He worked in mineralogy of hydrothermal alteration, geochemical modelling of water-rock interaction in crystalline rocks and 3D modelling of fracture systems.

Daniel Rodik (HR)

Daniel Rodik: Nine years actively working in the sustainable development and energy field as project coordinator for various Croatian environmental civil society organizations (Green Action, Green Network of Activist Groups, Society for Sustainable Development Design). Deals with promotion of renewable energy sources and energy efficiency, and non-formal education within permaculture courses or workshops. He has acquired experience as energy advisor for households in the UNDP project “Energy management in Croatia.” His fields of interest include public participation in sustainable development, local energy planning and decentralized development, direct action, and permaculture.

Marko Strpić (HR)

Marko Strpić is an editor in the publishing firm Što čitaš? [What do you read?], which publishes anarchist and similar books.

Dražen Šimleša (HR)

Dražen Šimleša was born in Bjelovar in 1976. He took his first, second and doctoral degrees in the Sociology Department at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Zagreb. He is now employed as senior assistant at the Ivo Pilar Institute of Social Sciences in Zagreb, his area of expertise being globalisation and sustainable development. He has published five books and several scientific papers. He teaches globalisation at the Centre for Peace Studies and courses on global society and sustainable development at the Centre for Croatian Studies, University of Zagreb. He is active on the civil society scene and currently volunteers as the secretary of the Green Network of Activist Groups (ZMAG). He is also the vice-president of the Federation of the Eco-Village Associations Network in the Balkans.

Barry Schwartz (US)

It is commonly acknowledged that the career of artist Barry Schwartz began at age five, when he successfully completed his first circuit utilizing the union between a wall socket and kitchen utensils. Based in Phoenix, Arizona and San Francisco, California, Schwartz has toured and performed with his large scale electromechanical structures in sixteen countries since 1986. Some of his selected exhibitions have included: Circuits Du Solénoïde − Mois Multi 'II, Quebec; Electric Eclectics Festival ’08, Ontario; Elektrosonic Interference, Brisbane; Arte-Suporte-Computador, Sao Paulo;Shock Tactics − The Works Festival ‘97, in Alberta; European Cultural City, Copenhagen and Ars Electronica Festival, Linz. He has completed six international artist residencies and has lectured in various countries, including recent lectures at the Chicago Art Institute and the Rotterdam Academy of Art. Schwartz was the recipient of a Rockefeller Grant and Pollack-Krasner merit grant for 1998.

mrpank1@mac.com

Dmitry Gelfand (RU/NL) & Evelina Domnitch (MBY/NL)

Dmitry Gelfand (St. Petersburg, Russia, 1974) and Evelina Domnitch (Minsk, Belarus, 1972) create sensory immersion environments that merge physics, chemistry and computer science with uncanny philosophical practices. Current findings, particularly regarding wave phenomena, are employed by the artists to investigate questions of perception and perpetuity. Such investigations are salient because the scientific picture of the world, which serves as the basis for contemporary thought, still cannot encompass the unrecordable workings of consciousness.

Having dismissed the use of recording and fixative media, Domnitch and Gelfand’s installations exist as ever-transforming phenomena offered for observation. Because these rarely seen phenomena take place directly in front of the observer without being intermediated, they often serve to vastly extend one’s sensory envelope.

The immediacy of this experience allows the observer to transcend the illusory distinction between scientific discovery and perceptual expansion.In order to engage such ephemeral processes, the artists have collaborated with numerous scientific research facilities, including the Drittes Physikalisches Institut (Göttingen University, Germany), the Institute of Advanced Sciences and Technologies (Japan), and the European Space Agency. They are the recipients of the Japan Media Arts Excellence Prize (2007), and four Ars Electronica Honorary Mentions (2013, 2011, 2009 and 2007).

entanglemennt@synergeticalab.com
portablepalace.com + synergeticalab.com

Andy Gracie (UK)

Born 1967. Works across various disciplines including installation, robotics, sound, video and biological practice. In his work he creates situations of exchange between natural and artificial systems which allow new emergent behaviours to develop. His recent work reflects cultural associations with astrobiology. The work uses scientific theory and practice to question our relationships with environment and the notion of the 'other'. His work has been shown across Europe, the USA, Japan, Mexico and Australia. He has exhibited at ISEA, Artbots, Radar, Ars Electronica and at the Capital of Culture robotic exhibitions as part of Lille 2004, and presented at numerous conferences and published a number of articles. His large scale installation Autoinducer_ph-1 received honorable mentions from VIDA (2007) and Ars Electronica (2007). His work also includes teaching, lecturing and workshop activities. He was a member of the DRU research group at the University of Huddersfield, and is one of founders of the Hackteria project set up in 2009, an online resource and workshop program for the DIY bio-artist and enthusiast. Recently he organized the Laboratory Life project in collaboration with Lighthouse, Brighton and The Arts Catalyst.

mischer'traxler / Katharina Mischer & Thomas Traxler (AT)

Katharina Mischer (1982) and Thomas Traxler (1981) form Studio mischer’traxler.
Based in Vienna, they develop and design products, furniture, installations and more, with a focus on experiments and conceptual thinking. Balancing between hand craft and technology, they envision whole systems and new production methods rather than single products. After graduating from the IM-masters Department of Conceptual Design in Context at the Design Academy Eindhoven, Katharina and Thomas founded studio mischer‘traxler in 2009. Their work was honoured with the Austrian Experimental Design Award 2009, the DMY Award 2009, received an honorary mention at the Prix Ars Electronica 2009 and was shortlisted for the Brit Insurance Designs of the Year Award in 2010. Exhibitions on contemporary design have displayed their work in several museums including the Art Institute Chicago, Design Museum London, MAK Vienna, the Designhuis Eindhoven and at international festivals.

Mónica Bello Bugallo (ES)

Mónica Bello Bugallo is a curator with a special interest in the area of art and science. She is currently artistic director of VIDA, the art and artificial life international awards founded in 1999 by Fundacion Telefonica, Madrid, Spain, having been a board member since 2006. She has curated several exhibitions, seminars and workshops on art, science and technology in society. In 2005 she co-founded Capsula, a platform for research into, and production of, cultural events involving art, science and nature. From 2005 to 2007 she curated Res-qualia, a web project promoting research in art-science and evolution of consciousness. From 2007 to 2008 she collaborated with the Digital Research Unit (DRU) of Huddersfield University to curate the Biorama event, organizing fieldwork explorations and debate platforms on digital culture and natural phenomena. Between 2008 and 2010, she held the position of head of educational programs of LABoral Centro de Arte y Creacion Industrial in Gijon, Spain, in which she lead experimental programs in digital media and education, research on new formats which facilitate artistic production, as well as promoted the collaboration between art and academia with the initiation of the postgraduate studies Innovation in Culture: Art, Digital Media and Popular Culture with the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC). She participates in different advisory boards and she has published articles on art, science, technology and new education modes on arts. In the academic area, she has lectured in Art and Technology seminars and has given talks on the merging of art and life sciences nationally and internationally.