SCHMIEDE Artist Residency

Two weeks ago I attended an artist residency in Hallein Austria (near Salzburg). Earlier this year I've met people who have been going there for many years, and the whole thing has been happening for the 14th year in a row now! It is a huge come-together of more than a hundred artists from various media art disciplines, ranging from dance and performance to music, animation, game design, robotics and eletronic textiles. Everything takes place in a beautiful and enormous former salt factory. Even though it can be tough to focus on work with so many people around, I admire the organisers of Schmiede for keeping OPENNESS as a central aspect of the whole festival: it enables collaborations and individual projects, welcomes old folk and newby-participants, and offers a loose structure and a lot of freedom.

Unfortunately I couldn't be there for the entire period of 10 days, but as Hallein is only 2.5h away by train from Munich, I've been commuting to take part on several days, and became a real pro in bayernticket-on-the-cheap and knowing-salburg-main-station-in-and-out. I took part in two workshops: toy hacking, where I took apart my daughter's lady bug and merged it with Steffi's creepy puppy, and soldering (which wasn't that new to me, but I always hope there might be something I don't know yet...).


After that I returned to my studio and continued working on a project, which is going to be featured in a Hands-on Wearble book I'm currently writing for Franzis publishing house. I took it as an opportunity to exhibit this project at Schmiede work show on its last day. It is an electronic noise instrument, which consists of a soft potentiometer in vinyl design, and two rhythm-changing pressure sensors.
 
 
 
 

I also exhibited the manuscript as work in progress, showing the DIY tutorial from the future book. And on the left from the DJ-shirt you can see a display of tools and materials which were utilised for making this project.
 
 
 
 

My neighbours at the work show were the lovely Data Paulette people from Paris - e-textile knitting and crocheting addicts :) I was delighted to meet them again! <3
 
Audrey & Cedric
 
Incredible Alice - the queen of chrochet and web-developing!
 
Even though I was only present for a couple of days, I met so many amazing practitioners of various backgrounds and enjoyed the vibes of Schmiede. I was very impressed by the overall work show. There were 75 projects and some of them were outstanding. Thanks for letting me be part of this big energetic family!
 
 
 
 
 
More in my flickr album.