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ART/SCIENCE FORUM
The Academy of Media Arts Cologne
Heide Hagebolling
scientific and
industrial developments.
Artistic contributions to modern
media point far beyond functional
questions-they have to be seen as
cultural questions in the widest sense.
To an increasing extent, the newer
media form our perception of the
world. New techniques lead to improved quality of sound and picture,
of which the development of highdefinition television (HDTV) is one
example. And in this respect the role
of visual communication is still growing. Education, professional communication and training, advertising,
and information in public places are
only a few instances where pictorial
presentation is becoming a primary
communication mode.
The invention of new technologies
such as laser and digital disks, holography, computer graphics and animation, new telecommunication
tools, the extension of powerful networks based on glass fibre and satellite communications-all this considerably alters our modes and codes of
? 1990 ISAST
Pergamon Press pic. Printedin Great Britain.
0024-094X/90 $3.00+0.00
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OF STUDY
320
in organizing joint
* informatics
INTERDISCIPLINARY
FIELDS OF STUDY
Special consideration will be given to
interdisciplinary realizations and artistic development and research projects. In this respect the academy focuses its attention on the following
areas of creative work:
* The electronic museum: experimental projects in the use of interactive media for art networks and
information networks for
museums (telecommunications,
video disk, glass fibre networks)
* Fundamental principles in the design of new television systems:
HDTV
* Media art in public places: for example, development of a multimedia subway station
* Use of public communication systems for artistic purposes (telephone, telefax, videotex systems,
teleconferencing, etc.)
* Development of multimedia stage
sets for television, theater, opera,
etc. (video, holography, lasers)
* Research and development of programmes for hypermedia applications and interactive media
* Research and computer-assisted
procedures for script-based film
animations
* New procedures in electronic
painting and sculpture (scanner,
plotter, process control)
STUDENTS, FELLOWS,
FACULTY
The academy requires a flexible personnel policy. In addition to seven
permanent posts, a wide range of temporary positions will be filled with personalities from the film and media
world. In addition, the academy is interested in inviting outstanding artists
and media experts from abroad as visiting professors and fellows in the
fields of media art, media design, television/film and science. During the
first year, 30 students will attend the
academy; with the beginning of the
second academic year, 60 students
will attend. The course of this postgraduate study will take 2 years, including the final project, which will
lead to an academic diploma.
Applicants of outstanding talent
who lack formal qualifications can be
accepted as students at the academy.
Art/Science Forum
COOPERATION WITH
UNIVERSITIES AND
INSTITUTIONS
Cooperation with other institutions is
particularly important in the area of
project work; for example, in developing new forms of programmes or in
designing entertainment programmes for television, the academy
has to work together with broadcast
companies. In this respect, Cologne is
a favourable location. Advantage will
also be taken of laboratories and
studios, as well as relevant course
offerings, at other universities-for example, the University of Cologne and
the Academy of Music, both in close
neighbourhoods.
Cologne's new Media Park is offering further opportunities for cooperation, particularly with the companies
that will settle there.
In addition to several contacts with
German universities and cultural insti-
Symmetryof Structure:
An InterdisciplinarySymposium, 13-19 August 1989
Arthur L. Loeb
During the notable summer of 1989
in Eastern Europe, an international,
interdisciplinary group of artists,
scientists and other scholars convened in Budapest, united by a common interest in symmetry. About 150
papers were scheduled, of which
some were not given and others were
substituted. The meeting was sponsored by the International Union of
Crystallography, UNESCO, the International Computer Club of Moscow
and other organizations on both sides
of the crumbling Iron Curtain, and organized by the Hungarian Academy
of Sciences.
The illustrious L. Fejes Toth put
Hungary on the map decades ago as a
center of interest in symmetry. Artist
Gyorgy Kepes's momentous Vision
and Value series for Braziller forged
bonds in the 1960s between art and
science. Victor Vasarely's art is
Arthur L. Loeb (design scientist, musician, vistial artist),
Department of Visual and Ensironmental Sttudies,
Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, U.S.A.
Received II11
January 1990.
Art/Science
Forum
321