Lilli Wessling Hart

At Expo '74, you will have a variety of events -- presentations, workshops, panels, social -- available to you. We hope you can attend all to get the most out of our short time together. 

Below you will find the list with the times. Please keep in mind, these details are subject to change. Also, you will see that workshops go on simultaneously. You can choose one (or a set when there's more than one) to attend each day. (The conference is sold out.)

See the color program. You will receive a copy at check-in.

10-10:30am David Zicarelli keynote, welcome

10:30-11:45am Cycling '74 Max 6 presentation with Joshua Kit Clatyon

Nick Rothwell (Programming with Clojure in Max)

Alex Harker (Convolution and Impulse Response Workshop using HISSTools)

9-10am Cycling '74 Gen (new code generation add-on to Max) presentation with Gregory Taylor, Darwin Grosse, and Joshua Kit Clayton

10-11:15am Education Panel with Luke DuBois

11:30am-12:15pm Brian Crabtree and Kelli Cain (monome), presentation

2:45-3:15pm Break, prepare for workshops and science fair setup

3:15-5:45pm One set of workshops and two individual workshops:


Dan Nigrin (Making A Slick Max Standalone) - 75 minutes
Nathan Bowen (Mobile Phones and Max) - 75 minutes

Scott Fitzgerald (Ins and Outs with Max and Arduino)

Cycling '74 (Max for Live) with Darwin Grosse, Matthew Davidson, and Dennis DeSantis (Ableton)

5:30-7:30pm Reception with food and drinks (open to all expo attendees)

5:45-6:15pm Science Fair setup (and a break for those not exhibiting)

6:15-8pm Science Fair (open to all expo attendees)

9-11:30am One set of workshops and two individual workshops:


Thomas Resch (Introduction to note~) - 45 minutes
Andrea Agostini (Bach: Automated Composer’s Helper) - 45 minutes
Michael Sperone (Techniques for Extending Acoustic Instruments) - 45 minutes

Jean-François Charles (Live Spectral Processing in Max)

Ben Houge (Videogame Music Prototyping in Max)

11:45am-12:45pm Group event with Geoff Morris of Cycling '74

1:45-2:30pm Philippe Manoury, an interview with David Zicarelli

7:30pm Todd Reynolds/Luke DuBois performance at Issue Project Room's 110 Livingston space (free ticket included with your expo registration)


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Expo '74 2011 Event Schedule

alp tugan

Technically speaking, there were two types of sensors to gather user interaction data. Force Resistive Sensors were placed on the front panel and piezzo sensors were placed on the sides of the car's body. Received user interaction was mapped onto a code via customized Arduino Board. Arduino code was commuicating with a sound patch that was built in MaxMSP/Jitter, and finally delivered into Ableton Live as Midi Data. In sum when a person taps onto a sensor that hides under the car's surface, that interaction was turning into a percussion sound. There were tons of cables, sawing, soldering, coding and etc...Check our video and website for more information.

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VW - Amarok Pikap : Interactive Percussion Playing Pickup

David Zicarelli

Here is the way I think about it. Cycling '74 is a software company. Developing software is our substantive contribution to mankind. We are not professional conference-givers. We are not O'Reilly. I was not born to give a smashing keynote address.

However, about a year ago, I decided that we should try to host a conference. I can't even remember why now, other than it seemed like it might be an educational experience -- if not necessarily for the attendees, at least for the company. We could do it as a kind of experiment, to see if we had any aptitude for conference-giving. Also, I had a clever name, and no one really advised us against doing it. (I have clever names for restaurants but *everyone* advises me never to open one.)


Last week, we put on our first conference. Now that Expo '74 is history, I've been asked to share my thoughts about the experience.

Anything you do for the first time will be accompanied by feelings of anxiety. At first I thought no one would want to come. After all, other conferences have already happened at least once, and as a company, we had no experience putting anything more than a few parties. They were pretty great parties, but a three-day conference was another level of planning and furthermore, we had no "last year's conference changed my life!" quotes we could use to promote the event. Sign-ups started out pretty slow, but as the deadline for discounted attendance approached, we had more people than we had ever imagined. At this point, my anxiety level actually increased since we had almost a hundred attendees. Would they be satisfied with anything less than a life-changing experience? My co-workers were anxious because they didn't really know what kind of people were signing up. Would anyone have a good time? As it turns out, the people who signed up were a fantastic group. They were both interesting and interested in each other.

As I announced at the beginning of the Expo, one of the benefits of having an event devoted to Max is that for three days out of the year, we needn't be embarrassed about talking about Max. We could safely explain how our patches work rather than worry about a crowd ultimately more interested in evaluating the musical or artistic quality of the results. On the second day, I witnessed a perfect example of this when, introducing one of her beautiful architectural projects, Dana Karwas told the audience, "Now here's something we did using jit.gl.multiple."

Yes, we had a few moments of artistic expression, but they felt spontaneous and were always accompanied by a display of a patcher on the screen. During Pamela Z's performance, we could see the changing names of her presets that provided a kind of internal commentary on the evolution of the song. I suspect that the presenters most attendees least expected to be shredding on guitar were Miller Puckette and Brad Garton, yet there they were (of course, it was not as simple as a "guitar" in either case). Miller even took requests from the audience to demonstrate presets in his amazing Pd guitar patch.

Obviously there are thousands of people we could have chosen to present their work, but we tried to come up with a selection of people that would simultaneously inspire the attendees and prevent them from drawing any conclusions about there being a "right" way to use the software. But there was one thread that emerged over the course of the three days: we all basically keep rewriting the same patch. This was eloquently confessed by Robert Henke, who provided a touching history of his quest for the ultimate step sequencer.

In addition to the presentations, Expo '74 was intended to create opportunities for social interaction. The opening night, we hosted a party at our little office.

Chief organizer of the conference Lilli Hart offered to cater the party with her husband Bryan, who is a professional chef, and they put together a modular collection of three soups and accompaniments. Naturally, we decided on soup long before it became clear that the party would be held on one of the hottest days of the year. I also spent the day before the conference preparing dough for 200+ chocolate chip cookies, which Bryan kindly ended up baking in our office kitchen.

We divided attendees into eight groups, each named after a different Max object. On the first day, I roped my San Francisco based co-workers into leading group field trips to various locations in the city, including the California Academy of Sciences, Balmy Alley, the Musée Mecanique, Treasure Island, and the Jejune Institute. Attendees collected data at each location and, on the final afternoon, worked as groups to create responses. The only two rules we gave them were that they had 75 minutes to work and that they couldn't use any pre-existing patches. All of the resulting projects were charming and imaginative. There was a laptop "garden" featuring elements of Yerba Buena and the pinball machines at the Metreon, and a continuous procession by the group that visited the Cable Car Museum using a 200-foot-long rope traveling around the outside of the conference space.

The creativity on display at the science fair on Thursday night really blew me away. Attendees brought over 30 different projects to share, of all different sizes. I found the science fair could be enjoyed on two levels. Most obviously, there was the fun of learning about the projects from passionate creators working with a wide variety of materials, including rocks, cameras, Monomes, aluminum foil, Markov chains, and boiling water. But I was also affected by seeing all of this activity in a single space, and from my conversations with others attending the event, I wasn't the only one.

Those are a few thoughts about our first attempt at presenting a conference. Based on comments from my co-workers, it seems that we feel it would be worthwhile to try to do this again someday. So, if you were not able to attend the first Expo '74, you may soon get another opportunity.

Last week, we put on our first conference. Now that Expo '74 is history, I've been asked to share my thoughts about the experience...

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A Look Back at Expo '74

On Thursday, February 23rd, Cycling '74 will host a casual evening with Max and RNBO projects in Brooklyn, NY.

The Integrated Design & Media program (IDM), located within Tandon School of Engineering in the Department of Technology, Culture, and Society (TCS).

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On February 23, 2023, Cycling '74 will host an event in Brooklyn, NY.

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An Evening with Max and RNBO in Brooklyn

UPDATE: We have decided to postpone this Max Connect event. 
==

On Friday evening, April 3rd, Cycling '74 will be hosting an evening of casual presentations and performances, and conversation. Join us!

date: April 3, 2020 TO BE DETERMINED
time: 7pm - 10pm 
location: Venue 101 @ Revolution Hall (1300 SE Stark St, Portland, OR) 
cost: free 
RSVP: events@cycling74.com  
format: each guest will perform and/or present for about 30 minutes

Joshua Kit Clayton is a musician and the Director of Engineering for Cycling '74. He will perform and lead a Q&A session.

David Zicarelli is a musician and the founder/CEO of Cycling '74. He will present work using MC in Max 8.

Special guest: Jesse Mejía is a composer, and an educator at Portland Community College Cascade Music and Sonic Arts Creative Coding program. He will discuss MIDI control over DMX lights. (Jesse's website)

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On the evening of April 3rd, Cycling '74 will be hosting an evening of casual presentations and performances.

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Max Connect Event in Portland - postponed

Gregory Taylor

Some of the events we attend are annual gatherings of scholar/practitioners who gather to discuss and encounter the work of their peers. They’re often convivial and intense gatherings of concerts interspersed with papers (or vice versa). We love ‘em, look forward to ‘em, and know that there is almost no better way to combine keeping up to date with increasing the chance for the serendipitous meeting.

Then, there are those interesting word-of-mouth events. You know the type: You might have seen the mention of it at the edge of the little circle of light you work in, and then – after it’s over – you start hearing from friends or acquaintances that you missed something amazing, and that thing is suddenly no longer at the edge of your little circle of light. “Next time, I’ll be there, if I can….” you promise yourself.

While I love those annual scholarly gatherings, I’ve got a real place in my heart for the buzz that accompanies the word-of-mouth gathering, and I’ve been lucky enough to attend and participate in a few that have really changed my life (the legendary and much-missed Spark Festival, the Ableton Loop event and Sonic Acts) and a couple of those that I have yet to experience (Electric Spring in Huddersfield).

I’ve just checked one of those kinds of events off my list – MOXsonic.

This was the second Missouri Experimental Sonic Arts Festival held. The first one showed up on my radar when my friend and colleague Andrew Pask returned from the first one raving about what a great experience it was. After I’d heard from a couple of the other attendees, I marked it on the calendar.

It was everything it was described as being – a couple of days enlivened by an astounding variety of performances that were spectacularly curated and ordered/presented in such a way that I ended the first concert vowing not to look at the online program notes (yes - no trees destroyed in the name of the festival!) until after the performance so as not to spoil the surprise of what was coming next.

Instead of the more usual collection of photos of people standing around and talking, this on the road is going to stick close to the action – a kind of whirlwind tour of the festival from the third row seats - right after I post these two pictures of the post-nightlife show MOXsonic crowd enjoying some libation and conversation at Old Barney's. Now that I've established the usual cheery festival vibe, let's move on to the concerts and MOXsonic events!

Why was MOXsonic such a pleasurable experience? I guess that a good festival is a complex cocktail of imagination, ingredients, and execution, presented in proportion. Beyond the size and scale and the tremendous level of expertise and support on the part of the UCM Music Tech students handling the sound and stage wrangling, the amazing concert hall facility that helped everyone sound great, and the fantastic Front of House support for the nightlife shows, MOXsonic had something else special going for it: curation.

Careful curation by the triumvirate of Eric Honour, Elizabeth Stimpert, and Jeff Kaiser - based on a call for submissions that stayed strongly focused on the motto “Surprise me,” – assembled a program between their three very different styles and outlooks that not only eschewed a single style or practice, but also wound up providing a widely varied program for each and every concert.

The layout of every stage in each of the three daytime concerts set you up for what was to come – a bewildering collection of devices/laptops/instruments spread across the stage, with the usual pianos and horns alongside megaphones, tabletop scaffolding, and the like. The mystery for every concert was “Who’s next, where are they on stage, and what does that do?”

And what was on stage? I'll share a few photos with you and merely invite you to imagine what you'd be hearing, all under one roof (If you were performing and I missed you, I hope you can forgive me. I owe you a pint)....

The concerts were spaced so as to allow ample time for a walk into town for a bite, a little hang time, and just enough time to recover your sense of anticipation for the next round. As much as I understand the reason for maximizing the number of concerts at a conference, MOXsonic really hit the sweet spot for me.

The festival’s guests this year were Shiau-uen Ding and Miller Puckette, which meant that attendees had a chance to hear a live performance of Philippe Manoury’s Pluton - the very first piece realized using Max– a really rare opportunity. Miller wasn’t able to attend at the last minute, but Barry Moon stepped into the breach to deputize for Miller minding Miller’s Pd port of the piece for the performance. It was a fantastic performance of one of those pieces that simultaneously enervates and energizes you. It's a listen that requires your full attention over a span of time, but whose energy cannot help but lift you up. f you ever have a chance to go hear this beast live, just go.

I can hear you saying (or thinking). "Well, what kind of festival would it be without papers or workshops or installations? Surely they included some of that, too...."

As it happens, they did, but - again - judiciously curated and scaled so as to avoid Chronic Conference Paper Fatigue. We were treated to two pairs of papers - a pair of talks interrogating personal artistic practice from Lars Bröndum and seah Heikes...

....followed by a pair of papers on software and hardware design from MDSP's daddy Hugh Lobel and Shawn Trail (a delicious piece of Raspberry Pi).

MOXsonic also included two workshop-like events, one of which was the reason I was in attendance. Following on the heels of the publication of Step By Step, I had the chance to present the book’s history as a narrative, and to provide a walkthrough of its contents and their ability to be recombined. I was happy that this meant I could attend the festival, and happier still at the amount of interest in the book.

Since I was otherwise engaged, I was unable to attend Stephanie Zalatel's dance Master Class. I heard it was amazing.

Sooner or later, the sun goes down and dinner's over and you wonder what to do next. As with other festivals, there was a nightlife component to every evening. Unlike other conferences, there wasn’t quite the distance in terms of style or personnel – the biggest difference was a combination of ensemble size and set length. I really liked the sense that the performances for the whole festival seemed more coherent and presented with less regard to time of day.

Of course, I was stoked to see the Choir Boys reunion (Jeff Kaiser and Andrew Pask). In addition to it being a rare opportunity, I was really curious to see Jeff’s Max patches that repurposed the Ableton Push 2 in action. Their take-no-prisoners gig was also full of surprises – from the odd dive into a refracted brass chorale and a finish that included (no, I am not kidding) a Cure sample.

Miller Puckette (along with his Higgs Whatever band partner Kerry Hagan) also made a telematic appearance during the final evening’s nightlife performance. Dressed in his finest Johnny Cash apparel and accompanied by Kerry and her facial recognition tiger mask, they brought the house down with their recombinant cakewalk through every version of “Ring of Fire” ever recorded, complete with cellphone tales of expired goldfish. To (mis)quote Shakespeare, “Oh brave new world, that has such pieces in ‘t!”

The nightlife curation closely mirrored the daily concerts - well chosen and paced, and well-varied. I even got a chance to sit in and provide the fog machine effects for signalsundertests - my friend Ricky Graham's magnificent expanded guitar project. It was a great way to end the festival for me.....

There are a few images missing here - I was so busy listening to and interacting with Ritwik Banerji's beautiful interactive installation Astromusicology and seah Heikes' installation work that I completely forgot to take any pictures of them! Ditto for the early morning coffee tasting hosted by the wonderful folks at the Kansas City Electronic Music Alliance that Andrew Pask mentioned last year - it was first thing in the morning....

So here's the bottom line: consider this another bit of buzz for a plucky little right-sized festival. Mark it on your calendar. If your work is accepted, go, and prepared to be surprised and delighted and challenged.

Oh yeah - you're also about an hour's drive from some of the finest barbeque in the world in Kansas City (and, if you're vegan, the Cafe Gratitude, which will knock your socks off). Win-win!

I'd like to thank Jeff Kaiser and Michael Bersin for providing some of these photos (and better ones than I was able to take from row three).

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In addition to those annual gatherings of scholar/practitioners who get together to discuss and encounter the work of their peers, there are those interesting word-of-mouth events. You know the type: You might have seen the mention of it at the edge of the little circle of light you work in, and then – after it’s over – you start hearing from friends or acquaintances that you missed something amazing, and that thing is suddenly no longer at the edge of your little circle of light.

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On The Road: MOXsonic 2019

Music Hackspace and Cycling '74 team up to deliver a monthly series of 4 workshops to help people learn the fundamentals of music programming with Max, and 4 monthly meetups where participants can share their work and learn from one another. 

The course and meetups are free for all. Cycling '74 offers a free trial of the software (download here), making this accessible to anyone who is curious about programming. There is no obligation to buy the software to participate in a workshop.

David Zicarelli, CEO of Cycling '74, says “We’re excited to partner with Music Hackspace to allow anyone to learn programming and music technology with Max for free. From our experience, it can have a big impact for beginners to learn with real time guidance and be able to ask questions. Music Hackspace has built a great online learning framework that our users will benefit from.”

All events are led by a certified trainer who has years of experience teaching music technologies.

JB Thiebaut, CEO of Music Hackspace, adds “Max is one of the best tools to learn music technology. Being able to access free courses is a fantastic opportunity for thousands to acquire new skills. The new influx of participants will also help our ongoing research to improve online learning. ”

The first of the free course series will start on January 6th and will be replicated each month throughout 2021. Timings are adapted on a bi-monthly basis, so that attendees from all over the globe can find a time that suits them. There will be limited places on each course so sign up is essential.

Getting started with Max Workshops
The monthly workshops will have 4 sessions of 2 hours each. Participants will learn how to get started with interactive audio and MIDI, and discover the possibilities of the Max environment.  They will learn how to manipulate audio, MIDI, virtual instruments, and program their own interactive canvas, and will learn from guided examples and live interactions with teachers and other participants. 

Session 1 – Understand the Max environment

Session 2 – Connect building blocks together and work with data

Session 4 – Work with your MIDI instruments

Max Meetups 
Online Max meetups are an open forum where the community can share ideas and learn from other artists, coders and performers. All are invited to showcase their patches, pair with others to learn together, get help for a school assignment, or discover new things.  

Participants can sign up and propose a presentation topic, which are accepted on a first come, first served basis. Max meetups offer breakout rooms for specific topics such as music, interactive installations or MIDI. More categories will be created at each meetup. See here when the next online meetups are taking place.

Music Hackspace’s mission is to develop the largest online learning platform  for music technologies. It was founded in 2011 by Jean-Baptiste Thiebaut in London, as a collective of artists and engineers. Starting with weekly meetups and seminars, Music Hackspace now curates over 20 live and online workshops every month on music programming, instrument design, and DIY electronics, for a growing number of artists and hobbyists. 

Cycling ’74 creates software for the specialized needs of artists, educators, and researchers working with audio, visual media, and physical computing. Our visual programming tool Max serves as the creative engine behind thousands of innovative projects. Its iPad app Mira allows the user to expand beyond the Max environment for increased flexibility. 

For more information:  www.musichackspace.org/learnmax 

Jean-Baptiste Thiebaut; Founder & CEO @ Music Hackspace

Lilli Wessling Hart; Director of Events @ Cycling '74

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Music Hackspace and Cycling ’74 team up to deliver free monthly Max workshops and meetups. 

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Cycling ’74 partners with Music Hackspace to deliver free online teaching in 2021

There is a new dimension to the Guthman New  Musical Instrument Competition this year: Cycling '74 and Georgia Tech are hosting a fair featuring music, art, and technology projects. Similar to our Expo Science Fair, exhibitors demonstrate and discuss their project with fair visitors as well as other exhibitors. Max is well-suited for the science fair environment and our Expo Science Fairs have been a big success. 

date: Saturday, March 7, 2020
time: 4pm-7pm (exhibitor setup prior to fair opening)
location: Caddell Building at Georgia Tech in Atlanta, Georgia USA
deadline: submit projects by February 3, 2020
fee: There is no cost to exhibit or to attend! 

If you create work at the intersection of music, art, and technology, we invite you to join us. Exhibitors may be artists, students, teachers, hobbyists, tinkerers, entrepreneurs, or enthusiasts from anywhere in the world. 

Learn more about the event and submit your project!

Exhibiting at the science fair was a fun way to collaborate with a friend while experimenting with the discipline of bioacoustics in a low-stakes environment. It gave me a chance to talk about my work with people from a variety of backgrounds and acted as a starter-kit for what has grown into a fully-funded research project. -- Jill Munger, Expo '74 2019 Science Fair Exhibitor

The Science Fair at the Expo 74 was, for me, a unique opportunity to present my work to a broader audience and to receive such valuable feedback. It was nice to interact with people from different backgrounds and to view their perspectives and interaction with my project. For me, it was also a wonderful experience to show my work and get to know some of the artists and developers that I deeply admire. Besides that, it was also nice to chat and explore other presenter's work, which was really interesting and inspiring. -- Andrej Kobal, Expo '74 2019 Science Fair Exhibitor

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Cycling '74 and Georgia Tech are co-hosting a music, art, and technology fair in Atlanta on Saturday, March 7th. 

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Exhibit Your Work at Our Upcoming Science Fair in Atlanta

It was ten years ago this month that we announced our first conference for Max users, which we confusingly named to honor a World’s Fair in Spokane, Washington that took place 35 years earlier. We promised the first Expo ’74 in April 2009 would be “a safe space to show your patch” and we endeavored to make it a reflection of our corporate bias in favor of the unpretentious and quirky. Once attendees arrived at the first Expo, we divided them into groups (naturally based on Max object names) that we proceeded to lead on field trips around San Francisco. That was just the beginning of a three-day patching party that featured a catered science fair and ended with Miller Puckette jamming on electric guitar.

Even in 2009, the world did not need another academic conference about digital media (and ten years later, it really doesn’t need another one). Instead, we took inspiration from events where anyone could feel welcome to show up, talk shop, share tips, and swap stories. From time to time, the Max community has been described as "model train club.” With Expo we consider that a feature not a bug.

Ten years later, Expo ’74 returns for a third iteration that will take place April 26-28, 2019. This time, we’re excited to be partnering with my favorite art museum in the universe, MASS MoCA. We’re hard at work putting together an inspiring program of presentations, workshops, and installations. Naturally, we’ll host another science fair. And a field trip? We can’t say for sure yet, but it’s definitely a possibility.

Despite the fact that it’s not exactly an Uber ride away from a major international airport, MASS MoCA promises to be an amazing venue for this event. One highlight among many for me would have to be recently opened Building 6 with its collection of large-scale immersive works by Laurie Anderson and James Turrell. Next to the Laurie Anderson installations, the museum created a room full of playable instruments constructed by Gunnar Schonbeck. Gunnar was a teacher of mine and his community-based approach to music-making was hugely influential. Perhaps you’ll be influenced to imagine how these instruments might exist in the Max domain. Beyond the curated exhibitions, we’re also excited about the opportunities afforded by the museum's variety of cool public spaces.

We've prepared a guide to help you plan for your Expo experience including hotel options and transportation advice.

We’re not quite ready to unveil everything we’re planning, but I am happy to announce that for this forthcoming Expo we’ve engaged our former colleague Luke DuBois to serve as Artistic Director. With his unrivaled knowledge of work done with Max, Luke seemed to us to be a particularly appropriate choice for this role given that the software is 30 years old this year. Luke is working on putting together a diverse lineup of presenters that will reflect both the historical significance and future directions of Max.

Ultimately, we go to the effort to put on Expo ’74 to connect to the extraordinary work being done by the Max community and engage in an unmediated conversation about where the software should go next. In that spirit, all of your friends at Cycling ’74 are looking forward to seeing you in North Adams next April.

Learn more about Expo '74 and buy your ticket now!

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Cycling ‘74 invites you to join us at Expo ‘74 2019. It will take place April 26-28 at MASS MoCA in North Adams, Massachusetts, USA.

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Announcing Expo '74

Darwin Grosse

I’ve been pretty vocal about this: The Currents New Media Festival, based in Santa Fe, New Mexico, is one of my favorite media festivals in the world. Produced by Parallel Studios (co-directed by Mariannah Amster and Frank Ragano), Currents is a city-wide celebration of technology-meets-art-meets-spectacle. While we’ve done a recap of last year’s festival, we thought we’d look ahead to this year’s festival - and maybe give you a chance to attend!

This year’s Currents features a special partnership with Santa Fe Institute’s InterPlanetary Festival. That gathering is an exploration of humanity’s future with an awareness of today’s problems. The InterPlanetary Festival’s inclusion draws performers like Ozomotli, and DJ/VJ Max Cooper, which dovetails perfectly with the performances and installations that are the hallmark of Currents. All of this occurs throughout the beautiful city of Santa Fe, and is embraced by the vibrant academic and artistic communities of the area. 

Recently, the Currents New Media Festival website has been updated to provide access to the amazing wealth of performance data, going back to its origins. Navigating to their past festivals page gives you an insight on the wide array of artists, technologists and performers that have been involved throughout the organization's history. Overview videos provide a historical reference to the growth of Currents – the kind of history that is often lost for important events.

The festival kicks off on June 8th, and the opening weekend is always filled with excitement and activity. This year, the Ozomotli Concert (presented by the InterPlanetary Festival) kicks things off on June 7th, followed by the Currents Opening Night event on the 8th. The lineup of performers, panelists and installation artists is amazing – but even more amazing is the fact that almost everything is open to the public and free to attend. The only exceptions are opening night (which has a suggested donation), a multimedia performance at SITE Santa Fe (which has an admission fee), and the Weaving and Coding Workshop (which is $75 for two full-day sessions). This is an amazing bargain, and it means that the entire city can get involved in the action. 

Hopefully you can see some of the reasons I’m excited by the Currents New Media Festival – and hope that you’ll think about dropping in. It runs from June 8th through June 24th, and is a great chance to see work and hear talks by people like Marco Buongiorno Nardelli, Kristin Stransky and others. You also might run into some of us there – especially on that opening weekend, when the whole city is hopping. 

If you find yourself traveling through Santa Fe in the month of June, or if you feel like and adventure, consider dropping in on the Currents New Media Festival and embracing one of the jewels of the Southwest. 

Currents 2007 / Salon Mar Graff / Tesuque, New Mexico / 13:56

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Our "On the Road" features are often after-the-fact reports on something amazing. This time out, I'd like to look ahead to the Currents New Media Festival, based in Santa Fe, New Mexico - and maybe give you a chance to attend! It's one of my favorite media festivals in the world, and well worth your time.

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