A
group of creative programmers gathered for a 48 hour hackathon. The idea was to
take data and turn into something "magical". The event’s
organisers are called 3 Beards, though it turns
out there are four of them and only three have significant bristles.
Hacking comes in three varieties. One is an invasion of
privacy practised mainly by middle-aged men on celebrities and the vulnerable;
the other is carried out mainly by teenage boys on the military-industrial
complex. Both are well-documented and often result in a court appearance. But
there’s a third kind, a good kind, so far unfeatured on Newsnight and
mainly practised mainly by young men with enthusiastic smiles and creative
facial hair who know their Python from their Ruby on Rails (they’re programming
languages, dummy). The good kind is about taking something apart – a computer,
a line of code, a set of data – and rebuilding it, hopefully making it better,
giving it a new function, or just doing something surprising and disruptive.
A hackathon is about much more than that. As Michael Hobson explains: “The
participants get an experience which is hard to find elsewhere. It’s only in
this high-pressure, time-sensitive environment that you can really come
face-to-face with yourself, and see what you’re capable of.
The 3 Beards thought London hackathons concentrate on
creating startups. “They are mainly focused on creating a business idea, then
pitching it on the final evening, along with all the relevant trimmings –
revenue plan, target market, etc,” says 3 Beards’s Michael Hobson. “We thought
that by making the output purely artistic, it would foster more creativity and
allow people to really run wild with their ideas.”
Hence, this hack has a theme: art meets tech.
The aim of the weekend is to encourage the hackers to take some of the masses
of data living on the internet, or even create some of their own, and present
it in new, unusual ways, to make something from it – a piece of music, an
artwork, a machine, a game – something that brings the data to life. Not
everyone here has a computing background: a smattering of artists, designers,
musicians have signed up to collaborate.
Fifty artists-hackers and hacker-artists got together over a weekend in a big
space to create an art exhibition from scratch and demonstrate the expressive
potential of new technology and the power of radical collaboration in art. The
digital works of art created include, but are not limited to interactive
installations, visualizations, web services, small physical objects and more.
Art Hackathons, or Art Hacks, are where teams take data and turn it
into something creative or artistic, often over an intense 48 hour
period. Samuel Fry lists some examples of great art hackathons that have
taken place over the last couple of years. Art
Hackathons are now popular throughout the world: from New York to San Francisco
(SF) and from London to Berlin.
Examples of Previous Art Hackathons:
There are a number of organisations that have run
Art Hackathons of different kinds. Here are a few that have been run in the
past as examples:
Hack the Barbican:
Throughout August 2013 Hack the Barbican took over
the Barbican’s cavernous foyer spaces and filled them with 100
discipline-bending installations, performances, workshops and discussions.
Art Hack Day:
Art Hack Day is an event dedicated to cracking open
the process of art-making, with special reverence toward open-source
technologies. Over 48 hour periods, artists and collaborators inhabit a space
to create and explore the participatory nature of technology. This brings
together hackers whose medium is art and artists whose medium is technology.
The Digital Sizzle:
Over one weekend a mixture of 100 people are
brought together. These are artists, developers, musicians and creatives,
guided by a variety of mentors, to just simply “create”. They have 2 floors –
the whole conference floor and also some rooms at South Place Hotel, all
dedicated to the Art Hack for the entire weekend.
3D Hackathon:
Also known as the Metropolitan Museum of Art
Hackathon. Twenty-five digital artists and programmers descended upon the
Metropolitan Museum’s Art Studio for the Museum’s first 3D scanning and
printing Hackathon. The invited guests, along with staff from MakerBot
Industries, spent two days photographing Museum objects and converting the
images into 3D models with the help of special software.
Culture Hack:
Culture Hack has grown into a digital development
programme – no longer simply about one-off hacks, each Culture Hack programme
now lasts for between 6 to 12 months.
Art Bytes:
Also known as the Walters Art Museum Hackathon.
This is a hackathon where technology and creative communities work
together to build programs and applications inspired by art or to add to the
museum experience. Attendees also visit the museum’s galleries for inspiration
throughout the weekend.
Etsy Hackathon:
Musicians, designers, programmers and makers of all
kinds spent the day at Etsy making music,
ending with a concert of what they created. The event really began the
night before, with a series of talks by different technical music makers,
including presentation on software generated Christmas music, software as music and violinists.
Hackathon Tips:
There are other digital making programmes that
develop the participants knowledge of technology. Here are a few programmes
that could give tips to those looking to take part in an Art Hack:
Make Things Do Stuff :
This is a digital making campaign. It lists a
number of simple online tutorials that can help people get started in digital
making, but who are not sure what you want to make.
Code Club:
Code Club is a UK-wide network of free after-school
coding clubs for ages 9-11. You can learn to code and programme with lots of
fun projects, showing you how to make computer games, animations and websites.
Technology Will Save Us
& Little Bits Global Make-a-thon:
During the London Design Festival, Technology Will
Save Us -London’s first haberdashery for technology and education, hosted a
Global Makeathon – to help designers get away from the screen and get their
hands dirty!
I think just hacking itself is very dangerous and may put one behind bars but to be able to hack into anything, that is smart. I am actually against hacking if it is for the sake of fun, to disrupt and to steal. I think it is ethically not right. Upon further research on art hackathon, I really like the idea of how art meets technology. Like for instance, the 3d printer. I think Art Hackathon is a very beneficial especially to artists because as time pass, art movement will change too over time. And to keep up, I think new media is the best way to keep the art scene alive. I just like how creativity is being combined and manipulated by technology. It may be challenging but the end result would be very pleasing. I believe art hackathon would inspire artist for a change of idea, perhaps something we have never encountered before.
Sources :
- http://www.rawstory.com/2012/09/hackathon-where-art-and-technology-run-wild/
- http://www.create-hub.com/comment/art-meets-tech-hackathon/
- http://jimmytidey.co.uk/blog/what-happened-at-arthack/
- http://arthackathon.co.uk/
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