#digitalresidency

Bit Explorers Research Team

Dr Wojciech Kukuczka has finished the Photographic Technical School, MA studies in Photography and Multimedia at the Academy of Art and Design in Wrocław and is currently studying at the AKI Academy of Art and Design in the Netherlands. He has earned his doctorate in Fine Arts at the Faculty of Arts of the University of Silesia. Participant in over 70 exhibitions, including over 30 individual ones, founder of the Negatyw Gallery, president of the Wielki Człowiek foundation, curator of 30 art exhibitions. Artistic scholarships: the Silesian Province, the city of Wrocław, the Academy of Art and Design in Wrocław, the University of Silesia; four times winner of the award for Young Creators of Culture of the city of Katowice. His main areas of activity are photography, multimedia and film.

Marek Straszak (born 1985) is a visual artist, graduate of the Academy of Art and Design in Wrocław (Multimedia) and UdK in Berlin (Art and Media). Lecturer in Animation at Collegium Da Vinci in Poznań. Founder of the Animateria and RenderBoys visual studios. As part of his commercial activities, he has done various audiovisual projects, including for Alter Art, Nike, Pernod Ricard. He also makes analogue-digital art installations, which he has presented at exhibitions such as ART+BITS, WRO Media Art Biennale or Ars Electronica.

Jacek Czarkowski is multimedia artist, creator of film intros and set designs for films (including Naznaczony, Włatcy Móch), maker of animations and visual effects in films. He has created animations for the largest companies in the IT industry, including IBM, Cisco, Netgear, Avast. He combines various techniques of image and sound processing, from analogue photography, through 3D effects composition, elements of virtual stage design to interactive scripts (Processing/Unity). As a member of the Altair group, he actively participates in the Polish demoscene. Developer of the game Rat Racer (2020) on nVidia physX engine.

Statement

„We are a team of artists and friends who met at the Academy of Art and Design in Wrocław. We currently live in various places in Poland, but we still cooperate in the field of art, artistic education and popularisation of culture. We have established the Bit Explorers Research Team out of a desire to implement projects at the intersection of art and science. We want to create technologically advanced installations on the basis of our experience in areas such as generative art, mixed media, digital art, experimental interface. By basing our artistic statement on new media, we want to sensitise the audience to the problems of the contemporary world. We aim at sending a pro-social message through a form that would stir the imagination. We are united by common ideas about art and the desire to look for new means of artistic expression, rooted in the socio-economic processes occurring around us.“

Project

The aim of the project is to create an artistic installation in the field of generative art. The installation will take the form of a machine whose job will be to change the profile of the global economy by replacing fossil fuels with green energy. The machine will be tasked with obtaining funds from the audience and then reinvest them in financial instruments from the energy sector. It will operate according to an algorithm designed to transfer capital from fossil fuels to green energy sources. During this process, using a programmed algorithm paired with a brokerage application, the machine will perform operations on financial instruments such as company stock and commodity contracts. The programmed algorithm will be able to fundraise, invest, be successful or go bankrupt. An important part of the installation will be the transformation of complex economic processes into a language that will be comprehensible to an audience without economic competences.

The machine will present the effects of its activities by mapping stock data (charts, current balance, total transferred capital), but also by visualising socio-ecological processes supported by complex stock exchange operations (tree planting, water treatment, improvement of air quality). Through numerous data mapping mechanisms and visualisation of the effects of financial transactions, the audience will be able to observe capital flows and their effects on the environment.

Portfolio:

Bit Explorers Research Team: link.

Marek Straszak: Animateria, RenderBoys.
Jacek Czarkowski: uszymyszy, faderfox.
dr Wojciech Kukuczka: Bramy, Fotografia ciągła, Balladyna, Savasana, Lustra.