(collective) Monika Fleischmann | Wolfgang Strauss

Profile Picture
Birthyear
1950
Currently based
Berlin, Germany | Gargnano, Italy
Affiliated institution
ZKM | Center for Art and Media, Karlsruhe, Germany
Documented / archived by
Fleischmann | Strauss
Website
https://www.fleischmann-strauss.de
About

Ryszard W. Kluszczyński, 2011:
"Monika Fleischmann and Wolfgang Strauss undertook their joint, creative actions in combined fields of art and science in late 1980s. (...) We can say that the art of Fleischmann and Strauss has developed in parallel to the development of computer and internet environment, depicting dynamics of this network and inscribing with the undertaken issues, in the circle of problems generated through out a development and transformation of accompanied cyber-cultural concepts. The structure and the range of problems of works created by them, under certain, often-crucial circumstances, were ahead of theoretical findings shaped by the world of science. It concerns especially the character and the status of their field of intervention – the person in cyberspace. Interactive installations of Fleischmann and Strauss didn't propose to its viewers drowning in depths of alternative, separate worlds, but offered interactive experience of beeing between connected worlds, experience connecting in hybrid entity real and virtual environments.
Viewers become integral components of these works, the intelligently working components. As a result, perceptive experience of Fleischmann and Strauss installations takes transgressive shape; it is an activity overtaken in one environment but bringing effects in another, and the results reflexively are coming back to the functioning interactors, building a developing context off interactions, motivating their further behaviors and co-creating in this way, the structure of interactive work-event. Both these features: real-virtual fluctuation and interactivity shaping its rythm and dynamic, together add to most of the Fleischmann/Strauss works hybrid character, and together ascribe them the feature described as Mixed Reality. These works prefigured in this way more advanced phases of cyber-cultural theories. (...)
These first, joint realizations of Fleischmann and Strauss: Berlin – Cyber City (1989-91), Home of the Brain (1990-1992) and Liquid Views (1992-93), as well as later installation Murmuring Fields (1997-99), in spite of the fact, that they were still made and located out side of the internet, also share some kind of network structure. They own this to the extended arrangement of interactive connections appearing between experiencing these works viewers-users and extended, multidimensional resources of materials (also virtual), consisting for these works. Hypertextual organization of an access to these materials makes receptive experience of these works with its navigational character, similar to Internet experience. (...)
Interactivity appears to be a very important and at the same time a uniquely characteristic feature not only in these early, presently discussed realizations, but above all in other works created by Fleischmann/Strauss duet. This feature, by Lev Manovich perceived as the obvious attribute of digital media (Manovich, 2006), from the Fleischmann and Strauss perspective appears not only (and not above all) as a feature of a medium, but as a structural indicator of works created by them, as an expression of deep logic of these works, finally as a basic system determining viewer’s experience. Second, not less important than interactivity, attribute of work of these two artists is, already mentioned earlier, the tension and fluctuation of their works between real and virtual reality. Both these features: real-virtual fluctuation and interactivity shaping its rhythm and dynamic, together add to most of the Fleischmann and Strauss works, already described before, hybrid character, and together ascribe them the feature described as Mixed Reality or Augmented Reality. Inevitably in this environment Fleischmann and Strauss locate viewers of their works. Consequently, viewers become integral components of these works, the intelligently working components. As a result, perceptive experience of Fleischmann and Strauss installations takes transgressive shape; it is an activity overtaken in one environment but bringing effects in another, and the results reflexively are coming back to the functioning interactors, building a developing context of interactions, motivating their further behaviors and co-creating in this way, the structure of interactive work-event (Kluszczyński, 2010). ...
Ryszard W. Kluszczyński, excerpt from: Living between reality and virtuality. Remarks over the work of Monika Fleischmann and Wolfgang Strauss. In: Performing Data, 2011
https://www.academia.edu/4470107/Living_between_reality_and_virtuality._Remarks_over_the_work_of_Monika_Fleischmann_and_Wolfgang_Strauss

CV
Monika Fleischmann (Karlsruhe, 1950) and Wolfgang Strauss (Gunzenhausen, 1951) are German artists internationally known for their pioneering interactive media art (virtual reality, mixed reality, knowledge discovery, performative interfaces). In the mid-eighties, they co-founded ART+COM in Berlin.
In the 1990s, they initiated media arts and technology departments at major German research institutes such as the GMD, the National Research Center for Information Technology, and the Fraunhofer Gesellschaft in Sankt Augustin near Bonn: MARS - Media Arts and Research Studies and the eCulture Factory.
For "Home of the Brain" (1989-91), the first artistic virtual reality installation, they received the Golden Nica for Interactive Art from the Prix Ars Electronica in 1992. They are recipients of the 2018 ACM SIGGRAPH Distinguished Artist Award for Lifetime Achievement in Digital Art and members of the SIGGRAPH Academy.

Other groundbreaking works such as "Berlin-Cyber City", "Liquid Views", "Energy-Passages", "Semantic Map", "PointScreen", "Digital Sparks", an academic network and student competition archived on the media art learning platform "netzspannung.org" have been exhibited at art and science festivals, museums, and galleries worldwide and are part of the collection of the ZKM Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe.Their work also includes production environments such as "Mobile Unit", which has been used to create complex works such as Netzspannung.org's "Tele-Lectures".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monika_Fleischmann_and_Wolfgang_Strauss

CURRICULUM VITAE
1987 Founder of ArtWork Raumlabor and co-founder of ART+COM Institute for Digital Art, Architecture, Design & Communication, Berlin - since 1988 ART+COM e.V.
1991 Virtual World Studio at the Centre Corbusier de la Recherche Continue
1992-93 Research Fellow at GMD - National Research Center for Information Technology, Sankt Augustin, Germany
1992-93 Scholarship at KHM | Academy of Media Arts, Cologne, Germany
1994-97 Researcher and leader of research groups such as VisWiz, VMSD and Virtual Environment at GMD - National Research Center for Information Technology, Sankt Augustin, Germany
1997-2002 Head of MARS-Media Arts & Research Studies, GMD-Institute for Media Communication, Sankt Augustin, Germany
2003-08 Head of MARS-Exploratory Media Lab, Fraunhofer Institute for Media Communication, Sankt Augustin, Germany
2005-08 Head of the eCulture Factory Bremen, Fraunhofer Research
2008 - 2013 Research Artist & Scientist on Digital Culture, Knowledge Media, Arts of Knowledge at the Fraunhofer Institute for Intelligent Analyze and Information System (IAIS)
since 2013: associated artists on the international development of media art at ZKM Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe.
News
Shared Thinking Space - AI, Digital Archives, and Knowledge Discovery. Wolfgang Strauss. ZKM | Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe. www.eculturefactory.de/CMS/index.php?id=377

Re:Source 2023 - PERFORMING MEMORIES - September 15 @ 11:35 - 12:50.

Aula Magna Silvio Trentin - Ca' Dolfin, Ca' Foscari University Calle de la Saoneria, 3829, Venezia, VE, Italia.

www.resource-media.art/event/performing-memories/

Media Narcissus from Ovid and Caravaggio to Liquid Views and today‘s Selfies. Monika Fleischmann. ZKM | Center for Art and Media Karlsruhe. www.resource-media.art/fleischmann-strauss-liquid-views/

Re:Source2023 - FIRST-PERSON ACCOUNTS - September 14 @ 11:35 - 12:50

Auditorium Santa Margherita, Sestiere Dorsoduro 3689, Campo Santa Margherita.

www.resource-media.art/event/first-person-accounts/

ISEA 2023 : Third Summit on New Media Art Archiving

[ISEA2023] Paper: Wolfgang Strauss & Monika Fleischmann — Exploring the Digital Archive as a Thinking Space – AI Aspects on Documentation, Access and Knowledge Discovery www.isea-archives.org/isea2023_3rd_snmaa-presentation_strauss_fleischmann

2018 ACM SIGGRAPH Award für Fleischmann/Strauss. Kunstforum.de

Monika Fleischmann und Wolfgang Strauss wurden für ihr künstlerisches Lebenswerk mit dem ACM SIGGRAPH Distinguished Artist Award for Lifetime Achievement in Digital Art ausgezeichnet. Sie arbeiten seit 1987 zusammen und zählen zu den Pionieren der Medienkunst. Dabei haben sie sich auf „Mixed Reality“ im Grenzbereich von analog und digital spezialisiert hat. 1988 gründeten sie gemeinsam mit anderen Künstlern das Forschungslabor für Kunst und Technik, ART & COM in Berlin. Die Auszeichnung wird von ACM SIGGRAPH (Association for Computing Machinery) vergeben. Das Forschungsnetzwerk zur Entwicklung von Computer Graphik und interaktiven Medien bildet die weltweit größte Gemeinschaft von Forschern, Künstlern, Entwicklern, Filmemachern und Wissenschaftlern, die zur Entwicklung der Neuen Technologien beigetragen haben. fleischmann-strauss.de

www.kunstforum.de/nachrichten/acm-siggraphaward-fuer-fleischmann-strauss/

Artist duo Fleischmann-Strauss receives Lifetime Achievement Award in Digital Art at SIGGRAPH 2018

On August 13, 2018 research and media artist Monika Fleischmann and architect and artist Wolfgang Strauss will be awarded the Lifetime Achievement Award in Digital Art at SIGGRAPH 2018.

SIGGRAPH 2018 is a five-day immersion into the latest innovations in CG, Animation, VR, Games, Digital Art, Mixed Reality and Emerging Technologies. Experience research, hands-on demos, and fearless acts of collaboration in Vancouver.

Fleischmann and Strauss have been realizing their artistic works since 1987 in partnership. The two are the first media artists in Germany to work in a research context in collaboration with computer scientists and to do pioneering work in the field of new media art.

They contributed to digital media developing into a reflexive and analytical arena for critical social and cultural thinking in their work. Their artistic goal is to shed light on the contradictory characteristics of digital media.

To experience the two media artists, it is not necessary to travel to Canada: One month before, on July 13, 2018, they will be present at the opening of »Art in Motion« at ZKM. Their interactive work »Liquid Views« will be on display in the exhibition until February 10, 2019.

zkm.de/en/artist-duo-fleischmann-strauss-receives-lifetime-achievement-award-in-digital-art-at-siggraph-2018

2018 Lifetime Achievement Award in Digital Art: Monika Fleischmann

The 2018 ACM SIGGRAPH Distinguished Artist Award for Lifetime Achievement in Digital Art is awarded to Monika Fleischmann, a research artist that has contributed to the field of interactive media art since the 1980s to the present day. She has pioneered the field of new media art, helping consolidate the shift that has of late transformed media into a research-led interactive media practice and a creative discipline; one that is able to engage in, analyze, and visualize digital media and their transformations in the context of shifting fields of cultural and educational contexts. These transformations have seen digital media turn into a reflexive and analytical arena for critical social and cultural thinking in her work. Her artistic goal is to shed light on the contradictory characteristics of digital media.

Her work – realized since 1987 in partnership with architect and artist Wolfgang Strauss – ranges from fashion to digital architecture, interactive design, poetic and social sculptures that intuitively interact with people and environment to explore intersections between art, science, technology, and society.

In 1987 she co-founded Art + Com, an interdisciplinary research institute for the convergence of analogue and digital culture in Berlin and the first research institute for digital media in Germany. This space has been instrumental to carry on collaborative projects at the intersection between art and computer science.

In 1992, within the Scientific Visualization research group at the GMD (German National Research Center for Information Technology) in Sankt Augustin near Bonn, Germany, Fleischmann and Strauss (the first media artists in Germany to work in a research context in collaboration with computer scientists) began to develop ground breaking interactive media systems in both pure and applied contexts. Among the projects developed were the “responsive workbench,” which today, along with the immersive virtual reality environment CAVE (Cave Automatic Virtual Environment), is extensively deployed in visualization environments, as well as the interactive media installation “Liquid Views” which has been exhibited successfully across the world. The VR installation “Home of the Brain” (1989), in collaboration with Strauss, represents one of the pioneering VR interactive artworks and has earned them a Golden Nica of Prix Ars Electronica for interactive art. Their work has been exhibited and awarded internationally and is part of the collection of the ZKM, Center for Art and Media in Karlsruhe, Germany.

In 1997, she founded the MARS Exploratory Media Lab, a research laboratory at the forefront of artistic and technical-scientific research on digital media and one of the world’s leading hubs for trans-disciplinary collaborations between artists, architects, designers, cultural scientists and computer scientists. As a research artist in a computer science environment, Fleischmann has benefi ted from and extended the research in this field and brought it across global networks by constructing netzspannung.org, one of the first media art archive and eTeaching platforms at Fraunhofer Research Society, Munich, Europe’s largest application-oriented research organization.

Her multidisciplinary background – fashion design, art and drama, computer graphics – has made her an expert in the world of art, computer science and media technology. Her artistic work deals with the change of identity and perception in a digital media culture.

Beside the VR technology used in “Home of the Brain”, Fleischmann has contributed to the development of sensitive surfaces for the promotion of joint content exploration. These began with the mixed reality installation about the fall of the Berlin Wall, “Berlin-Cyber City“ (1988-1989), and continued with the interactive realtime morphing installation “Liquid Views“ (1992-93) which originated in the first mirror touchscreen and further to a contactless interface – the PointScreen technology (patented in 2005) which was motivated by a search for alternatives to touching the screen. PointScreen is based on gesture control and the promotion of electric field sensing – with the energy of the body. Electric field sensing is a method to perceive the body in its essential condition.

She uses the design of interfaces as a tool, as space and as a situation in the basis of communicative action and motivation, for her scientific exploration of mixed realities.

ACM SIGGRAPH is honored to recognize Monika Fleischmann as an important pioneer for her research projects, based on interface design and new forms of communication.

www.siggraph.org/about/awards/2018-art-award-monika-fleischmann/

Exhibitions & Events
Tweakfest
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De Balie
Participating Artist
Werkbund-Galerie
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Bibliography
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