Prompted by the UK-Russia Year of Culture 2014, Manchester’s digital lab FutureEverything will host a series of exhibitions, workshops and live performances in Moscow later this month.
As part of the UK-Russia Year of Culture 2014, FutureEverything, Manchester’s innovation lab for digital culture and annual festival, has just announced a three month exchange with their digitally inclined compatriots in Moscow. For the past twenty years FutureEverything has provided a forum for developers, coders, designers and policy makers to collaborate on projects as eclectic as they are important; now they are exporting their own brand of creative community across European boarders to the Russian capital. The programme aims to foster greater ties between technologists in either country as well as promoting frank debates about global data policies
The exchange is formed of two parts. FutureEverything Moscow, the first stage of the venture, will take place over four days in venues across Moscow, from 20-23 November. This will feature a series of live performances by both Russian and UK artists. A brand new commission, The Well, by UK musician Koreless and live lighting engineer Emmanuel Biard will be presented over three days; in addition there will be performances from Lee Gamble, Mark Fell, Powell, Evian Christ, Young Fathers and more. The programme will close with a 10th anniversary showcase of the UK label Hyperdub, bringing Kode9, Ikonika and Scratcha DVA together for the first time in Russia.
This will be accompanied by workshops on participatory technologies and a central exhibition of the latest thinking in the arts and sciences, held at the Karpov Institute of Physical Chemistry, with work from Memo Akten, Semiconductor, Where Dogs Run and Electroboutique.
The return leg will occur at the FutureEverything Festival in Manchester, 26-28 February 2015, where projects developed between participants over the coming months will be presented.
Drew Hemment, Founder and CEO of FutureEverything: “We’re thrilled to launch this programme that we hope will build new connections between global communities working to realise a more truly participatory culture and society. The cooperative nature of these projects illustrates FutureEverything’s ‘festival as lab’ methodology. Artists and technologists around the world are lightning rods for new ways of thinking and doing, and at this moment of global change their voice and viewpoint is more important than ever.”
FutureEverything Moscow
20-23 November 2014, Moscow
futureeverything.org/moscow