We have been running Art & Tech Social since 2017, the idea is to bring people together to explore art and tech with the addition of drinks and a curry! Sadly Covid ruined our chances of sharing a curry over the last 18 months but we have been bringing international practitioners to your screens instead! The Summer of 2021 brings some practitioners from near and far to teach you some new skills and widen your knowledge around gender and colour theory, immersive theatre and interactive fiction…..

ART & TECH SOCIAL: John Sear & Katie Day, fusing tech and theatre

 7 & 14 July 7pm

A two part interactive session from BOM Fellows Katie Day and John Sear, sharing learning from their recent experience reformatting A Moment of Madness, an immersive and playful theatre experience which sees audiences thrust into the heart of a political spy thriller.

Originally a site-specific experience, in 2021 A Moment of Madness was reformatted for online audiences. Now a multi-modal online experience, it uses a bespoke software system to blend pre-recorded and live performances to camera with interactive SMS messaging, puzzle breaking, secure documents and facilitated audience debate.

The session will take place in Zoom and will include practical exercises to illustrate the process of making interactive narrative-driven work for live audiences. The workshops will suit emerging or established theatre makers, artists, makers, technologists and games designers interested in fusing theatre with collaborative gaming and new technologies.

A Moment of Madness is a Norfolk & Norwich Festival commission. Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England.  Supported by Unity Theatre Trust & BOM.

ART & TECH SOCIAL: Martha Hipley, digital theory

Colour & digital design 21 July 7pm

Colour & digital design: Colour is often an afterthought when it comes to digital art and design, rather than an integral tool for expression. In this workshop we’ll look to the science and history of colour to build a shared vocabulary and toolkit for working with colour in digital spaces.

Gender and digital design 28 July 7pm

Gender and digital design: In this workshop we’ll playfully examine our own unconscious biases and the historical biases present in the tools and technologies we use to make and consume digital work through several exercises design to spark conversation and creativity. Instead of continuing to reproduce these biases, we can then look for ways to subvert them to imagine technologies that are more inclusive and more exciting.

Martha Hipley is an artist and technologist with a journeyman’s approach to commercial digital products and conceptual art. She has exhibited work at Haus der elektronischen Künst, The Museum of Human Achievement, and Powrplnt, and received a microgrant from Rhizome for “untitled Twitter hack.” She enjoys paintings and video games, and always wants to be making more of both. She also writes and self-publishes An Artist’s Guide to Computation, a newsletter of resources for creatives of all kinds who engage with technology.

ART & TECH SOCIAL: Dan Hett, digital + interactive fiction

11 & 16 August 7pm

Dan Hett is an award-winning writer, artist and games developer from Manchester, whose career has taken him through creating creative technology and artworks for the likes of Havas, the BBC, Sky, TATE and the Open Data Institute. He’s also the creative director of indie games studio PASSENGER, who recently released their first large-scale work CLOSED HANDS – an interactive fiction project exploring radicalisation, extremism, and identity politics in the UK, which launched in March 2021. Dan has also written extensively on extremism and digital culture for The Guardian, The Observer, and the BBC.

Dan will be lead you through two practical interactive fiction workshops, one focusing on Twine (interactive fiction game making tool) and one focusing on Ink (a narrative scripting language for games).

TO BOOK YOUR FREE PLACE ON ANY (OR ALL!) OF THESE WORKSHOPS, PLEASE EMAIL louise@bom.org.uk