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MFRU

Many artists dealt with very basic computer graphics, there were fewer interactive projects. Darij Krevh was one of the first ones to present immersive installations. Vuk Čosić popularized HTML art internationally when he created an image that was native to the computer. It wasn't a kind of transfer, translation or illustration, it was the whole narrative in new notations. A few other artists were working on machine-written poetry. Today: ChatGPT. The creative field was very lively, energetic and advanced, but technically it remained on a low level. Most artists had access to basic PC software and that was where their space ended. Meaning they had to make use of what they lacked and integrate it into their artistic practice, which nevertheless has a crucial impact on the outcome of these artworks. In these festival editions we have witnessed the beginnings of careers, some have developed them, others have sadly given up.

The audience expected to enter science fiction, but they entered reality and nothing more than that. Purely and simply the reality of the computational locality – there's not much glamorous about that. But the settings were great.

Because the first MFRU edition was mapping of spheres that had not yet been explored, we wanted the next edition in 1996 to identify with a certain pressing topic. At the time, there were reflections on the new corporeality, still worthy of all the considerations, dialogues and discourse today. The questions were timeless: who am I, what am I, what is life? How do I define myself, identify myself? What attitude should I have towards a machine that shows the beginnings of thinking? Can we give a computer identity a citizen number? We could have spent years on this subject, but we were interested in too many things. In the next edition, we were already rushing into other topics, into the principles of responsiveness, bidirectionality, interactivity. We exhibited objects that responded to the viewer, that spoke to the viewer to interact, to communicate, to respond. We were asking questions of feminism – a very interesting field, still very relevant today in the academic and other worlds, while computing in its time had the promise of equality written into it. Technology, at least at that time, did not care who operated it.

We were looking to other parts of the world – remote parts of Asia, Africa – and tried to invite artists from a wider area. It was always a hurdle, financially and bureaucratically. And even though it was possible to send a file, we struggled to get together in person in the first place.

We were working on presence and were not fans of the idea of the festival existing as a virtual point. The aim was to gather the creators in the space and talk to them, we never wanted to dehumanize that aspect. Some artists deliberately worked under a disguise of a code. It was their aesthetic and conceptual intention. The dilemma of whether or not an image was created by artificial intelligence is a dilemma of today; back then, there was none, there was definitely a person behind the work. So – if the artist was not just a virtual file, why present only the file and not the person? That was important.

We talked about surveillance systems, about the emergence of drones in the military. The present was reflected in those objects and actions that did not seem futuristic enough to people at the time, in 1995 in Maribor.

The public's expectations were twofold: some, surprised as they didn't even know what to expect, and others who expected more, imagining computers were science fiction. But they have entered reality and nothing more than that. The first and second festivals were pure reality of the computer in the locality – there is not much glamorous about that. But the settings were great: mobile phones, miniature technology, internet access from your pocket. Some visions came true, others didn't, and our optimism that technology would be more democratizing, more equalizing, more collaborative was lost. We are now witnessing the reverse trend. In 30 years we witnessed a great deal of hostility, of conflict over technology. We talked about surveillance systems, about the emergence of drones in the military. The present was reflected in those objects and actions that did not seem futuristic enough to people at the time, in 1995 in Maribor.

In 1995 I received my PhD from the Department of Philosophy at the Faculty of Arts, University of Ljubljana. The title of my PhD thesis was "Virtual Realities: acronymic time, paraspace and simulation". I was one of the first, if not the first, in Slovenia and perhaps in the former Yugoslavia to obtain a PhD in philosophy and virtual reality, cyberspace, cyberfeminism (Haraway), postcolonial theory (Trinh T. Minh-ha), French structuralism and media theory (Baudrillard, Couchot, Klonaris/Thomadaki, Virilio, etc.). In the meantime, I was already publishing and so I used new media and technologies to analyze the war in the Balkans. My book, which came out of my PhD, was entitled In the queue for the virtual bread (1996). The title symbolizes politics: what good does the virtual world do us if we are hungry? It emphasizes the contamination by technology and politicizes media discourse. Already in 1994, at the time of the rise of the Internet in the East, I published my first analysis "Media and War" in the very influential British journal Art and Design.

From 1997 to 1998 I did postdoctoral studies at the University of Tokyo (I received a scholarship from the Japanese Government, JSPS) and spent a year with Professor Machiko Kusahara. When I returned from Japan, I organized a project at the Museum of Modern Art with the full title "East - East: Spaces, Media, Bodies" (together with an exhibition and a symposium, and the publication of a paper in Maska magazine in 1999), in which I invited Japanese and Finnish theorists, including Erki Huhtama and others, who became regular visitors to the International Computer Arts Festival. I was following the work of Jože Slaček, who was and will remain a pioneer of this festival, an incredible sensibility, and with whom I realized many projects within the MFRU. The Slaček case is a living proof of how the Slovenian space functions: because Slaček had not finished any "schools" in the academic sense, he was constantly disparaged by some institutional actors.

I joined MFRU at the invitation of Slaček, who was not only a coworker and organizer, but a pure visionary. He played an incredibly important role. The festival was created practically from scratch, through the work of one or two people who had a tremendous sense of timing, and there were very important individuals coming in, extremely important. In 1999 we published a volume on cyberfeminism “The spectralization of technology”. “From elsewhere to cyberfeminism and back: institutional modes of the cyberworld”was the second publication of its kind, published in 1997 at the Documenta in Kassel, Germany. Today there is a lot of archiving of cyberfeminism, mainly by American women's positions through various platforms – one of the major projects being worked on at the moment, but a lot of the developments that took place in Eastern Europe are being overlooked. There are battles being fought over this, which is sad and shows the continuation of ideological discourses – there is always interpretation, control and power at stake.

Today the archiving of cyberfeminism is very prominent, mainly by American women's positions through various platforms – it is one of the major projects being worked on at the moment, but a lot of the developments that took place in Eastern Europe are being overlooked. There are battles being fought over this, which is sad and shows the continuation of ideological discourses – there is always interpretation, control and power at stake.

We should not forget Kapelica in Ljubljana and laterKibla in Maribor, which were also important in this context.

In 2000, as part of the MFRU, I organized a symposium and an exhibition entitled "The body caught in the intestines of the computer and beyond: women's strategies and/or strategies by women in media, art and theory" and published a special issue of Maska (in collaboration with the MFRU/MKC). A year later, as part of the 7th MFRU, I brought Timothy Druckery, who gave a lecture on the social impact of electronic media and communication in interactive and networked environments. In 2002, also in the framework of the MFRU, I published the world's first monograph on Stelarc, a pioneer of virtual and hyper-prosthetic technological art. The title of the book is excellent, "Stelarc: political prosthesis and the knowledge of the body".

I think I have said it all. All these editions of the MFRU were, of course, organized or coordinated by Slaček. In 2003, as part of the 9th MFRU, I invited Sandy Stone, who had already changed gender, and she gave a fantastic lecture on what it means to be trans*. We ended up doing Sandy Stone's lecture, called "Drive-By Theory", at the Slovene National Theatre Maribor, because it was the only venue that could accommodate a bigger audience, and people almost fell unconscious [laughs]. I explained prior, that it was a revolutionary "transgender" position, but they didn't listen to me, I don't think they even knew what it was about. Sandy Stone was talking about trans* sex, about how sex is not just vaginal, that you can fuck with your hand. I organized this lecture in collaboration with MKC. He talked about what Paul B. Preciado talked about years ago, and even further back, in the days before the gender change, when he was still Beatriz Preciado: that you can enjoy every part of your body in the connection between technology and the body, that is, that you can have sex without coitus in the classic sense of the word, which is true.

I would be so naive as to say that perhaps the reason for the absence of an overarching theme for the edition of the festival that I curated with Stelarc in 1998 was that the pool of those we were able to host was very narrow. From today's point of view this is absurd, there are thousands of artists working in this field of art. There were fewer then, and we knew even fewer of those. We invited those we appreciated and had to patiently wait to let us know if they could come at all – only at the end of this selection process were we able to extract some kind of a statement. I would dare to say that we only invited artists from outside the mainstream. In this way – I won't say alternative, non-governmental or out-of-series – but less known, radical, marginal production was encouraged.

I don't know much about curatorial approaches. Every time I was offered a curatorial role – twice in Maribor, then in Nova Gorica at Pixxelpoint – I took it on as an outsider and made this very clear. Of course, I have experience with curators because I work with them, but I am not one. In fact, I saw the curatorial position more as a counterposition – when non-curators are put in such a role, we are granted a kind of freedom, which I later called the paracuratorial position. Like a para-military, not being obliged to adhere to the rules of the official army, to the techniques of warfare, to the humanitarian and ethical rules. It can do as it pleases and it can be completely irresponsible. So, as a para-military, I can do whatever I want and I am very free, I can set my own rules. But in Maribor it has always been very much about teamwork. We were called selectors, and in my memory it was a very wide circle, I was not alone or isolated. I worked with Stelarc once, and Marina Gržinić another time, which was really great, because they were both complete experts, and I still feel honored that I was able to put some of my own ideas into practice alongside theirs. I remember long, all-night sessions in obscure spaces. We were sitting in restaurants in Nova Vas, eating and debating until the morning, and they let us. It was extraordinary, we were accompanied by the wider festival team, Peter Tomaž Dobrila, Aleksandra Kostič, Jože Slaček, involved in some pretty intense debates, which I joined as a beginner curator.

I worked hard to involve as many net artists as possible in the festival – that was my mission, the only thing I was interested in back then (laughs). Maybe it was just my own limitations, but I think that net art was crucial in computer art at that moment, the approaches like robotics were not so widespread yet. We hadn't really talked about artificial intelligence. We were more concerned with the contextual levels: net art as a form of resistance, and local feminist, political positions. New and fantastic. Stelarc brought a certain worldliness to all of this, he was everywhere and knew everything. In the selection process we went to quite personal acquaintances – the marginal caravan from the festivals was my circle. When we met, we were almost an audience unto ourselves. There was no general public to watch us. That creates special bonds (laughs). I brought them to Maribor.

We had a lot of enthusiasm for new media, first video, then computerware. Since we are talking about mostly American and Japanese technology, it was always interesting to think about its non-domesticity – Slovenian video created with Japanese, ultimate foreign equipment. The emphasis was always on open source software and activism. I myself have a degree in computer science and it was very clear to me in the early days of MFRU that technology was about control. Control while we sleep. Every email, call, text message, photograph is publicly available to the agencies. In the early days of the MFRU, open source software was democratic, with some shared ambition, effort, resources, and it had some promise. It was a romantic vision – the faith in open source. This held true until sometime in 1995. The year itself appeals to one of the most famous brands, Windows 95. At the time of its release, it already contained a full mix of general-purpose programs for writing, drawing, spreadsheets and web access. Previous operating systems were in this sense more like units than systems, specialized, one for personal use, the other for web use etc.

We wanted to be subversive, to use art to hold up a mirror to society, to draw attention to and thus empower the independent use of the computer medium, both in general use and in artistic creation. Initial computer graphics depicted the computer as a new brush, a digital brush. The history of art is also the history of media – the first medium was perhaps the Neanderthal flute, as the first artifact, the medium of the bear's femur. Video, on the medium of celluloid film, enabled the democratization of photography as mainstream and artistic. The computer, on the other hand, was the democratized brush, without the need for celluloid film. So we felt it important to announce the computer as the most modern medium, which has produced many great works of art, cutting-edge web art, much of which is now archived and forgotten. It has produced many subversive, activist experiments, subversions of contemporary online networking platforms and social networks. Such works have been associated, exposed in the gallery and festival environment. And today, gallery institutions have bought these kinds of works, they are part of their permanent collections. We have been successful.

The positions in computer art that we held during my curatorship can be summarized as follows:

Integrating Technology and the Arts. One of the enduring approaches was emphasizing the integration of technology and art. Here, computer technology is not just a tool but an integral part of the creative process, opening up new possibilities for expression.

Exploring Digital Material. It is always valuable to consider a position that focuses on experimenting with digital material (such as code, algorithms, and virtual spaces) to explore new aesthetic forms and expressions in the digital medium.

A Critical Attitude Towards Technology. At that time, we collectively adopted a critical approach to the role of technology in society. Art served as a means to explore, comment on, and critique technological progress and its impact on culture and interpersonal relations.

Interdisciplinarity. I also emphasized interdisciplinarity, fostering dialogue between artists, technologists, scientists, and theorists. This approach aimed to broaden the understanding of computer art and its possibilities.

Talking about the virtual paradigms of the time, I would also highlight the following:

Interactivity: Emphasis on interactive artworks, where the viewer is an active participant in the artwork, leading to dynamic and personalized artistic experiences.

Net Art: Focusing on the internet as a platform and medium for artistic expression, exploring digital culture and social networks.

Algorithmic and Generative Art: The use of algorithms and computer programs to create artworks that can stand alone or evolve in response to specific inputs or interactions with an audience.

These approaches and paradigms served as the basis for my curatorial decisions, the selection of artists and works, and the way we shaped the festival experience for visitors at the time.

I was aware that I would be running the festival for three years, so I focused on treating the festival as an autonomous zone with its own moment in time and place in space. With this Trilogy of trust, I wanted to explore our approach to the festival.

The first edition focused on the city—we aimed to engage with as many spaces, institutions, activities, and citizens as possible. The second year, the theme was national—we sought to build bridges to various national stories. The final year was international, where we decided to work exclusively with women artists.

I grew up with the MFRU. I follow it, or perhaps it has followed me since childhood. I always felt it was a collaborative effort among friends, perhaps even a family—a global family of individuals I got to know through my regular work in the new media scene, as it was called globally.

When organizing the Kiblix festival, which preceded the MFRU, I was already thinking about concepts like "festival as a lab" and "festival as a laboratory." As an anthropologist, I was interested in the festival as an organism and the exchange of knowledge within the art-science-technology-human nexus. This necessitated a workshop component—an autonomous zone where knowledge could be exchanged.

We created a whole new set of concepts: workshopology, relating to the aforementioned laboratory aspect; bedology, addressing the question of being; substitutive, and foodology. We turned Kibla into a laboratory that was also a kitchen and a concert space. There, we cooked, programmed, and worked, creating a living space where organizers and visitors spent the festival together.

I was particularly impressed by my previous experience with the wonderful Swiss artistic community. We met at a festival in Indonesia, where the narratives that were central to the last Documenta, which Ruangrupa brought to Europe, were gaining momentum. These included new media groups with globally connected principles, community action principles, and community productions.

At Kiblix 2011, I aimed to recreate this fresh experience of Indonesia—working, eating, living, and exhibiting together in one house in Maribor. It was far removed from the typical manifestations of art and festivals as we know them here. For me, it was an incredible anthropological experience.

When it was time for the trilogy of trust, I decided to consider the bridges within the city, with national artists and institutions, and finally with international artists. Trust served as a foundational element. There was a sense that I might be deluding myself, thinking: yes, yes, Miha, we trust each other, we cooperate, we are sincere. But we knew these were just phrases we were throwing around. We had to deeply consider who we are, what we are, and what our cultural pattern is. It was a difficult task.

To return to the topic of the dominant paradigm of my editions: in my opinion, the festival itself is a work of art. Having lived and worked in theater for the past fifteen years, I've come to see the festival as a medium where artists, producers, and audiences connect, sharing ideas and concepts in the moment. I value being in an open environment—my family in this scene is, after all, an open-source family. We consider the types of programs and computers we use and how self-sustaining, independent, or dependent we are. The approach to festival production is already part of the message.

The festival serves as a medium where artists, producers, and audiences connect, sharing ideas and concepts in this momentary zone. I appreciate being in an open environment—my family in this scene is, after all, an open-source family. We reflect on the programs and computers we use, and how self-sustaining, independent, or dependent we are. The way you approach the production of a festival is already part of the message.

I'm not an art historian, nor have I had any formal curatorial training—my background is in new media, humanities, and the arts. In my work, I strive to produce outcomes that make all involved parties happy, feeling a social responsibility towards that goal. However, this process can sometimes be quite frustrating.

I met the curator Mark Ornik in Vienna when we were both studying with Professor Peter Weibel. Weibel was also an artist, curator, museum director, and theorist. In all his roles, he gathered innovators around him. Mark and I developed a very close and deep connection. When Mark told me around 2007 that he was thinking about taking over the MFRU, it was clear that we would work together, and we did until 2011.
Mark was particularly interested in sound, while I focused on images. For me, the edition of the festival centered on images was crucial. All the other editions were related but emerged from our team's desire (we've always worked as a group) to establish a broader view of computers and their social uses.

The question "can the image still show anything today" addressed the new possibilities of manipulating digital records and the fundamental questions of reality, truth, and fact. These topics are even more relevant today in light of fake news and the potential of artificial intelligence. Our approach has always been broad enough that a difference of a few decades is not significant. It couldn't be otherwise because computer art has always been visionary.

Artificial intelligence in image-making also heavily impacts copyright, as it uses the works of others in creating new images. This is a matter of political economy, as algorithms are "trained" on user data. These themes were addressed in our symposium. The main difference between then and now is that the uses of AI today are much less transparent.

This concern has always been at the forefront of Mark's and my programming at MFRU. We've done extensive work to expand computer literacy, organize workshops, and collaborate with universities and other stakeholders to help people become more skilled in using computers and understanding the changes they bring about.

I curated the MFRU for three years, from 2021 to 2023. This period was notably influenced by the epidemic, which significantly shaped the festival's course. Thematically, I aimed to continue the festival's established focus on social topics, addressing the situations and roles of individuals within society. Through the exhibitions, I sought to explore what new artists, using new mediums and occupying new virtual spaces, can offer to humanity and beyond.

We aimed to define technological phenomena in society and how to manage them consciously, ensuring these new possibilities do not become overwhelming. Human beings are fundamentally sentient, socially conditioned creatures. By 2023, we reflected on the festival's past positions and their potential for the future. We invited many younger generation artists and offered them opportunities to explore new fields of creation within intermedia and computer art. There was a strong emphasis on working with artificial intelligence. Simultaneously, the festival revisited its history by exhibiting works from pioneers who participated in previous editions, internationally renowned and driving innovation in the field.