// Workshop > 24/01 – 02/02 > BN
// Performances > 01/02 > BN
// Exhibition > 02/02 – 01/03 > DAM
 
Generator.x in collaboration with CTM.08 and partners [DAM] Berlin and Hyperwerk presents Generator.x 2.0: Beyond the Screen, a workshop and exhibition about digital fabrication and generative systems.
 
Digital fabrication (also known as "fabbing") represents the next step in the digital revolution. After years of virtualization, with machines and atoms being replaced by bits and software, we are coming full circle. Digital technologies like rapid prototyping, laser cutting and CNC milling now produce atoms from bits, eliminating many of the limitations of industrial production processes. Once prohibitively expensive, such technologies are becoming increasingly accessible, pointing to a future where mass customization and manufacturing-on-demand may be real alternatives to mass production.
 
For artists and designers working with generative processes, digital fabrication opens the door to a range of new expressions beyond the limits of virtual space. Parametric models apply computational strategies to the analysis and synthesis of space, producing structures and surfaces of great complexity. Through fabbing these forms may be rendered tangible, even tactile.
 
Beyond the Screen explores these new types of spatial constructs in a hands-on workshop, bringing together artists and designers working with code-based strategies for producing physical form. The workshop will feature public presentations bringing the topics of the workshop to a broader audience, culminating in an exhibition of fabbing works at the [DAM] gallery. In a continuation of the Generator.x concert tour, Beyond the Screen will also include an evening of concerts at the Ballhaus Naunynstrasse, showing the use of generative systems in audiovisual performance.
 
Generator.x is a platform for examining the use of generative and computational processes in art, architecture and design. It was set up to provide a much-needed forum for discourse in a field that has seen explosive growth in the last few years, but which has traditionally fallen outside the media art scene.
 
In particular, Generator.x was set up to examine the following topics:
 
Generative aesthetics: How can generative strategies be applied to aesthetic problems? Whether the aim is provide a design solution or simply to explore the dynamic qualities of a given system, this requires the encoding of creative and aesthetic choices into algorithms and machine-readable code. What are the criteria for successful generative solutions, and what parameters and boundary conditions can be manipulated to produce satisfying results?
 
Designing processes: Computational approaches to design transform static objects into dynamic processes, capable of adaptation and evolution over time. What implications does this have for design and architecture, whether used for aesthetic expression, data analysis or visualization? What happens when digital processes are connected to digital fabrication technologies to produce new physical forms?
 
Performative software: Musicians and visual performers are using generative systems to create custom software instruments for sound and image, often producing synaesthetic mappings between the two. How can a software instrument approach the complexity and expressive range of a physical instrument that has been perfected over centuries? What new strategies does realtime visual synthesis provide for the creation of live cinema?
 
Software by creatives for creatives: Artists and designers are increasingly creating their own software to meet special needs not covered by commercial packages, sharing their results as Open Source. Many are publishing their code on blogs, available for others to use. How are these solutions furthering new work, and how can these efforts be supported by the community?
 
Read more on:
> www.generatorx.no
 
 
Partners:
[DAM] Berlin has since its opening in 2003 been a leader in the field of
digital art, showing pioneers of new media as well as emerging
contemporary artists. It is also home to the d.velop digital art award
(ddaa), an important acknowledgement of excellence in the digital art field.
> www.dam-berlin.de
 
Hyperwerk, Institute for Postindustrial Design, is part of the Academy of Art and Design in Basel, Switzerland. The institute provides new solutions for a postindustrial world through experimental and interdisciplinary design practices. Their Acar2 project looks at how digital fabrication can be used to transform craft-based traditions into a new digital reality.
> www.fhnw.ch/hgk/ihw
 
Supported by Office for Contemporary Art Norway and Lasern.