Pressespiegel paraflows 08

http://panic.liber.us/2008/05/15/utopia-at-paraflows08-vienna/
Utopia at Paraflows08 [Vienna]
paraflows08 - festival for digital arts and cultures :: The topic of the 3rd festival for
digital arts and cultures in the city of Vienna is UTOPIA.
UTOPIA: The term utopia, the non-place, derived from old Greek u-, non, and topos,
place, denotes a nowhere which is untraceable and therefore projecting all longing into an
unreachable beyond. Utopia is therefore an imagination which is thinkable as an idea, yet
is not directly realisable. It is the great dream, concept, and vision of a world or a time
with a new social, religious or technical order.
UTOPIA can be traced back to the book De Optimo Reipublicae Statu deque nova insula
Utopia Libellus vere aureaus, nec minus salutaris quam festivus (Of the best state law and
of the new island Utopia, truly a golden booklet, as pleasant as it is cheerful) by Thomas
Morus which was first published in 1516. The text alludes to positive scenarios of
technical, spatial and social constructs which have not been realised. Usually, technology
plays a major role in utopian phantasms. More often than not their realistic
implementation is a matter of availability of technology and very often it is especially in
digital art the starting point of a work of art.