Partners

The CYENS Centre of Excellence was established in 2018 as a non-profit organization in the walled city of Nicosia, through securing a competitive proposal from the European Commission’s Horizon 2020 funding program supporting research and innovation. The project is coordinated by the Municipality of Nicosia, partnering with the three public universities of Cyprus, and the European scientific institutions University College London and Max Planck Institute, and supported by the Republic of Cyprus.
The Centre is active in areas of Interactive Media, Smart Systems, and Emerging Technologies, conducting interdisciplinary and applied research in a wide range of disciplines. These include Computer Science, Engineering, Psychology, Neuroscience, Human Factors, Multimedia, Artificial Intelligence, Design, Computational Imaging, Machine Learning, and Virtual and Augmented Reality. At the same time, CYENS acts as a link between academic research and industrial development through the combined expertise of its staff. It is, therefore, able to provide solutions to a wide range of problems and to serve almost all areas of the Smart Specialization Strategy of Cyprus.

Beta is a new festival of art and technology, co-founded by Aisling Murray and The Digital Hub who have made an initial five year commitment to the festival. The inaugural edition took place in November 2023 where over 2 weeks Ireland’s research and digital art communities come together. 

Beta makes new technologies and complex themes accessible to the public and critically reflects on Ireland’s role as a global tech hub. Taking Ireland’s role as a central node in today’s networked world as a starting point this festival showcases and celebrates Ireland’s research and artistic communities through a combination of creativity, debate and experimentation. 

Beta allows members of the public to engage playfully and critically with new technologies, essentially beta testing ethical issues facing society public through exhibitions, screenings, panel discussions and workshops. The festival creates a network, international platform and anchor for the community of digital artists and researchers based in Ireland. Providing commissioning, upskilling, residency and mentorship opportunities as well as nurturing a creative pipeline and creating pathways for industry collaboration. 

The programme explores AI and creativity, immersive technologies and big ethical questions on diverse topics including the environmental impacts of our networked society, data equity, web3 and the third quantum revolution. 

Beta aims to: 

• Empower people in the way they think about and use new technologies. 
• Support and showcase Irish artists and researchers in art and technology.

The Digital Hub is managed by the Digital Hub Development Agency, a state agency set up by the Irish government in 2003 to run The Digital Hub and implement its enterprise and campus development strategy. It also facilitates and contributes to urban regeneration in the Liberties area and pilots projects that are vital to the ongoing development of the digital sector in Ireland. The Digital Hub campus is home to companies, organisations and individuals at the forefront of technology, digital media and the creative industries in Ireland.

Kersnikova Institute is a non-profit and non-governmental cultural organisation, founded by the Student Organisation of the University of Ljubljana, and serves as an institutional frame for three progressive venues: Kapelica Gallery, a world renown platform for contemporary investigative arts, the hacker space Rampa, where relations between society, science, technology and art are being reconsidered, and the inspirational laboratory BioTehna, which focuses on the artistic research of living systems. Over twenty years of daily activities have resulted in hundreds of unforgettable moments and experiences, which have given the contemporaneity form and meaning.

Kersnikova Institute is due to its strong programme focus marked on the maps of the most interesting international centres dealing with contemporary investigative arts, science and cuttingedge technologies.

The Cluj Cultural Centre (CCC) is a non-governmental organisation for culture and sustainable development, based in Cluj-Napoca (Romania). The Centre has 131 members (organisations and institutions, universities, associations in the business sector and civil society, and local and regional administrations) – over 60% percent of its members come from the independent sector. The CCC structure extends to 40 schools within the Cluj School Community, 12 rural municipalities within the Remarkable Romania community, 36 European cities in the Culture Next network and over 70 active international partners including prestigious universities, cultural organisations and leading institutions such as the World Health Organization and UNESCO.

Art and Science have been on the agenda of several programmes run by CCC in the last years – from activities in schools, training for teachers, residency programmes for collaboration between artists and scientists, international exhibitions and events featuring projects at the intersection of art, science, theory and experiment. Beyond these specific activities, art and science feed into several major strategic directions in our programme: contemporary art, cultural mediation and capacity building within the Academy of Change platform; STEAM education within the QUB area that brings together labs, workshops and maker space and spills over with our cultural and artistic education in schools.

CCA ŁAŹNIA program is based on four pillars:

1. Art in public space
2. Art and science
3. International exchange / residences
4. Education

The CCA ŁAŹNIA program deals with diverse issues that combine art and science in various and multi-faceted ways. These issues include the phenomenon of art impacting urban tissue, experimental music and films, video art, artistic events at the junction of disciplines, and cooperation to benefit local communities.

Our mission is to showcase the most recent artistic developments in their process of transformation, while responding to the cultural and civilizational changes in the modern world. We also aim to educate using new media and technologies.

The institution achieves its goals through various means such as organizing exhibitions, performances, interventions in public space, workshops, publishing, international exchanges, artistic residences and educational programs.

ŁAŹNIA CCA is one of Poland’s most important contemporary art institutions, and is increasingly gaining recognition worldwide.

Hexagone Scène nNationale is a 560-seat theatre located in Meylan, France, which has been a “scène nationale” since the label was created in 1991. Since 2021, it has been directed by Jérôme Villeneuve. A team of 17 people is dedicated to implementing the project.
The project is based around three themes: the relationship between the arts and sciences as a framework, the digital arts as a sphere of experimentation and the relationship between nature and society. Based on these axes, the team is working to implement a vision of a place devoted to zones of experimentation and porosity through the disciplines of live performance with other forms of artistic expression such as the visual and graphic arts, music, design and the plastic arts. This artistic and cultural project is fully in line with the missions of the scènes nationales, which are to create, present and raise awareness. It defends singular and daring artistic choices, rooted in the history of the region and a strong commitment to audiences. A wide range of local cultural initiatives to raise awareness of contemporary art is a key feature of the Hexagone. Jérôme Villeneuve has teamed up with two artists, Isis Famhy and Arnaud Chevalier, to offer a wide range of programming. Over the past year, the company has stepped up its production activity, opening up to other artistic fields and themes such as sound and visual immersion. Around fifteen projects a year are supported as co-productions, as well as one delegated production.

LABoral is a multidisciplinary institution that creates, disseminates and promotes access to new forms of culture based on the creative use of new technologies. Since 2007 it has offered a transversal programme with the aim of favouring access to culture for all kinds of audiences. The Art Centre acts as a platform for the exchange of knowledge and access to tools to support artists and creators in the development of cultural projects and the communities in their immediate surroundings in the acquisition of a critical and creative vision of technology. LABoral’s objective is to anchor itself in the local environment to foster a dynamic relationship between the artistic and creative communities of Asturias and the rest of the world. LABoral is an initiative of the Government of the Principality of Asturias to promote technological culture as the axis of a strategy aimed at introducing alternative and sustainable models for the future.

Ars Electronica is a cultural institution, an educational facility and an R&D lab based in Linz, Austria. Like no other institution, Ars Electronica represents a comprehensive approach in the confrontation with techno-cultural phenomena and enjoys a worldwide reputation for excellence. It is comprised of four divisions: the Ars Electronica Festival, the Prix Ars Electronica, the Ars Electronica Center and the Ars Electronica Futurelab. These four divisions mutually inspire one another, constituting a circuit of creativity: The FESTIVAL as test environment and the PRIX as competition of the best and brightest—both of them international, artistic, experimental and focused on the leading edge; the CENTER as year-round presentation & interaction platform—local, educational and entertaining; and the FUTURELAB as R&D facility—innovative, creative, endowed with strong technical competence and implementation skills, and linked up to a global network of universities & research facilities.

Gluon is a Brussels-based organisation that puts artists at the centre of imagining a better future. We support them to take on a critical yet constructive role in the necessary transformation of our times. We do this with two different pillars: Gluon Art&Research & Gluon Connect.

Technology has an increasing impact on our future and sphere of life. Therefore, Gluon Art&Research facilitates & intervenes in cross-sectoral fellowships that bring together artists and researchers in a speculative and art-driven research into more balanced relationships between humans, their technology and the natural environment.

Through Gluon Connect, we involve the street, the citizen in our work. Together with activists, critical journalists, entrepreneurs, researchers, teachers, students and pupils, the artists acquire and share insights, networks and technological skills to engage in more critical and informed dialogues about the future. Gluon is a cross-sectoral organisation that realises its operation with an ever-expanding network of national and international partners. Research institutions and artists, with Gluon’s support, develop new insights together. These are then translated by cultural, educational and media partners to a wider audience.

Bozar is a welcoming and dynamic arts house with a beating heart in Brussels. We provide a platform for artists from Belgium and the wider world. Victor Horta’s art deco building is akin to a living body, in which we encourage the free circulation of visual arts, music, film, performances and ideas. Bozar aims to be a vibrant space for the living arts.

Bozar transforms to sustain… Everyone in this house is driven by the transformative power of art, from the artists and visitors to our staff. Art plays a fundamental role in society, in a world that is in the throes of transformation. Art opens up a capacity for change, both on a personal and communal level. We live in critical times, at a tipping point that is riddled with challenges: ethical, demographic, democratic and ecological. Artists and thinkers are deeply cognizant of these issues.

Bozar inhales and inspires… Bozar is akin to a laboratory in which we collectively analyse the possibilities for positive societal change: how can art, both historic and contemporary, contribute to wider social transformations? The Bozar project is founded on democratic and ethical values, with a view to a fairer and more sustainable society that embraces solidarity.