The Digital Literature Hackathon on 16th to 18th April 2021 was filled with creativity, concept making and getting to know each other. The jury, that consists of poet-scholar Matti Kangaskoski, director Mika Taanila and producer of the Aalto Studios Hetta Huhtamäki, has, of the 11 concepts presented during the weekend, chosen five to further development. The actualized five artworks will be presented in the Night of Digital Literature on 19th August 2021 in Cinema Orion, Helsinki as a part of the Poetry Moon -festival. On the Digital Literature Projects behalf, we want to thank all participants of the Digital Literature Hackathon. You can read the jurys decision below.
The jury was impressed by the technical and the thematic range of the concepts presented in the Digital Literature Hackathon as well as the detailed project proposals that were made in a very short time. Many of the concepts were evolved from idea phase to concrete realization plans. The jury also noted the wide range of different concepts.
In their final decision the jury focused on the originality of the ideas, the use of digital thinking and tools in ways that are interesting and awake interpretations, the influence of the works of art, the connection between the form and the content and risk-taking. The jury warmly thanks all that participated the Hackathon.
The five projects, that are chosen to further development are (in a random order):
Socially Awkward System
Socially Awkward System is an app, that gets its inspiration from the social distancing of the pandemic era and that uses machine learning, in which the machine learns social skills and interacts with the audience and the public conversation. It makes use of both the audio- video- and text formed impulses collected from the audience and material that is quarried from the internet. The jury saw appropriate fragility, uncertainty and aesthetics of glitch in the well developed thinking and technical concept of the project. The jury awaits with excitement for the continuing of the work, and especially the installation actualized in a physical space.
Group members: Lauri Hei, Veera Jussila, Joonas Puuppo, Santeri Salmirinne, Marloes van Son
Telemarketeer (Mukavalla asialla)
Telemarketeer plays with a recognizable and daily situation. The concept that roleplays with telemarketing opens up to a variation of dramaturgical further develpoments from short, humoristic therapy experiences to weeks-long processes of getting to know the virtual telemarketeer. The genre of the artwork is according the group “a casual roleplay with avantgarde twist”, and it makes use of the rhetorical appeals to strengthen the opposite part of the telemarketeer – or to provide the telemarketeers even more effective ways of persuation? The jury felt that the idea of the artwork was inspiring and open to many variations and paths of further develpoment.
Group members: Hilkka Haaga, Lea Kalenius, Miia Seppänen, Frida Maria Pessi
<3
<3 or the heart impressed the jury with its peculiar touch that reached even the presentation. The artwork avoided the exact definitions that the jury tried to reach and produced fruitful, interpretation-awakening confusion with its positive megalomania, artistic inventiveness and feelings of danger and risk-taking. The brutal, beautiful, futuristic project aims to change the noise of internet and especially hate speech to poetry and love by making use of the raw data, that is created of audio files transformed of hate speech symbols, and quarried poetry in several languages. The technical skills and concept understanding that reached even the meta level created trust for the concepts succeeding in further development. The jury was perplexed and smiled when weighing this project.
Group members: Camilo Sanchez & Liisi Soroush
Railo
Railo, as many of the presented works, focuses on a current theme, but handles the theme in an unexpected way. In the game-like structure of the artwork, the quickening climate change draws a parallel with the level of concentration of the reader; the gamer has to jump from a ice floe to another reading poems before the ice floe melts. Through the thematic comparison the funny ice floes and light game-likeness bring depth to the concept that focuses on the otherwise familiar theme. In addition, the jury got the impression that one can not win the game through jumping from an ice floe to another, and that instead, the game leads to an inevitable defeat. In this way, the artwork opens up to thoughts of the short- or long tempered thinking around the climate change talk. The jury appreciated the web-based form of the artwork for its accessibility and the technical and artistic readiness to actualize the concept in the time frame provided by the Digital Literature Project.
Group members: Tuukka Pasanen, Sanna Telkki-Kova, Riikka Helle-Kotka, Timo Salo
Speak to me
Speak to me draws a parallel between a machine and a forest as well as between the biodiversity and the poetic diversity in an interesting way. In the artwork the reader-user talks to the app, that learns from talk and reacts to it as well as advices the reader to act. The interactive poem generator grows its poetry tree stem while the artwork continues and the amount of readers increases, which is: the artwork grows as a forest. The concept of the work opens up to many kinds of interpretations both of the relation between a human and a machine and the relation between a human and a forest. The jury noted the readiness of the group to actualize the project on the platform the group has chosen.
Group members: J.P. Sipilä, Heidi Halonen, Kati-Annika Ansas, Maija Saksman