In Search for the Third Reality

Symposium:


Session Title:
  • East & West (High & Low)

Presentation Title:
  • In Search for the Third Reality

Presenter(s):


Abstract:

  • Institutional Presentation Statement

    “The Third Reality” is a Russian centre for computer-oriented art recently founded in St. Petersburg. The Centre was created with the administrative and financial support of CREAT Inc., a major Russian Company specializing in the field of high technologies.

    Computer-based technologies took some time to reach Russia, the space and military industries being the first to adopt them. Within the last 3-4 years, however, computers started to penetrate into the mass media. Computer-designed opening titles and special effects appeared on the Russian TV screens. A number of private companies and corporations is currently specializing on computer animation for TV and computer-generated promotion spots for large corporations. CREAT Inc. has been and still remains one of the leaders in the area of multimedia and computer animation. Unfortunately, the application of computer technologies is today generally limited to commercial and advertising activities. These new technologies are not easily accessible to the artists – cinema workers, painters, musicians. While the theorists strive to comprehend the consequences of electronic technologies penetrating into the Western culture, the Russian artists suffer from the unavailability of this sophisticated equipment and sometimes, from the lack of information on the advanced technologies in question.

    The purpose of the First International Forum of Computer-oriented Art “In Search of the Third Reality” held in St.Petersburg in September 1993 was precisely to bridge this gap. The Center for Computer Oriented Art born as a result of the Forum has the same main purpose: to publicize and promote new technologies into the sphere of Art and Culture. The objectives of the Center are to accumulate information related to computer-based art and audiovisual culture, to foster the R&D and artistic studies on computer-based arts and to study the peculiarities of the assimilation process of the new technologies into the Russian culture. When commercial firms operating in the sphere of electronic technologies, such as CREAT Inc. realize that it is not enough to possess these technologies, it is necessary to learn to CREATE with their help, we may hope for new outstanding results from this union.

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