The Guide to MUTEK Forum
The 9th edition of MUTEK Forum will take place from August 22nd to August 25th at The 7 Fingers in Tio'tia:ke/Mooniyang/Montréal, Canada.
Featuring a varied and carefully curated program examining our technological futures, each day of the Forum showcases innovation belonging to a specific track of digital creativity, ranging from digital creation and curation to artificial intelligence (AI), extended reality (XR) and electronic music industry.
Dive into this year's program
Day 1 - NEW HORIZONS: DIGITAL CREATION AND CURATION
The inaugural day of MUTEK Forum 2023 prompts the reimagining of both creation and curatorial methodologies in digital art.
Activities will explore new frameworks for the work of digital arts festivals in post-pandemic times, ethical alternatives to digital art tools, innovative approaches to digital art and music making, as well as the unique possibilities of cross-cultural and collaborative curation.
Forum
KEYNOTE | Opening talk: Festivals as radical rituals
PANEL | Future Festivals: Forging new horizons
KEYNOTE | Are machines empathetic? Gaze, surveillance and bias in computation
PANEL | Open source software as an ethical and responsible alternative: Challenges and opportunities
Q&A | Open Reel Ensemble: Reel-to-reel artist talk & demonstration
Lab
WORKSHOP | Crafting indie video games: An introductory workshop with Bitsy
PANEL | Curating cross- border collaborations: INSCAPE: NEW HOMEOSTASIS
WORKSHOP | Deploying ephemeral immersive spaces
Day 2 - ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: DESTABILIZING DIFFUSIONS
The AI-themed day expands interdisciplinary discussions by bringing together outstanding AI experts from MILA, the AI Now Institute, Dreaming Beyond AI, Data & Society, PHI and more.
DESTABILIZING DIFFUSIONS bridges questions of confronting tech’s power, the evolving role of AI in and through artistic practice, Indigenous ways of knowing as acts of resistance, the environmental cost of AI and its gender- and race-based biases, all while addressing the impactful arrival of general-purpose and generative AI tools in our collective consciousness. The day will come to a close with a special AI happy hour, featuring a very special guest.
Forum
KEYNOTE | Shifting narratives of AI: Confronting tech's power
PANEL | Resisting unstable diffusions: Art and the governance of AI
PRESENTATIONS | Transdisciplinary explorations of AI: Project presentations
Q&A | Artist talk: Animistic Beliefs & Jeisson Drenth
Lab
WORKSHOP | Connect the dots: Digital innovation, new audiences and unexpected collaborations
WORKSHOP | From text to sound: Building multi-modal AI agents
Lounge
- COCKTAIL | Data on the Rocks - AI Happy Hour
Day 3 - XR SALON, Presented by the Canada Media Fund (CMF)
Presented by the Canadian Media Fund (CMF), MUTEK’s highly reputed XR Salon returns to the Forum with representation from Atlas V, XN Québec, PHI, the National Film Board of Canada (NFB) and the MIT Open Documentary Lab. The day will begin with a talk by THE CATALYSTS, who will present their study on how to develop an innovative and sustainable economic model for the digital art ecosystem.
Before the report is shared with the general public in autumn 2023, the Forum will offer an exclusive preview of its findings, specifically those gathered from within the XR industry. Activities will delve into important questions of accessibility and inclusivity in the virtual, probe novel approaches and exciting prospects for XR distribution and feature fascinating XR projects exploring ecology and wellness.
Forum
KEYNOTE | Digital art as a business: XR in focus
PRESENTATIONS | XR landscapes
PANEL | Building bridges in the immersive : Advancing inclusivity and accessibility in XR
ROUND TABLE | Beyond the headset: Tactics and circuits for XR distribution
PANEL | From the studio to the spotlight: The transformative role of digital art residences
Lab
WORKSHOP | Building your brand DNA in the music industry
ROUND TABLE | (Jointly) Expanding orbits of future festivals
MASTERCLASS | Between the Keyframes: Humanity in Virtual Production
Lounge
- XR Salon Networking Cocktail, presented by CMF and Xn Quebec
And as part of our XR programming, we'll be presenting our Immersive Collection, a series of immersive works produced by MUTEK, from Wednesday August 23rd to Friday August 25th in the Forum lounge.
Day 4 - FUTURE OF MUSIC
For its last day, MUTEK Forum 2023 prototypes what’s next for the music industry with the help of changemakers and artists challenging conventions.
In collaboration with the Brian Eno-founded charity EarthPercent and research collective Water & Music, activities will examine the possibilities and impacts of AI-driven music making, imagine ways to better the music industry in the wake of the climate crisis, and highlight thrilling projects enabling and empowering artists to create a more equitable, sustainable, accessible and diverse ecosystem.
MUTEK is pleased to partner with Resident Advisor to present two activities: an RA Exchange with Eris Drew and a segment of The Art of Production with Tunisian musician and producer Deena Abdelwahed.
Forum
KEYNOTE | Finding our climate muse: A greener industry for electronic music
BOT OR NOT: Navigating AI-driven music creation
PRESENTATIONS | Building a better beat: Worldbuilding music’s future
Q&A | Artist talk: Eris Drew
Lab
MASTERCLASS | Art, AI and the law – IP for digital artists
MASTERCLASS | The Art of Production: Deena Abdelwahed
BEATMAKING WORKSHOP | Artbeat Montreal and Ableton present: Loop Sessions Speedrun
Lounge
- Cocktail: MUTEK Forum 2023 Closing Cocktail, presented by Notch with Water & Music DJs
THE ESSENTIALS OF THE FORUM
WHEN: Tuesday, August 22 through Friday, August 25
VENUE: at Les 7 Doigts, 2111 Boul. Saint-Laurent in Tio'tia:ke/Mooniyang/Montréal.
THE MUTEK FORUM APP
The MUTEK Forum App is the main networking tool for international professionals and Canadian artists to make valuable connections during the festival. You may use it to send messages to all other participants, book 1-on-1 meetings with them, and to register for limited capacity activities via a desktop computer or a smartphone. All Forum tickets and passes include access to the platform. Once you purchase a ticket, you receive an invitation to set up your account.
THE ESSENTIALS OF THE MARKET
For its fourth edition, the MUTEK Market is coming back in full force with its virtual networking platform connecting local and international artists with industry professionals from around the globe. After a highly successful 2022 edition that brought together more than 625 artists and industry professionals, the MUTEK Market aims to showcase the most cutting-edge projects in electronic music and digital art to both industry professionals and artists alike.
FUTURE FESTIVALS
Future Festivals is a research project funded by the Canada Arts Council, assembling a task-force of independent festival makers from Canada, Germany, and Mexico to collaboratively imagine how their work might evolve in the years and decades ahead. This year at the Forum, key activities have been developed as part of this initiative to foster important conversations relating to the project’s research.
Participating festivals include MUTEK (Montreal, CA), imagineNATIVE (Toronto, CA), Mois Multi (Quebec City, CA), MUTEK Mexico (Mexico City, MX), New Forms (Vancouver, CA), NEW NOW (Essen, DE), and Send+Receive (Winnipeg, CA) who draw on distinct curatorial agendas, communities, geographies and in many cases decades of institutional memory.
Future Festivals at the Forum :
- Opening talk: Festivals as radical rituals
- Future Festivals: Forging new horizons
- Digital art as a business: XR in focus
- XR landscapes
- (Jointly) Expanding orbits of future festivals
- Finding our climate muse: A greener industry for electronic music
ACCESSIBILITY
• Adress: 2111 boulevard St-Laurent, Montréal, Québec, H2X 2T5
• Contact: +1 514 521 4477
All Forum events will take place in the Studio 1 and the Dance Studio [LAB], both located on level 2. Entry is through the main entrance of The 7 Fingers Studio (2111 Saint-Laurent).
The rooms used will be Studio 2 and the Dance Studio [LAB], both located on level 2.
Cocktails and lunches will be held at the reception area on the ground floor.
No outside alcohol is permitted at any time.
The MUTEK Forum programming is open to all, but please note that they may not be specifically geared towards young audiences.
These events will not be streamed and will only be available in person.
The main Forum Room activities in English will be simultaneously transcribed live by the artificial intelligence application Colibri.ai (this concerns panels, presentations, Q&A and keynotes) for any attendees who will benefit from this accessibility feature. Those wishing to access this feature will find the session link at the beginning of each content in the MUTEK Forum application.
This is a beta service, we cannot guarantee 100% accurate transcription.
