A.C.T – Art/Community/Technology. The Cross-Cultural Creative Mashup

Germany and Israel are connected by a diverse range of different networks; in 2015, it will be a whole 50 years of German-Israeli relations that the two countries will be able to look back on. This anniversary is reason enough for the Tmuna Theater Tel Aviv to create a new web platform which people doing creative work, communities and project developers can use to make new connections as well as intensifying and extending existing ones. The concepts behind the abbreviation A.T.C. are the order of the day: art, community, technology. Cross-cultural, interdisciplinary dialogue is the goal here, with the Internet representing a place accessible to (nearly) everyone for developing new bilateral projects. The focus here is on connecting everyday life, art and technology, using cultural means to stimulate social processes and bringing together online social networks and local communities.

The platform A.T.C. thus isn’t just about its own agenda, but also offers potential project partners a basis for meetings and exchange, (inter-)active cooperation and thus ultimately also diverse opportunities for shared design and participation. In the process, the Internet itself becomes a place for becoming part of things: events, exhibitions, concerts and discussions will be brought together online and thus made accessible to a large number of people – who are then, in turn, inspired to set up new projects of their own. The users themselves thus become creative, with the ongoing development and use of the platform equally becoming their own concern. In the end, A.T.C. is one thing more than anything else: a participatory networking project and laboratory for ideas which makes use of the possibilities of social networks and digital interaction in innovative fashion; a place (not just) for those creating culture which stimulates discussion about socially relevant themes in Germany and Israel; a place which is the starting point for projects in the analogue world and that return to and are discussed and further developed within it. All in all, a most important place.

The A.T.C. Internet platform is a project by the Tmuna Theater Tel Aviv and offers a new basis for networking to artists, project developers and communities as well as any other interested parties from Germany and Israel. The projects created via the platform connect everyday life, art and technology in the two countries. The conception and implementation of the platform will take place in the period between May 1st, 2013 and December 31st, 2015, although the project will begin unilaterally and extend into the bilateral realm as it progresses. The development of the platform will be recorded in a report and accompanying research conducted by the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design, Jerusalem and the Berlin University of the Arts.