AHA Activism Hacking Artivism

Self-portrait

AHA: l'arte di fare network.

AHA: Activism-Hacking-Artivism e' un progetto di networking artistico, ideato da Tatiana Bazzichelli alla fine del 2001. I concetti principali di AHA, sono Activism = attivismo politico, Hacking = attivismo tecnologico, Artivism = attivismo artistico.

AHA si basa sulla creazione di un network in costante mutazione realizzato da soggetti sempre diversi e attivato dalla contaminazione/integrazione di molteplici media ed eventi, in cui il filo conduttore e' la sperimentazione artistica, l'hacktivism e la net art.

AHA: Activism-Hacking-Artivism si focalizza sulle collettivita' attiviste in Italia e all'estero che usano i nuovi media in forma indipendente, evidenziandone le diverse modalita' d'azione. (http://www.ecn.org/aha/progetto.htm)

Description

AHA: Activism-Hacking-Artivism is a project started in Italy by Tatiana Bazzichelli at the end of 2001. Its main themes are experimental art, hacktivism and net art in Italy, although members and initiatives from other countries are included.

AHA organizes events, exhibits, conferences and workshops by exchanging projects and ideas through a 600 member-strong mailing list (aha@lists.ecn.org) started in 2002 and has been part of Nettime since 2003. AHA is also a website that works as a showcase for all its activities, providing space for burgeoning art projects looking to be hosted on the Isole nella Rete server. Additionally, the project is supplemented with theoretician’s texts and articles on the history and current state of artivism (also known as art activism), hacktivism and net art.

Tatiana Bazzichelli transferred the project to Berlin in 2003, where the AHA made an appearance at the Chaos Communication Camp organized by the Chaos Computer Club European hacking group, with exhibits, conferences, events and collaborative activities. Among the AHA’s international appearances, the “Media Democracy and Tele Street: establishing an open television network” exhibit is a highlight, shown in Monaco in 2004 at the Muffathalle center; another highlight is the “hack.it.art: Hacktivism in the context of art and mass media in Italy” event-exhibit, shown in Berlin in 2005 at the Municipal Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien museum, and also as part of the program at the Transmediale international new media festival. After these two appearances, there was also a conference on Italian art networks at the Sardisches Kulturzentrum ending July 2005. On October 2006, research on hacktivism was mixed with sexuality at the CUM2CUT Festival and the Indie-Porn-Short-Film Festival. In 2008, they conducted the “HACK.Fem.EAST.: women and the Eastern European technology network” exhibit at the Kunstraum Kreuzberg/Bethanien. In 2009 they conducted an event called “Sousveillance: the art of reverse surveillance” at the Aarhus University in Denmark, where the AHA has been based since September 2008.

In December 2006 Costa & Nolan Milan published “Networking, la rete come arte”, a book written by Tatiana Bazzichelli with a preface from Derrick De Kerckhove and an epilogue by Simonetta Fadda. The 336-page book summarizes the history and current state of Italian art networks. Its English version was published by the Center for Digital Aesthetics Research at Aarhus University. Both publications are downloadable for free at the wiki’s library.

Completed projects

AHA List on Artistic, Activism and net Culture http://dpya.org/en/index.php/AHA_List_on_artistic_activism_and_net_culture

Interview

Tatiana Bazzichelli http://dpya.org/wiki/index.php/Tatiana_Bazzichelli

Links

URL: http://www.ecn.org/aha/

Wayback Machine: http://web.archive.org/web/20161229005605/http://www.ecn.org/aha/