video

Justice Minister Ester Capella says images “undermine right to intimacy”; Spanish government opens investigation

The 15th edition of the Barcelona LOOP festival opens its doors from May 18–27, presenting a retro-perspective of international video art production. The festival will show the works of video artists from the 60s, 70s, and 80s in different formats at more than 80 venues around Barcelona. According to Carolina Ciuti, the LOOP festival coordinator, the aim of this year’s edition is to “build bridges between the past and the present” in order to understand modern audiovisual art. The festival’s program was elaborated under the supervision of the renowned Catalan historians of audiovisual art and new media in Spain, Eugeni Bonet and Antoni Mercader. An Andy-Warhol-exhibition as well as a six-hour video marathon of the works of Paul McCarthy are among the festival’s highlights.

Barcelona Games World has kicked off this Thursday at the Montjuic Exhibition Centre in the Catalan Capital. In its first edition in Barcelona, after the organisers decided to move it from Madrid, the fair expects to surpass the 90,000 visitors that attended Madrid Games Week last year. The event, which will last until the 9^th of October, will count on the participation of 155 exhibitors setting up showcases by brands such as Electronic Arts, Nintendo and Badland Games. The fair will serve as a connecting point between businesses, facilitating the market for professionals who work in the field, but there will also be room for amateur and professional video games competitions and conferences by key gurus of the video game industry. 

The Barcelona Games World video game fair, to be held from the 6^th to the 9^th of October, has released more information about its upcoming event in 2016. Previously held in Madrid, the event will now also focus on mobile games, to “open (the fair) to other forms of interactive digital entertainment”, according to Josep Antoni Llopart, director of the fair. This decision was made in part thanks to Barcelona’s “bond” with the Mobile World Congress event. Still, the gamer will continue to be “the centre of the experience”, with over 90,000 expected to attend, competitions and prizes of up to €15,000, and the giants of the sector present (such as Nintendo, Sony, etc.). What’s more, another novelty is that the fair will be used to connect businesses, offer jobs, and help people who would like to do studies in the field of gaming. Lastly, there will be a ‘space for socialisation’ on the fairground, complete with lectures, concerts, music sessions with DJs, fashion shows and competitions.

Barcelona turns into a moving image hotspot again for over three weeks with the 14^th edition of LOOP, a festival dedicated to video art. Since 2003, it has provided a platform for both emerging and well-known international video artists to get together, with curated exhibitions taking place around the Catalan capital. Not only is it an event exhibiting high-quality video art, but also hosts workshops and other art events related to the moving image; as is the case again this year, with LOOP featuring over 400 artworks, 58 exhibition projects and 28 activities carried out through a budget of 77,000 euros. In this year's Festival, which is titled 'Faraway, so close', the main themes are 'Beyond the Black Box' and 'Back to the Black Box', exploring the connection between cinema and video art.

The 9th edition of the Videogame and Interactive Entertainment International Conference, Gamelab, takes place in the Catalan capital from the 26th to the 28th of June. This year the business fair and conference has moved to a smaller location – Catalonia’s Cinematheque. However, the number of participants remains the same and the expectations generated are probably bigger, since this year’s conference displays a top selection of “frontline speakers” at international level. In fact, Barcelona’s event has gradually become “one of the world congresses with the greatest influence” within the videogame industry and an “international reference” point, according to the organisers.

The world’s number one restaurant with three Michelin stars, has launched a new project called ‘El Somni’ (the Dream). The Dream of the restaurant El Celler de Can Roca is a project with the aim of bringing “a feelings explosion” to their guests. To do this, they have created a whole experience dinner which carefully combines cuisine, wine, audiovisual sources in 3D, live music and direct interaction with the diner. Only 12 exclusive guests will be able to feel The Dream. The dinner took place on the 6th May at the Arts Santa Mónica (Barcelona) but the Roca brothers want to export this idea to another 12 countries in two years’ time.

From May 17th to June 2nd video art invades over 150 spaces in Barcelona during the 10th edition of the Loop Fair and the Screen Festival. The first showcases the latest ideas in International video art. The second, Screen, offers close contact with audiovisual creative practices including the brightest ideas and latest developments, all in very different places. Moreover, this year’s new addition is the first ever Screen Forum Pro, an International Symposium under the slogan: “What about production?” The annual video art festival attracts numerous professionals from the world of art, including representatives of leading museums, artists and galleries worldwide, as well as an audience eager to discover the latest trends in video art.

Gamelab is organised in Barcelona for the first time and it will take place in the Catalan capital at least until 2015. It is the video game fair of Spain, which is the sixth market in the world. The trade fair contributes to consolidate Barcelona as a technology capital.