transmediale.04 invites you for an excursion into the utopias of an age determined by media and technologies.

THERE IS HOPE.
The ideologies of the 20th century and their illusions about a perfect world are obsolete. Modern technology has lost the air of a universal remedy, instead its potential for the development of creative action and human community is being explored.
Artists are turning to the design and reflection of the information society, i.e. to the factual and to the many hypothetical societies of the digital age. The uniformity of a standardised global media zone is countered by a heterogeneous multiplicity of competent users and producers who are appropriating digital technologies according to their own cultural needs.

THERE IS NO HOPE.
At the beginning of the 21st century, the modern ideals are transformed into the ugly caricature of a world torn apart by global conflict and claims to unlimited power. Calls for technological progress hide the emergence of ever more perfected, irrational societies of control which are busy destroying their cultural and natural resources.
This unavoidable reality can only be escaped by means of the projection of imaginary places. These may be mythical pasts, unreal parallel worlds, or a fantastic Science Fiction future. They are the escape vehicles of an imagination which attempts to surpass the boundaries of reality.

FLY UTOPIA!