Moogfest and Research Triangle Park (RTP) have entered a five year partnership to celebrate the creative force behind scientific and technological innovations.
Moogfest is a platform for conversation and experimentation. The conference attracts creative and technology enthusiasts for three days of participatory programming in Durham, North Carolina. At night, Moogfest presents cutting-edge music in venues throughout the city. Performing artists include early pioneers in electronic music, alongside pop and avant-garde experimentalist.
The partnership is multi-part, including ‘future media’ art installations and public programs that reinforce RTP’s vision of a vibrant future based on big ideas.
RTP says a partnership with Moogfest introduces the Park to a broader audience: neighbors living in Durham and Moogfest attendees interested in science and technology. It provides a platform to communicate the vision for the Park Center Development as a truly new kind of collaborative space.
“At RTP, we have a commitment to education, pushing boundaries and exploring that unknown area that exists when art, technology, science and music converge,” says Bob Geolas, president and CEO of RTP in a statement.
“Partnering with Moogfest allows us to see this kind of collaboration in action, and it’s our hope to take what we learn and apply it to the ongoing redevelopment of RTP.”
“Moogfest, at its core, seeks to create a space through the festival where new ideas and new work can come to life,” says Marisa Brickman, Moogfest’s Festival Director. Park Center will be a new kind of ‘work, stay, play’ development that reimagines how spaces can inspire collaboration and innovation. The convergence of new technology and art are true to both brand’s DNA.”
RTP’s partnership with Moogfest includes three major components:
RTP Convergence
RTP Convergence will be an interactive installation in downtown Durham’s CCB Plaza that invites people to work with each other and the environment to collaboratively create cityscapes made of light.
Developed by Floating Point Collective, a field of LED rods form a volumetric display. Each rod is equipped with a touch sensor. When touched by a participant, colored light grows from their fingers, creating a light structure that rises into the sky and spreads outward through the other rods.
When people are not interacting with the sculpture directly, another layer of interaction is revealed. The light city is affected by real time light data, shifting colored particles and allowing colors to mix in organic ways.
In developing this concept, Floating Point Collective was inspired by research practices and discoveries that have come out of RTP. The designers were also inspired by the vision expressed in RTP’s redevelopment plans: a sustainable urban community that evolves in harmony with nature.
RTP Future Cities Conversation
Moogfest will kick off with a town hall-style conversation on how our “future cities” will combine information technology with buildings and urban infrastructure. A reimagined workplace, and increasingly flexible notions of recreation and entertainment, are the backdrop for an exciting collaboration between architects, planners, technologists, and artists: Tomorrowland is being built today. What are the pressing issues for designers and developers trying to imagine 10, 20, 50 years into the future? How do we balance safety and privacy, sustainability and open green space, overcrowding and happy collisions?
RTP STEAM Program
On Thursday, May 19; Friday, May 20 and Saturday, May 21, Moogfest’s RTP STEAM program will invite kids in select classes at Durham Public Schools to participate in tours, workshops, seminars and performances designed to promote science, technology, engineering, art and math.
More information available at Moogfest.com and RTP.org.
