Alternative Party program includes competitions, workshops, presentations and performances. The program is updated as we confirm more performers.
- Special guest – Nick Montfort
- Artist: Sam Aaron
- Artist: Takatsuna Mukai
- Artist: Heikki Parkkonen
- Artist: The Rise of the Annis: Anni Aartomaa, Anni Roihuvuo, Anni Salonen & Anni Murtosaari
Special guest – Nick montfort
We have a long-held tradition of inviting distinguished and prolific individuals from tech and artistic communities to Alternative Party, to share their experiences and visions.
This tradition continues this year – and we’re happy to announce that the special guest for Alternative Party 2024 is none other than Nick Montfort, Professor of Digital Media at MIT, lead organiser of the Synchrony demoparty, poet, and many other things! He will appear via a video link and will share not only his love for the demoscene but also ideas about generative narration, artificial intelligence and creativity.
P.S. Have you heard of his book titled “10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10”? https://www.10print.org/
Artists
Takatsuna Mukai
Takatsuna is a London based Japanese musician, composer, producer, sound artist and actor. He has worked across a wide range of Alternative Arts scene including music, theatre, film/video art, fashion, site-specific installation and dance.
“I believe that, while A.I. represents an unprecedented opportunity for humanity to transcend into the next stage of social/technological evolution, our own history suggests that the human nature itself will be the largest obstacle in achieving that goal, which will remain elusive unless we partake in an active reassessment of our inner selves and make the required changes in ourselves, in order to attain a new perspective necessary to make this process a fruitful one. In my opinion we have no other choices but to take this chance and start acting, as the alternative will be extremely bleak.”
Read more here
Sam Aaron
Sam Aaron’s futuristic cyberpunk music sets are improvised through the creation, manipulation and evaluation of live code. Harnessing the power of hand-coded algorithms, he surfs deterministic random streams to improvise unique rhythmic and melodic structures to dance to.
Sam live codes with Sonic Pi, a free software he created to engage the next generation of creative coders. Sonic Pi is used throughout the world to teach coding in schools, making live coding music accessible to everyone.
Heikki Parkkonen
Heikki Parkkonen, aka Hexagon, is a creative mind who merges sacred geometry, natural materials, and high technology in his immersive light installations. The project is a playground for arcane algorithms, occult bitstreams and tangible illusions. His work features prominently in festivals such as the Kosmos Festival and Wibes in addition to his own galleries.
Mandala.cafe is a web application for vector designers created by Heikki. Supporting different kinds of digital drawing gear, the program was initially developed for artists using laser cutters, CNC machines, and 3D printers, providing an intuitive toolset for sketching symmetrical artwork and exporting it as vector files or 3D models. Created with the intention to spark quick inspiration and lower the friction of starting something, the program hides a surprising depth of features beneath its simple interface.
AlgoRave
Algorave Helsinki is a semi-monthly open and free-form workshop/collective, where we practice live coding program languages together. With these different open source languages, it’s possible to quickly write code, which produces improvised electronic music in an intuitive way. This method largely differs music making with the traditional digital audio workstation programs.
We will use primarily TidalCycles as our main platform, which is a sort of a sequencer / sampler. TidalCycles is built upon a different open source program called SuperCollider. TidalCycles enables the use of your sample library and synthesizers with simple Haskell-language based commands and it is made especially for live use. We also use the aforementioned SuperCollider to dwell deeper into the magic of DSP and algorithmic MIDI generation.
The workshop will not have a teacher. Instead it’s an open space for learning and practicing different aspects of the programs together. Participating the workshop doesn’t require any previous knowledge about music making or programming. We strive to keep the workshop as easily approachable as possible and will assist any newcomers as best we can.
At the moment the core organizing team of Algorave Helsinki is Forces (Joonas Siren) and pulu (Miranda Kastemaa).
The Rise of the Annis: Anni Aartomaa, Anni Roihuvuo, Anni Salonen & Anni Murtosaari
Anni Aartomaa-@annikkiart
Annikki has been hoop dancing since 2012, having discovered electronic music a year earlier. What started as a hobby became a semi-professional pursuit, allowing her to join production teams for various events. After over a decade, Annikki has performed at both intimate underground gatherings and large festivals. Currently, she showcases her passion as a solo artist and as a member of the firegroup Roihu.
Anni Roihuvuo – @hypnotic.maelstrom
I am Anni Roihuvuo from Tampere. I am a dancer/choreographer, performance artist, event producer and a 3rd year IT student. I usually (but not always) perform with hula hoops. I can also code my led-hoops light patterns to match the music and choreography of the piece. I think this would be the perfect occasion for that kind of work.
Besides solo performing I am also part of a duo called Galactic Hoop Bums and do fire shows with Tulikukka. The latest show with Galactic Hoop Bums (in the picture) is more in the avant garde and performance side but still it’s a choreographed dance piece. We also made the music ourselves to the piece. It’s called ‘Mitosis’.
Anni Salonen – @delenda
delenda has been involved in the event industry as both a hobby and a profession since 2012. She is a video technician, a nerd, and she loves colors and lights even though she dresses in black. She prefers to create something by hand rather than sitting at a computer.
Anni Murtosaari – @annimurtosaariart
Anni has been working with decorations and event productions since 2013. She has done gigs in many cities across Finland and around Europe. Nowadays Anni combines generative and AI mixed visuals to decorations with video & pixel mapping techniques providing tailored visual worlds to all sorts of events. Anni is also teaming up with her partner Jaroneko producing things for events as DekoNeko and is working as a producer at Alternative Party this year.