Festival X

This is the second edition of a festival that described itself as “the point of intersection between art, technology and the community … The main goal is to attract and create a community of open minded artists, scientists, and tech experts to come together and share knowledge”. It also aims to promote an alternative to “the ‘entertainment-only’ lifestyle in Dubai”.

That was for the original festival, which ran back in 2022 with some success. The upcoming version tomes down the rhetoric somewhat but retains a strapline of ‘arts / technology / science’ and adds an overlay of community. The UAE is seen as “a special ecosystem in which people and their culture, tools, and relationship with nature form a special alliance … This raises the question of how this complex life situation can be artistically reflected and what artistic forms of expression and tools can emerge from it … The contemporary form of media art, which engages with a society shaped by new technologies and the associated risks and opportunities, is presented …”

The organisers say their goal is to promote a local artistic community through this future-oriented art form” “inspired by the dynamics of the region’s unique circumstances, a distinct dialectic of media art will emerge”.

Sounds impressive, and at the very least Festival X should stimulate thought if not action. It runs for three days in Alserkal Avenue, with Exhibitions of curated installations and projects with the title  ‘From the past we love, to the future we need’ in Alserkal Avenue’s Concrete and Warehouse 46; a couple of Workshops; Performances in the evening on all three days; and a short programme of panel discussions.

The workshops are by new media artist Amir Bastan (“An Astrolabe for Computational Arts”, 10am on all three days) and James Kelly from NYUAD (active sound researcher/performer, vinyl enthusiast, and responsible for the interesting Phonography show back in February; his workshop is repeated on two days only). The performance schedule also looks interesting – they include a total of five sessions by James Kelly again, immersive AV installations from Italian artist Michela Pelusio, soundscapes by Safeya Alblooshi from NYUAD, and the very cool Sahar Homami who creates real-time visual content “at the intersection of art, technology, philosophy, and mysticism”.

The panels and presentations look to be more of a mixed bag, with a Keynote session on two days followed by a panel. The keynotes are two hours of bite-size contributions from individuals and organisations apparently without a specific theme, and they range from educational institutions like DIDI, VCUarts Qatar, and NYUAD through local business-oriented organisations like PwC Middle East and Dubai Economy & Tourism to thought leaders Ars Electronica and Alserkal Avenue (the original inspiration for Festival X does apparently come largely from Ars Electronica, an Austrian new media art institute which also runs a similar “festival for art, technology and society“).

That leaves two panels, both of which seem to us to be a little underserved timewise and slightly baffling in their choice of subject. There’s only 45 minutes for the first, ‘How to Create a Connection Between Tradition, Innovation and Vision’ with which has contributions from Ars Electronica, Alserkal Avenue, Dubai Future Foundation, Dubai Department of Economy & Tourism Dubai, and PwC MiddleEast. The moderator is Olof Van Winden, Founder and Director of TodaysArt Festival (maybe we’ll get to hear whether the Festival will be returning in its original format). And on the final day there’s what looks like another meaty topic with only an hour allowed for it; we think the subject is ‘The University Portal: Fast Forward To The Future And Back’, which makes sense given that the panellists come from all those educational bodies (with Amir Bastan as moderator), but elsewhere in the website it’s listed as ‘How Media Artists Can Shape the Future’.

The best news is that it’s all free, though you do have to pre-register for individual sessions presumably to give the organisers a chance to manage numbers.