Animation by Katrīna Sadovņikova

From February 26 to March 3, the second Valmiera International Multimedia Festival will take place, bringing together artists from Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania, Canada, and Norway to explore the diverse possibilities of using technology to create new forms and content in art. One of the festival’s curators is creative producer Elizabete Palasiosa, who combines both traditional and digital media in her work. In the Nice Touch section, Elizabete recommends an augmented reality art app created in Latvia.

Nice Touch Editorial February 23, 2024

«In my daily work with cultural projects and different forms of content, I often have to analyse and use the possibilities offered by technology for both content creation and representation. During my many years of creative work, I have developed a particular fondness for augmented reality and its extremely diverse applications. Content in a specific GPS location, scannable graphics that virtually come to life before your eyes, 3D installations in urban environments, interactive solutions, and many other possibilities are in principle available to anyone using a smartphone or tablet. Augmented reality strikes a good balance between cost, accessibility, and creativity. There are a number of very good and user-friendly apps developed in Latvia, but I would like to highlight the Art+ app, which is an augmented reality art gallery available both in the app stores and in the web browser. It is a great way to integrate digital artworks in different locations, to tell stories, to reveal the invisible or hide the visible, to realise impossible visions, to build the future, or to bring back lost cultural heritage. The Valmiera International Multimedia Festival is also creating its own collection of artworks on the Art+ platform, which is now offering nine works by new media artists to be discovered in the urban environment of Valmiera.»

Elizabete Palasiosa is a creative producer and lecturer at the Latvian Academy of Culture. Together with producer Marta Kontiņa, she founded Story Hub, a company that produces interdisciplinary projects as well as multimedia and interactive content.

 

Elizabete and Marta have worked together on the programme of the second Valmiera International Multimedia Festival. The aim of the festival is to create a platform to explore modern technologies and how they can be used in the creation of artistic content and forms, as well as to foster dialogue and knowledge exchange between practitioners, scholars, technology experts, and the public. More information about the festival programme is available on the Valmiera Municipality website and on the Valmiera International Multimedia Festival Facebook and Instagram accounts. The festival is organised by Valmiera Municipality in cooperation with Story Hub. The arts and education programme for young people is supported by an EEA grant.