Presented by the City of Alexandria’s Office of the Arts and Virginia Tech’s Institute for Creativity, Arts, and Technology (ICAT), School of Performing Arts (SOPA), and School of Visual Arts (SOVA).
This event is by invitation or RSVP only.
Schedule:
- 5:30 – 6:00pm: Reception with food and open bar
- 6:oo – 6:45pm: Performance by Laptop Orchestra
- 6:45pm: Q&A with Laptop Orchestra, reception with food and open bar
- 7:30pm: Evening ends
The performance and reception are part of “Creativity, Empathy and AI: A National Summit on The Human-AI Creative Partnership” hosted at Torpedo Factory Art Center by the Alexandria Office of the Arts, with Virginia Tech, Penn State, Carnegie Mellon, and a2ru. The second day of the summit is located at the National Academy of Sciences in Washington DC.
About Creativity, Empathy and AI: A National Summit on The Human-AI Creative Partnership
A gathering of those at the forefront of leveraging technology for creative generation – The influence of AI has been widely felt across a wide range of artistic, expressive and creative domains. Across theater and performance, music, design and architecture, the fine arts, creative writing and the humanities, experts and practitioners have been crafting a point of view and policies at their universities, in their classrooms, in research, and in practice on how to explore the nuances, capture the promise, and confront the challenges of new AI technologies rather than avoiding them or regulating student use. With practitioners and educators at the nexus of creativity and AI, this is the first time the network is convening nationally to focus singularly on advancing human-computer creative partnerships to transform participatory teaching, learning and creative practice.
Learn More Here
About Laptop Orchestra
Synopsis
Virginia Tech faculty artist-scholars Dr. Ivica Ico Bukvic and Prof. Thomas Tucker in collaboration with the Linux Laptop Orchestra (L2Ork) students and community members present an evening of telematic performances. Using L2Ork Tweeter, a free and open source software developed by Bukvic, the ensemble will perform three co-created electronic dance music (EDM) pieces that require perfect synchronization. The said software ensures that despite having participants over 5,000 miles apart in Buenos Aires, Argentina, the performers will remain in perfect sync. All three works are based on excerpts from published EDM songs that were used as a foundation for co-created theme and variations. Every aspect of said works is co-created, including digital instruments, musical ideas, structure, and ultimately performance. Musical elements are further captured by Tucker’s projection mapping that visually punctuates hypnotic upbeat music.
Relevant to the symposium, elements of the experience were devised using AI, including projection mapped textures that correspond to the song’s title and theme. Further, L2Ork Tweeter is currently being used as a foundation for a research into developing a live AI co-creator, a goal that has largely remained elusive in a recent race to create an AI-based artist.
About L2Ork
Named as one of the top six national transdisciplinary exemplars (a2ru, 2015), and one of the top eight research projects at Virginia Tech (DCist, 2014), a contemporary multimedia ensemble Linux Laptop Orchestra or L2Ork (pronounced as ‘lohrk’), explores the collaborative nature of ensemble-based musicking through the use of innovative human-computer interaction technologies. L2Ork seeks an integrative approach to arts, design, engineering, and science, and nurtures communities eager to explore the boundaries of music through technology.
Founded by Dr. Ivica Ico Bukvic in May 2009, L2Ork is part of an interdisciplinary initiative by Virginia Tech College of Architecture, Arts, and Design, the School of Performing Arts and its DISIS Interactive Sound & Intermedia Studio (DISIS), and the Institute for Creativity, Arts, and Technology (ICAT). As the world’s first Linux-based laptop orchestra incorporating extensive study of gesture and Taiji (Tai Chi) choreography and other extended performance techniques L2Ork offers optimal infrastructure for creative research at minimal cost. By pursuing a seamless integration of arts, design, science, and engineering, it in part seeks to bridge the gap between STEM and the Arts, with particular focus on K-12 education.
Since its inception, the initiative has helped start seven laptop orchestras in North and South Americas. L2Ork’s infrastructural backbone Pd-L2Ork, a visual programming environment with its unique K-12 learning module has been utilized in dozens of K-12 Maker workshops, including the 2014 Raspberry Pi Orchestra summer gifted program, and the ongoing 13-year partnership with the Boys & Girls Club of SW VA. In 2020, the ensemble introduced L2Ork Tweeter, its new free and open-source online platform for collaborative instrument design, ideation, improvisation, composition, rehearsal, and performance, that has served as a foundation for an international L2Ork community ensemble.
Virginia Tech L2Ork Members
- Rohin Batra
- Ivica Ico Bukvic, Director
- Caroline Flynn
- Austin Sherwood
- Jacob Alan Smith
- Diego Urquizo
- Andrew Wickman
- Lane Michael Wills
- Cameron Young
- Jin Yun
L2Ork Tweeter Community Members
- L2Ork Community Ensemble
- Gala Gonzalez Barrios (Virginia Tech, UNTREF)
- Rohin Batra (Virginia Tech)
- Ivica Ico Bukvic, Director (Virginia Tech)
- Justin Kerobo (Virginia Tech)
- Daniel Manesh (Virginia Tech)
- Joaquín Montecino (UNTREF, Buenos Aires, Argentina)
- Jacob Alan Smith (Virginia Tech)
- Lauti Sosa (UNTREF, Buenos Aires, Argentina)
- Lane Wills (Virginia Tech)
About Virginia Tech Interdisciplinary Artist Scholars
The work of post-disciplinary creative Ivica Ico Bukvic (b. 1976) encompasses audio-visual, acoustic, and electronic research, technologies, performances, and installations, grants, and patent disclosures. His recent work focuses on creativity enabling technologies, such as mobile technology-mediated ensembles, and audio immersion, including spatialization and data sonification. Bukvic currently serves as the Director of Virginia Tech Institute for Creativity, Arts, and Technology’s Creativity + Innovation interdisciplinary initiative. He is the founder and director of the Digital Interactive Sound and Intermedia Studio (DISIS) and the Linux Laptop Orchestra (L2Ork), and a member of the Center for Human-Computer Interaction with a courtesy appointment in Computer Science. For additional info visit ico.bukvic.net
As a visual artist, Thomas Tucker specializes in harnessing new technologies to unveil invisible or immaterial subjects, ranging from unseeable forces to complex geometries and histories. His applied research spans virtual spatial environments, groundbreaking scientific and historic visualizations, and dynamic interactive artworks. Engaging in transdisciplinary collaborations at the forefront of art, technology, humanities, and sciences shapes his practice, evident in research contributions at this critical intersection. As a Creative Director, Thomas leads projects that exemplify successful transdisciplinary collaboration models, integrating art, creative technology, and visualization across diverse research methodologies. His work facilitates the integration of creative methodologies and technologies, aiding researchers in visualizing the intangible. This approach directly influences his teaching, enabling students to grow professionally within research collaborations and acquire innovative creative research methodologies through hands-on projects.
For additional information visit
- https://l2ork.music.vt.edu
- https://youtube.com/VTDISIS
- http://ico.bukvic.net
- http://thomastucker.net/
