Spot of the Month: Arbor Artificialis Naturalis

Our first spot of the month was made by Tijn Kooijmans, who pinpointed the first Dutch Arbor Artificialis Naturalis planted in 1999 by telecom provider Libertel.

You too can share your favorite and most peculiar nextnature spots in your surroundings via our nextnature spotter for iPhone. Who knows your submission will be the spot of the month someday which means fame & goodies. Congratulations Tijn, T-shirt and DVD are coming your way.

Infotizement Call For Entries

In anticipation of the forthcoming Next Nature book, we call upon you, dearest creatives, to submit a fictitious editorial advertisement: The Infotizement.

The infotizement is a new editorial typology that is the exact opposite of the advertorial, which presents itself as editorial content but is in fact an advertisement in disguise. The infotizement presents itself as an ad and aggressively exploits the visual language of advertising – but rather than trying to sell you something, it conveys a story, message or statement.

Sounds nice, but what’s in it for me?
The best infotizements will be published in the forthcoming Next Nature book (see below) and the submitters of selected infotizements receive a free copy. Additionally, the top 3 submissions are awarded with a Next Nature goodie package, including a DVD, icon watch, and t-shirt.
How to contribute?
Take the following in consideration when submitting:

– Download the Infotizement Call For Entries pdf file (852Kb)
– Take a post or observation from nextnature.net as inspiration, this gives your infotizement focus
– Use the classical elements of advertising: image, payoff (slogan) and logo (sender)
– Give your infotizement a corporate feel: high-quality, seductive imagery, packshots, commercial typesetting etc.
– Use and misuse corporate logos, or invent your own
– Study the examples in this pdf
– Page size = 40p x 56p (170 x 238mm)
– Margins =3p (12,7mm)
– Bleed on every side: 1p (= 5mm)
– Image quality preferrably 300 dpi / 100% size
– If you use other people’s images, please include image credits, or a source/url
where you found the used material so that we can clear the rights.
– Send your submission before friday oktober 22nd, 2010 to: infotizement@nextnature.net

Jury (to be confirmed)
Your infotizements will be judged by a jury consisting of Koert van Mensvoort and Hendrik-Jan Grievink (editors of the Next Nature book), Arnoud van den Heuvel (editor nextnature.net), Rolf Coppens (editor nextnature.net), Mieke Gerritzen (designer and director of the Graphic Design Museum Breda, NL), Daniel van der Velden (designer, teacher, researcher and co-founder of Metahaven) and Dagan Cohen (creative director at Draftfcb).

Digital mockup of the Next Nature book, designed by Hendrik-Jan Grievink.

About the book
In a highly visual, magazine-style way, the Next Nature book combines re-edited material from NextNature.net with new material such as maps, graphs, visual essays and written contributions by Next Nature mavericks such as Kevin Kelly, Bruce Sterling, Rachel Armstrong, Peter Lunenfeld and Tracy Metz.

– Circulation: 4.000 copies
– Editing and design: Koert van Mensvoort and Hendrik-Jan Grievink
– Volume: 521 pages over seven chapters
– Binding: seven separate magazines, glued together in one softcover volume
– Release date: early 2011
– Publisher: Actar, Barcelona

Nano Supermarket – Jury Report

Nanotechnology is an important emerging technology of our time – it radically intervenes with our sense of what is natural – yet most people are still relatively unaware of its consequences. Hence, this autumn 2010 the Next Nature NANO Supermarket will be presented in Eindhoven (NL): a physical supermarket featuring debate–provoking visions on possible nanotech products expected to hit the shelves between today and 2020.

Designers, technologists and artists were called to submit their speculative nanotech products for the NANO supermarket. A selection of these projects will be presented in the NANO Supermarket and the accompanying publication. On Thursday, June 10th, a NANO Supermarket jury consisting of design and science experts awarded the best submission a € 2,500 prize. Furthermore, three submissions have been awarded an Honorable Mention in recognition of the quality of their project proposals.

Read more »

NANO Supermarket – One Day left to Submit your speculative Product

Self–healing anti scratch surfaces, tasty medicine, contact lenses with a display, molecular printed food, diabetes tattoos, cyborg insects, tooth phones, organic jewelry, twitter implants or whatever you can envision.

You have little over one day left to submit your speculative nanotech products for the NANO supermarket. A selection of the projects will be presented in the Nano Supermarket which will open its doors this autumn. The best submission is awarded with a € 2500 price.

Event website: http://www.nextnature.net/events/nano-supermarket/

NANO Supermarket – Introducing the Jury

Ten days left to submit your speculative product idea for the Nano Supermarket. The jury that will select the finest submissions – to be exhibited in the Nano Supermarket this autumn and award the 2500 euro price – consist of distinguished scientists, designers, artists, critics and thinkers. Here is the list:

Prof. Dr. Bas Haring – Philosopher, Writer, Professor for the Public Understanding of Science, Leiden Universtity
Prof. Dr. Bert Meijer – Distinguished University Professor in the Molecular Sciences, TU Eindhoven
Prof. Dr. ing Dave Blank – Professor Inorganic Materials Science, TU Twente
Drs. Karin Spaink – Writer, Columnist, Activist
Dr Lucien Hanssen – Academic Entrepreneur, Promoter of imagination in Science
Prof Dr. Ir. René Janssen – Professor in Physical Organic Chemistry, TU Eindhoven
Dr. Ir. Rinie van Est – Technology Assessor, Rathenau Institute
Ronald van Tienhoven – Artist, Design Educator, Social & Cultural Expert
Taco Stolk – Artist, Founder department of Genetic Design

We are proud to bring together such excellent people from such a broad spectrum of disciplines, who will undoubtedly be capable to judge the submission on their merits. If you haven’t submitted yet, download the submission form now.

Next Nature Spotter – iPhone application

While the spotting of old nature phenomena in our surroundings – birds, insects, trees, stars, etc – has a large tradition enjoyed by millions, the spotting of next nature phenomena is still more quirky and yet to be defined.

Join our quest to explore nature caused by people. If you own an iPhone, use this free application to spot next nature phenomena around you. On a map you can see all spots that are submitted in your neighborhood and comment on them. Of course there is also an integrated blog reader and additional info on next nature including a visual essay and FAQ.

The Next Nature spotter was developed in collaboration with Studio Sophisti, with support of the Mondriaan Foundation. Comments and ideas for improvements are welcome!

p.s. Although next nature is first and foremost a philosophical view on the interrelation between people, nature and technology in the larger evolutionary game, of which we realize the effects are not always necessarily visible in a geographical sense, we still find it worthwhile to see how this reflects in our surroundings.

8-bit Icon Watch

Remember that aggravating 8-bit pixeled watch icon that used to replace your mouse cursor whenever your Apple computer was ‘taking time’ to finish a task? Displaying a wristwatch to show your computer was busy always felt like an odd metaphor – likewise for the sand clock icon on Microsoft computers – yet once it was replaced by the animated rainbow warp, people immediately missed it.

Luckily for all you pixel-nostalgics out there, the icon watch now boomeranged into the physical world. To be worn as a wrist clock for 8-bit retro time telling. Get yours and keep this lost symbol of the pixel era alive. Pass it on to your children!

Read more »

Nano Supermarket – Call for Products

Nanotechnology is an important emerging technology of our time – it radically intervenes with our sense of what is natural – yet most people are still relatively unaware of its consequences. Hence, this autumn 2010 the Next Nature NANO Supermarket will be presented in Eindhoven (NL): a physical supermarket featuring debate–provoking visions on possible nanotech products expected to hit the shelves between today and 2020.

Self–cleaning windows, contact lenses with a display, smart medicines that are delivered exactly on the spot, molecular printed food, blush–reducing make-up, self–healing anti scratch surfaces, nano-particle tagging spray that may identify your possessions when stolen, cyborg insects, breathing textiles, tooth phones, organic jewelry, implantable microprocessors and whatever you may think of.

We call upon designers, technologists and artists to submit their speculative nanotech products for the NANO supermarket. A selection of the projects will be presented in the Nano Supermarket and the accompanying publication. The best submission is awarded with a € 2500 price

Event website: http://www.nextnature.net/events/nano-supermarket/

The Playboy Interview: Marshall McLuhan

A candid conversation with the high priest of popcult and metaphysician of media.

From “The Playboy Interview: Marshall McLuhan”, Playboy Magazine, March 1969. © Playboy

In 1961, the name of Marshall McLuhan was unknown to everyone but his English students at the University of Toronto — and a coterie of academic admirers who followed his abstruse articles in small-circulation quarterlies. But then came two remarkable books — The Gutenberg Galaxy (1962) and Understanding Media (1964) — and the graying professor from Canada’s western hinterlands soon found himself characterized by the San Francisco Chronicle as “the hottest academic property around.” He has since won a world-wide following for his brilliant — and frequently baffling — theories about the impact of the media on man; and his name has entered the French language as mucluhanisme, a synonym for the world of pop culture.

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Nature Transformer – Microwave Festival 2009

If you happen to be in the neighborhood, you may want to attend that inspirational Next Nature lecture Dr. Van Mensvoort will be throwing this Sunday 15-11-2009 at the Microwave International New Media Arts Festival in Hong Kong.

The festival is highly resonating on the nature caused by people. They will also screen parts of the Next Nature DVD and reprint the Real Nature is not Green essay. Nature transforms along with us!

Next Nature DVD

A DVD with over twenty visions of artists, scientists, designers, filmmakers and thinkers who present their powerful imagery, radical ideas and visionary statements on how we can design, build and live in on the nature caused by people.

Filmed during the Biggest Visual Power Shows at Paradiso, Amsterdam (NL), Zeche Zolverein (DE) and the Million Dollar Theater in Los Angeles (USA). The DVD box contains a booklet including the essay Real Nature is not Green. Among the presenters are Floris Kaayk, Kevin Kelly, Tobie Kerridge, Jack van Wijk, Sunny Bergman, Hendrik-Jan Grievink, Karl Grandin, Casey Alt, Amir Admoni, Jos de Mul, Tracy Metz, Henk Oosterling and many more.

Read more »

Ars Electronica Festival goes Next Nature

This years edition of the Ars Electronica festival, which has been hangout for international experts from the arts and sciences for almost three decades, focuses on the nature caused by people:

Human Nature: The Reinvention of Nature

We are entering a new age here on Earth: the Anthropocene. An age definitively characterized by humankind’s massive and irreversible influences on our home planet. Population explosion, climate change, the poisoning of the environment and our venturing into outer space have been the most striking symbols of this development so far.

But to a much more enormous extent, the achievements of genetic engineering and biotechnology are the truly indicative markers of this transition to a new epoch. Now, we’re not only changing our environment; we’re revising the fundamentals of life itself—even our own human life.

Among the works on display are the Cloned robot professor, Flesh nike, Living doll, Cloned beef, human body farming and conductive bodypaint.

Ars Electronica 2009: Human Nature is organized from September 3rd – 8th in Linz, Austria.