My name is Karina Smigla-Bobinski
and I am very honored
to be here
in this wonderful place.
I would like to talk a bit about my development,
so that you get an idea about my interests,
my work processes
and my artistic methods.
It was the painting I began with.
In Krakow, I lerned the classical part of art:
the historical painting techniques,
the nude drawing,
the art history.
In Munich, I switched to abstract painting
and here a new door opened up for me
to a completely different world of colors.
So I wanted to understand the mechanisms behind it
and started an artistic basic research.
I wanted to understand what exactly is this "color".
It didn't last long then
I found myself
between waves and particles of light.
Pretty soon after,
I asked myself the question:
Why should I pretend with color and canvas
a depth or a movement,
if instead of the oil color
I could take the light
and instead of a fake space
I could take a real space?
And so I reconstruct one of my paintings
in a gallery space.
Layers of tulle fabric
took over the function of the layers of paint
and color light
from slide projectors
were the paint.
This was my first installation
and at the same time
it was an interactive one ...
because I decided
to let the visitors walk between the layers
to create by that
a sort of animation.
That brought me in 2000 to the theater
where until 2008
I made video stage.
Every time what I'm asked
what kind of artist I am,
I can't answer that easily
and I don't like to commit myself either ...
But I think,
... if any ...
the term Intermedia artist
could work best.
My repertoire includes
classical and modern art techniques.
I move between
digital and analog.
And that gives me the freedom
to use the technology
that best suits the project.
The medium is also the message.
I am not afraid
to mix the techniques or the worlds
... or even to interchange them.
I like the unorthodox approaches
that allow us
new fascinating perspectives.
My topics are those of today
but I keep our subjective view in mind
and that's all about the black box of our head.
We try to understand
what's going on outside the box,
but for that
we first have to understand
what's going on in there.
Only thing we can do
is to increase our perception
of the experiences of the others.
In this way we can
in a cubist manner tinker the world together.
And so we also hope
to get closer to the reality.
As an artist,
my premiere perception
is the visual one.
I think in pictures
and I articulate myself
on this way as well.
Sometimes I set my view to the outside
and I position myself into.
Sometimes I turn the focus inwards
and I observe
the perception and consciousness at work.
I do art
to get connection with the others
where the information flow
not only in one direction:
artist > artwork > viewer
but through the interactive nature of my works
I get a perfect connection
where artists and visitors meet in the artwork
and where they influence each other
and generate permanently new variations.
I like the state
that my art without the visitors
does't  work.
So I'm the one
who digs the hole to the Wonderland,
but follow the white rabbit
and jump into it ...
this you have to do by yourselves.
How deep such a rabbit hole can be
I would like to show you on the example
of one of my works "ADA".
ADA is a balloon
spiked with charcoals
filled up with helium
it's floating freely in a white box gallery space.
It leaves marks on the walls, ceiling and floor.
Like a computer
that after receiving a inputs
from the visitors
produces wonderful outputs.
Title of this work is ADA
and that because of Ada Lovelace
an English mathematician
and daughter of Lord Byron.
Ada wanted to find a mathematical formula
for how our brain produces thoughts
and the nerves generate emotions.
1833 Charles Babbage began to build
the analytic machine
It was nothing more
than a big analog calculator
what we now have
as a app in our smartphon.
Charles Babbage wrote a text about it
and looked for someone to translate
and so he found Ada Lovelace.
Ada was so impressed by this machine
that she made notes during the translation.
At  the end they were much longer
than the original text.
Ada saw this machine
through the eyes of an artist, a poet.
That was the wonderful moment
that brought together
mathematics and mechanics ... and poetry.
Her idea was to create a machine
capable of creating works of art ...
artworks like pictures or music
as an artist does.
Charles Baby was so impressed by this fantastic idea
that he persuaded Ada to try this.
And so ... 1834
they developed together
the first prototype of a computer.
Charles Babbage supplied the machine
... the hardware
and ADA developed the first software.
This idea of ​​Ada Lovelace
inspired me as well.
At this time I was namely
looking for the first idea
why at all the computer has developed.
And then ... appears at once
the connections to
the post industrial drawing machines
«Méta-Matics» by Jean Tinguely
or the Memex Maschine by Vannevar Bush
And then suddenly
the prediction of the post digital
by Niklas Negroponte
makes sense to me.
At that moment
I wanted to reanimate
this wonderful sparkling idea
for a poetic, art-making machine.
But, it should however be
a machine of today.
And technology od today
is the nanotechnology
that works with carbon helium and silicon.
This here is a nanorobot
that can repair the broken connections
between the neurons in our brains.
I, in turn
I manipulated the proportions a little bit
and with charcoals, silicon and helium
I brought a silicon-carbon hybrid into being.
A kinetic sculpture
a drawing machine
an analog or ... one could say
an post digital interactive installation.
ADA as a post digital work
doesn't need any hardware or software.
But yet we could say
that the gallery is the hardware,
ADA is the software
and the visitors
in an open source method
give then the commands.
The result
is a merging of lines and dots,
a visual documentation of the performances
and a immediate demonstration
that allows many interpretations.
Due to the copyright discussion of today
arises here a very interesting question:
What exactly is the work of art here?
The balloon?
The drawings?
... or both?
No matter how hard the visitors try
to controll ADA,
try to get her to do what they want,
to domesticate her
they realize very soon
that ADA is an emancipated performer.
She doesn't follow anyone 100 percent.
This experience of interacting with ADA
is so new to the visitor
that it is not possible
to go back to the old experiences.
And so ... inevitably and unconsciously
they start to use intuition.
Here, I think
ADA activates an ancient human instinct.
Back then ... the humans would leave their handprints
on the walls of the caves,
here at ADA
visitors leave traces on the gallery walls.
I often think about it
while I observe the people
in the interaction with ADA.
The more ADA is used by the visitors
the more it is covered by the coal dust
the more alive it appears.
Even I, who built her,
sometimes get the impression
... the illusion ...
that "she" is a living thing.
And this is just like in the nano-world
where it makes no difference
whether it is a living
or not living matter.
So much on ADA.
Thank you.
