CultTech × Ars Electronica Award

Art Meets app is a tool for networking artists, curators, cultural institutions and art lovers in Africa. Geodata, chats, and event information create a social network that connects the cultural scene across cities and countries on the continent. The application was established by the Art Meets collective, which since 2013 has been pushing the basic idea of a digital infrastructure for actors in the cultural sector in South Africa and beyond with diverse projects – exhibitions, videos, podcasts. Around 55 media designers and experts from the arts and culture scene from South Africa, Malawi, Zimbabwe, Nigeria, Kenya, Botswana and Ghana have designed the digital application remotely.

At the center of the digital ecosystem is the exchange between artists and organizers, between curators and art spaces; via a virtual map, locations and events can be marked and personal contacts can be maintained via the messaging function. In the future, Art Meets app will digitally connect art communities and help users to build professional networks and acquire a sustainable audience.

Tammy Langtry, Art Meets: “The Art Meets App accommodates varied levels of arts infrastructure, with the aim to override systems of economic exclusion to build local and international audiences and professional networks beginning locally. The project will be launched in South Africa as a testing ground to further research and expand through partner locations in other regions in Africa".

The Honorary Mention of the award is Pavel Ruzyak (CZ), a filmmaker who created a project Filming in the Dark. It uses innovative AI applications to enable people with visual impairments to make their own films — even in the production phase.

This requires innovative technical solutions: One of them is a special camera that, with the help of AI, operates a chatbot that describes objects in the image in speech and provides assistance via a loudspeaker. In this way, video recording becomes an interactive work and visual impairment becomes irrelevant, as the camera – as well as appropriate hardware and software design – becomes a co-producer through communication with the person filming. The new camera technology should enable people who cannot see to produce audiovisual content – for their own social media presence or YouTube channel, for example.