Armin Medosch

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Armin Medosch (2004)

Armin Medosch (born September 16, 1962 in Graz ; † February 23, 2017 in Vienna ) was an Austrian media artist and freelance journalist. He was considered one of the pioneers of web culture in Europe.

Life

Armin Medosch was born on September 16, 1962 in the Styrian capital Graz, where he grew up and completed his school education. In 1982 he began studying at the University of Music and Performing Arts in Graz , which he completed in 1985. At the same time he also attended the Karl-Franzenz-University in Graz from 1982 to 1985 , where he studied philosophy and German literature . After completing his studies, he began working as a media artist in Graz and Vienna in the late 1980s. At this time he began the project as part of Radio Subcom - A different Radio that the new, Kunstradio of ORF to experiment aired. As a journalist and artist, he remained connected to the medium of radio, which allowed experiments but could also reach many people, until his death. From 1992 to 1994 he was co-initiator of the Stubnitz-Kunst-Raum-Schiff , a former refrigerated ship of the GDR - deep sea fishing fleet , which was used socio-culturally from 1992 onwards. This idea arose a year earlier when artists from Austria, Germany and Switzerland , including Medosch, set the goal of transforming the ship in June 1991.

During this time he curated and organized numerous exhibitions and symposia in Rostock , Hamburg , Malmö and St. Petersburg . After the bankruptcy of the project in 1994 and the ensuing consequences, Medosch took over the management of the newly founded media laboratory in Munich . This resulted in the Telepolis project , an exhibition on the “interactive” city that took place in Luxembourg , the European City of Culture in 1995. This project resulted in the online magazine Telepolis , which, like when it was founded, is still part of the Heinz Heise publishing house today . The magazine was founded in cooperation between the two editors Armin Medosch and Florian Rötzer . Medosch then appeared as an editor at the magazine from 1996 to 2002. When only around 3 percent of Germany's population used the Internet in 1996, Telepolis was one of the first, if not the very first, purely online medium from a large German publisher. Under the capable management of the editorial team, a large network of freelance authors quickly developed. As a central medium, Telepolis had a great influence on an experimental, political and far-sighted Internet discourse, building bridges between Internet culture in the narrower sense and a wider public. While the internet was on the rise, Medosch continued to focus on the new and the experimental. In the years after Telepolis , a number of curatorial exhibition projects followed for the native of Graz, such as with the media art center RIXC in the Latvian capital Riga , which theoretically became more and more demanding.

Grave of Armin Medosch at Baumgartner Friedhof in Vienna

In 2005 he received a Master of Arts degree in Interactive Digital Media from the University of Sussex . From 2006 to 2012 he completed his doctorate in Arts and Computational Technologies , abbreviated to ACT , with Professor Janis Jefferies in the Digital Studios in Goldsmiths, University of London and graduated with the title Ph.D. from. In 2016 he published the book New Tendencies: Art at the Threshold of the Information Revolution (1961–1978) with the MIT Press . His academic activities include, among other things, his work as Associate Senior Lecturer in Interactive Digital Media at Ravensbourne College in London from 2003 to 2007 and as subject leader MA Network Media Environments at the same college from 2005 to 2007. He also worked with Critical Studies entrusted to the MFA Digital Studio Art Practice in Goldsmiths, University of London, was from 2014 to 2015 researcher of a confine project on WP5 dissemination in the FunkFeuer project or from 2015 to his death in 2017 as a visiting professor in the theory and history of art and media from the Faculty of Media and Communication at Singidunum University in Belgrade . Medosch's illness became known to the public at transmediale in January 2017, as he was no longer able to present one of his last projects called Technopolitics in person, but could only follow it via live stream in the hospital bed. Medosch, who most recently lived and worked in Vienna and London, died on February 23, 2017 in the Austrian capital Vienna. He was buried at the Baumgartner Friedhof (group R, no. 1640).

Works (selection)

Web links

Commons : Armin Medosch  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Oil Blo, Armin Medosch: Radio Subcom - The radio with a difference . Kunstradio website, April 14, 1988, accessed February 28, 2017
  2. ^ Armin Medosch: Stubnitz-Art-Space-Ship project - Background to the MS Stubnitz guarantee case . Stub.Mur.at, August 28, 2006, accessed on March 3, 2017.
    Armin Medosch: Bankruptcy Book Stubnitz-Art-Space-Ship - The Stubnitz Guarantee Case . Stub.MNur.at, August 28, 2006, accessed on March 3, 2017.
  3. ↑ Michaela Simon: 10 years Telepolis. Telepolis , March 6, 2006, accessed March 3, 2017 .
personal data
SURNAME Medosch, Armin
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Austrian journalist and media artist
DATE OF BIRTH September 16, 1962
PLACE OF BIRTH Graz , Austria
DATE OF DEATH 23rd February 2017
Place of death Vienna , Austria