Leonardo Aranda

Media artist graduated from the Faculty of Arts at the UAEM. He studied the masters in philosophy at the National Autonomous University of Mexico. He is director of Medialabmx, a non-profit organization focused on the links between art, technology and social change. He has exhibited in various mayor venues in Mexico, and internationally in countries like Russia, Austria, Spain, Canada and Brazil. In 2015 he was part of the curatorial team of the Transitio_MX 06 International Electronic Arts Festival. In 2016 he participated in IDEAS CITY Detroit from the New Museum. More recently he participated in Interactivos?’17 at the Medialab-Prado, Madrid. Currently he is studying a PhD in Media Study at SUNY at Buffalo where he serves as Research Assistant at the Center for Architecture and Situated Technologies and Coalesce Center for Biological Art.

Workshop

SMSbot

This is a theory-practice workshop which aim is to investigate into the possibilities of using SMS's as a mean for alternative communication in an era in which this techology has fallen in disuse. The workshop will consist, first, in a discussion around the possibilities of appropiating of SMS technology for creative and political uses, and then it will try to develope an alternative mean of communication following the conclusions of the first part. Some technical knowledge will be shared around building of a custom SMS bot through the use Adafruit's FONA board, Arduino and a Raspberry PI.

Exhibiting

PirateCycle

Network of Creative Pollution is a device that hacks the main function of bicycles, to turn them into an alternative means of dissemination and propagation of contents. The device operates in a parasitic manner both of the vehicles to which it is attached, and of the telecommunication networks that it uses to fulfill its function. Through the recovery of disused technologies such as SMS messages, the project investigates three areas of exploration: alternative mobility, networking and citizen participation and radiofrequency governance, using art as a way of problematizing our relationship with each of these areas. The device creates a network of content propagation, but unlike extremely structured communication networks, this network is constructed through uncertainty and chance in a logic more similar to how pollen travels between flowers using insects as a medium of transport. The project builds an Exquisite corpse by remixing and redistributing SMS messages received in a semi-random manner, creating a common incoherent narrative by this process. This project was initiated at Interactivos17 at the Medialab-Prado, Madrid.