Expanded Animation – Mapping an Unlimited Landscape
The symposium Expanded Animation began in 2013 and offered a first approach to the expanding field of computer animation. It has since become an established part of the Ars Electronica Animation Festival and the international competition Prix Ars Electronica Computer Animation. Every year under an overarching theme, the symposium has researched the field of technology, art, animation, and aesthetics, investigated the collapsing boundaries in digital animation, and explored positions and future trends. As with the first conferences on computer animation at Ars Electronica in the 1980s, practice and theory are equally important.
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Jürgen Hagler studied art education, experimental visual design and cultural studies at the University for Art and Design in Linz, Austria. He currently works as a professor of computer animation and animation studies in the Digital Media Department at the Hagenberg Campus of the University of Applied Sciences Upper Austria. Since 2014 he is the head of the research group Playful Interactive Environments with a focus on the investigation of new and natural playful forms of interaction and the use of playful mechanisms to encourage specific behavioural patterns.
Since 2009 he is the curator of the Ars Electronica Animation Festival and initiator and organizer of the symposium Expanded Animation. The symposium has and is continuing to investigate the collapsing boundaries in digital animation and explore positions and future trends in the expanded field of animation. Since 2017 he is the director of the Ars Electronica Animation Festival and initiator and organizer of the symposium Expanded Animation
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