Jump to content

Johannes Grenzfurthner

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Johannes Grenzfurthner
Grenzfurthner at Museumsquartier, Vienna (2011)
Grenzfurthner at Museumsquartier, Vienna (2011)
Born (1975-06-13) 13 June 1975 (age 51)
Vienna, Austria
OccupationArtist, filmmaker, writer, actor, curator, theatre director, performer, lecturer
Signature
Website
grenzfurthner.com

Johannes Grenzfurthner (Austrian German: [joˈhanɛs ˈɡrɛntsfʊrtnɐ]; born 1975 in Vienna) is an Austrian artist who is the founder, conceiver and artistic director of monochrom, an art and theory group and film production company.

Career

[edit]

In the early 1990s, Grenzfurthner was a member of several BBS message boards.[1] Grenzfurther used his online connections to create monochrom, a zine[2] or alternative magazine that dealt with art, technology and subversive cultures.[3] His motivation was to react to the emerging conservativism in cyber-cultures of the early 1990s,[4][5] and to combine his political background in the Austrian punk and antifascist movement with discussion of new technologies and the cultures they create.[6] The publication featured interviews and essays by for example, Bruce Sterling, HR Giger, Eric Drexler, Terry Pratchett and Bob Black,[7] using an experimental layout style developed by Grenzfurthner.[8] In 1995 the group decided to cover new artistic practices[9][10] and started experimenting with different media: computer games, robots, puppet theater, musical, short films, pranks.[11][12]

The group is known for working with different media, art and entertainment formats.[13] Grenzfurthner calls this "looking for the best weapon of mass distribution of an idea".[14]

Grenzfurthner was head of the Arse Elektronika[15][16] festival in San Francisco.and hosted Roboexotica,[17] the international Festival for Cocktail-Robotics.[18] He was head of Hedonistika, a festival for artistic food tech and robotic indulgement.[19]

Grenzfurthner wrote and directed theatre plays[20][21][22][23] and pieces of performance (e.g. Eignblunzn) and interventionist art.[24]

Film

[edit]

Grenzfurther is the CEO of film production company monochrom Propulsion Systems.[25] He is member of the Austrian Director's Guild[26] and the Association of Austrian Documentary Filmmakers.[27]

He wrote and directed shorts[28] and feature films. His first TV film was the independent fantasy-comedy Die Gstettensaga: The Rise of Echsenfriedl[29] (2014). Parts of his comedy show "Schicksalsjahre eines Nerds" form the basis of his documentary film Traceroute (2016). That was followed by Glossary of Broken Dreams (2018). His horror feature Masking Threshold premiered at Fantastic Fest in September 2021[30][31] and was released by Drafthouse Films.[32][33]

His horror film Razzennest had its premiere at Fantastic Fest 2022. His documentary feature Hacking at Leaves had its premiere at Diagonale in 2024. His horror mystery feature Solvent had its premiere in September 2024.

Academia, writing, lecturing

[edit]

Grenzfurthner lectures at art institutions,[34][35] symposions[36][37] and political events,[38] teaches at universities[39][40][41] and mentors students.[42][43]

He has published books, essays and articles on politics, contemporary art, communication processes and philosophy including Mind and Matter: Comparative Approaches Towards Complexity, Do androids sleep with electric sheep?, Of Intercourse and Intracourse: Sexuality, Biomodification and the Techno-Social Sphere and Pr0nnovation?: Pornography and Technological Innovation.[44][45][46][47]

2020 through 2021, he was editor-in-chief of the print and online magazine The Free Lunch.[48]

Since April 2023, he has been contributing as a weekly columnist to the Austrian news magazine Profil.

Personal life

[edit]

Grenzfurthner lives and works in Vienna.[1] As a child, he spent a lot of time at his grandparents' farm in the small village of Unterzögersdorf (a cadastral municipality of Stockerau). His grandparents' experienced Nazism in World War II and the Soviet occupation in allied-occupied Austria which influenced his long-term project Soviet Unterzoegersdorf.[49]

Awards

[edit]

Selected filmography

[edit]

Selected theater

[edit]
  • Udo 77 (Rabenhof Theater, Vienna, 2004/2005) – director, actor, writer

Music

[edit]

References

[edit]
  1. 1 2 Kaestle, Thomas (14 April 2016). "The story of Traceroute, about a Leitnerd's quest".
  2. ↑ "monochrom | fanzineindex.de". fanzineindex.de.
  3. ↑ Uwe Husslein, Ralf Bornowski (1995). Fandom Research (Reader und Index zu deutschsprachigen Fanzines. Ventil-Verlag. p. 70.
  4. ↑ "Chaos Radio Express, episode 62: Monochrom"
  5. ↑ "Schubumkehr Manifesto, published 1996; "Manifiestos sobre el arte y la red 1990–1999", published 2021 by Exit Media)". Retrieved 25 March 2021.
  6. ↑ Marc Da Costa, "Interview with Johannes Grenzfurthner of monochrom, Part 3 Archived 17 March 2012 at the Wayback Machine", Furtherfield.
  7. ↑ "monochrom print". monochrom.at.
  8. ↑ "monochrom #26–34 Ye Olde Self-Referentiality Archived 5 May 2012 at the Wayback Machine", Neural, 15 June 2010.
  9. ↑ Kobayashi, Erin (6 February 2007). "How to be buried alive". Toronto Star.
  10. ↑ Lechner, Marie (4 March 2008). "Pop Guérilla | Libération". www.ecrans.fr.
  11. ↑ "the Thomann intervention (2018)". 8 March 2018 – via YouTube.
  12. ↑ Interview with V. Vale in Pranks! 2
  13. ↑ "Q21 Backstage Tour - monochrom". 13 November 2020 – via YouTube.
  14. ↑ "Monochrom: „Digitales Politisieren erlebt eine Renaissance"". futurezone.at. 15 March 2018.
  15. ↑ Silverberg, David (4 October 2007). "Sex Meets Tech at Kinky Conference in San Francisco" Digital Journal. Retrieved 19 February 2012.
  16. ↑ Violet Blue, Special to SF Gate (4 October 2007). "Arse Elektronika 2007: Porn and Tech Conference / Violet Blue holds hope for the future of sex, despite the musical condoms". SFGate.
  17. ↑ Jenna Wortham (12 June 2008). "Bot Bartenders Sling Drinks at Roboexotica USA". WIRED.
  18. ↑ Justin Page. "Sputnikfest 2012 Event Schedule". Laughing Squid.{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: deprecated archival service (link)
  19. ↑ "BIAN 2016 | AUTOMATA". bianmontreal.ca. Archived from the original on 25 May 2014.
  20. ↑ "Der Standard, Ronald Pohl: "Das ist der Zuckerbäckerblues"; 2004".
  21. ↑ Peter Mühlbauer (24 June 2011). "Kotze, Sperma und Inventur im Weltraum". Telepolis.
  22. ↑ ""Steppenrot": Der Sonnenkönig ist runtergefallen". kurier.at. 3 December 2017.
  23. ↑ "Sex, Crime und ein Halleluja für Hansi". Die Presse. 6 January 2019. Retrieved 14 January 2019.
  24. ↑ ""Protestors" call games industry a "temple of sin," demand repentance". Ars Technica. 9 March 2012.
  25. ↑ "monochrom: TRACEROUTE". www.monochrom.at.
  26. ↑ "Profile Johannes Grenzfurthner". Austrian Directors Guild. Retrieved 23 May 2018.
  27. ↑ "Profile Johannes Grenzfurthner". Dok.at. Retrieved 23 May 2018.
  28. ↑ Ellingson, Josh (6 February 2012). "Earthmoving, A Short Film by Monochrom (A Prequel To Sierra Zulu)".
  29. ↑ "monochrom: DIE GSTETTENSAGA: THE RISE OF ECHSENFRIEDL". www.monochrom.at.
  30. ↑ Gingold, Michael (5 July 2021). "Exclusive teaser, photos, comments: The existential unease of "MASKING THRESHOLD"".
  31. ↑ Review of Masking Threshold by Annick Mahnert Archived 9 September 2021 at the Wayback Machine on the Fantastic Fest website
  32. ↑ "Drafthouse Films Sells to Giant Pictures, Sets Nick Savva as CEO". Variety. 9 March 2022. Retrieved 9 March 2022.
  33. ↑ "Draftshouse Films Label Sold to Giant Pictures". The Hollywood Reporter. 9 March 2022. Retrieved 9 March 2022.
  34. ↑ Architecture (CCA), Canadian Centre for. "Come and Forget, with Johannes Grenzfurthner". www.cca.qc.ca.
  35. ↑ "Tactics and Practice". aksioma.org.
  36. ↑ "Utopia Festival 2014 Robots in Human Society - Utopia Festival 2014".
  37. ↑ Imlinger, Tamara (5 November 2012). "SYMPOSIUM ZUM TRENDTHEMA CROWDFUNDING AM 15./16.11. IN LINZ".
  38. ↑ "Linkes Sommercamp, Wagrain; "Context Hacking"; 2014". Archived from the original on 18 June 2018. Retrieved 17 April 2018.
  39. ↑ Bandi, Nina; Kraft, Michael G.; Lasinger, Sebastian (15 March 2014). "Kunst, Krise, Subversion: Zur Politik der Ästhetik". transcript Verlag – via Google Books.
  40. ↑ "Academic biography at Transcript".
  41. ↑ "Arse Elektronika: the future of sex?". onscenity.org.
  42. ↑ "Keeper of Evil", 2014
  43. ↑ Mir, Georg. Michtim: Designing a Pen & Paper Storytelling Game. Graz: FH Joanneum, 2012. p. 1.
  44. ↑ "Die Leiden der Politik, oder: Die Identitätskrise". Die Presse. 8 October 2020.
  45. ↑ "Guerrilla Comm?". 21 April 2009.
  46. ↑ Ingo Vavra. "Kroeger u.a. (Hg.) – Geistiges Eigentum und Originalität". Archived from the original on 3 August 2016.
  47. ↑ Turner, Rodger. "The SF Site Featured Review: Do Androids Sleep With Electric Sheep? Critical Perspectives on Sexuality and Pornography in Science and Social Fiction". sfsite.com.[dead link]
  48. ↑ "The Free Lunch, team page; 5 December 2020". Archived from the original on 29 November 2020. Retrieved 5 December 2020.
  49. ↑ "fm4v2.ORF.at / Kurzbesuch in Sowjet-Unterzögersdorf". fm4v2.orf.at.
  50. ↑ "Die Presse: Die Pioniere des wilden Worldwideweb". Archived from the original on 22 June 2018. Retrieved 23 April 2018.
[edit]
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Johannes_Grenzfurthner&oldid=1363335613"