Alpha-ville Festival 2011

Billed as an ‘international festival of post-digital culture’, Alpha-ville 2011 is a not-to-be-missed arts feast taking place from 22 to 25 September at various venues in Hackney and beyond. The 2009 and 2010 festivals both sold out, and this year’s event promises to dazzle with a web of interlinked shows, happenings and discussions to be held at Netil House, Space Studios, the Vortex Jazz Club, and Hearn Street Warehouse, as well as spaces outside the borough including the V&A, Rich Mix, the Whitechapel Gallery, XOYO and cyberspace.

The festival is the brainchild of Estela Oliva, former Google employee and digital entrepreneur, and Carmen Salas, arts manager and creative entrepreneur.

Oliva explains the vision behind the 2011 ‘edition’ of the festival: “This year we are joining the discourse about a post-digital age. The festival, and more specifically the symposium, will provide a forum to exchange knowledge and inspire discussions about the future of digital culture.”

Four interconnecting strands run through Alpha-ville 2011: Innovation, Live, Screening and Exchange. Participants will include artists, creative coders, new media technologists, designers, architects, professionals, musicians, researchers and academics. Among the most prominent are Tom Uglow (Google Creative Labs), Marius Watz, Filip Visnjic, Man Bartlett, Daito Manabe, Moritz Stefaner, Keiichi Matsuda and James Alliban.

Hackney-based highlights of the festival include a showcase of the latest digital film-making trends including short film, animation and documentaries, curated by Alpha-ville and guest curators from Friday 23 – Sunday 25 at the Vortex Jazz Club and Netil House.

More information: alpha-ville.co.uk and @alphavillefest on twitter