CYFEST 15 Lands in Venice with Focus on Vulnerability and Technology

The 15th edition of CYFEST, an itinerant media art festival founded in 2007, takes place in Venice on the island of Giudecca, hosted by CREA Cantieri del Contemporaneo. Curated by Elena Gubanova and Silvia Burini, the festival explores vulnerability as a collective, 'more-than-human' condition encompassing social, biological, and technological systems. Selected international artists present multimedia works that engage with automation, digital processes, and cybernetics. A key theme is the intersection of technology and nature, exemplified by Tuula Närhinen's 'Drop Tracer,' a study of raindrop shapes captured on slides and macroscopically enlarged. Science and science art feature prominently: Ann Marie Maes presents bacterial cultures on large textiles reflecting on microbial life from a post-human perspective; Mariateresa Sartori offers frottage from rocks of the Rosà quarry in Vicenza, evoking scientific cataloging; Fabrizio Plessi's video art totem explores energy through the generative and destructive power of lightning; and the Russian collective Where Dogs Run performs a knitted visualization of the Mandelbrot fractal. Previous editions were held in Yerevan, Armenia, and Miami, USA.