Open source domain
Introduction
The Internet is revolutionising our creative process. Practically speaking, the making of art and design can be shared and improved by local and global communities using networks to exchange, collaborate and learn from each other. Meanwhile the creative boundaries of art and design are stretched to new frontiers as networked media can both permit the transformation of existing tools and know-how into unique skills, and at the same time move the role of content creator to the one of designers of platforms and participatory processes to help understand and navigate in the increasingly wide and wild ocean of information.
This revolution did not happen over night, in fact it belongs to a long history of inventing and experimenting with new forms of appropriation, collaboration, publishing in the domain of art, design, engineering and software production. At the turn of the 21st century, free and open source software has successfully demonstrated the impact of novel ways of sharing, publishing and collaborating online. As best exemplified by the Linux software project, free and open source software relies on the free sharing and complete openness of a project where even underlying technical formula and blueprints are public and can be copied, reused and adapted.
While these methods, its tools, standards and the philosophy behind it are now inspiring the many facets of art and design, the Willem de Kooning Academie is putting out a call for a new generation of artists and designers who will explore with us the impact of the open source mindset on a whole new range of exciting social, commercial and autonomous practices.
The Minors
Because open source in the context of art and design is an extremely vast subject, we have decided to focus our attention on three specific topics:
