NEoN Digital Arts Archive
THEME 2020: SHARE, SHARE ALIKE
In 2020 NEoN Digital Arts invites artists to help us explore what sharing means, whether we’re talking about environmental biodiversity, community relations, or data leaks. We casually use the word ‘share’ to describe distributing images, stories, and info across social media networks, but what responsibilities come with sharing resources today? Can digital tools help us understand our collective needs and make better, fairer choices? Sharing suggests ownership, and yet inclusivity, generosity, accessibility, and holding in common are key virtues of Scottish identity and universally important values for the future. NEoN’s programme will draw attention to our shared ecosystems, the empowering potential of file sharing, and the necessity of the creation of new digital economies.
Newly commissioned works of art and design, workshops, performances, and talks will include projects that address the shared connections between the local and the global. Community-led programming and local currencies, how advances in biotechnology illuminate our understanding of our shared biopolitics, rewilding and the rethinking of environmental systems, and machine learning and shared data-sets.
The creation of new value systems is contingent upon a shared commons for everyone to use and yet which isn’t depleted through overuse - whether digital or physical. 2020 is the year of Scotland’s biodiversity challenge aiming to meet targets set by the United Nations; artists will reflect on sharing as a survival strategy for our species on our planet with its rapidly depleting resources.