December 2022

The recipients of hydra microgrants for December 2022 are:

Aida El-Oweidy
David Matunda
A1219 & Vagné L.
Sabrina Sims
George Githuma Njogu
Rafa Diaz and Rafa Puyana

Aida El-Oweidy

Aida El-Oweidy is a visual artist and graphic designer. Her work spans many mediums including VR, drawing, text and performance. She is interested in utilising speculative practices and technology to explore themes such as space, collectivity, and rituals. She also explores creating visuals through live coding by playing with found footage, video synthesizers, and generative design elements.

I would like this workshop to lead into a small live coding night, where participants can feel they can explore coding as a performance and creating audio visual experiences.

https://www.instagram.com/aidaeloweidy/

David Matunda

I’m a web developer, digital artist and writer as well as an active resident at the Pervasive Media Studio (Bristol, UK). My art practice explores generative/parametric design principles anywhere between a static output of an algorithm to be machine plotted to a live code performance where this exploration is happening live. My practice is informed by history, politics, fashion and cultural ideas around wealth and legacy.

By accepting this grant, I’ll write a beginner-friendly tutorial on how you might create an augmented reality artwork that makes use of the hydra video synth together with augmented reality JavaScript libraries like Craig Kapp’s ‘A-Frame P5’ which conveniently wraps around the p5 JavaScript library for drawing on the HTML canvas and the a-frame JavaScript framework for building augmented/virtual reality worlds. I’ve also recently been awarded the DYCP grant from the Arts Council England to evolve my live coding art practice- so keep an eye on my socials to follow my progression of more explicit uses of the hydra video synth within an explicitly live code performance context.

https://matunda.xyz

George Githuma Njogu

I am a self taught software developer with proficiency in web technologies including HTML, CSS, JavaScript, NodeJs, Python and React. I enjoy designing and building products and systems that help businesses and organizations easily interact with their customers, collect data efficiently and for e-commerce platforms make seamless payments.

I started my coding journey with sonic pi, a code-based music creation and performance tool developed by Sam Aaron. Learning to code by making music gave me immediate results from the code I wrote, something that inspired me to go down the rabbit hole and learn more. I am currently a project lead for Dunia Moja, a local organization in Kilifi which is working to connect rural communities to affordable internet.

I will use the grants to create tutorials for hydra. I run a youtube channel, Talking To The Machine, where I talk about all things tech. I will dedicate one day of the week to Hydra, where I will explore the system and show my viewer the different possibilities of hydra.

The grant will help me supplement my wifi and space cost which is a win win for both my channel and Hydra.

https://georgegithuma.com | https://www.linkedin.com/in/georgegithuma/| https://www.instagram.com/georgegithuma/

A1219 & Vagné L.

A1219 is Adeniran Balthazar Silva, music producer, multi-artist, bass player of the instrumental band Meneio (São Paulo - Brazil) and member of the Brazilian chapter of the Black Speculative Arts Movement (BSAM). It stands both as an artistic identity and as a multidisciplinary initiative aimed at experimental arts and music production, with focus on Afro-Diasporic aesthetics and open-source philosophies.

Vagné L. is artivist, multi-instrumentalist producer, composer, web developer, designer and researcher. He creates sound art from afro-indigenous ancestry, concrete music, experimentalism, afro futurism, reuse of scraps, technological discards, field recording and computational algorithms, Founder of Muziek Mutantti and member of Coletivo JACA.

With the grant, we will translate the Hydra documentation to Brazilian Portuguese and organize an 8h long online workshop along the course of one month, based upon the translated texts. The activity will have an introductory character, showing basic instructions, tips and essential techniques of the Hydra language, in addition to audio-reactive interactions with the Gibber environment. We will prioritize vacancy for peripheral, indigenous, afrodescendant, female and LGBTQIA+ publics.

To conclude, we will produce a virtual livecoding exhibition consisting of works developed by people attending the workshop and an Afro-Diasporic performance made by the artists A1219 and Vagné using resources provided by Hydra, Gibber and other creative programming and musical productions tools, in addition to notions of Afro-Brazilian percussion and claves. The production will be available for free for an undefined time at the Muziek Mutantti official web page, streaming platforms and the artists’ individual web pages.

Sabrina Sims

Sabrina Sims is a Black Puerto Rican artist from the Bronx, New York. She experiments with many mediums including synth music, audiovisual livecoding, zines, riso printing and textiles. Magic, transformation and self care/kindness are common threads in her work.

Sabrina teaches community workshops centering Black Indigenous people as part of her practice.

With this Hydra grant, Sabrina will make a zine documenting the varied uses of “hydra x rainbowInit”. She created this script to livecode-draw and create glitched images on the fly. She first used it with indie art software “Electric Zine Maker” but it can also alter video and make still graphics.

It works by using screenInit to capture action in EZM and then glitches it using colorama and different types of modulation. In performances Sabrina switches back and forth between changing the code and working in EZM.

With this code & zine, Sabrina aims to create connections with artists and other people that wouldn’t typically livecode. Anyone can experiment with their image-making process using this script using Hydra and EZM or other art programs.

https://www.starlyart.studio/ | https://www.starlyart.studio/links

Rafa Diaz & Rafa Puyana

RAF ▒░▒ RAF

We, (Rafa Diaz and Rafa Puyana) ❤️ Live Coding.

We are part of the TopLap community since 2017 when we fell in love of the practice and the wonderful spirit of the community. We are happy members of the worldwide community and the local nodes in Bogota, Colombia. Rafael Diaz has performed in multiple spaces under his artistic name Rafrobeat. Rafael Puyana has performed visually in several local performances of the TopLap Community in global events and local performances under his name.

We both work closely with the Cinemateca Distrital, a cultural space in Bogota that has been the home of the TopLap Bogotá Community, and currently spreading the word about live coding and helping grow our local artistic community.

Challenge

This Hydra Library will focus on two levels of adaptation: Language and Visual Aesthetics. We will curate a group of Hydra functions and will rename them as kid-friendly terms that spark a closer connection to their culture and mother tongue. The library will allow others to perform their localizations and adaptations. Visually we want to create a visually engaging look and feel by using visual frames like: TVs, ovens, Arcade machines, or any other type of fantasy computer interfaces.

https://github.com/Rafrobeat | https://www.rafaelpuyana.com