United Kingdom -- The Media Centre in Huddersfield

Number of residencies: 1
Period and duration of residency: during 2004


The Media Centre

The Media Centre is located in Huddersfield half way between Leeds and Manchester - both cities are half an hour by train. We are a non profit passing organisation committed to supporting the creative industries in Yorkshire. We supply serviced office/studio space to various creative businesses, across two buildings. There are 40-50 companies in these buildings and 270 people employed by those companies. We have received funding from the ERDF scheme, Arts Council of England, Yorkshire Arts Board, and Yorkshire Forward - a government initiated body established to fund creative business development in the region.

The Media Centre has recently established two major initiatives in order to deliver a creative programme in Huddersfield:

+ The Medialounge
The Medialounge is a networked exhibition and events space, designed specifically to showcase digital and interactive media art. Currently we run four exhibitions each year. Each exhibition is marked by a launch event which consists of a panel discussion, an opening and live electronic [laptop] music.

and

+ The Digital Research Unit
The Digital Research Unit [DRU]is a research and production facility
with eight workstations, various software and a wide range of very high specification hardware; Unix Servers etc.

The DRU is a partnership with the School of Architecture at The
University of Huddersfield, and therefore some, though not all of our work is research based.

Three types of activity have been developed for the DRU:

+ Residency Programme
+ Commissioning Programme
+ Access - Development and support of regional artists using digital
media


Facilities available for the artist

The DRU residency programme is working in the following areas:

+ Open source/free software
+ Electronic music production
+ Net.art
+ Digital video
+ Hybrid games
+ Mobile technologies
+ Physical interfaces [architectural]
+ Networked and interactive installation art

The artist(s) in residence will be Associate Research Fellows of The University of Huddersfield, and will have twenty-four hour access to the University facilities, including the library, as well as the DRU.

Accommodation is organised in a new 'loft' conversion of an old
Victorian industrial building with a networked two bedroom apartment, a large open living room, kitchen and bathroom, three minutes away from DRU.

For more information, see also
http://www.nifca.org/new-media-air/dru_facilities.doc
http://www.nifca.org/new-media-air/dru_university_resources.doc
http://www.nifca.org/new-media-air/inventory_creative_lofts.doc

Possibilities and preferences for the residency artist

We are well connected with other arts organisations regionally,
nationally and internationally, and our commissioning programme will be seen in many institutions in the near future.

More information on http://www.druh.co.uk