24Hz - Internationales Festival für urbane Medienkunst

24Hz is the frame rate of classic cinema. It’s also a extremely low sound. So low it can’t be found on a standard piano, but in the sub bass drones of contemporary electronic music. 24 hours of a day mirrored in the heartbeat of a second. 24Hz is our code for the clash of media art and urban culture, for young artists working together across national and artistic borders, for the hybrid art forms of a near future.

It’s our aim to install a new festival in Cologne featuring diverse facets of urban media art: 24Hz festival, scheduled to run for the first time on August 25th to 29th, 2015. The festival will foster and make visible urban culture and media art, putting focus on gaps and interspaces: urban culture between youth and art avant-garde; interdisciplinary rooms between installation, projection and performance; inter-culture as urban normality; international exchange of young artists with each other and with the Cologne audience; a temporary laboratory for upcoming young artists and Cologne based, established media artists. We also want to reach an audience beyond people who are already interested in contemporary arts, pull media art out of its drawer and make it more accesible for a wider public.

Because you help us making a very special festival become reality in Cologne. Because your contribution helps young artists from Cologne area and from six partner countries – Greece, Italy, Lithuania, The Netherlands, Romania and UK – to collaborate beyond borders. Because with your support, the festival could happed even if neither foundations nor the city of Cologne would give us funding. And if they do, your contribution will make things bigger: more stages, more great artists, installations, performances and workshops. Because you help us reaching a wide audience – with posters, flyers and ads in magazines. Because you blow up boxes that imprison art. Because we have some really nice perks (rewards) for our supporters.

Current state of affairs is: We have handed in several applications, to private foundations and to governmental bodies on local, regional and European level. From the EU programme ERASMUS+ and from the federal state of NRW, we got funding for an international exchange of young artists as well as a residency for regional young artists, both working towards presentations at the 24Hz festival. However, we don’t have any funding yet for the festival itself, that is: for artist fees, rental of halls, stages and equipment, PR etc.

Not earlier than end of June we will learn whether or not we’ll get funding from a private foundation for the festival. Also, it’s still unclear whether or not the city of Cologne will give financial support helping us to invite the Japanese theatre company Mum&Gypsy to perform at 24Hz festival.

A small part of your contributions will be used for production and shipping of your perks, the bigger part of course goes directly into 24Hz festival.

In case the private foundation will reject our application, your contributions will be used for:

– Artists fees: 2,900 €
– Rental of premises, stages and equipment: 2,550 €
– Printing of flyers and posters, billpostings, ads in magazines, promotion: 2,300 €
– Salaries technicians and security: 1,250 €

In case the private foundation will grant our application, your contributions will be mainly used for fees for additional artists and rental of additional halls, stages, equipment to make the festival line-up bigger.

In case we won’t reach our 12,000 € funding goal, yet still cross our 2000 € funding threshold, we will be able to run at least a small version of 24Hz festival, based on the international exchange, the regional residency and additional artists playing for free or paid by audience entrance fees. In this case, we would minimize room and equipment rental costs by making things smaller, and reduce PR to voluntary PR.

ROOTS & ROUTES Cologne e. V. is a registered non-profit association. We are underlying strict internal and external budget controls, ensuring that every Euro donated to us is used for the right purpose. In case 24Hz festival will make surplus through entrance fees, this surplus will be re-invested into non-profit projects for young artists.