Life as art

Point at the man and he'll punch himself in the face, do it another time and he'll hurl himself at the floor, jump out of a box, or just fall out of the sky.

The man, who has no name, does all this and 85 other crazy deeds at your command on a Web site entitled Modern Living.

The Web site, www. hoogerbrugge.com/ml.html, was created by Dutch web artist Han Hoogerbrugge, and is a reflection of his thoughts, dreams, expectations, conflicts, hopes and fears.

Regarded as deconstructive cinema by media arts scholars, Modern Living is one of the works now on display at the international media arts festival, Third Text: images + media, at the City University.

Presented by the university's School of Creative Media, the festival features cutting-edge videos and media artworks from around the world.

The festival, comprising a campus exhibition and video and film screenings at the Hong Kong Film Archive, showcases the latest developments in the field of media arts.

CityU's creative media assistant professor Ip Yuk-yiu said the festival aimed to provide an alternative venue for showing media artworks.

'The works featured at the festival are more experimental. Whether it's their genre, the form they take, the techniques used or how they are repre-sented, I would say they are quite avant garde,' Mr Ip said.

The exhibition features online shorts like Modern Living, Web sites, research projects, international Web artists, and games and media installations from the school's graduates. It will run until this Friday.

Unlike more contemporary installation art, media installations tend to utilise the Internet and other new media to offer a more interactive experience, Mr Ip said.

Two films, Inscription Of Power and Dark Rooms, will be screened at the Hong Kong Film Archive tonight.

Dark Rooms, co-presented with Windsor-based interna-tional experimental film and video art festival Media City, will showcase six shorts from Korea, the United States, France and Austria.

Festival details:

Third Test: images + media festival

www.cityu.edu.hk/scm/3rdtxt

School of Creative Media, 2/F, Red Zone, Academic Building, CityU

10am to 7pm

Hong Kong Film Archive

50 Lei King Road, Sai Wan Ho

Festival details:

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