"Molecular Zoo", nanosculpture by Orfescu

Bellow are transcripts from the EuroNaonoForum website. The event was hosted at Prague Congress Centre (Czech Republic).

“There have been several events aiming to build a bridge between the World of Art, Science and Public in the area of Nanotechnologies during the conference. First of all, the accompanying program was set up to, as well as other things, mediate the latest high technologies that are produced by the current science in the area of nanotechnologies to the public – using artistic devices. The project was aimed to mirror the scientific field through the unlimited visual language of art and also, shall we say in a rather subtle way – viceversa. ”

“We were hosting an artwork exhibition of fourteen gifted artists from literally all around the globe. Main contribution came from Cris Orfescu, an American based in California, who is an author, producer, coordinator and evaluator of the annually held online competition NanoArt 21 which started back in 2006 and 2009 is going to be a fourth one in a row. It is certainly the first and most probably still the only online competition/exhibition/festival on NanoArt as such. (For more visit the exhibition slide show here). Orfescu himself says he considers NanoArt to be an appealing and very effective way to communicate a reflection and usage of the latest technological and social movements with and within general public as well as plain informing about the technologies of the 21st Century. You had a chance to see 20 masterpieces of Cristian Orfescu at the EuroNanoForum 2009.
As outlined above, thanks to Cris Orfescu’s kind cooperation we could also present some of the competitors of the above mentioned contest. Namely: Bjoern Daempfling, Carol Cooper, Darcy Lewis, David Derr, David Hylton, Eva Lewarne, Fred Marinello, Chris Robinson, Philip Brun del Re, Renata Spiazzi, Teja Krasek, Ursula Freer.
Last but not least, we were having a very fruitful and nice cooperation with our crucial media partner: “NANO – the Magazine for Small Science”, thanks to which, we got to know a very interesting textile artist and scientist Dr. Frances Geesin, whose artworks you were sure to meet at the conference.
We would like to thank all the artists and especially Cris Orfescu as well as our media partner “NANO – the Magazine for Small Science” for the great cooperation.”

"Stretching the Limits 1", nanosculpture by Orfescu

The NanoArt 2009 – 2010 International Exhibition featuring 154 artworks submitted by 48 artists representing 16 countries is now officially open. A record number of works related to Nanoscience and Nanotechnology are displayed in the NanoArt21 Online Gallery. All artworks were submitted to the 4th edition of the NanoArt International Online Competition. I noticed at this time a triple record number of participation in artworks as well as artists and countries. This is a good indication of the amplitude of the NanoArt movement and the major progress made by this new art discipline in the last few years.

The worldwide competition NanoArt International Online is open every year to all artists 18 years and older. The judges for this edition are:
Dr. Pilar Irala (PhD, History of Art), world renowned photographer, expert on contemporary art, photography, and new technologies, and member of the International Association of Art Critics; apart from her activity as international photographer, Art critic and curator, she is currently Professor of Photography and Contemporary Art at San Jorge University (Spain) and co-director of the contemporary photography and music ensemble animAMusicae.
Guillermo Muñoz, physicist and PhD candidate in Photonics working in the field of Nanotechnology at Material Science Institute of Valencia University (Spain); he is part of the ‘Piratas de la Ciencia’ science communication group and is working as moderator for the international Art and Science network ‘Yasmin’; recently, he curated the NanoArt exhibition ‘Nanoconfluencias: miradas artísticas hacia lo infinitamente pequeño’.

The Top 10 artists will be presented in a multimedia work by Cris Orfescu on NanoArt21 site (you can still view the last edition winners on this site). Also, the winners of the competition will be invited to the 3rd edition of the International Festival of NanoArt to be held in San Sebastian, Spain, in September this year. The first two editions of the festival were held in Finland and Germany.