Projects by students
Projects by students
"Never again! The podcast against forgetting" is a format in which Timon Wiese talks to various actors who are involved in the broad field of remembrance work, campaigning against the forgetting of National Socialist crimes and upholding the memory of their victims.
Why keep bringing up this long-forgotten topic? Because it is not in the past. If we look at the crises of the present, humanity has clearly not learnt enough from the mistakes of the past.
There is a dangerous dictator in Russia who is killing thousands of innocent people in an aggressive war of aggression. In autumn 2023, the terrorist militia Hamas murdered hundreds of Israeli civilians for anti-Semitic reasons, among others. And even in the USA, there is once again a presidential candidate who wants to pursue openly anti-democratic policies.
So it's high time for a wake-up call as a reminder of the darkest hour in human history.
For this episode, Timon Wiese spoke to two people who do just that in their daily work: Marie Zachger, student assistant at the Neuengamme Concentration Camp Memorial and Marcus Meyer, scientific co-director of the Valentin Bunker memorial site.
The podcast feature by Timon Wieso was created as part of the exercise "Podcasts as a feature". Lecturer Magdalene Melchers offers this exercise every two semesters, either as "Podcast as Feature" or "Visualised Features".
Found Footage Scores by Amelie Schierenbeck (Winter–Spring 24/25)
In Anke Fischer’s ‘Found Footage’ exercise, the students experimented with found material and their own archive material. Found Footage is an artistic method of montage and involves a conceptual engagement with found film material from every conceivable film genre. Part of this exercise involved working with scores: students drew instructions and sketches – some of which appeared rather cryptic – which had to be realised in video form by the score’s creators themselves and their partners. In some cases, the students also responded to their partners’ video material, as in the example shown here: the split-screen piece shows Amelie Schierenbeck’s realisation of her own score, as well as Juran Landt’s realisation of Amelie’s score.
Another piece showcases Amelie Schierenbeck’s adaptation of an external score. For this, the student used various video clips which she found on Instagram pages dedicated to different forms of video and media art. She set the newly edited footage to music herself.
Viktoria Achtelik’s analogue photographs offer glimpses of St Gertruden Cemetery and the Stolpersteine of the Evers siblings. The photographs were taken as part of the module ‘Remembering Urban History through Photography – Artistic and Documentary Perspectives on Places of Remembrance in Oldenburg’, in co-operation with the Oldenburg City Museum. In the course, the students explored the question of how places of remembrance can be captured and interpreted through the medium of photography. The aim of the project was to photographically document and explore selected places of remembrance in Oldenburg. The analogue black-and-white photographs produced during the course are on display as part of the permanent exhibition at the newly opened Oldenburg City Museum .
Noisearcher Satellite by Julian Gummich for the Post Digital Instrument Labs module (Winter Semester 24/25)
As part of the ‘Post Digital Instrument Labs’ module, the students created audiovisual media artworks. In doing so, they practised developing ideas and designing concepts, as well as collaborating in creative processes. Working individually or in small groups, the students programmed their own instrument. To assist them and control this instrument, the students used a controller, which allowed them to adjust the pitch, direction, volume, reverb and much more for the individual sound and visual elements. They experimented with various control systems and interfaces for music software: Dr Jan-Torge Claussen worked with students to explore the possibilities of the Max for Live programme and visualise sound.
In Julian Gummich’s Noisearcher project, the gyroscope integrated into the controller can be used to change the orientation of a satellite, which can receive different sounds depending on its direction. By pressing the various buttons, the sounds can be altered and manipulated with effects.
The song has been composed and everything has been recorded, but something is still missing. From a sound engineering point of view, the mix is the most important step in a production and is often compared to cooking: It's about balancing the different sound components, giving them the right presence and embedding them in the panorama. To do this, experts make use of classic practices such as equalising, compression, saturation and automation, but also like to dig a little deeper into their bag of tricks by using special hardware devices. In the "Mixing & Mastering" exercise by lecturer Moritz Höger, the students explored this bag of tricks and worked their way to a mix that is ready for digital distribution.
The students were given a song by the musician. Working in groups, the students completely mixed a song using the Ableton programme.
Video work "How Much Water" by David Flesch (Winter/Spring semester 25/26)
The video work How Much Water by David Flesch was created as part of the AI Filmmaking & Future Aesthetics seminar, which was held over two weekends in the form of a workshop. In this workshop, the students explored new workflows in filmmaking with image-generating AI tools. They investigated how different systems influence the creative process - for example through time limits, quality restrictions and specific software requirements - and how editing strategies can be used to work with these peculiarities.
A central question was how these technologies change film aesthetics: How do we deal with challenges such as visual consistency and other software-imposed limitations such as maximum video lengths? What new possibilities are emerging, such as fluid image transitions and the resulting morphing one-shots that are specific to AI-generated images? Do AI systems only reproduce the aesthetics of polished advertising clips or Hollywood-style blockbusters, or do they enable new visual languages? What are the strengths and weaknesses of this medium? Can we also use it without reproducing stereotypical representations and instead experiment with absurd or speculative images?
In small groups or individually, the students created short video films using the generative AI tools of their choice. Compact technical introductions provided an overview of various systems, from browser-based online tools to the local, node-based interface ComfyUI.
The seminar was organised in co-operation with the House for Media Art Oldenburg. It was led by the "(post)digital" video and media artist Theresa Reiwer.