“23 WORKS” is a video series documenting the history of the art/tech group monochrom. monochrom has chosen 23 projects, anecdotes and stories out of their 20 years of material and recreated them as dioramas and machines.
Episode #6 tells a story from 2001 — about the early days of Soviet Unterzoegersdorf.
Director Johannes Grenzfurthner will talk about Sierra Zulu and the Kickstarter campaign at Think out Loud! 2 / Crowdfunding in Attnang-Puchheim, Austria.
Johannes Grenzfurthner etwa hat seinen Film Sierra Zulu über Crowdfunding teil-finanziert. Über 50.000 Dollar sammelte er auf diese Weise über die US-Plattform Kickstarter von den Fans ein, eine Summe, die zuvor noch kaum ein heimisches Projekt erreicht hat. Er wird über seine Kampagne berichten und unter anderem auch die Frage beantworten, warum er nicht eine der deutschsprachigen Crowdfunding-Plattformen dafür ausgewählt hat.
April 25, 2013; 6 PM at Technologiezentrum Attnang-Puchheim, Austria.
Johannes will give a keynote on Context Hacking and the digital future at Print Screen Festival in Israel on April 17, 2013.
Time Out Tel Aviv interviewed him about monochrom and the future of (digital) cinema.
What a nice surprise!
Last week, Sierra Zulu actor and good friend Max Grodénchik visited our “20 years of monochrom” exhibition.
(Max and director Johannes Grenzfurthner at MUSA Vienna)
Our director Johannes Grenzfurthner was captured by Soviet Unterzoegersdorf Military Intelligence, brought to an undisclosed basement without toilet and questioned about Sierra Zulu’s production status. So much can be said: SUZ Officer Moloshnikov was not happy…
The interrogation transcript was published in German in the magazine Joe.
Es stinkt nach Urin, Angst, Lügen und Wahrheit. Der Ort: ein karger Verhörraum. Die Protagonisten: Ein Offizier und Johannes Grenzfurthner, der Initiator des Film-Projektes Sierra Zulu. Ein Freigeist, dem seine Vision einer sowjetischen Mikrorepublik bis in die Realität gefolgt ist – Ein Interview der etwas anderen Art.
Text by Hubertus J. Schwarz & Johannes Grenzfurthner.
Photographs by Gerulf Dösinger.
“Wir sind Nerds, die in der Kunst gelandet sind”, sagen Johannes Grenzfurthner und Günter Friesinger von monochrom. Das neunköpfige Kunst-, Theorie- und Bastelkollektiv feiert noch bis Ende April im Wiener Musa seinen 20. Geburtstag. In der “Die waren früher auch mal besser” betitelten Ausstellung blickt monochrom auf ein bewegtes Schaffen zurück, das von Cyberpunk-Fanzines über Videos, Theaterstücke, Musicals, Perfomances und Konferenzen reicht. Die futurezone hat mit Grenzfurthner und Friesinger über Nerdtum, Hedonismus, Technologie und Crowdfunding gesprochen.
We currently celebrate 20 years of monochroms with an exhibition at MUSA in Vienna. As part of the show we also present an anecdote about Soviet Unterzoegersdorf, dating back to 2001. We chose the format of two jumping jacks connected to an audio player. The piece tells the story of an Austrian police officer who tried to question Commissar Chrusov (played by Johannes Grenzfurthner) — and fails.
Comrades! Comradettes!
Johannes Grenzfurthner presented Sierra Zulu at TEDxVienna 2011.
He will return for TEDxVienna 2012 to give an update and screen Earthmoving — Sierra Zulu’s short film prequel (featuring Jeff Ricketts, Martin Auer).
TEDxVienna 2012 @ Odeon, Taborstraße 10, 1020 Vienna, Austria.
November 3, 2012.
Hammer and axe.
An impression from the photo shoot for Wired UK in Unterzoegersdorf.
More: soon.
Oh yes, Johannes Grenzfurthner will talk about Sierra Zulu and the Kickstarter campaign at Think out Loud! 2 / Crowdfunding in Linz.
Crowdfunding in Österreich – Paneldiskussion: Erfolgreiche CrowdfunderInnen und BertreiberInnen von Crowdfunding-Plattformen sprechen über die Möglichkeiten und Erfahrungen in/aus Österreich mit Hilfe der Community ein Projekt zu finanzieren. Moderator: Christian Henner-Fehr (Kulturmanager, Co-Founder der stART-Konferenz)Panel-TeilnehmerInnen:
Johannes Grenzfurthner (Sierra Zulu), Lena Robinson (Three Coins), Robi Faustmann, Lisa Keiner (Keiner mag Faustmann), Reinhard Willfort (1000×1000)
November 15, 2012; 4:15 PM at Klub Kantine/Tabakfabrik Linz, Linz Austria.
Director Johannes Grenzfurthner is guest star at Duncan/Channon’s Toast of the Tip!
He’s an artist, writer, curator, director, professor, all-around instigator, and founder of Monochrom, the notorious Viennese art/technology/philosophy powerhouse. His projects have been featured in The New York Times, Der Spiegel, San Francisco Chronicle, CNN, Slashdot, Boing Boing, LA Times, NPR, Gizmodo, Wired. He (or his lookalike Comrade Chrusov) have been spotted at SXSW, TEDxVienna, Maker Faire, Google’s Tech Talks, Ars Electronica, Mozilla Drumbeat Barcelona and underground hacker conferences around the world. From translating dense political philosophy into internet memes to composing pop musicals about banking software to running the first (and, inevitably, leading) festival concerned with cocktail robotics, Johannes and Monochrom constantly seek the right medium for their message(s). Among other projects, they’ve established a one-baud semaphore line through the streets of San Francisco, buried couples alive in plush surveillant coffins and cracked the hierarchies of the art market with a series of elaborate pranks. Now they are taking on the silver screen with the Kickstarter-funded story of Sierra Zulu, the last Soviet micro-state.
As our first Toast of the Tip honoree of the fall, Grenzfurthner will share his global adventures in subverting subversion and discuss some of the oddities of storytelling and filmmaking in a digital age.
Wednesday, 26 September 2012
Beer, wine, snacks, 5:30 pm
Speaker, 6:00 pm
RSVP REQUIRED
There will be a list. To be included, RSVP by the morning of 26th to: moc.nonnahcnacnudnull@pvsr
Our producer Arash T. Riahi gave an interview about Sierra Zulu and crowdfunding to Austrian magazine “The Gap”. 
(Click to enlarge.)
Bolsheviks! Upcoming events to promote our Kickstarter campaign for Sierra Zulu!
July 13, 2012, 9 PM
At HOPE Conference in New York City, Hotel Pennsylvania
Lecture performance “Sierra Zulu: How To Create A Feature Film About The Digital Age — And Why That’s Pretty Hard”
July 16, 2012, 7 PM
A Soviet Drink-Up at Beer Authority in Manhattan
613 8th Avenue (corner of 40th street across from Port Authority)
July 17, 2012, 7 PM
A Soviet BBQ at Bar Alexandraplatz in Montréal, Canada
6731 rue de l’Esplanade, Montréal, Canada
July 19, 2012, 7 PM thru 8:30 PM
A Soviet BBQ in Indianapolis, IN
Ellenberger Park, 5301 E. St. Clair St. (check intersection of Ritter and St. Clair)
July 21, 2012, 7 PM
A Soviet BBQ in Columbia, Missouri
Location: Location: 300 McNab Drive, Columbia, MO
July 22, 2012, 7 PM
At Kansas City Hackerspace CCCKC
440 East 63rd Street, Kansas City, MO
Lecture performance “Sierra Zulu: How To Create A Feature Film About The Digital Age — And Why That’s Pretty Hard”
July 24, 2012. 7 PM
A Soviet Occupation in San Francisco
Location: 19th and Dolores… please come in proper Soviet attire!
July 29, 2012, 2 PM
Closing Celebrations in Los Angeles
A Soviet Picnic at Old Zoo at Griffith Park
Soviet Unterzoegersdorf’s Research Group For Commodity Fetishism published a new paper (H32/7/12).
Quote: “In order to access and attract the wealthy plutocratic Western clientele, the State has to offer an additional reward in form of a decadent perversion.”
Recommendation of the research group: “In case of a single donor contributing more than $19,998, director Johannes Grenzfurthner should consume 1 pint of his own blood.”
He accepted. Only 1 pint available.
Link to Kickstarter.
