PKMN + Fagor [3 min.]

[Subtitles in English available soon]

Paola Tognazzi + Grupo i68 [3 min.]

Mikel Morlas + Lauaxeta Ikastola [3 min.]

Alternativa 13

The international call is open for artists and social scientists to collaborate with the following seven organisations located in the Basque Country (Spain) as part of the 2012 edition of Improbable Connections: Artepan (artisanal bakery and pastry maker), EDE Fundazioa (social intervention), Eraikune (construction cluster in Euskadi), Grupo Uvesco (supermarkets), Oiz egin (rural development platform), Orbea (design and manufacture of bicycles) and Silam (Products and solutions based on silicone elastomer).
Deadline: 9am on 25 June 2012.
Collaboration period: September 2012 - June 2013.
Payment: 12,000 euros + VAT (including travel and accommodation).
[Image: Oiz egin]

Alternativa 13, an alternate reality game created between Carme Romero and Anesvad within Conexiones improbables is now open. It only lasts 3 weeks, sign up, move to 2013 and find solutions to the health crisis!

An initiative of Bilbao Ekintza and the Basque Development Agency (SPRI), the second edition of EkintzaLab has begun, bringing together artists and creators with nine SMEs: Artekopi (digital printing)+ Mabi Revuelta; Bit This (advertising and communication) + weareQQ; Capital Languages (language academy) + Mikel Morlas; Ideable Solutions (web and mobile applications) + Vivero de iniciativas ciudadanas; Iruña Catering + Laurita Siles; Tesysal (prevention of occupational hazards in the construction sector) + Recetas Urbanas; Urbegi product research (creation of employment for people with integration difficulties) + Ania Bas; Urgabi (technologies for surface waters) + Mobiolak; y Worköholics (communication) + Amasté. [Image: Mabi Revuelta]

Promoted by Irun and Hondarribia City Councils through Bidasoa Activa with the support of the SPRI, 10 creative pills are starting in SMEs of Irun and Hondarribia. The participants are the following one: Adimedia with Horman Poster, Beorlegi rótulos y luminosos with PKMN; Carpintería del Bidasoa Laister with Zaramari Hiri Ekologia, Piedras y Mármoles de Irún with Saioa Olmo.
Six retail trades are also participating: Deportes González with Maider López; Droguería Manolo with TrucaRec; Higer Optika with Maushaus, Hobeto Bizi! with Idoia Zabaleta, Marian Janaridenda with Pez[Estudio] and Txelo with ...por favor. [Image: PKMN]

The nine long-term projects (nine-month collaborations) from the 2011 edition of Improbable Connections officially ended their collaboration period on 1 February 2012, although at least six of them have decided to extend the experience for a few months. Several projects aimed to generate new narratives to reach their audiences/users (Fagor, DeustoTech, Tknika). Other projects focused on investigating the desires and needs of their audiences/users to later create projects based on these (i68, Fundación Germán Sánchez, Lauaxeta, Obe Hettich), and two projects are creating new tools based on games to immerse their audiences in new realities (Anesvad, Ipar Uribe). In short, almost all the projects focused on studying end users and rethinking existing channels between users and the organisation itself as spaces for innovation. [Image: Fagor/PKMN]

If you are part of a company or an organisation and you want to experiment an improbable connection integrating an artist or a social scientist to your project, please contact us to: info@conexionesimprobables.com.

We have experienced a new form of creative exchange with the celebration of OpenLabs in Gizpukoa (San Telmo Museum), Bizkaia (Bilbao Arte, University of Deusto and Lauaxeta Ikastola) and in Melbourne, Australia (Arts House), opening up 8 improbable projects to the participation of more than 400 people. We are very pleased with the results, which have materialized in very interesting contributions to the projects, and we would like to thank all the persons that have contributed to it.

We have just attended the second meetings organised by the two European projects in which we are involved, Creative Clash (in its third year) led by Tillt (Sweden) and Training Artists for Innovation led by Ondernemen Cultuur (Netherlands). Thought the Creative Clash project the WZB Social Research Center in Berlin will designed a questionnaire to assess the 9 long projects currently driven by Conexiones Improbables. The Training Artists for Innovation project is thinking about which complementary trainings artists would need in order to collaborate with companies or organisations.