SIGNAL Festival

Probably one of the coolest things I have been to since living here in Prague. The Signal Festival is an art installation festival that happens all across the city. These range from simple light and sound shows to a full-on interactive experience. Mostly centered around Prague 1 (Old town Prague) this walking festival ranges from beautiful piano installations to mind-melting visuals and sound. It is almost a nighttime tour of Prague as the attractions are in or around most of the major historical monuments. It is at night, so some of the photography isn't the best because of the low light and my lack of a tripod. Also, most of the installations had to be filmed as they are moving all the time and a simple photograph wouldn't do them justice.

Each installation is marked with one of these, it contains information about the artist and his or her inspiration for the piece

Side note. Signal festival is a 4-day event. usually starting on a Thursday and going through the weekend. If you can I recommend going before the weekend starts as the crowds will not be nearly as big. Also some of the installations you must pay for to enter, usually the ones that are way more elaborate and complicated or inside buildings that had to be rented for the event. So if you are planning on coming to the event make sure to check the map before you wait an hour in line 

They have event organizers walking all over the city selling maps to the event, usually costing 30 crowns. (you can also order these online)

We started the night down in The Old town Square, where they had a massive installation in the middle of the square that illuminated the entire area in flashing light and sound. It was pretty impressive for how big it was. the amount of sound coming from inside the tent was enough to feel like you were at an EDM concert sitting in front of the subwoofers. A huge line of people was waiting outside the tent and we ended up waiting for just under 20 min to get inside... that was until we learned that there was a shorter line on the other side of the piece and got right in during the next performance. 

Inside the installation in Old town Prague. Was a little cramped but was still amazing.

The piece was trying to convey what it would be like to travel as sound through different mediums. They used flashing lights inside of a tunnel and very large speaker pointing inwards on all sides to really drive-home this feeling. It was pretty fantastic and the thumping of the speakers was large enough to push the air out of your chest. Overall they could have made it a little bigger but as it is a free festival (for the most part) it was well done and well executed.

As you can see in the video, it was a surreal experience. 

We decided to move north from the Old Town Square to the installations around the St.Agnes Church. Up here we encountered some of the strangest works out of the entire festival. It involved a study of light and sound that was something out of 2001: A Space Odyssey. I seriously thought on the first one we would be greeted by monkies pounding the ground worshiping some of these. Take a close look at the video of the first one we came across, that popping and cracking noise is part of the piece. It was mind numbing at points so much so that Tyna and I quickly became overwhelmed and had to move on to the next station. 

Watch your volume it is loud

So an artist had the great idea of putting a piece in the gardens of the St. Agnes church... it sounds like a great location, quiet, secluded, one way in and out..... until you throw hmm... maybe a 1000 people into the mix. The line for this took almost 30 min just to see the entrance and maybe another 15 to get to it. The basis for the entire installation was "Mechanical octopi from another dimension where the world has ended have taken over the gardens of St. Agnes". Ok, that's odd. 

As you can see the "octopi" use lights and projectors to create an interesting experience 

The octopi interacted with users and had many whirring gizmos and gadgets on them. They mostly focused on the relationship of nature and the organic world with mechanical stiffness and rigidity. A lot of them used projectors to show a silhouette of organic things in movement, usually attached to a revolving motor of sorts. Others used light and sound to create an interactive experience allowing visitors to clap or to wave in front of them to get a response. It was very cool but again there was only one way in and one way out so the crowd got a little bit much at the beginning. All in all a wonderful installment.

Being goofy and exploring the garden of mechanical octopi

Moving on, we walked down the street a ways to find what was meant to be a Heart with a piano trapped inside. The artist who created it must not have tested it very often as the electrics didn't work as planned. The outside cage was supposed to have a light show that changed color with the tune and speed of the music but it didn't work very well. It was still wonderful to hear live piano on the streets of Prague and although it wasn't fully working the piece attracted many people around it. 

After this, we moved south back into the city center to see the ones we had missed in Prague 1. We walked up and down crowded streets and grabbed some food to eat. We walked up on one that we had not read about in any of the flyers, well, because we just had not seemed very interesting. As it turns out it was just some projection mapping on a wall that looked cool. But... After reading about it the idea came to life. It consisted of many different symbols and icons that all represented a different hobby or activity that humans do online. The artist had apparently been granted access to see what trends were being done online over a vast majority of the city and then had allocated a symbol to that activity. He then had this entire wall covered in the symbols and as someone did something else online the symbol would change. It was amazing how fast people flip from one thing to another online. Although the end product wasn't that fascinating, the idea was there. 

You can see the many different symbols dotting the wall, changing every moment, every second.

After this, we decided to head out to Namesti Miru. This has been as Tyna put it "The best one since the festival started". The square at Namesti Miru has a very large church that sits in the middle of it. The organizers of the festival then projection map the entire front face of the church and it creates an insane light show. This was by far the best installation so far. It is huge and the mapping is incredible. Not only that but the local shop owners and merchants stay open for the event allowing people to buy pilzner and hot wine during the shows. Check out the video I cannot express in words how amazing it was. 

The projection mapping was incredible.

Once the light show was done we decided it was time to take the tram home. It was the perfect end to a perfect night.