CV English

LUMA.LAUNISCH
luma.launisch – visual Frontal attack
Luma - Represents the brightness in an image
Launisch - Given to frequent changes of mood
luma.launisch – From dark to light
The VJ duo Luma.Launisch, alias Astrid Steiner and Florian Launisch, create their surreal worlds on screens
in techno-clubs and classical concert halls. With their background in filmmaking the duo aims to tell stories.
Their visual journeys can pilot you into a colourful balloon, letting you float over the boats of the Bosphorus
only to land in New York’s Central Park.
With their eccentric live shows they have accompanied musicians like Qluster (formally Cluster), Jimmy Edgar,
Akufen, Groove Armada, Juan Atkins, Peter Kruder, Richard Dorfmeister, Electric Indigo, Luciano, Josh Wink,
Mocky, Extrawelt, Dj Mehdi and many more. Their latest live show “INNENWELTKOSMOS” with musician Ken
Hayakawa won the ZIT Content Award for best Visuals 2011.
In the last years luma.launisch started to flirt intensively with Jazz and new classical music, leading to
collaborations with artists such as the Zawinul Syndicate, Kristjan Järvi’s Absolute Ensemble, Gene Pritsker’s
Sound Liberation, as well as with Martin Reiter.
Luma.Launisch has gained the attention of the international art scene, including invitations to present video
installations at the Benaki Museum Athens, the Photobiennale Thessaloniki, the exhibition Sound:Frame at
Vienna’s Künstlerhaus, the Austrian Cultural Forum in New York & the CNN screen in Times Square. In October
2011 their video installation “60 Seconds Somewhere” was showcased at the MAK Vienna.
“The real star of the performance, however, is video duo Luma.Launisch, whose reanimated photographic
landscapes mould the music into something much more memorable. Memory, indeed, seems an apt motif
for a performance that feels not so much improved as it does recalled at the expense of great effort - a
bricolage of fond recollections.” (Paul Britton about Qluster &Luma.Launisch / in “405 UK”)
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Exhibitions
MAK Vienna 2011 / “60 Seconds Somewhere”
25 one minute portraits of cities all around the world
from Shanghai, Tokio, Rio, Abu Dhabi, Detroit, New
York, Berlin to Barcelona
Photobiennale Thessaloniki 2010 / “Ellinikon”
Video installation
Music: Chris Kuklis, Luke Damrosch
Photography: Alexandros Lambrovassilis
Austrian Cultural Forum NY 2009 / “7min 20sec”
Walk-in video installation
Exhibition: Creative Migration
Music: Zanshin
in collaboration with Johannes Girardoni
Vienna Art Week 2009 / “We are”
live audio & video installation
Salon Projektionist Vienna 2009 /
“Thriller - Crushed by the lightness of life”
solo exhibition
Music: Gabriel Kogler
Benaki Museum Athens 2010 / “Island”
Video installation
Exhibition: Hopes, Dreams & Hard Times
Music: Chris Kuklis & Luke Damrosch
Künstlerhaus Vienna 2008 / “Romantikraum 8”
quadrophonic multi-screen video installation
Exhibition: sound:frame Festival Music: Gabriel Kogler
Künstlerhaus Vienna 2009 / “Need for Night”
Octophonic walk-in multi-screen installation
Exhibition: sound:frame Festival Music: Gabriel Kogler
Island 2010
Need for Night 2009
Ellinikon 2010
Romantikraum 8
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FESTIVALS
SEMIBREVE, Braga 2011 / Portugal
ARD Hörspieltage, ZKM Karlsruhe 2010 / Germany
Freakwave, Festspielhaus Bregenz 2010 - 2011 / Austria
Donaufestival Krems 2010 / Austria
Moving Sounds Festival 2009 / New York
Elevate Festival 2009 / Austria
Mapping Festival 2008 / Switzerland
N.A.M.E Festival 2008 / France
wilsonic festival 2008 / Slovakia
ETNA Festival 2008 / Italy
Cracow Screen Festival 2008 / Poland
Sound:Frame Festival 2008 - 2011 / Austria
Urban Art Forms Festival 2007 – 2010 / Austria
Music Fest Bremen 2007 / Germany
Outreach Jazzfestival 2006 – 2009 / Austria
Music Fest Bremen 2007
Urban Art Forms 2009
live with Groove Armada
Mapping Festival 2008
live with Shy FX
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Live Performances
excerpts
World EXPO 2010 Shanghai China
Live at the Austrian Pavilion,
special Vienna showcase
The Moonflight 2009 / New York
video installation and live video composition
at the Chelsea Art Museum NY
Vienna Showcase TIFF 2011 / Toronto
Sound:Frame Vienna Visuals
M.O.N.E.Y. / New York
a hip-hop/chamber opera composed
by Gene Pritsker
premiered at Flea Theater New York in 2007,
later on tour in NY, Austria & Italy
Qluster (Cluster)
Live video show for the German innovators of
electronic music back in the 70`s
Volksbühne Berlin, Elevate Festival Graz,
ZKM Karlsruhe
Strike! / New York
a new music and boxing extravaganza with
The International Street Cannibals performed at
Brooklyn`s famous boxing club “Gleason’s Gym” and
at Austria`s Jazz-festival Outreach in Austria
Hugo Wolf Festival 2010 / Radiokulturhaus, AUT
Visualization of Wolf`s composition
“Spanisches Liederbuch” (1889/90)
Lifeball 2008 / Austria
360 panorama live video projection at one of the
world`s biggest AIDS charity events
Strike!
World EXPO 2010 Shanghai
Hugo Wolf Festival 2010
Lifeball 2008
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„Norma“
Théâtre du Châtelet Paris, 2010
Qluster 2011
In concert with
electronic & pop:
Qluster, Alkinoos Ioannidis,
Groove Armada, Apparat, Luciano,
Josh Wink, Jimmy Edgar, Akufen,
Electric Indigo, Onur Özer, Little
Dragon, Shy FX, George Morel,
Dorian Concept, Dominik Eulberg,
Mocky, Matias Aguayo, Rob Acid,
Gustav, Peter Kruder, Richard
Dorfmeister & many more
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jazz & classical:
Kristjan Järvi’s Absolute Ensemble,
Zawinul Syndicate, Martin Reiter,
Sound Liberation, Gene Pritsker,
Borislav Strulev, Chanda Rule,
Daniel Schnyder, Adam Holzman,
Brothers Ivanov & many more
PRESS & QUOTES
60 Seconds Somewhere
at MAK Vienna 2011
“By making us their travel mates
from abandoned Detroit city
centre to watching a swimming
dog at some riverside Luma
Launisch hijack us on a journey
that involves our innermost. Large
screen projections showing slowmotion details of daily life, urban
scenery and leisure scenes make
urbanism and nature mingle as do
vividness and melancholy, all with
an striking eye for the incidental.
A great escape!”
Lilli Hollein, Tulga Beyerle
Directors Vienna Design Week
Qluster + Luma.Launisch
at Semibreve Portugal 2011
“The delicacy of the performance
was perfectly echoed by the
projections of Luma.Launisch,
assembled and processed in real
time from personal film archives,
thus giving the concert a sense
of overwhelming grandeur while
staying solidly anchored to an
understated and fragile narrative.
As the visuals morphed from the
cosmic through maritime themes
to continue their journey towards
more human evocations, they
finally settled for the passing
seasons as a way to suggest
the slow erosion of life – a very
touching ending that set the
mood for the entire festival.”
Luma.Launisch
“Visualists with an eye for the
power of the image. ... They were
not only doing VJing but also
working with Jazz groups and
choruses. On top of that their
images were curious constructs
that were not completely literal
but balanced in such a way that
there was room for the viewer to
connect the meaning in their own
way.”
Ilan Katin
Modul8.us and
Mapping Festival Geneva
Pascal Savy / Fluid Radio UK
Qluster 2011
CONTACT
Luma.Launisch
info@lumalaunisch.com
www.lumalaunisch.com
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