Average of one thousand visitors per day since opening
The Centre quickly earns a reputation as an interactive, participative space offering the public a chance to enjoy arts related to new technologies and industrial creativity.
Around 7,500 people have already visited the LABoral Centre for Art and Creative Industries from its opening on Friday 30th March through till Thursday 5th April. This means that in the first six days (closed on Tuesdays) the Centre registered an average of 1,250 people per day. Visitors came to see the three exhibitions on view at the new centre that embodies Asturias? ambition to put itself at the forefront of contemporary art. During these first six days the word quickly spread that LABoral actively encourages an interactive approach to arts related with new technologies and industrial creation.
That interaction between visitor and work is a constant in almost all of the 37 pieces on view in Feedback, an exhibition establishing links between digital creation and some of the major movements of the historical avant-gardes. Apart from being able to see some legendary pieces of the most recent art, visitors could ?play? with many of the works , like Participation TV by Nam June Paik; involuntary shoot a film with images made up with materials from a number of webcams in Short Film by Thomson & Craighead; browse through a virtual world thanks to a waistcoat controlling their movements and breathing in Osmose by Char Davies; or play with Mary Flanagan?s three-metres long giantJoystick.
Gameworld demonstrates that videogames are more than playing. This is clearly visible after visiting the two galleries with works by over forty artists and designers selected by the exhibition?s curator Carl Goodman to showcase the complex convergence of art, creativity, business and technology in videogames. Children and adults alike can enjoy, use and play with the 10 historic icons of innovation and design in games selected by a panel of five experts in games development who made their decision public on 5th March 2007 at the ?Game Developers Conference? in San Francisco. The same happened with the selection of alternative, independent, political and experimental videogames which , by reason of form or content, challenge commonly assumed notions of what a videogame should be.
LABcyberspaces, an initiative of the Projects Office, includes ten works selected after an open invitation attracted 133 entries from 26 countries around the world. The proposal invites visitors to reflect on the virtual over and above the use of Internet as a tool. The Projects Office is one of the fields of activity through which LABoral Centre for Art and Creative Industries will introduce experimental art and design into the Centre.
But LABoral Centre for Art and Creative Industries also has an active presence in other locations in Asturias, including Pravia, Luanco, Covadonga, Villaviciosa, Valnalón and Grao, thanks to Extensions?Anchors, an exhibition in which the Art Centre ?extends? beyond its Gijon headquarters in order to engage with seven local artists: Adolfo Manzano (Pravia), Avelino Sala (Luanco), Juan Carlos Martínez (Luanco), Maite Centol (Villaviciosa), Pablo Armesto (Covadonga), Natalia Pastor (Grado) and Cuco Suárez (Polígono de Valnalón).
opening hours
Until 15th April
Opening time: 12:00
Closing time: 22:00
CLOSED: Tuesdays (except public holidays), plus 1st January & 25th December
From 16th April
Opening time:12 noon
Closing time:8 pm
ADMISSION FEES
General public€5
Reduced€2
For students (university card, youth card, or international student card); over 65s and unemployed
Free Admission
Every Wednesday plus 18th May (International Museum Day
Free Admission
Members of LABoral Amigos Association, under 10s, journalists and ICOM members (International Council of Museums)
