🗓️September 23— October 1, 2022
DARINGTON ESTATE
📍Totnes, Devon, TQ9 6EL UK
The fourteenth edition of CYFEST, one of the world’s longest-running media art festivals, took place at the Dartington Estate in Devon, UK—a site known for its rich history in the arts, sustainability, and social innovation.
Titled “Ferment”, the exhibition used the concept of fermentation as both a biological process and a metaphor for transformation, decay, creation, and coexistence. The curatorial focus was on how change—chemical, emotional, societal, or ecological—can be explored through sound, media, installation, and sensory perception.
Over 30 artists from seven countries contributed to the project, including internationally recognized names in bioart, sound art, and digital performance. The show featured installations, video works, and interactive experiences that explored life cycles, invisible processes, and new modes of perception. Notable participants included Anne Marie Maes, Mariateresa Sartori, and the art collective Where Dogs Run.
A special section, “Digital Fermentation”, presented video works ranging from 1990s experimental cinema from St. Petersburg to contemporary digital art reflecting the ever-shifting boundary between reality and virtuality.
According to CYLAND MediaArtLab co-founder Anna Frants, “Fermentation is a metamorphosis—it’s about the living and the dead, about smell, color, sound, and emotion.” The exhibition did not aim to provide answers but to provoke dialogue and shared reflection on transformation in today’s world.
Set against the backdrop of Dartington’s historic estate—home to artists, philosophers, and social reformers for nearly a century—CYFEST-14: Ferment created a space for deep artistic inquiry and interdisciplinary exchange.
