It's the early 80's. The PC for plain mortals is called the home computer. There are diskettes, the monitor is a television set and we are playing Space Invaders and Pac man…
Intro The Event Demos Symposium / Workshop Geek Club Exhibition objects Movies Guests Pressclippings Acknowledgements	Arkanoid on the C-64, many visitors used to play it a whole afternoon...

The Event   [ electronic kindergarten ] presented from May 18th to May 26th in Vienna's WUK and Schikaneder Cinema, the primal status symbols of today's whiz kids- to touch, play and to hack with them…
Lots of guests had the opportunity to remember their old system commands, i.e. in order to load games on a C-64. Arakoid and Loderunner were ready to be played and tested, other classics first had to be loaded with a diskette into the "breadbox".
In the WUK-Museum's vestibule there is a bar and blank walls, which where decorated in the style of the exhibition with "ministeck" (mini sticks) creations from Norbert Bayer, showing computer game screenshots from the 80's in the original pixel-design.

electronic kindergarten was visited by 1687 persons.

The happy winner of the [d]package in Tron-pose

In each proper IT-company there is a place to relax and recive and of course such a place couldn't be missing from electronic kindergarten. Directly next to the playroom, where the Tron competition was taking everyone's breath away, Demos (computer animations) where projected on a big canvas- such a canvas as used for the GL-Tron competition next room-. Old commercials for Atari, Commodore, Apple and Amiga demonstration clips presented on screens on one side of the room added to an amazing atmosphere, presenting what minimum size data packages can achieve in a 3D-Power constellation. Demos, created by ambitious young programmers, try to prove how a good code can be written with minimum memory capacities. The results are beautiful computer animations with music which you can view on your own contemporary personal computer. The [d]vision demo compilation and the GL-Tron game are on the electronic CD-ROM, the catalogue to electronic kindergarten. Order for 60,-ATS/ 4,5 €.

electronic kindergarten though was much more than a simple exhibition. Lots of guests also visited the movie-series Geek Classics of the 80's at the Schikaneder cinema. Other attractions were also the symposium Computer Assault and the workshop Interactive Narrativity with guest speakers from Austria, Germany and Switzerland.

---

Symposium May 25th 2001:
Computer Assault -
When a game is no longer a game
The times are gone when one could reduce the function of a computer to calculating only. Interfaces create worlds that go beyond zeroes and ones. These worlds expand since the 80s upon our private space. And everything began just by playing games.

Andreas Lange: Game/Culture
Gerin Trautenberger: Glory Days and the Hype of Hacking
Johannes Domsich: ComputerKinderKörper

---

[d]vision opened on May 18th 2001 its [ parenthesis to digital culture once again and closed it with the Geek Club on May 26th ] revealing a total view of the Game/hacking culture of the 80's.

Geek Club in the Schikaneder cinema, May 26th 2001
Tapes n' slicks (Tapes and Video-Remix) vonAutomatisch with Ghettoblaster,
Workbench VS 2.0,
Visuals cracked by HOEC.

Exhibition objects in Vienna's WUK, May 18th-26th 2001

Rare computers, old consoles and tric-o-tronics where displayed behind glass, though the true attraction where games for testing and hacking. Consultants where always in place, ready to help, when the start command showed an error or when the Nintendo started to blink once again.

…you could try Mattel Intellivision Sega MEGADRIVE - the first real 16-Bit Console Channel F / Saba Videoplay / Clone of the 1976 evolved Channel F / Fairchild, the first Tele-game with exchangeable modules. Nintendo NES / from Japan directly beneath the Christmas tree for children all over the world …you could look at Amiga CDTV - the Multimedia station Apple//e - the most successful 8-Bitter, Apple ever has produced (from 1983 to 1993 !) Atari - the worldwide most famous enterprise Colecovision - from manufacturing leather articles to producing Video games Commodore C128D - Desktop edition of the C-128 Commodore VC20 - Commodores first sensational commercial hit Tric-o-Tronics, handhelds, tabletops - adapting of the manufacturers name for a product. Mupid Komfort - the BTX Computer from Austria Epson HX-20 - Minicomputer (smaller than a modern Notebook) with a screen in handheld-size and Printer

electronic CD-ROM with catalogue, games, videos, infos,... Main attraction was the game GL-Tron, played with four competitors, like a deathmatch...

electronic kindergarten with picture on APA's www.OTS.at (startpage)	The FutureZone (ORF) presented electronic kindergarten four times	derStandard.at Culture presented a Slideshow about [d]vision with 34 pictures and articles in the WebStandard
[d]vision on the startpage of surfEU.de	Party.at with [d]vision on the startpage	The Kurier presented three great articles about electronic kindergarten

Kurier (Kult-Kurier) May 20th 2001:
<<Coarse graphic design, fine fun […] Electronic kindergarten, an exhibition with movies and lectures has the purpose to give the era of home computers the acknowledgment it is entitled to. On this occasion visitors may try a huge variety of old games.>>

Kurier (Vienna chronik), May 22th 2001:
<<Back to future: a journey to the past to the electronic kindergarten … it is more than a funny journey to the past and the first computers, has to give more than an entertaining game-afternoon at the WUK.>>

Die Presse, May 22th 2001:
<<Star Wars, Tricotronics and C64 are IT-History. At the WUK the 80eth decades' Whiz Kids are brushing up their memories.>>

Der Standard, May 19/20th 2001:
<<The Schikaneder Cinema starts today with the series "Geek Classics of the Eighties" the accompanying film program to the [d]vision-festival which this year is dedicated to the entry of digital media into the children's room an its influences in the beginning of the 80ies.>>

Falter, 20/01:
<<When low-tech (Commodore, Atari & Co.) enjoys a comeback, then "electronic kindergarten" joins in to celebrate the anachronistic charms of Pacman and Tricotronics. There is a Symposium, a workshop and a movie series and an picture exhibition showing Norbert Bayer's pixel-pictures.>>

RAY - Cinema magazine, May 2001
[...] <<electronic kindergarten opens a window into the past of the present.>>

[d]vision wishes to thank it's sponsors and media partners:

opening 18.05. 2001 [ electronic kindergarten ] closing 26.05.2001

In cooperation with WUK and Schikaneder

supported by: Wissenschafts- und Forschungsförderung der Stadt Wien, Wien Kultur, Stadtplanung Wien
Assisted by the partners of [d]vision:
cross-media, digital vitamins, Dittrich, Filmschule Wien, ameg, JVC, k-effects
Media partners: Radio Orange 94.0, Party.at, TIV, UTV, cycamp.at, Vienna Online, Winside, Infoscreen, 4students.at, freikarte.at, club.at