''Neural'' is a print magazine established in 1993 dealing with

new media art New media art includes artworks designed and produced by means of new media, electronic media technology, technologies, comprising virtual art, computer graphics, computer animation, digital art, interactive art, sound art, Internet art, video g ...

, electronic music and

hacktivism In Internet activism, hacktivism, or hactivism (a portmanteau of ''hack'' and ''activism''), is the use of computer-based techniques such as hacking as a form of civil disobedience to promote a political agenda or social change. With roots in hack ...

. It was founded by

Alessandro Ludovico Alessandro Ludovico (born 1969) is a researcher, artist and chief editor of ''Neural'' magazine since 1993. He received his Ph.D. degree in English and Media from Anglia Ruskin University in Cambridge (UK). He is Associate Professor at the Winch ...

and Minus Habens Records label owner

Ivan Iusco Ivan Iusco (born September 4, 1970) is an Italian award-winning composer and record producer based in Los Angeles, California, United States. Career Music In 1987, he founded the pioneering Italian music label Minus Habens Records (involving ar ...

in Bari (Italy). In its first issue (distributed in November 1993) there was the only translation in Italian of

William Gibson William Ford Gibson (born March 17, 1948) is an American-Canadian speculative fiction writer and essayist widely credited with pioneering the science fiction subgenre known as ''cyberpunk''. Beginning his writing career in the late 1970s, his ...

's '' Agrippa (A Book of the Dead)''.Ludovico, Alessandro e Iusco, Ivan, (1993) ''Neural n.1'', Minus Habens Records, Bari.

History

The first topics covered were:

cyberpunk Cyberpunk is a subgenre of science fiction in a dystopian futuristic setting that tends to focus on a "combination of lowlife and high tech", featuring futuristic technological and scientific achievements, such as artificial intelligence and cyber ...

(both as a literally and political movement), electronic music, networks and BBS, virtual reality, media, science fiction and UFO. The magazine's mission was to be a magazine of ideas, becoming a node in a larger network of digital culture publishers. The magazine was also committed to give its topics a proper visual frame: focusing on graphic design and how it could have expressed the electronic culture in a sort of printed 'interface', exploiting at the same time the "sensorial" possibilities of the printed page. So, for example the page numbering was strictly in binary numbers for three years, then decimal figures were added aside. There was a department with stereogram pictures and the centerfold hosted a few optical art artworks. The graphic design included a fixed space in every article for contact and links, being inspired by the

Whole Earth Catalog The ''Whole Earth Catalog'' (WEC) was an American counterculture magazine and product catalog published by Stewart Brand several times a year between 1968 and 1972, and occasionally thereafter, until 1998. The magazine featured essays and articl ...

experiments. In issue #18 the centerfold was dedicated to a hacktivist fake. It was made by fake stickers, created by the Italian hacker laboratories' network. These fake stickers were sarcastically simulating the real ones that are mandatory stuck on any book or compact disc sold in Italy, because of the law supporting the SIAE, the local Authors' and Musicians' Society. On the one published on ''Neural'' is written 'suggested duplication on any media'. In 1997 the first ''Neural'' website was established, and it has been updated daily since September 2000. The Neural website is bi-lingual (English and Italian). In 1998, the topics were restricted to three: media art, with a peculiar attention to the networked and conceptual use of technology in art (the so-called

net.art net.art refers to a group of artists who have worked in the medium of Internet art since 1994. Some of the early adopters and main members of this movement include Vuk Ćosić, Jodi.org, Alexei Shulgin, Olia Lialina, Heath Bunting, Daniel Gar ...

), hacktivism, or activism using electronic media to express itself and electronic music, investigating how the technology is involved in music production, consumption and experimentation. In May 2002, ''Neural'' was one of the founding members of Mag.net, electronic cultural publishers, an international network of magazines, whose slogan is "Collaboration is Better than Competition". This network was founded during the conference and workshop "Post Media Publishing" that took place at the Universidad International de Andalucia, in Seville (Spain). Since then, a few Mag.net meetings, mutual workshops and presentations were done in various countries, and three Mag.net Readers were published as well. In 2007, ''Neural'' was part of the

Documenta 12 magazines ''Documenta 12 magazines'' (also ''the Magazine project'' or simply ''the magazines'') was a central project of the 12th edition (2007) of the documenta exhibition, similar in dimensions and world outreach to the "platforms" of the previous edit ...

project and Alessandro Ludovico was appointed as an. In 2008, ''Neural'' celebrated 15 years of publishing with a join micro-printed action with Swamp group. ''Neural'' magazine () started as a bi-monthly but since 1997 it was printed three times in a year (some years it was printed irregularly). It was printed originally in Italian, but since 2003 there were two different printed editions: in English and Italian. The Italian printed edition was discontinued in 2008.

English Edition

*Issue #20, Hacktive Community *Issue #21, Breaking the Rules *Issue #22, Facing Reality *Issue #23, Hacking the Air *Issue #24, Geek Girls *Issue #25, Media Interventionists *Issue #26, Disturbing the System *Issue #27, Copyright Guerrilla *Issue #28, Data Error *Issue #29, Digital China *Issue #30, Dangerous Games *Issue #31, Information Value *Issue #32, Machine Affection *Issue #33, Scripting Green *Issue #34, Fake'ology *Issue #35, Friends? *Issue #36, Time Deceptions *Issue #37, Common Spacing *Issue #38, p2p > f2f *Issue #39, Multiplied Identities *Issue #40, The Generative Unexpected *Issue #41, Addiction(s) *Issue #42, The Illegal Issue *Issue #43, Networked Tangibility *Issue #44, Post-Digital Printing *Issue #45, Américas! *Issue #46, Unearthed: The 20th Anniversary Issue *Issue #47, Art in the age of neurological reproduction *Issue #48, Uncanny Abundance *Issue #49, Off-Western *Issue #50, Transient Gestures *Issue #51, Revive *Issue #52, Complexity issue(s) *Issue #53, Obfuscate or Die *Issue #54, Making it up *Issue #55, Inconvenient Utopias *Issue #56, Intelligently Weak *Issue #57, Propaganda Mon Amour *Issue #58, Archivism (the dynamics of archiving) *Issue #59, Pimping the Eye, VR now *Issue #60, Blockchain. The Trust Catalyst. *Issue #61, Speculative Pink *Issue #62, Spiked Pieces, Celebrating 25 years of Neural *Issue #63, Surveillance Surveyed *Issue #64, Post-Growth *Issue #65, Redirecting Networks *Issue #66, State of Emergency *Issue #67, Adversarial Tactics

Italian Edition

*N. 1, Agrippa *N. 2, Dream Machine *N. 3, Realtà Virtuali e Guerra *N. 1 nuova serie, Bruce Sterling *N. 2 nuova serie, Brain Machines *N. 3 nuova serie, Videogames *N. 4 nuova serie, Wired *N. 5 nuova serie, Intrusioni Cerebrali *N. 6 nuova serie, BBS copyright non è reato *N. 10, Telefoni cellulari, i danni biologici *N. 11, William Gibson *N. 12, Next World Radio *N. 13, Dead Media *N. 14, Scanner *N. 15, Lassigue Bendthaus *N. 16, Etoy *N. 17, RTMark *N. 18, Marcus Novak *N. 19, Richard Stallman *N. 20, Hacktive Community *N. 21, Breaking the Rules *N. 22, Facing Reality *N. 23, Hacking the Air *N. 24, Media Interventionists *N. 25, Copyright Guerrilla

Awards

Prix Ars Electronica The Prix Ars Electronica is one of the best known and longest running yearly prizes in the field of electronic and interactive art, computer animation, digital culture and music. It has been awarded since 1987 by Ars Electronica (Linz, Austria) ...

has been awarded since 1987 by

Ars Electronica Ars Electronica Linz GmbH is an Austrian cultural, educational and scientific institute active in the field of new media art, founded in Linz in 1979. It is based at the Ars Electronica Center (AEC), which houses the Museum of the Future, in the ...

, based in

Linz Linz ( , ; cs, Linec) is the capital of Upper Austria and third-largest city in Austria. In the north of the country, it is on the Danube south of the Czech border. In 2018, the population was 204,846. In 2009, it was a European Capital of ...

Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous ...

, acknowledging excellent international initiatives and achievements in electronic and

interactive art Interactive art is a form of art that involves the spectator in a way that allows the art to achieve its purpose. Some interactive art installations achieve this by letting the observer walk through, over or around them; others ask the artist ...

computer animation Computer animation is the process used for digitally generating animations. The more general term computer-generated imagery (CGI) encompasses both static scenes (still images) and dynamic images (moving images), while computer animation refe ...

, digital culture and music. From 2001 to 2006, awards were given in the Net Vision / Net Excellence category. In 2004, Neural received an honorary mention in this category.Honorary Mention Net Vision,
"Ars Electronica Archive"

, 2004. Retrieved on 14 September 2016.

Contributors

Contributors who wrote on ''Neural'': Josephine Bosma, Jonah Brucker Cohen, Bronac Ferran, Daphne Dragona, Paul Prudence,

Vittore Baroni Vittore Baroni (born 1956 in Forte dei Marmi, Italy), is an Italian mailartist, music critic and explorer of countercultures. Since the mid-1970s he has been one of the most active and respected promoters and documenters of mail art. He has writt ...

, Francesca Bianchi, Aldo Chimenti, Cosma Di Tanno, Francesco Lodolo, Antonio Scacco, Paul Toohill, Fabrizio Usberti, Luca Valtorta, Maurizio Verga, Francesco Zappalà

References

{{Reflist

External links

official website

official website in Italian

We Make Money, Not Art: Interview with Alessandro Ludovico

Interview with Alessandro Ludovico (Neural.it)
1993 establishments in Italy Contemporary art magazines Irregularly published magazines Magazines published in Italy Bi-monthly magazines published in Italy Italian-language magazines Magazines established in 1993 Mass media in Bari Triannual magazines