Rafael Beznos | Portfolio

About

Rafael Beznos is a Brazilian multidisciplinary artist whose work explores the boundaries between art, technology, and human experience.

With over two decades of trajectory, his work traverses immersive interactive installations, video mapping, documentaries, theater, experimental music, and DIY technological development. Based in Vienna, Austria, he continues researching the relationship between the real and the virtual, between the analog and the digital.

His series project "DreamLoading" investigates the relationship between the real and virtual worlds through the stimulation of man-machine and body-mind interaction in intuitive artistic installations.

Installations and Exhibitions

Immersive interactive installations that explore the relationship between street art, digital art, electronic music, and traditional brush painting techniques.

2007

Art Bombarding (Art Bombarding)

Cross-media Interactive Installation

Developed for FILE 2007 (Electronic Language International Festival) in São Paulo, in collaboration with graffiti artists Isaac "Grow" Dev, Mea, and Boleta. It explores the relationship between street art, digital art, man-machine, electronic music, and traditional brush painting techniques. The black and white colors represent the binary 0/1 system as a basic model of the digital world.

FILE · São Paulo/SP

2008

The House of Chance (The House of Chance)

Cross-media Interactive Installation

Developed for FILE 2008 in Porto Alegre, in collaboration with graffiti artist Nina Moraes. As an immersive space, it produces a displacement effect of perspective in the viewer's mind by merging the boundaries between the digitally projected virtual reality and the physically tangible material reality painted on the walls. The animated projected elements were interactive sampler triggers activated through touch-screen.

FILE · Porto Alegre/RS

2008

The House of Chances

Collective Interactive Art Exhibition

Developed for FILE 2008 in Rio de Janeiro. A collective space where the audience was invited to produce art live: canvases and pieces spread across the gallery walls received interventions from visitors throughout the exhibition, in collaboration with several artists. Performances and creations took place inside the installation itself.

FILE · Rio de Janeiro/RJ

2010

Kronomnemocynética

Cross-media Installation / Photography Exhibition

An installation created from the reflection on the movement of memory through time in association with storage and capture technologies. Projection mapping, graffiti, computer, video projector, plasma TV screen, and DVD player. The photos represent the frames of memory moving through time.

Casa da Ribeira · Natal/RN

2009

S.U.N. (Synchronic Universal Navigation)

Cross-media Interactive Installation

A space dedicated to acquaintanceship and interaction among visitors built at the request of a music festival in Brazil. The installation visually emulated a yellow cartoon-like submarine, with two video installations within it. Performances, lectures, gaming, movie sessions, and other activities took place inside the space.

UP 09 · Bahia

2006

U.DO

Cross-media Interactive Installation

The first installation of the "DreamLoading" series. Visitors are challenged to change their position from viewer/observer/consumer to participant/creator/producer of the reality around them. A three-option interface made in Adobe Flash, two projectors, and a 5.1 surround sound system with interactive panning controlled by joystick.

Idanha-a-Nova · Portugal

2010

In Lampião's Footsteps

Cross-media Installation / Interactive Photography

An interactive photographic exhibition with 700 pictures selected from 10 years of photographic expeditions to "Sertão do Apodi", Brazil. The pictures were projected inside mapped graffiti art and changed when the visitor reached a marked spot, triggering the ultrasonic sensor. Four projectors, four computers, and four ultrasonic sensors created millions of possible visual combinations.

SBPC · Natal/RN

2010

Unimed · Você

Interactive Video-mapping Installation

Developed for the premiere of the health-plan magazine "Você" (You). Three decorative projection-mapped walls and an interactive bathroom weight scale that triggered animations of dialogues over painted characters on the bathroom corridor wall. The dialogues contained sayings about body and mind health written by the Taoist philosopher Confucius.

Magazine Você Launch · Brazil

2009

A Memória da Cidade e a Ponte dos Tempos (The City's Memory and the Bridge of Times)

Interactive Photo Installation

An interactive photo exhibition portraying the changes in the city's architecture along more than 300 years of history. Photo visualization was made through a timeline interface on a touch-screen monitor. The viewer could interact with the chosen images through touch that triggered a bitmap displacement effect, creating interactive abstract digital projected paintings from the original photos.

Day of the Plastic Artist · Capitania das Artes · Natal/RN

2008

Metamúsica

Interactive Touch-screen Sampler and Video-art

Interactive video-clip sampler where the viewer could change the parts of the song, play or mute instruments, and mix videos associated with each loop/sound channel.

Etnica Outdoor / Etnica Indoor · São Paulo/SP

Video and Documentaries

2012

Amundiá

Feature-length Documentary

Pre-production and director's assistant. A documentary about the origins of Carimbó, a rhythm originated in the Amazonic regions of Brazil. Filmed in Belém and cities in the state of Pará.

2004

Wild Rio (Wild Rio)

Feature-length Documentary

Direct Sound Recording Technician. Documentary produced by National Geographic Channel in association with ARD Channel about the wildlife living side by side with the city of Rio de Janeiro.

2012

Bass, Drums, Apocalypse — Metrópole Locomotiva

Music Video

Direction and editing. Music video made by remixing exclusively public domain images selected from the archive.org database.

2013

Psychology and Diversity

Documentary Series · 4 Chapters

Produced by the Federal Council of Psychology of Brazil. The 4-chapter series addresses the need to live democratically with differences and diversity.

Theater and Performances

2011

2011, A Clown's Odyssey

Audiovisual and Circus Acrobatics Spectacle

Direction, soundtrack, video projections, and script. A circus trampoline acrobatic performance with multimedia projections. The script was inspired by "2001: A Space Odyssey" by Stanley Kubrick, divided into three conceptual parts: The Primate, The Astronaut, and The Starchild.

Funarte · Brasília/DF

2009

Nativity (Nativity)

Theatrical Spectacle · Video-projection Scenography

A spectacle about the birth of Christ in a contemporary outfit. With the use of giant projected structures and multimedia resources as interaction between characters on stage and filmed actors in the projections. Eleven projectors were used in total.

Anfiteatro UFRN · Natal/RN

Music and Sound Design

♫

2013

We Are Not Musicians

Experimental Sound Performance

Experimental sound performance with Glerm Soares and Gustavo Paim, using hammer, nails, guitar strings, typewriters, laptops, MIDI controllers, and PureData software.

♪

EP

Lab.Oratory

Alternative Experimental Electronic Music EP

The name Lab.Oratory represents the integration of the science/spirituality duality, as well as art/technology, the two sides of the brain represented in logic/creativity, the Taoist light/darkness view, and so on.

♬

2001–2011

Recycled Music

Full Album

Alternative lounge music made between 2001 and 2011 in different studios with several collaborators and different instruments, experimental recording techniques, and different equipment used for each track.

📻

2013

Rádio Balaio

Web Radio

Founder, maintainer, and content programmer of the non-commercial web radio of exclusively Creative Commons licensed music. The Icecast server is self-maintained with no commercial purposes at Matehackers, a hackerspace in Porto Alegre.

www.radiobalaio.org

🎬

2013

Drugs and Citizenship

Soundtrack and Sound Design

A series of 6 short films for a drug prevention campaign produced by the Federal Council of Psychology of Brazil.

🎭

2013

Psychology and Diversity

Soundtrack

Soundtrack of the 4-chapter documentary series about the need to live democratically with differences and diversity.

Sequential Arts and Printed Works

2011

A Shark's Life

Comic Book

Comic book and video animation produced for a campaign against shark finning in Brazil. The practice is out of control and unbalancing the local ecosystem.

2012

A Restless City

Experimental Sequential Art

Sequential art made from pictures of graffiti art by Isaac "Dev" Grow and also from prints and scans of drawings. The idea was to integrate photos of street art and graphic design techniques to build a silent visual narrative about the worldly chaos of city life.

2012

Drugs and Citizenship

Comic Book Series in 6 Chapters

Comic book series in 6 chapters for a drug prevention campaign produced by the Federal Council of Psychology of Brazil.

Technology and DIY Lab

Research and development of open tools for art and technology.

2013

uMIDI

Arduino Multiplexed MIDI Controller Shield

In partnership with Rômulo MidiLab, development of an Arduino shield that allows 48 inputs and 192 MIDI controllers. Supports potentiometers, buttons, analog sensors, and drum triggers. The software has 4 memory scene maps.

github.com/midilab/umidi

2013

MetaTazLab

Independent Temporary Art and Technology Labs

Independent and non-commercial meetings of art and technology in Temporary Autonomous Zones (TAZ) aimed at audiovisual, musical, and technological research and information exchange. Already held in indoor, outdoor, urban, and rural environments.