Dear festival visitors,

there is a lot to discover in the various areas of art. Hardly any other area of society is able to react to the rapid change of our time and the challenges that come with it, like art does. In the past year we have been able to observe how quickly, flexibly and agile artists found not only digital media and communication channels for the publication and accessibility of their works, but also how they dealt with the phenomena and effects of the pandemic in terms of content, transformed and interpreted them and thus found forms of expression for something previously unthinkable.

The “Blaues Rauschen” festival presents moments of overlap between digital sound experiments, dance, electronic music and performance. The festival answers the question of “location determination in digital” with a diverse program of artistic experiments at special locations in the Ruhr area. “Blaues Rauschen” blurs the genre boundaries, as well as the boundaries between the individual Ruhr area cities and event locations, Bochum, Dortmund and Essen.

Art needs a public, artists need the opportunity to exchange ideas with one another, with the public and with the market. Festivals like “Blaues Rauschen” offer such an important platform for presentation, dialogue and networking.

Fortunately, “Blaues Rauschen” can take place again in 2021 and faceus with current developments in art and music in the digital sector, when more than 25 artists make their voice heard within a week.

I wish “open systems e.V.” every success, the visitors interesting discoveries and the artists, after all the months of hardship caused by the pandemic, joy and the well-deserved response.

Isabelle Pfeiffer-Poensgen
Minister of Culture and Science of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia