The annual festival of digital and creative culture, also known as the Signal festival of light art will begin this Thursday across Prague, presenting four days of Czech and international artwork. To learn more about this year’s 11th edition, I spoke with the founder and head of the festival Martin Pošta.

For our listeners who may not know about the Signal festival, can you tell us about it?

“Signal is a digital arts and creativity festival that takes place in public spaces across Prague. It’s in its 11th edition this year, and we usually present about 20-25 artworks in public spaces in either outdoor or indoor environments. Most of the events are free to access, but some of them have an entrance fee because they are indoors with capacity protocols.”

How many people are expected at the festival this year? Is it mainly Czechs that visit the festival or does it also attract an international audience?

“Generally, the festival attracts about 500,000 people over the course of four nights, it’s usually quite crowded and very popular. Usually, it’s mostly Czechs, but obviously tourist and visitors to Prague attend the festival as well because it has some international acclaim already. In terms of the art we present, it’s about 50 percent Czech artists and 50 percent international artists that present their work at the festival.”

Is the festival held in collaboration with any other groups in Prague or across Czechia?

“It’s definitely not a one man show, it’s a highly collaborative festival. Apart from the artists, we also work with other institutions. For example, Laterna Magika which is the new media department of the National Theatre. We also work with Kunsthalle, a newly built art gallery here in Prague, and other artistic groups and artists. So the festival is highly based on collaboration, so the attendees get to see a wide variety of approaches to contemporary art.”

Since 50 percent of the artists being presented are Czech, this must be an important festival in terms of exposure for them. Why are events like the Signal festival important for artists across Czechia?

“I hope it’s important for the artists! Not only because we give them the support to realize their ideas and thoughts, but also because we present the artwork to such a huge amount of people. So they get to realize their artistic visions, and also get to be presented to a vast amount of people.”

Is there one exhibition in particular that you are looking forward to the most, or are you just excited for the overall festival?

“I think the programming for this edition is pretty well balanced. There is going to be great artwork from Rafael Lozano-Hemmer, a Canadian-Mexican artist who is going to be presenting his artwork Thermal Drift. We have Polish artist Ksawery Komputery who is presenting his artwork Flux, and our friends from Catalonia/Spain, Playmodes presenting their project called Horizon at the Holešovice Market. It’s going to be a very solid edition of the festival, and I invite everyone to come and see it for themselves.”

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