UTV
«UTV (Our Television Broadcaster)»

Monitor text:
Take the Television.

Based on the hypothesis that the industry has meanwhile instrumentalized for its own purposes the leftist demands (Bert Brecht, Hans Magnus Enzensberger) that the public be made the producers, a new form of low-tech television for all and by all is suggested. This may recall the 'Media for Citizens' approaches of the 60s and 70s, but it is done in the knowledge that the results of that movement, for example Berlin's 'Offene Kanal' (Open Channel), have failed. Now, instead of creating a noncommercial zone, a low-budget TV operation is to be financed precisely through cheap advertising for any and all, on the model of a local advertising circular. Initial negotiations on a possible realization were conducted with the North-Rhine/Westphalia state media facility in 1996-97, but so far there are only a few token UTV studios in the art context. The framework was provided in 1997-98 by a travelling exhibition by the Viennese artist Heimo Zobernig, who also designed the simple studio. The concept for a UTV broadcasting station was presented in several texts and the comic found here.