New institute will connect the study of technology and art

Prague - Architects and scenographers, but also scientists, will benefit from the new Institute of Intermedia, which was opened today by the Czech Technical University in Prague (ČVUT). The project, which connects the study of technical and artistic fields, involves three universities. The facility is temporarily located at the Faculty of Electrical Engineering of ČVUT and is expected to move to the Orlík cinema later, Director of the institute Roman Berka told reporters today.
    The goal of the institute is to guide students, educators, and researchers towards interdisciplinary collaboration at the intersection of technology and art. The facility includes, for example, an experimental space for light design and scenography equipped with theatrical and exhibition technology.
    "Interior architects want to use this space for one-to-one modeling," Berka stated, adding that it will be possible to test how light will spread in a real environment.
    The institute also features a Cave virtual reality device, placed in an academic setting for the first time in the Czech Republic. A person who enters between three walls while wearing special glasses, on which architectural visualizations are projected, feels as though they are in a real space.
    However, the device will not only serve architects and artists, but according to Berka, it also has significant research potential, which will allow chemists to view structures from the inside or can be used to study electromagnetic fields.
    In the future, a new study program is also planned to be established at the institute. Its graduates could find employment in the operations of modern television studios, for example. "It is necessary to create a team of people who will be versatile and will include experts from both relatively distant fields - art and technology," plans Pavel Mindl, the deputy dean of the Faculty of Electrical Engineering.
    Once financial resources are secured, the reconstruction of the Orlík cinema will begin. Representatives of ČVUT believe that this could happen in a few years.
    The school also opened four new laboratories today, which were created by renovating spaces in a transformer station.
    They will be used for teaching physical methods in medicine and biophysics, as well as for nuclear fusion research, with one room serving as an optical laboratory with complete darkening. ČVUT will thus be able to vacate some spaces at the University of Chemistry and Technology, which it has been using due to a lack of space.