First International Conference on the Histories of Media Art, Science and Technology

September 28–October 3, 2005

Banff New Media Institute, Canada

REFRESH!

“The technology of the modern media has produced new possibilities of interaction. … What is needed is a wider view encompassing the coming rewards in the context of the treasures left us by the past experiences, possessions, and insights.”  (Rudolf Arnheim, Summer 2000)

Recognizing the increasing significance of media art for our culture, this Conference on the Histories of Media Art will discuss for the first time the history of media art within the interdisciplinary and intercultural

contexts of the histories of art.  Leonardo/ISAST, the Database for Virtual Art, Banff New Media Institute, and UNESCO DigiArts are collaborating to produce the first international art history conference covering art and new media, art and technology, art-science interaction, and the history of media as pertinent to contemporary art.

Media Art Histories

After photography, film, video, and the little known media art history of the 1960s-80s, today media artists are active in a wide range of digital areas (including interactive, genetic, and telematic art). Even in robotics and nanotechnology, artists design and conduct experiments. This dynamic process has triggered intense discussion about images in the disciplines of art history, media studies, and neighboring cultural disciplines. The Media Art History Project offers a basis for attempting an evolutionary history of the audiovisual media, from the laterna magica  to the panorama, phantasmagoria, film, and the virtual art of recent decades. It is an evolution with breaks and detours; however, all its stages are distinguished by a close relationship between art, science, and technology.

Refresh! will discuss questions of historiography, methodology and the role of institutions of media art. The Conference will contain key debates about the function of inventions, artistic practice in collaborative

networks, the prominent role of sound during the last decades and will emphasize the importance of intercultural and pop culture themes in the Histories of Media Art. Readings of new media art histories vary richly depending on cultural contexts.  This event calls upon scholarship from a strongly international perspective.

Therefore Refresh! will represent and address the wide array of disciplines involved in the emerging field of Media Art. Beside Art History these include the Histories of Sciences and Technologies , Film-, Sound-, Media-, Visual and Theatre Studies, Architecture, Visual Psychology, just to name a few.

Mailing List

LEONARDO, journal of the International Society for the Arts, Sciences, and Technology, has documented for the past thirty-seven years the pioneering work of artists who work in and with new media. Together with Leonardo Book Series and LEA Electronic Journal, the journal is published by the MIT Press. For further information about the forthcoming conference and the long-term LEONARDO Media Art History Project, please email to join:

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Conference and Call

Held at The Banff Centre, featuring lectures by invited speakers as well as others selected by a jury from a call for papers, the main event will be followed by a two-day summit meeting (October 2—3, 2005) for in-depth dialogues and international project initiation.

The first call for papers will be in Autumn 2004.  In particular, young postgraduates in the research areas of: art history and new media, art and technology, the interaction of art and science, and media history, are

encouraged to submit for the panels (use link Media Art History).

BANFF

Sara DIAMOND, Director of Research and Artistic Director of BNMI (local chair)

Susan KENNARD, Executive Producer of BNMI (organisation)

website: BANFF

LEONARDO

Annick BUREAUD, Director Leonardo Pioneers and

Pathbreakers Art History Project, Leonardo/OLATS

Publications Committee

Chair: Roger F MALINA, Chair Leonardo/ISAST

Leonardo

Conference Director & Organization

Oliver GRAU, Director Immersive Art & Database of Virtual Art,

Humboldt University Berlin

Link to Immersive Art II

Link to GRAU 2001

Supported by:

Leonardo, Database of Virtual Art, BANFF New Media Institute, German Research Foundation, Unesco Digiarts, Villa Vigoni, Intel, Goethe-Institute Internationes

Media Art History