Fri 27 August 2010
13:00–14:30h
Volkshochschule, L 103

Convened by Nick Lambert (gb) / The AHRC Computer Art and Technocultures Project

Focusing on the scope and development of Computer Art, this panel presents the CAT project's current research, dealing with issues of archiving, curation, conservation and historical research. Tackling e.g. aesthetic and theoretical points concerning the survival of material archives, the panel also examines what aspects of early computer art activity might be relevant to the contemporary digital scene and might also influence its future development.

1. 13:00h | Nick Lambert (gb): The CAT Project as an Historical and Archival Collaboration
2. 13:25h | Honor Beddard, Douglas Dodds (gb): Codifying History. The CAT Project Examines the International Trajectory of Computer Art 1975-2000
3. 13:50h | Francesca Franco (gb): Computer Art in the Mainstream. How the Venice Biennale Responded to the Historisation of Computer Art in the 1980s

ISEA2010 Conference Proceedings | P46 Codifying History (Archive/Preservation I) (PDF, 55.43 KB)

Nick Lambert (gb)

The CAT Project as an Historical and Archival Collaboration

The Computer Art and Technocultures Project is a resource enhancement project funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, running jointly between the Department of History of Art and Screen Media at Birkbeck College and the Word and Image Department at the Victoria & Albert Museum. Our initial brief was to catalogue, digitise and explore the Patric Prince archive and related documents, with a remit to investigate the major exponents of computer art from 1975 to 2000. A more pragmatic aim was to undertake the preservation of a new media archive, albeit one that was mainly paper-based, at a major museum and use it as a test-case for future acquisitions in this area.


ISEA2010 Conference Proceedings | The CAT Project as an Historical and Archival Collaboration (PDF)

Nick Lambert is Researcher in Digital Media Art at the Department of History of Art and Screen Media, Birkbeck. He is Principal Investigator on the Computer Art and Technocultures project, held jointly with the Victoria & Albert Museum, and researches the history of digital art. He is also associated with the EVA Conference and is Chairman of the Computer Arts Society.

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Honor Beddard, Douglas Dodds (gb)

Codifying History. The CAT Project Examines the International Trajectory of Computer Art 1975-2000

The Victoria and Albert Museum is the GB's national museum of art and design. In recent years the V&A has received two major collections of computer-generated art and design, one from the Computer Arts Society, London, and the other from Patric Prince, an American art historian and collector. Together with more recent acquisitions, the museum now holds the GB’s national collection of this type of material. This paper will examine the research outputs of the Computer Art and Technocultures project, funded by the GB's Arts and Humanities Research Council, and its impact on both the Victoria and Albert Museum and the wider field of digital art and design.

ISEA2010 Conference Proceedings | Codifying History. The CAT Project Examines the International Trajectory of Computer Art 1975-2000 (PDF)

Honor Beddard is Curator of Computer Art in the V&A’s Word and Image Department. She currently works on the AHRC funded Computer Art and Technocultures project. Honor is responsible for researching and cataloguing the V&A’s collection of computer-generated art and design. Prior to joining the V&A, she worked at the British Council and the Contemporary Art Society.

Douglas Dodds is the V&A's Senior Curator of Computer Art. He is also Head of Digital Collections and Services in the Museum’s Word and Image Department, which incorporates the National Art Library and the V&A’s western collections of prints, drawings, paintings and photographs. He is the Co-Investigator of the Computer Art and Technocultures project (CAT), funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council.

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Francesca Franco (gb)

Computer Art in the Mainstream. How the Venice Biennale Responded to the Historisation of Computer Art in the 1980s

The mid 1980s have witnessed the first genuine attempt of historisation of computer art. A seminal example is given by the major retrospective of computer art organised by Patric Prince for SIGGRAPH in 1986. This paper investigates the main points of Prince’s lecture Computer art in the mainstream written for the 1986 SIGGRAPH catalogue. How do these points connect to the Venice Biennale’s approach to computer art in the 80s? To answer this question I will analyse two main Venice Biennale’s shows, i.e. the 1980 Biennale show Cronografie and the 1986 Biennale devoted to Art and Science.

ISEA2010 Conference Proceedings | Computer Art in the Mainstream. How the Venice Biennale Responded to the Historisation of Computer Art in the 1980s (PDF)

Francesca Franco is Research Fellow on the AHRC funded project Computer Art & Technocultures at Birkbeck College. She is a lecturer at Birkbeck where she teaches Critical Approaches to the History of Art. Francesca has been sitting on the editorial board of Computers and the History of Art since 2005.

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