UCLA Information Studies Seminar

Perspectives on Media, Art, and Interactivity

Erkki Huhtamo
UCLA Department of Design and Media Arts

Thursday, February 20th, 2003, 3pm-5pm
GSE&IS Building, Room 111
(just west of the Research Library)

Abstract: Interactivity and interactive media are buzzwords often encountered in contemporary discussion on media. In spite of their massive exposure on television, the press and the internet, these concepts remain vague and insufficiently defined and theorized. This lecture claims that artists have given an important contribution towards understanding the meaning and potential of interactivity, exploring its uses and criticizing both its material and discursive manifestations. Works by several key artists, including Jeffrey Shaw, David Rokeby and Maurice Benayoun, will be discussed and analyzed, with particular emphasis on their use of interactivity. The discussion wll be supported by a rich selection of audiovisual material.

Erkki Huhtamo has worked in the fields of media culture and media art in several different roles. As a researcher, his work focuses on the history and aesthetics of media art and media history. Over the years he has contributed developing an approach called "media archaeology". In addition to his book-length studies in Finnish, he has published numerous influential articles in English. As an exhibition curator he has created several important international exhibitions of digital art, including major retrospective exhibitions of Toshio Iwai, Perry Hoberman and Paul DeMarinis and large group shows like The 4th International Symposium of Electronic Art Exhibition and Alien Intelligence. His media-archaeological installation "The Ride of your Life", featuring a computer controlled flight simulator platform, was shown at the major SurroGate exhibition (ZKM, Karlsruhe, Germany, 1998). As a television director, scriptwriter and producer, he has created acclaimed television productions about media culture for YLE, the Finnish National Television (Channel One), including "The Empire of Monitors" (1994) and "The Archaeology of the Moving Image" (1996), which he both scripted and directed. Current projects include a book on "Archaeology of Interactivity" for MIT Press (in progress) and another one on the "moving panorama" as a forgotten mass medium of the 19th century.

Everyone is invited.