Leonardo Network News

The Newsletter of the International Society for the Arts, Sciences and Technology and of l’Observatoire Leonardo des Arts et Technosciences

GROWING THE NETWORK FOR 50 YEARS

Starting mid-2017 we invite you to participate in our 18-month-long celebration of Leonardo’s 50th anniversary. Almost half a century ago, kinetic artist and astronautical pioneer Frank Malina set out to solve the needs of the community of artists and scientists working across disciplines by using the “new media” of the time: offset print publishing. As a groundbreaking, innovative venture, Leonardo represented a unique vision, serving as an international channel of communication among artists, with emphasis on the writings of artists using science and developing technologies in their work.

Today documenting and capturing the creative innovators and provocateurs of culture is not enough. If media is the messenger, then Leonardo must expand its scope to represent the unique works and challenges we face in the 21st century. To fully realize Leonardo’s purpose and place over the next 50 years, we are sponsoring a project called “Beta-testing the Future.” We are reaching out to pioneers, institutions, thought leaders and the curious in an effort to facilitate dialogue. As a network of networks, Leonardo is reimagining its future with you at the forefront. We invite you to come along with us on this journey of rediscovery and reinvention. Visit <leonardo.info> to find out more!

ARTECA: AN EXCITING NEW SPACE WHERE ART, SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY INTERSECT

Brought to you by The MIT Press and Leonardo/ISAST, ARTECA is a curated space for essential content linking the arts, sciences and technologies. With a growing collection of more than 200 books and 4,500 journal articles, ARTECA provides scholars and practitioners the resources to bridge the once-independent fields of art, science and technology. The full corpus of Leonardo, Computer Music Journal and Leonardo Music Journal published by MIT Press are available in ARTECA. MIT Press book series include Game Studies, Leonardo Book Series, Platform Studies, Software Studies, and Technologies of Lived Abstraction. In addition to the published content regularly added to ARTECA, the platform will become a home for the community of artists, curators, educators and researchers—a space to network and explore literature, ephemera and other working archives. For more information, visit <http://arteca.mit.edu/>.

LEAF CHAIR 2017–2018: ALAN BOLDON

The Leonardo Education and Art Forum (LEAF) is a Leonardo Working Group that promotes the advancement of artistic research and academic scholarship at the intersections of art, science and technology. This year’s elected LEAF Chair, Alan Boldon, begins his term in February 2017. Boldon is an artist, curator and academic. He has exhibited throughout Europe and given lectures and keynote addresses throughout the world. Boldon spent many years working on interdisciplinary projects and for 12 years directed an international arts summer school in Luxembourg devoted to exploring interdisciplinary engagement with place. He has a BA in Art and Social Context and an MA in Psychological Aesthetics. Currently, Boldon is Head of Cultural Engagement and Innovation at the University of Brighton where he also held positions as Deputy Head of the School of Arts, Design and Media and Head of Research. We look forward to Boldon’s leadership this year and anticipate great things to come in the LEAF community. Learn more about LEAF at <leonardo.info/leaf>.

CALL FOR PAPERS: PIONEERS AND PATHBREAKERS—NARRATIVES IN DARK CULTURE

In anticipation of Leonardo journal’s 50th anniversary, we created the Pioneers and Pathbreakers project, which calls for papers that deal with the history of developments in the arts, sciences and technology and the art-science movements. The aim is to establish reliable selected online documentation about 20th-century artists, scholars and institution- builders whose works and ideas are considered seminal in the development of technological art.

The Narratives in Dark Culture is a memoir series within the Pioneers and Pathbreakers project. The term dark culture refers by analogy to the concept of dark matter in astronomy. Astronomers have realized that most of the universe does not emit light of any kind and alternative methods must be used to understand the full content of...