Introductory Statement

In these Proceedings you can find the successful academic submissions towards ISEA2019, comprising 143 selected submissions in full and short papers, posters, and panels. Each one underwent a rigorous double-blind peer-review process involving the tireless work of multiple reviewers from all over the world, whom we thank deeply.
When in the spring of 2016 the plan to win the hosting rights to ISEA2019 in Gwangju, Korea was taking shape, it did not take long until it dawned upon us that there was one clear theme that touches upon the essence of the place: Light. Gwangju means “land of light”, and soon the unlikely theoretical physicist (Juyong Park) was busy at work, together with the rest of the original group from equally unlikely backgrounds, compiling the many fascinating—oftentimes paradoxical—natures of light such as its permanence in the universe and its ephemerality
in time, each one confirming our belief that the choice is the right one for ISEA2019.
Three years later, here we are presenting the diverse ways in which Lux Aeterna — stunningly eternalised in the late great Stanley Kubrick’s A Space Odyssey via György Ligeti’s composition of the same name — has been imagined and materialised in the minds of the leading researchers of our time. With its long history as the centre of Korea’s traditional culture, Gwangju is now ready to assert its role in the future landscape of art by embracing ISEA2019 and catapult itself into the future. The contributions collected in these Proceedings will provide the way forward, by highlighting how Light, the very identity of Gwangju, intersects the past and the future, from the timeless, fundamental question of human existence to applications of bleeding-edge technologies that have yet to show us their full capabilities. The quality and diversity of the submissions prove that the months-long review process has been undeniably worthwhile; Therefore congratulations to all our authors, and let us now celebrate
and bask in the glorious Lux Aeterna.
Seoul, Korea, 2019

• Juyong Park, Korea Advanced Institute of Science & Technology (KAIST)
• Juhan Nam, Korea Advanced Institute of Science & Technology (KAIST)
• Jin Wan Park, Chung-Ang University, South Korea