Abstract

Keywords:
ISEA, International Symposium on Electronic Art, Inter-Society for the Electronic Arts, ISEA-International, Electronic vs Digital, Definition of Art

This paper takes a critical look at the motivations to start the series of ISEA symposia and how the original intentions evolved over time. The author takes a journey through the history of ISEA, both the ISEA symposium and the ISEA organisation(s). The history is based on the ISEA Symposium Archives as well as the author’s personal archive. The focus is on the aims of ISEA as they were formulated at the start and in the course of its development. In the conclusion the current situation is evaluated in the light of the original aims.

• Wim van der Plas (NL) studied Social & Cultural Sciences at the Erasmus University, Rotterdam. He was director of the Foundation for Creative Computer Applications (SCCA, Rotterdam) when he started working, in 1986, on the first ISEA, that took place in 1988 and was an original idea of Theo Hesper. Together with Hesper he founded the Inter-Society for the Electronic Arts in 1990, the year he also organised the second ISEA. Since then he has run the ISEA HQ until 1996, then was a board member of the Inter-Society, and, in 2008, founded ISEA-International, together with Anne Nigten. In 2017 he left the board, but continued work as an ISEA Symposium archivist. In 2018 he received a Leonardo Pioneer Award. He is also the Honorary Chair of the ISEA International Advisory Committee. From 1987 to 2011 he worked for several Art Schools and Universities of Applied Sciences in The Netherlands, among others in the fields of Computer Animation, Media Technology, Media History and the Creative Industries. Also, he published in many journals, magazines and books and gave lectures in The Netherlands, Belgium, the UK, Spain, Italy, Greece and the USA.