Electronic Arts Intermix
Electronic Arts Intermix (EAI) is one of the world’s leading resources for video and media art.
Founded in 1971 by Howard Wise, EAI was envisioned as an alternative paradigm for the cultivation of artists’ media, serving as a critical hub for the creation and distribution of video at a time in which the availability of these tools was limited and the infrastructure for the circulation of these works was still emerging. Access, community, and experimentation were the cornerstones of EAI’s founding, and continue to charge the work we do. These values will serve as springboards as we reflect on the history of our organization, and the medium more broadly.
Prior to the foundation of Electronic Arts Intermix, the Howard Wise Gallery (1960-1970) exhibited works at the nexus of art and technology with a particular emphasis on multimedia and kinetic art. The pathbreaking 1969 exhibition TV as a Creative Medium cemented Wise’s interest in the possibilities of television. The first exhibition in the United States dedicated to video, the show featured an array of approaches to TV, including performance, objects, closed-circuit tapes and installations. It was a major catalyst for the emerging heterogeneous video culture, and ultimately inspired Wise to close his gallery and open a non-profit to “explore the potentials of the electronic media as a means of expression and non-commercial communication.”
EAI's founding mission was to develop and support the emergent video medium by providing artists with access to funding, technology, and other resources. At its inception, EAI served as the sponsor for projects that included The Kitchen, the Annual Avant Garde Festivals, the first Women's Video Festival, the Open Circuits conference at MoMA, Computer Art Festivals, and the patenting and distribution of Eric Siegel's Video Synthesizers, among others. The sponsored projects were independently directed; several became autonomous once they had established stable sources of funding. The Artists' Videotape Distribution Service and the Editing/Post-Production Facility—projects initiated within EAI—were thriving by the end of the decade, and became the organization's core programs. (Source)
- Publications
- Artists' Video: An International Guide, ed. Lori Zippay, New York: Cross River Press, 1991, 272 pp.
- Broadcasting: EAI at ICA, forew. John McInerney, Institute of Contemporary Art, University of Pennsylvania, and EAI, Sep 2022, 192 pp. Volume marking the 50th anniversary of EAI. [1]
- Links
