Writing media art into (and out of) history

Abstract

This paper will review the context of the development of interactive media art within Australia in the 1990s. It is particularly interested in the conditions that enable arts practices to galvanize into an arts culture. Such conditions include publishing, the role of criticism and debate, funding, advocacy and the curation of focussed and dedicated exhibitions. The paper will seek to ask some questions answers as to why the conditions of an emerging media arts culture in the 1990s have virtually lost momentum. And why, ultimately, the very notion of media arts has become annexed as a minor moment in the history of the moving image.