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ELO’s Visionary Landscapes 2008 Conference by the Numbers

The ELO Visionary Landscapes 2008 conference at Washington State University Vancouver was one of the largest in the history of the organization and certainly one of the largest (if not THE largest) international conferences to focus on electronic literature.

The conference also marks a watershed expansion in ELO since all attendees were either current or new members. As this organization continues to grow internationally, the conference drew attendees from 17 countries and 5 continents. The works and presentations continued to demonstrate the diversity of forms that call themselves electronic literature.

Here are some more numerical output from the conference in the first part of a series of post-conference posts.

149 artistic works submitted
80 papers submitted
36 artists featured in the galleries
16 panels, plenaries, and workshops
74 presenters
120 attendees
10 bursaries awarded
16 classic elit works on display
10 bursaries awarded
2 exhausted conference organizers
Bursary winners included:

  1. Ian Hatcher, USA
  2. Deena Larsen, USA
  3. Marjorie Luesebrink, USA
  4. Judd Morrissey, USA
  5. Stefan Muler Arisona, Switzerland
  6. Kate Pullinger, UK
  7. Stephanie Strickland, USA
  8. Donna Leishman, UK
  9. Ethan Miller, USA
  10. Steve Gibson, Canada

Links to their bios and works can be found online here. Post-conference news will follow on the ELO blog and can also be found here on the post-conference page.

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Electronic Literature Collection, Vol. 2 – Call for Work

The Electronic Literature Organization seeks submissions for the Electronic Literature Collection, volume 2. We invite the submission of literary works that take advantage of the capabilities and contexts provided by the computer. Works will be accepted from June 1 to September 30, 2008. Up to three works per author will be considered; previously published works will be considered.

The Electronic Literature Collection is a biannual publication of current and older electronic literature in a form suitable for individual, public library, and classroom use. Volume 1, presently available both online (http://collection.eliterature.org) and as a packaged, cross-platform CD-ROM, has been used in dozens of courses at universities in the United States and internationally, and has been widely reviewed in the United States and Europe. It is also available as a CD-ROM insert with N. Katherine Hayles’ full-length study, Electronic Literature: New Horizons for the Literary (University of Notre Dame Press, 2008).

Volume 2, comprising approximately 50 works, will likewise be available online, and as a cross-platform DVD in a case appropriate for library processing, marking, and distribution. The contents of the Collection are offered under a Creative Commons license so that libraries and educational institutions will be allowed to duplicate and install works and individuals will be free to share the disc with others.

The editorial collective for the second volume of the Electronic Literature Collection, to be published in 2009, is Laura Borràs Castanyer, Talan Memmott, Rita Raley and Brian Kim Stefans. This collective will review the submitted work and select pieces for the Collection.

Read more Electronic Literature Collection, Vol. 2 – Call for Work

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Extension: CFP: Visionary Landscapes (12/16, 5/29-6/1)

The deadline for Visionary Landscapes: Electronic Literature Organization 2008 Conference has been extended to December 16, 2007.

The conference takes place from May 29-June 1, 2008 at Washington State University Vancouver in lovely Vancouver, WA. It is sponsored by both the Electronic Literature Organization and WSUV. Speakers include Mark Amerika, Sue Thomas, and John Cayley. A Media Arts Show will be held in conjunction with the conference and will feature art such as digital sculpture, net art, multimedia installations and performances, electronic music, and the like. Workshops in audio production and reading elit are also scheduled.

According to conference co-chair, Dene Grigar,

It should prove to be an interesting weekend for anyone involved in digital media projection, scholarship, and teaching.

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CFP for Visionary Landscapes: Electronic Literature Organization 2008 Conference

Visionary Landscapes: Electronic Literature Organization 2008 Conference

Thursday, May 29-Sunday, June 1, 2008
Vancouver, Washington

Sponsored by Washington State University Vancouver & the Electronic Literature Organization

Dene Grigar & John Barber, Co-Chairs

http://www.vancouver.wsu.edu/programs/dtc/elo08.html
Producing a work of electronic literature entails not only practice in the literary arts but sometimes also the visual, sonic, and the performative arts; knowledge of computing devices and software programs; and experience in collaboration, interdisciplinarity, and hybridity. In short, electronic literature requires its artists to see beyond traditional approaches and sensibilities into what best can be described as visionary landscapes where, as Mark Amerika puts it, artists “celebrate an interdisciplinary practice from a literary and writerly perspective that allows for other kinds of practice-based art-research and knowledge sharing.”

To forward the thinking about new approaches and sensibilities in the media arts, The Electronic Literature Organization and Washington State University Vancouver’s Digital Technology and Culture program are inviting submissions to the Electronic Literature Organization 2008 Conference to be held from May 29 to June 1, 2008 in Vancouver, Washington.

“Visionary Landscapes: Electronic Literature Organization 2008 Conference” is interested in papers that explore forms of digital media that utilize images, sound, movement, and user interaction as well as––or in lieu of––words and that explore how we read, curate, and critique such works. Topics may include:

• New, non-screen, environments for presenting multimedia writing and/or electronic literature
• Research labs and new media projects
• Strategies for reading electronic literary works
• Curating digital art
• Innovative approaches to critiquing electronic literature
• Emerging technologies for the production of multimedia writing and/or electronic literature
• Building audience for new media literary works and writing
• Digital, literary performances
• Publishing for print or electronic media connecting literature and the arts through common archiving and metatag strategies
• Artistic methods of composition used in intermedia storytelling(improvisation, collaboration, sample and remix, postproduction art, codework, hactivism, etc.

In conjunction with the three-day conference, there will be a juried Media Arts Show. Along with prizes for the most notable work, selected artists will be awarded bursaries to attend the conference featured at the show. Submission guidelines will be posted beginning August 15, 2007 on the conference website.

The keynote speaker is internationally renowned new media artist and writer, Mark Amerika, named a “Time Magazine 100 Innovator.” His artwork has been exhibited at the Whitney Biennial, the ICA in London, the Walker Art Center, and the Denver Art Museum and has been the topic of four retrospectives. Amerika is also the author of many books, including his recently published collection of artist writings entitled META/DATA: A Digital Poetics (The MIT Press), founder of the Alt-X Network, and publisher of the electronic book review. He currently holds the position of Professor of Art and Art History at the University of Colorado at Boulder.

Deadline for Submissions for Presentations: November, 30, 2007
Notification of Acceptance: December 30, 2007

Vancouver, Washington, located in the Pacific Northwest just across the Columbia River from Portland, OR, is about a six hour drive south of Vancouver, Canada and three hours south of Seattle, Washington. The conference day events will take place at Washington State University Vancouver, a Tier One research Institution built in the foothills of the Cascade Mountains with views of Mt. Hood and Mt. Saint Helens. The official conference hotel is the Hilton Vancouver located in downtown Vancouver, Washington with easy access to restaurants, bars, and evening conference events. Special rates have been negotiated for conference attendees. A conference shuttle will take attendees to and from the campus daily. The recommended airport is PDX at Portland, which is about a seven minute drive to downtown Vancouver, WA.

The cost of the conference is $150; graduate students and non-affiliated artists pay only $100. Conference registration covers access to all events, the reception, some meals, and shuttle transportation.

For more information, contact Dene Grigar at Grigar@vancouver.wsu.edu.

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The Chronicle of Higher Education Covers ELO Open Mic & Mouse

The Chronicle of Higher Education has devoted three pieces to the ELO/MITH Open Mic & Mouse event that was held as a kick-off to the Electronic Literature Symposium that was held at the University of Maryland in early May.

Click here for an article covering the event. Below the lead picture, you’ll find a link to the video story. And, on the right-hand side of the screen, under “Related Material,” you’ll see a link for an audio interview with N. Katherine Hayles.

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Volume 1 of the Collection in The Philadelphia Inquirer

The Electronic Literature Collection, volume one is the topic of Katie Haegele’s column in the Philadelphia Inquirer this week. She writes:

But wouldn’t it be nice to get our arms around this thing, to get a sense of the full breadth and scope of what’s called digital literature?

The 60 works in the first volume of the Electronic Literature Collection (ELC) (http://collection.eliterature.org) – edited by N. Katherine Hayles, Nick Montfort, Scott Rettberg and Stephanie Strickland – show the wide range of forms that exist within the genre.

The column describes the keyword index and discusses four of the pieces included in volume one of the Collection in detail.

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E-Lit Meetup at the MLA Convention

We’re writing to invite you to a meetup and happy hour at this year’s MLA for those with interests in electronic literature, new media arts, digital humanities, text-encoding, and related areas. We will have CD-ROMs to offer you of the Electronic Literature Organization’s latest free publication, the Electronic Literature Collection volume one. We’ll be meeting at the lobby bar of the Marriott Convention Center (the rotunda bar) at 5pm on Friday Dec. 29.

–Alan Liu, Nick Montfort

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ELO’s Matt Kirschenbaum now Associate Director of MITH

Neil Fraistat recently reported this news about Matt Kirschenbaum, a member of the ELO Board of Directors:

“I am delighted to share the good news that Matt Kirschenbaum, Assistant Professor of English and Acting Associate Director of MITH, has accepted the position of Associate Director of MITH. By now everyone in the MITH Community knows Matt as one of the leading theorists in the field of digital studies, as one of the most interesting practitioners of applied work in the digital humanities, as a blogger extraordinaire, and as one of our most compelling and thought-provoking colleagues. Matt brings to the think tank of MITH a deep and wide-ranging expertise on new media, visual culture, and the digital humanities.”

MITH becomes the new headquarters of the Electronic Literature Organization on July 1.

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MACHINE Reading Series at Kelly Writers House: Stuart Moulthrop, April 19

On Wednesday, April 19, acclaimed veteran hypertext writer Stuart Moulthrop will read from early and recent works at the University of Pennsylvania’s Kelly Writers House. Moulthrop’s appearance, part of the MACHINE reading series co-sponsnored by the ELO, will take place at Kelly Writers House at 5:30 p.m. Map and directions can be found on the Kelly Writers House website.