My partnership at VIVO Media Arts Centre consists of me conducting interviews with media artists spanning the history of media art in Vancouver, which will be a permanent addition to the Crista Dahl Media Library & Archives. I’m working closely with Karen and Audrey at the library and archive. Karen has connected me with five media artists (Crista Dahl, Brady Marks, Jayce Salloum, Gabriela Aceves Sepulveda, and Matilda Aslizadeh) through emails. My major task before the interviews is to research on my interview subjects as much as possible by utilizing my research skills that I have gained throughout my academic experience at UBC. I’m currently contacting the artists through emails to set up a time for an interview, and so far the interview with Jayce is confirmed on Oct. 25th at his studio. As much as I’m excited to meet and talk with those artists, I feel some pressure for the need to connect well with the artists in order to make the project meaningful for the library archive, for the artists, and for myself. I believe preparation and more research are essential for the achievement of the project’s goal.  I hope to gain diverse perspectives from different media artists about the history of media art development and their artistic practices as well as to gain interpersonal skills out of this interview experience.  I’m planning to do audio recording alone.

Before the initial meeting with Karen and Audrey, I expected the partnership would look something different than what I’m doing now. I was expecting that my supervisors would decide and assign work for me. However, our first meeting was more like discussing my interests and knowledge that I hope to gain through the partnership and then coming up with a project that would be useful for me and their library archive at the same time. Although I’m happy that I can conduct my own project independently, that also means I’m expected to be responsible for the whole process, and that is much more commitment than I expected. Sitting in the corner and doing my own research at VIVO for a couple of days, I familiarized myself with the quiet workspace where everyone is focusing on their own project, yet they are nice and relaxed. I’m at VIVO on Wednesdays and I usually have a conversation with Karen and Audrey regarding my progress of the project, related events’ information, etc. Karen has provided me useful sources about VIVO and the artists, especially Crista. Other than physical sources from the archive for me to look at, such as Vimeo link, Karen, Audrey and I are communicating via email.

Part of my project involves looking at VIVO’s past Signal + Noise programming to explore where this form of media art has evolved and the divergence of working in video and media art, which will be useful for me to understand the history of media art development.