Judy Malloy: Memories of Arts Wire

Arts Wire
The Arts Online
Beginning in 1992

Memories of Arts Wire

In 1988, in the days before the World Wide Web, a group of artists and arts workers got together at Orcas Island to discuss new ways of supporting artists. Many ideas came out of this conference, which was organized by the New York Foundation for the Arts, and the participants wanted to keep talking. It was Seattle-based artist and arts administrator Anne Focke who came up with the idea of Arts Wire. Arts Wire began to take shape after a meeting with NYFA Director Ted Berger and others.

Begun in 1992, Arts Wire, a program of the New York Foundation for the Arts, was an online computer network that brought artists and arts organizations together to talk and work on the Internet -- providing access to news information and dialogue on the social, economic, philosophical, intellectual, and political conditions affecting the arts and artists.

When Arts Wire was founded, I had been making art online on ArtCom Electronic Network on the WELL since 1986. I had also been the first editor of Leonardo Electronic News. (Now Leonardo Electronic Almanac) and worked at Deep Creek Camp, showing Arts Students how to get online. I was looking for a job. In 1993, I began working for Arts Wire, initially with network artist Anna Couey, Arts Wire's first Network Coordinator, who brought both network experience and a community-centered approach to Arts Wire. I worked for Arts Wire from 1993-2002 -- in the early years helping the arts community to learn how to use modems and computers and hosting and coordinating Arts Wire conferencing. Later, I helped artists and arts organizations create and post web content, and I was editor of Arts Wire Current (that became NYFA Current) from 1996-2004.

But in 1993, I was happy to work to bring artists and arts organizations online. At that time, going online was quite difficult. It meant getting a modem, (They weren't standard with computers) then getting it to work with your computer which wasn't always easy. Then you needed a connection to get to the system and then you needed to negotiate the system using text-based commands. Helping people get online required technical skill and a lot of time and patience. There were constant incompatibilities and technical failures, and it was *very* slow.

Initially led by Anne Focke and then by Michigan-based poet, Joe Matuzak, Arts Wire was run from a virtual online "office", a staff conference where from all over the country, we met to discuss our work: Barry Lasky and David Green at NYFA in New York City; Joe Matuzak in Ann Arbor, MI; flutist, arts administrator Beth Kanter in Norfolk, MA; Tommer Peterson in Seattle; I (new media poet Judy Malloy) in Northern California; and Kim Adams in Detroit, MI.

The Steering Committee also "met" online. Among others, over the years they included Jane Bello, Association of Hispanic Arts; Ted Berger, NYFA; Nancy Clarke, American Music Center; Steve Durland, artist/writer, High Performance; Pauline Oliveros, composer; Randy Ross, American Indian Telecommunications; Gary Larson, National Endowment for the Arts; artist Louis LeRoy, Association of American Cultures; Bill Pratt, Montana Arts Council and Dan Martin, Director of the Master of Arts Management Program at Carnegie Mellon University, which collaborated with Arts Wire beginning in 1996.

Until 2001, Arts Wire hosted over 80 arts discussion conferences and over 100 websites for artists and arts organizations, and our Map included links to over 400 artists and arts organization members.

Among the conferences we hosted were

AIDSwire -- AIDS information. (maintained by Michael Tidmus)

ARTISTS -- a conference for and about artists.

ABBNET (Art Beyond Boundaries) -- for the states that sponsored the annual ART BEYOND BOUNDARIES conference: Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, South Dakota, and Wyoming.

CENTER FOR SAFETY IN THE ARTS -- information on Art Hazards (Maintained by Michael McCann)

INTERACTIVE -- A conference on electronic art and art on the Internet. Interactive contained both core documents and interactive online interviews with artists in the field. Created and hosted by Anna Couey and Judy Malloy,

NATIVE ARTS NETWORK ASSOCIATION (NANA) -- a group of Native Arts Organizations, from New York City to California, including Joanna Osborne Bigfeather, American Indian Community House, NYC; Janeen Antoine, American Indian Contemporary Arts; E. Donald Two Rivers, American Indian Economic Development Assoc, Chicago, IL; Jennifer Baxter, Guilford Native American Association, Greensboro, NC; Pat Petrivelli, Institute of Alaska Native Arts; Susan Stewart, Montana Indian Contemporary Arts, Bozeman, MT -- with core involvement from Atatl in Phoenix, AZ. (Carla Roberts and Wendy Weston-Ben) NANA was funded by the Nathan Cummings Foundation with tech help by Randy Ross and Judy Malloy. I particularly remember going to a Pow Wow with Atlatl in Phoenix after working in their office.

NEA INFO -- Hosted by The National Endowment for the Arts, NEA INFO contained a comprehensive listing of grant recipients.

NEWMUSNET -- One of Arts Wire's first online Interest Groups, NEWMUSNET was started in the summer of 1992 and hosted by composer Pauline Oliveros.

NPN -- The National Performance Network (NPN) received funding to begin its primary sponsors online to conduct NPN business and talk about the field. Among the people who kept this conference lively was Mark Russell of PS 122.

PROJECTARTNET -- created in 1993 by Aida Mancillas and Lynn Susholtz, PROJECTARTNET was a San Diego-based community arts networking project that brought children from schools in immigrant neighborhoods online to create a community history.

WESTAF -- The Western State Arts Foundation is a regional arts organization serving the Western states. On AW, they initiated a subscriber-based online version of their job listing service ARTJOB.

In 1996, Arts Wire hosted an online component of the FOURTH NATIONAL BLACK WRITERS CONFERENCE that was held at Medgar Evers College of the City University of New York. The theme was "Black Literature in the 90's: a Renaissance to End all Renaissances?" Keynote speakers for the Black Writers Conference were Paule Marshall and Amiri Baraka. Marita Golden, Terry McMillan, Bebe Moore Campbell, Walter Mosley, Arthur Flowers, Thulani Davis, and others participated in a series of panels that included "Black Literature: Who are the Readers?" and "Black Literature: The Politics of Publishing." Texts of many of the speeches and online components for many of the panels were available on Arts Wire.

Other conferences hosted on Arts Wire included PEOPLE FOR THE AMERICAN WAY; and LITNET.

Arts Wire Current/NYFA Current

From 1996 to 2004, I (Judy Malloy) was the editor of Arts Wire's online news, Arts Wire Current, which was renamed NYFA Current in mid November 2002. I was responsible for the writing, editing, HTML and production which included two versions -- the ListServ version and the web version. The first Arts Wire news editors were Anna Couey, Penny Boyer, and David Green.

As editor of Current, I worked to create a publication that reached a large niche audience -- covering arts information not covered by the major media -- such as new music, alternative art spaces, performance art, arts advocacy, small dance companies, artists' websites, and much more. In producing each issue, my editorial approach was to weave together information that was not always a strongly stated theme but was a series of contingent themes. It was an information artist's approach that worked not only to focus on individual voices but also to create a coherent whole.

Art Wire Current 1998

Selected Coverage:

__ "1998 - The Arts Year in Review", Arts Wire Current, December 29, 1998

Art Wire Current 2000

Selected Coverage:

__ "Artists/Arts Organizations at the Heart of the Millennium Celebration"
Arts Wire Current, January 4, 2000

__ "Continental Harmony Enables 56 Performances of New Music in 49 States"
Arts Wire Current, December 12, 2000

Art Wire Current 2001

Selected Coverage:

__ 2001 -- The Arts Year in Review

__ Back to Art School Issue
Arts Wire Current, September 4, 2001

__ :In the Wake of the Terrorist Attack, Artists and Arts Organizations Rally to Help
Those in Need; Jamaican Sculptor Michael Richards Missing; LMCC Offices Obliterated"
Arts Wire Current, September 18, 2001