The web also continues to be an evolving medium for making art which actively involves audiences, such as pioneering hypertext poet Jim Rosenberg's DIAGRAMS in which the user peels away text from elegant, densely nested layers -- or for making art which integrates user input into the work, such as Martin Wattenberg's IDEA LINE (on the Whitney Museum of American Art's ARTPORT) which "displays a timeline of net artworks, arranged in a fan of luminous threads." The timeline is composed of input entered by net artists in a publicly accessible database.

Interactive web works also include user-controlled art-making environments, such as RIPPLE, created by composer/musician John Maxwell Hobbs in collaboration with visual artist/programmer Mark Napier. Ripple is an interactive online musical and visual instrument which is designed to work for both solo and ensemble use and is fully under the control of the user.

Hobbs describes the work in this way: "Each user is assigned a different geometric shape and color. The actions of each user appear on the screens of all users connected. The tones that are produced are based on a scale in just intonation that I created specifically for the piece. Other than the pure intervals involved, it is not based on any traditional scale patterns. The piece is intended to be ever changing and just as engaging for the solo user as it is when played by more than one person. The system is based on a web chat architecture, with Java client that runs in a web page and connects to other clients via a chat server."

Hypertext poet Robert Kendall recently teamed up with a French computer scientist, Jean-Hugues Rty, to create Connection Muse, a Javascript-based system for implementing adaptive hypertext on the Web which lets him build a certain "intelligence" into Web pieces. The system monitors the reader's progress and makes on-the-fly structural modifications depending upon what the reader has or has not read. Using Connection Muse, he created a new work, CLUES, which he describes as "poetry in the form of a game."

Kendall observes that better web browsers and the increased availability of broadband connections and faster computers have greatly improved the web experience for both creators and users. He also believes that Flash "has really changed the work of a lot of writers in a huge way. A lot of poets are now routinely using audio and animation or video in all the poetry they publish. Many Web poems now are hybrids between texts and poetry videos."

Looking at the current web environment in a somewhat different way, composer/musician John Maxwell Hobbs emphasizes that artists have been on the Web since its beginnings in the early 90's, that art on the web didn't begin in 1996 as some sources have reported. "Perhaps 1996 should be referred to as the 'end' as far as the environment goes for artists on the web. There is very little that can be done today that couldn't be done back then," he comments.

But he added that "This doesn't mean I think the Internet as a tool for artists has stalled. I currently use Cubase and the Rocket Network to collaborate on music with David Azarch between Stockholm where I live now and New York where he is. And I'm much more in touch with developments in technology thanks to e-mail and the Web."

In addition to using the web as a medium to make art, artists are innovatively presenting their work in web-hosted portfolio sites.

For instance Alejandra Munizaga, who was born in Santiago, Chile, and currently lives and works in New York City creates comprehensive documentation of her installations on her website.

Approaching the web documentation of Munizaga's installation THE PLAYROOM, (Wood, plexiglass, light, and feathers) the viewer initially sees a photo of the installation. It is possible to click on individual objects in this photograph, and each click brings the viewer closer to the selected object. Thus the site simulates the viewer's experience of entering and experiencing the actual installation.

"People inhabit spaces. And in their absence, objects take their place, waiting for a new inhabitant to animate them," Munizaga writes about the work. "In my installations, the viewer becomes this inhabitant. I have chosen the house, as primal symbol of protection. But within each setting, the walls are translucent and familiar objects are camouflaged or destroyed. This is my way of speaking about the fragility of our everyday life."

Artist's sites which feature the work of several artists can provide a varied yet contingent user experience. For instance, the website HERE2DAY, which features the work of husband and wife Andrea Brewster and Seyed Alavi, opens with two profiles facing each other.

Clicking on one brings the viewer to online documentation of Andrea Brewster's mixed media work -- such as documentation of her ON THE THRESHOLD series in which she utilizes images of immigrants arriving at Ellis Island to explore the concept/ state of betweenness, such as documentation of her INVISIBLE VEIL series which utilizes images of bobbin lace and handwritten variations on the Greek mythic tale of Amour and Psyche to explore the notion of veiling and unveiling.

Clicking on the other profile brings the viewer to documentation of Seyed Alavi's installations -- such as FLOWING LIGHT; ROOM FOR MECHTHILD OF MAGDEBURG. (Bees wax, wood, honey, candles; table)

"This piece is an homage to the Thirteenth Century mystic Mechthild of Magdeburg, and seeks to express in a visual form, the emotional and conceptual layers that are contained in her writing," Alavi writes on the web site. "Inspired by her work, this installation seeks to reflect and explore a variety of metaphysical concepts regarding the nature of love, passion and devotion...."

Each work in this dual website is documented with both text and images and the whole not only imaginatively documents the artists' work but also reflects different approaches to overlapping subjects.

"The dual approach was purely practical as both my wife, Andrea, and I are artists and we wanted to feature both of our works," Seyed Alavi told Arts Wire. "It's a bit hard to judge how the website has expanded our audience. It has definitely been a useful tool for familiarizing folks with our work without having to send them a whole set of slides etc. We also periodically get emails from people like yourself who have been searching on the web for an article or school project, and it's gratifying to know that somebody out there is seeing our work."

Some artist's sites are designed as installation components. For instance, Bradley McCallum and Jacqueline Tarry's WITNESS: PERSPECTIVES ON POLICE VIOLENCE both documents and was a part of a work, which was installed in the Cathedral Church of St. John the Divine in Manhattan and at the Bronx Museum of the Arts.

Other artist's sites, such dance company Troika Ranch's web site, combine both online documentation of works with actual web works. Since 1993 when they formed the dance theater company Troika Ranch, Artistic Co-Directors Mark Coniglio and Dawn Stoppiello have been creating dynamic live performances that combine dance, music, theater and interactive digital media. On their web site, in addition to documenting their performance work, Troika Ranch features a Web Salon which they describe as "a chronicle of our ongoing investigation into ways that we can make the web part of Troika's Ranch's mix of live performance and technology." Currently, web salon features YEARBODY, a work designed especially for the Internet.

In response to a question from Arts Wire about how the Internet's increase in size -- from a handful of sites in 1991 when the World-Wide Web was released by CERN (Tim Berners-Lee developer) to over one billion pages in 2000 -- has impacted the visibility of artists websites, Rob Kendall observed that "There certainly has been a huge proliferation of literary Web sites during the last few years, so it would seem logical that they would be competing more with each other for readers now. Yet it seems that the numbers of visitors to the good literary sites are growing steadily or at least remaining constant. That's certainly true of my site, which has been online since 1997."

Among the factors which Kendall, who has taught hyperfiction at Stanford University and at the New School Online University, cites as possible contributors to continued visibility of artists websites -- despite a more commercially concentrated web environment and a much larger number of choices -- are that the number of new Web users is growing as fast as the number of new literary Web sites; the power of linking to attract users from one artist or writers site to another, and more mainstream media attention to the Web.

John Maxwell Hobbs, who put the Kitchen online in 1994, commented that "We've just been through an interesting time on the web, sort of a landrush, and now at harvest time, we're finding out who chose good land, and who didn't. Web artists were here before the rush and the committed artists and producers will remain after it's over."

But writer, sound composer, radio producer and new media artist Helen Thorington, the Director of Turbulence, which regularly commissions artists to create work for the web, is concerned that "There are many more sites and many more aggregating sites. It's unfortunate but the more aggregating sites there are, the less audience members feel the need to travel the network."

This puts a substantial burden on individual artists to promote their sites, she points out.

In the contemporary web environment, venues for artists web projects range from artist-originated project sites, such as Turbulence, to Univerity hosted spaces such as The Electronic Poetry Center at SUNY Buffalo, to museum hosted sites, such as the Whitney's ARTPORT, The Museum of Modern Art ONLINE PROJECTS, Guggenheim Museum VIRTUAL PROJECTS, the Alternative Museum's DIGITAL MEDIA COMMISSIONS, the Smithsonian American Art Museum's NEW MEDIA/NEW CENTURY AWARD, the Walker Art Center's New Media Initiatives GALLERY 9, and the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art's E-SPACE.

The Brooklyn Academy of Music's (BAM) website continues to host online interactive documentaries which explore and offer insights into the ideological foundation and creation of work presented on stage at BAM. For instance, UNDER_SCORE: NET ART, SOUND AND ESSAYS FROM AUSTRALIA exhibits the works of nine Australian artists for whom the Internet has emerged as a significant arena for artistic experimentation and multimedia production. Under_score is part of NEXT WAVE DOWN UNDER, which was the month-long Australian focus of BAM's Next Wave Festival 2001.

"From Francesca da Rimini's diary-like reflections and confrontational rants concerning erotic relations, power, and sexual taboo in GashGirl, to the richly layered dream-like 3D spaces and soundscapes in Melinda Rackham's empyrean, Australian artists are helping to define new modes of electronic writing and reading, multimedia, performance, image making, and sonic production," Wayne Ashley, Organizing Curator and Manager of New Media, BAM, writes on the website.

Although there are many online literary magazines, most publish poetry and short fiction, rather than commissioning or featuring writer's websites. An exception is THE BLUE MOON REVIEW, which has been publishing poetry and fiction online since 1994.

This fall, The Blue Moon Review published "Intersections : Explore - Web-Specific Women Writers", curated by Marjorie Coverley Luesebrink. (who writes hyperfiction under the name of M.D.Coverley) For the issue, she assembled a collection of ten web hypermedia works by 12 women and one man -- including Giselle Beiguelman's RECYCLED and Shelley and Pamela Jackson's THE DOLL GAMES.

Noting that, for instance, "Jennifer Ley's the amniotic meander ends with a re-entry into the "real" world, erasing the boundary between fiction and action", Marjorie Coverley Luesebrink writes in her Commentary that "Other genre lines become blurred as well. Since hypermedia includes graphics, sound, and movement, it often looks as much like "art" as it does literature. The stanzas of Stephanie Strickland's poem in Errand Upon Which We Came are certainly poetry, but the text is embedded in Flash movies that expand the meaning and implications. The text itself suggests that the reader might well devote as much attention to the choreography of image and sound, the oscillation between media, as to the words, themselves. C. Allen Dinsmore's Terra is so visually striking that the reader may know a great deal about the narrative before ever reading a word of the story. The processing of and interaction with the graphic and structural elements of these pieces is integral to the reading process. Moreover, the blending of text, image, sound, and structure facilitates unusual modalities of point of view."

Many of the museum web spaces launched several years ago have not recently put up new projects, and/or they only feature a very small number of artist-made web sites.

By contrast, Turbulence, which was created as a new direction for New Radio and Performing Arts, has commissioned and distributed over 50 web works since 1996.

"Our objectives with Turbulence were pretty straight-forward," founding Director Helen Thorington states. "Turbulence was to fund established and emerging artists to explore the Internet environment, and making use of the latest web and multimedia technologies, to create specifically web work."

Turbulence has also served as host to a number of distributed performances, including ADRIFT, a collaboration between Thorington, Jesse Gilbert, and Marek Walczak currently installed at the New Museum, and a series of distributed musical performances with Mills College in Oakland, CA and Harvestworks in New York City.

Helen Thorington emphasizes that Turbulence is open to new and challenging work. "The Turbulence works are so varied and with few exceptions attempt to enlarge the possibilities of the medium," she told Arts Wire. "I have personal favorites -- like the Riel's THEATRALIS, Diane Bertolo's CHANNELUNTITLED and others, and I think some of the work produced for Singlecell, like Martin Wattenberg's SAND SHRIMP and Golan Levin's OBZOK are small gems."

"I try to stay open to new work and new artists," she added. "I think today it's important for organizations like mine to keep enlarging the artist pool and that's what we're trying to do -- to provide commissioning funds and distribution to a wide variety of artists and artistic work."

In series of articles in 2002, Arts Wire Current Will Explore Tools for Creating and Promoting Artists websites

'Five Conglomerates Control 80% of American Book Sales, Says New Press Founder"
Arts Wire CURRENT -- http://www.artswire.org/current/2000/cur102400.html
October 24, 2000

Jim Rosenberg - DIAGRAMS SERIES 5 -- http://www.well.com/user/jer/d5/d5_Intro.html

Martin Wattenberg, IDEA LINE
WHITNEY ARTPORT -- http://www.whitney.org/artport/

JOHN MAXWELL HOBBS -- http://www.cinemavolta.com

MARK NAPIER -- http://www.potatoland.org

ALEJANDRA MUNIZAGA -- http://www.munizaga.com/

HERE2DAY -- http://www.netwiz.net/~here2day/ -- (Andrea Brewster and Seyed Alavi)

TROIKA RANCH -- http://www.troikaranch.org/

Bradley McCallum and Jacqueline Tarry, WITNESS: PERSPECTIVES ON POLICE VIOLENCE -- http://www.witnesscallbox.org

ROBERT KENDALL -- http://wordcircuits.com/kendall/

ELECTRONIC LITERATURE DIRECTORY -- http://directory.eliterature.org

TURBULENCE -- http://turbulence.org

BROOKLYN ACADEMY OF MUSIC (BAM) -- http://www.bam.org/

THE ELECTRONIC POETRY CENTER -- http://epc.buffalo.edu

The Museum of Modern Art ONLINE PROJECTS -- http://www.moma.org/docs/onlineprojects/index.htm

The Alternative Museum DIGITAL MEDIA COMMISSIONS -- http://www.alternativemuseum.org/home.html

Guggenheim Museum VIRTUAL PROJECTS -- http://www.guggenheim.org/exhibitions/virtual/index.html

Smithsonian American Art Museum - NEW MEDIA/NEW CENTURY AWARD -- http://www.si.edu

The Walker Art Center NEW MEDIA INITIATIVES GALLERY 9 -- http://www.walkerart.org/nmi/

San Francisco Museum of Modern Art E-SPACE -- http://www.sfmoma.org/espace/espace_overview.html

THE BLUE MOON REVIEW-- http://www.thebluemoon.com/index.shtml

"We are delighted to be able to join with a large segment of the university press community in making available to scholars and libraries the books that might otherwise be declared out of print," said Press Director Paula Duffy. "These are difficult times for publishers in all segments of the industry. Mellon's support for the work connected with preparing books for delivery using new printing and online technologies will enable us to continue to provide the content that universities and their presses have invested in over the years. And we are excited at the prospect of developing a versatile repository for digital files of books."

The 18-month grant will support the development of the CDDC and the BiblioVault, as well as the preparation of 5,000 books for short-run digital printing and, eventually, for online searching. The CDDC will serve not only Chicago but also the many scholarly presses served by the Chicago Distribution Center, (CDC) which manages warehousing, order fulfillment, and business services for a growing number of scholarly presses, including the presses of the following universities: Alabama, Iowa, Minnesota, Northwestern, Notre Dame, Ohio, Ohio State, Tennessee, Temple, and Wisconsin.

The establishment of the CDDC will enable these presses to print small quantities of books, a practice that is not economically feasible with standard offset printing methods. The short-run printing facility, operated by Ann Arbor-based printer Edwards Brothers, will be at the CDC and have an initial capacity of 36,000 books a year. This new facility will keep books with low demand available and will allow university presses to bring back out-of-print titles as requested, ensuring that the scholarly community will always have access to work critical to ongoing research and teaching.

The BiblioVault, an electronic repository of books in digital form from the cooperating university presses, will initially serve the short-run printing facility and will, in the future, make backlist books and new publications available to scholars for online searches. It will also enable participating publishers to deliver their books to scholars in new ways as technologies evolve.

The grant will also allow the CDDC to develop a strategic intellectual property management system that will benefit scholars and publishers.

"This initiative provides hope that there will be an acceptable delivery structure for monographs throughout their useful lives and in formats that bring scholars to material valuable to their work," said Martin Runkle, director of the University of Chicago Library. "As technologies change, it is important that presses change with them to keep ideas circulating among readers.

Sources/Resources:

UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO PRESS -- http://www.press.uchicago.edu

For more information about the Chicago Digital Distribution Center and the BiblioVault, contact Mary Summerfield, Director of Business Development, at 773-702-2383 or msummerfield@press.uchicago.edu

The Hidden Half depicts internal struggle within Iran soon after the 1979 Islamic Revolution. The filmmaker has been charged with supporting factions waging war against God, and misusing the arts in support of counterrevolutionary and armed opposition groups. According to Facets, The Revolutionary Council has ordered the arrest of journalists and other cultural figures, but this is the first time it has taken direct action against a filmmaker.

Tahmineh Milani has been released on bail and is currently free to travel. However, she has not been cleared and the charges have not been dropped. The charges of supporting those waging war against god and misusing the arts in support of counterrevolutionary and armed opposition groups are potentially punishable by execution under Islamic law in Iran.

Facets reports that Mohammad Khatami, the President of Iran, personally supported Ms. Milani's release on bail. "Like all domestically produced Iranian films, The Hidden Half went through intense censorship processes," they state. "It was then approved by the Ministry of Culture and released to theatres. For the director then to be arrested for the content of the film seemed, as Mr. Khatami himself put it at the time, unfair to say the least."

Filmmakers who have signed the petition include directors Jamsheed Akrami, Hisham Bizri, John Boorman, Francis Ford Coppola, Jonathan Demme, Carlos Diegues, Ali Kazimi, Hanif Kureishi, Ang Lee, Spike Lee, Lucrecia Martel, Raoul Peck, Martin Scorsese, Steven Soderbergh, Oliver Stone, plus many other directors, producers, actors, and other filmmakers. Among the signatories are numerous women filmmakers, including Allison Anders, Catherine Breillat, Michelle Citron, Sofia Coppola, Faye Dunaway, Su Friedrich, Marina Goldovskaya, Mary Harron, Agnieszka Holland, Sarah Jacobson, Lucrecia Martel, Alice Nellis, Yvonne Rainer, Molly Ringwald, Greta Schiller, Cauleen Smith, Susan Sontag, Amy Taubin, and many others.

The petition has also received institutional endorsements from over 75 institutions, including the Association of Independent Video and Filmmakers, the Black Filmmaker Foundation, the Canadian Film Institute, the Directors' Guild of Canada, Zeitgeist Films, film festivals in Greece, Norway, Portugal, Sweden, and the United States, and many others.

Facets Multimedia, which coordinated the declaration of solidarity because of long-time commitments to promoting and distributing Iranian cinema, to human rights, and to the freedom of artists, plans to send an updated copy of the petition with all its current signatories to representatives within Iran shortly.

"We expect this filmmakers' declaration of solidarity to be the first action in a worldwide protest against the arrest of Tahmineh Milani, leading to the charges against her being dropped," said Milos Stehlik, the Director of Facets Multimedia.

One of Iran's best-known filmmakers, Tahmineh Milani has written and directed films including THE LEGEND OF A SIGH, (1991) WHAT ELSE IS NEW? (1992) and TWO WOMEN, (1999) in addition to THE HIDDEN HALF. (2001) She is well-known for taking strong feminist positions in both films and public appearances.

For more information, visit Facets Multimedia at http://www.facets.org

WHAT'S HAPPENING TO BOOK REVIEWING?

"Newspapers are cutting back; e-tailers are posting everybody's opinions, and some reviewers have taken to selling coverage, while the flood of new titles makes it harder and harder for media people, booksellers and readers to identify the best books. This panel of insiders - those who control and understand book reviewing - will explain the most important trends and events to help writers and publishers get their books into the limelight."

The final event in the current Small Press Center Publishing Workshop series, "What's Happening to Book Reviewing?" will take a topical look at the book reviewing process. Held with the support of PUBLISHERS WEEKLY, the workshop will take place at the Small Press Center in midtown Manhattan.

The panelists include Ilene Barth, Creative Director, Red Rock Press and former NBBC board member; Julie Just, Deputy Editor, The New York Times Book Review; Malcolm Jones, Book Critic, Newsweek; and Laura Miller, Editorial Director, Salon.com. The workshop will be moderated by PW NewsLine Editor, Steven Zeitchik of Publishers Weekly.

ognizing the links between oppressions, our goal is to be trans-inclusive, multi-lingual, open to all sexualities and spiritualities, intergenerational and to challenge racism, classism, ablism, sexism, ageism and sizism. We have adopted a collective structure, and we strive to be an organizing site in the struggle for social, economic, and environmental justice."

Programs this fall include:

November 17, 2001 - 7:00 PM
Spoken Word: MARTHA CABRERA ESTVEZ AND INGRID RIVERA CHAPBOOK RELEASE OF, LAS ALAS
"an evening of empowered poetry and spoken word which honestly and powerfully unveils issues of discrimination, sex and gender with a dash of Spanglish!

November 20, 2001 - 7:00 PM
Film: WOMEN MAKE MOVIES - PERILS AMID PROGRESS
"an evening with New York's strongest women's filmmakers organization, Women Make Movies, featuring Marion Appel's 39 minute film, PERILS AMID PROGRESS"

November 23, 2001 - 7:00 PM
Exhibition: TRASHY WOMEN - a slide show presentation
"From Plastic Bags to Heavy Metal, Women Who Make Art From Recycled Materials'. Conducted by Sally Willowbee, this is a look at women, some with formal art training and others with little or none, who collect trash and transform it into objects of beauty including the old stories as well as creating new ones. This is an ever growing and changing slide show as Sally finds, collect, and include more women. In this throwaway society where there is no away, reusing and reclaiming junk is one creative response to a huge, overwhelming problem."

November 27, 2001 - 7:00 PM
Poetry: POETRY JAM AND WOMEN'S OPEN MIC
"Bluestockings invites you to a Poetry Jam and Women's Open Mic night hosted by Vittoria Repetto, the hardest working guinea dyke poet on the lower east side. The evening will feature writer Barbara Bell and poet Ingrid Rivera. Barbara Bell will read from her novel, STACKING IN RIVERTOWN, a stunningly bizarre and just plain scary story of pimps, guns, edgy sex, and lesbian love; hold onto your hats, it's a ride. Ingrid Rivera combines activism and lesbian motherhood into her slam poetry; she has collaborative poetry chapbook with Martha Cabrera Estvez entitled 'Las Alas'. Bring your poetry, your prose, and your songs. 8 min limit, sign- up at 7 PM

November 28, 2001 - 7:00 PM
Music: ACOUSTIC WOMEN'S OPEN MIC
"Bluestockings invites you to an acoustic singer/songwriters night hosted by NJ musician and SHEE collective founder, Catherine Moon. This month features the funk, R+B, rock, and pop sound of Valerie Ghent. Her style snaps between forms like a hiker on switchbacks. Open mic sign up at 6:45 followed by featured performers.

And on December 7, look for the final fall reading of the BELLADONNA series with Lynn Tillman, Abigail Child, Cheryl Pallant.

For complete details on these and other programs, including CONNECTIONS - An Expressive Movement Therapy Benefit, visit http://www.bluestockings.com
tel 212-777-6028
email: info@bluestockings.com

"If you are a writer, poet, performer, artist or other woman-identified person who likes to take part in feminist activities in a community space, then please consider this a full-time standing invitation to come down and do something at bluestockings," they state.

THE MIRRORINGS PROJECT
an original dance theater piece by bROOKERdANCE based on writings of Lucy Grealy

"There was a long period of time, almost a year, during which I never looked in a mirror. It wasn't easy, for I'd never suspected just how omnipresent are our own images. I began by merely avoiding mirrors, but by the end of the year I found myself with an acute knowledge of the reflected image, its numerous tricks and wiles, how it can spring up at any moment: a glass tabletop, a well-polished door handle, a darkened window, a pair of sunglasses, a restaurant's otherwise magnificent brass-plated coffee machine sitting innocently by the cash register." - Lucy Grealy, "Mirrorings: to gaze upon my reconstructed face", HARPER'S MAGAZINE

THE MIRRORINGS PROJECT is based on the writings of Lucy Grealy, a childhood cancer survivor. It spins a story of deformity, beauty and identity through words, dance and video. The script and movement were created by Rachel Brooker in collaboration with the dancers. The piece also includes photography and video by Bill Wilkerson of Broad Designs, music by Kelly and Wade Baynham, and costumes by Rachel Hoke.

Brookerdance is a modern dance company based in Durham, NC. Their mission is to create dance events which impact and enrich the local community, showcasing the work of local artists and promoting social change through an artistic exploration of socially relevant issues. The company currently has three members, Alice Johnson, Maureen Jordan and Rachel Brooker, (artistic director) and invites guest artists to perform in many of their shows. Since Brookerdance was founded in 2000, they have produced events at the Durham Arts Council, Ninth Street Dance, the Carrboro ArtsCenter and the Sizl Gallery.

"In the process of developing the piece, we worked with improv and our own writing, focusing not only on the content of the essay but on our own reactions to it," the company states. "The finished product includes video, photographic stills, spoken text and dialogue, and of course, movement."

For more information, call the Durham Arts Council at 560-2787 or visit http://www.homestead.com/brookerdance/dance.html

WOMEN IN ART

Students in an Art History Seminar on Women in Art at Seton Hill College juried the exhibition WOMEN IN ART, currently at the College's Harlan Gallery. Works by 34 regional artists -- whose work ranges from traditional bronze casting and charcoal drawing to mixed media installation -- were selected. Artists whom the students singled out for awards were Patricia Barefoot, Fran Gialamas, Judith Schumaker, Judith Charlson and Laura DeFazio.

For more information, contact Carol Brode, director of Harlan Gallery, 724-830-1071.

Seton Hill college is named for Saint Elizabeth Ann Bayley Seton, the first American born saint and the founder of the American Sisters of Charity. At a time when most of the nation's preeminent colleges were closed to women at the undergraduate level, the Sisters of Charity persuaded a reluctant College and University Council to grant permission to establish Seton Hill as a college for women. The College received its charter on June 3, 1918.

Brownbox Theater:
BLACK TO MY ROOTS AFRICAN AMERICAN TALES FROM THE HEAD...AND THE HEART

"Whether it's happily nappy, kinky-curly or silky straight. Black America and more specifically African American women have had a complex, convoluted and unique relationship with their hair. Here we share some of the stories behind black hair. Tales of love and laughter, pride and pain, and ultimately tales of acceptance."

A cast of women, representing a variety of ages, experiences and backgrounds, will perform the show. They include Kathya Alexander, Tracena Marie Jones, Wilna Julmiste, Camille Yavonne-Kennedy, Laura Malone, and Michelle Robinson.

For tickets call (206) 381-8708 or via email at tyeseattle@yahoo.com.

Deadline: Ongoing - ELIZABETH GREENSHIELDS FOUNDATION provides funding to representational or figurative artists working in the early stages of their careers in painting, drawing, printmaking, or sculpture. Funds may be used for any art-related purpose: study, travel, studio rental, purchase materials, etc. Applicants must have started or completed art school training and/or must demonstrate through past work or future plans a commitment to making art a lifetime career. Grants are up to $10,000 Canadian. Up to 60 grants are awarded yearly. For more information, contact: Elizabeth Greenshields Foundation, 1814 Sherbrooke St. West, Suite #1, Montreal, Quebec, Canada H3H1E4 or phone 514-937-9225.

Deadline: Ongoing - LIGHT WORK offers one-month residencies for artists working in photography and digital media. The residencies include a private apartment with kitchen (sometimes shared), $1,200 stipend, plus private darkroom and 24-hour studio access. For more information, send a SASE to: Director, Light Work, 316 Waverly Ave., Syracuse, NY 13244; phone 315-443-1300; or visit http://www.lightwork.org

Deadline: Ongoing - THE ELIZABETH FOUNDATION FOR THE ARTS (EFA) provides visual arts grants to artists in all media except photography, video/film, and crafts. Applicants must be 30+ or have been working at least six years since completing formal schooling. Only 12 to 15 grants are awarded per year. For more information, contact: Elizabeth Foundation for the Arts, P.O. Box 2670, New York, NY 10109; or phone 212-586-5896. Deadline: Ongoing - THE GETTY GRANT PROGRAM funds a diverse range of projects that promote research in the history of art and related fields, advancement of the understanding of art, and conservation of cultural heritage. Funded projects include a wide variety of methodologies and subject matter, ranging through all historical periods and geographic regions. For more information, contact: The Getty Grant Program, 1200 Getty Center Dr., Suite 800, Los Angeles, CA 90049; phone 310-440-7320; fax 310-440-7703; or visit http://www.getty.edu/grants

WASHINGTON, DC - In 2001, the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) awarded over $14.5 million in National Leadership Grants to museums, libraries, professional museum and library service organizations, and museum-library partnerships.

IMLS encourages all eligible museums and libraries to apply for 2002 National Leadership Grant funds. Applicants may request up to $500,000 for proposals that encourage creativity in providing public service, meet community needs, and use technology innovatively. Projects that can be replicated nationally, provide broader public access to collections, and that extend the impact of federal funds through collaborations are also encouraged.

Among the new priorities are: education of lifelong learners in the 21st century; training in outcome-based evaluation; digital collaborations to bring together related collections; and enhancing interoperability of library and museum collections.

Examples of projects funded in 2001 are

• PORTLAND MUSEUM - LOUISVILLE, KY - $232,849
  (National Leadership Grants for Museums - Museums in the Community)
  The Portland Museum with Louisville Metro Parks will partner with the Shawnee High School to create a new park, the Portland Wharf. In creating this park, the students, the museum, and the parks department will develop prototype interpretive plans and education programs, forge a management plan for the park and related resources, apply concepts of cultural tourism management, and seek ways to weave the park into its neighborhood context.

• CHEROKEE NATIONAL HISTORICAL SOCIETY - TAHLEQUAH, OK - $182,442
  (National Leadership Grants for Museums - Museums in the Community)
  The Cherokee National Heritage Society in cooperation with the Tahlequah Chamber of Commerce, the Stillwell Chamber of Commerce, the Cherokee Nation, and the Eastern Oklahoma Development District will help traditional artisans teach their skills to younger generations, and will document this teaching process on film and video to preserve the techniques. The collaborative will also provide basic training in business and marketing, including e-commerce, to 100 artisans.

• RICHMOND PUBLIC LIBRARY - RICHMOND, CA - $199,325
  (National Leadership Grants for Libraries - Library-Museum Collaboration)
  The WWII Richmond, California, Home Front Digital Project is a two-year project of the Richmond Public Library, the Richmond Museum of History and John F. Kennedy University's Department of Museum Studies to bring together text and images from their collections into a single Web site. The digital collection will be accessible through the new Rosie the Riveter/World War II Home Front National Park located in the city's harbor area and will include Web-based instructional programming developed in collaboration with teachers and students that address state teaching standards.

• National Leadership Grants for Libraries - February 1, 2002
• National Leadership Grants for Museums - March 1, 2002
• National Leadership Grants for Library-Museum Collaboration - April 1, 2002

Guidelines, successful proposals, and application forms are available on the IMLS Web site at: http://www.imls.gov or contact IMLS at 1100 Pennsylvania Ave., NW, Washington, DC. 202-606-8536, email: info@imls.gov

Calls for Participation

Thousands of cultural heritage institutions are now on-line, presenting programs, creating communities and delivering information using the world wide web. But museums, libraries, archives and others involved in creating digital heritage have much to learn about what makes web sites successful. To facilitate this exchange of information, Archives & Museum Informatics organizes an annual international conference devoted exclusively to Museums and the Web.

MUSEUMS AND THE WEB 2002 will be held from April 17 -20 in Boston, Massachusetts. The program will address web-related issues for museums, archives, libraries and other cultural institutions. They are inviting papers, web site demonstrations, on and off line events, and workshops. The Deadline for Proposals is November 30, 2001. Full details and online proposal submission details are available at http://www.archimuse.com/mw2002/

Opportunities for Artists

Details about these and other opportunities are available on Arts Wire's Web Site at http://www.artswire.org/current/calls.html
To submit "calls" for either artists or organizations, send email to artswire@artswire.org

Deadlines: various, Visual artists, writers, composers, choreographers, and dancers interested in working with the Master Artists, Atlantic Center for the Arts

Deadline: November 15, 2001, visual artists, Residency with Martha Rosler, Atlantic Center for the Arts, Florida

Deadline: December 1, 2001, Seattle area young bands (16 -21 years old), Sound Off! Experience Music Project, Seattle, WA

Deadline: December 3, 2001, Playwrights, directors, designers, composers, choreographers, and/or actors, National Theatre Artist Residency Program

Deadline: December 20, 2002, Proposals of Ideas for Exhibitions, The Euphrat Museum of Art, Cupertino, CA

Deadline: January 4, 2002, Photographs, sculpture or paintings of destinations that were at one time or are no longer available for entry, No Entry/ Passport Denied, Catskill Gallery, Catskill, NY

Deadline January 25th, 2002, Woman Nature Photographer, Nadine Blacklock Woman Nature Photography Fellowship

Deadline: February 1, 2002, Composers - full scores of any style and aesthetic direction for one to ten players, Salvatore Martirano Memorial Composition Award, The University of Illinois School of Music

Deadline: February 15, 2002, Artists, Writers - residencies, Dune Shack-A Provincetown Retreat for Art & Healing

Deadline: May 17th, 2002, Art about the effect of the American lifestyle on forests, Exhibition - SEEING THE FOREST, Oregon Trail Interpretive Center, Baker City, OR

Deadine: Ongoing, net based art work or art projects documentated online, Le Musee di-visioniste

Deadline: Ongoing, Writers to cover the arts in Ohio, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky, and Michigan Wisconsin and Minnesota, DIALOGUE VOICING THE ARTS

Deadline: Ongoing, artists based in the Midwest or originally from the Midwest who are involved in exhibitions/projects outside of the Midwest, DIALOGUE VOICING THE ARTS

To submit jobs to Arts Wire, email them to joblist@artswire.org Please send a text file in the body of the message. (ie no attachments and no HTML) There is no fee for posting job listings. The deadline is Friday for the next week's listings. (which usually are posted on Monday) For the most part, job listings are not edited. The contents of the postings are the responsibility of the originating agency.

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, Marie P. DeBartolo Performing Arts Center, The University of Notre Dame, (Indiana)

EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR, The Center for Lake Champlain, (Burlington, VT)

DIRECTOR, CENTER FOR DIGITAL HUMANITIES, University of California, Los Angeles, (Los Angeles, CA)

WRITER, (part time teaching) MFA Writing Program, School of Critical Studies, California Institute of the Arts, (Valenica, CA)

PROGRAM DIRECTOR, Flatbush Youth Initiative, (Brooklyn, NY)

ART CENTER DIRECTOR, City of Sioux City, (Sioux City, Iowa)

CHOIR DIRECTOR, Portland Symphonic Choir, (Portland, OR)

TENOR AND BASS SECTION LEADERS, Grace Episcopal Church, (Nutley, NJ)

MASTER ARTIST/TEACHER, Ryman Program for Young Artists, (Los Angeles, CA)

SCHOOL AND YOUTH PROGRAMS COORDINATOR, The American Craft Museum, (New York City, NY)

PRODUCTION MANAGER, "The Egg", (Albany, NY)

PROGRAM CONSULTANT II, The Kansas Arts Commission, (Topeka KS)

GENERAL/BOOKING MANAGER, Manhattan Tap, (New York, NY)

PRODUCTION MANAGER; TECHNICAL DIRECTOR, University of Massachusetts, (Amherst, MA)

ASSOCIATE REGISTRAR, The New Museum of Contemporary Art, (New York City, NY)

ASSISTANT DIRECTOR OF SPECIAL PROGRAMS ADMISSIONS, Office of the Vice-Dean, Tisch School of the Arts, New York University, (New York City, NY)

DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR, Jacob s Pillow Dance Festival, (Lee, MA)

DEVELOPMENT-INSTITUTIONAL SUPPORT, The Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, (New York City, NY)

ARTS ADMINISTRATOR, Engine 27, (New York, NY)

PROJECT ASSISTANT, Arts Education Partnership, The Council of Chief State School Officers, (Washington, DC)

ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT, EDUCATION, San Francisco Symphony, (San Francisco, CA)

TECHNOLOGY COORDINATOR; GRANTS / FISCAL ASSISTANT; ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT, New England Foundation for the Arts, (Boston, MA)

MEMBERSHIP ASSISTANT, The Studio Museum In Harlem, (New York City, NY)

BOOKKEEPER, (part-time) The Lark Theatre Company, (New York City, NY)

INTERNSHIPS FOR GRADUATE STUDENTS, The Getty, (Los Angeles, CA)

MAJOR GIFTS INTERN, National Foundation for Jewish Culture, (New York, NY)

INTERNSHIP, (performing arts magazine) (New York City, NY)

INTERNSHIP, Edward Tyler Nahem Fine Art, (New York City, NY)

PERFORMING ARTS ADMINSTRATION INTERN, Abundance A Community Arts Project, (New York City, NY)

Artist Pat Oleszko was in the voting both at a nearby school when she heard the double boom. "...in retrospect, I realized that not having my bike probably saved my life as it prevented me from riding around to get a better look," she writes.

Below are excerpts from a letter she wrote to her friends after working on the site for eight days.

"Dust was filling the air and the horror seeped like the foul smell slowly into consciousness. Mesmerized by the sight, I watched the fire move, and then the horror of maybe forty people jump from the Towers of Babble, as individuals, then in groups. Even watching it live, it was incomprehensible until the north tower imploded like Vesuvius in reverse. Then Building Five fell, down like a sheet of water at the end of my street."

.....

"Since then I have been working at the site, my destroyed neighborhood, in whatever capacity that I could. I have bagged hundreds of containers of garbage. I have given out food at the canteen for the Salvation Army. I have organized the distribution center for goods, the enormous outpouring of sandwiches, made by communities and schoolchildren, and made the bins laden with overnight supply bags, socks, glasses, hard-hats, masks, shirts, underwear, aspirin, ice, eyewash, boots, etc, etc, etc. I never in my life thought I would run a boot-ique, particularly one in the middle of the road. I have ferried hot food, sloshing around in postal hampers, to The Hole, barely able to restrain tears, to that monochromatic hellhole, in sandals, ankle deep in concrete muck, to guys that hadn't seen hot food or a bed in three days. Who would've guessed that White Castle hamburgers would be such a hit.

Armies of firefighters were everywhere, sleeping, waiting, working, everyone's attention consumed by The Hole until there was a call and everyone stood aside for the stretcher with the body bag on it."

.....

"I have seen the best and the worst. Legions of firefighters, so eager going in, leaving many hours, even days later, completely encrusted with dust, walking bone weary, to sleep--anywhere. Neighborhood restaurants making food and taking and putting it into rescue workers hands. A masseuse who set up her cot and hand-lettered sign in the middle of the busiest corner to take any and everyone that needed relief. A man with no legs who I saw from day one, running ice around on his wheelchair, and giving out water. Everyone working 14, 16 hour shifts. And the spoilage of food, that simply couldn't be helped."

.....

"And then the dogs. I was working from a site right across from the canine MASH repair unit which took care of the dogs after they came off their tour, showered and fed them, took their temperature, repaired their paws, took blood, gave them IV's as most come off seriously dehydrated. (Apparently when they catch smell of something they become so animated that it is comparable to doing wind sprints in humans.) The dogs, usually large, mostly very well-behaved or, incredibly enthusiastic, were always an emotional lift. Of course, the all time high came when I joked to some burly guy walking a saggy barreled multi-teated low-rider if she was coming to work, which, to my astonishment she was. A little dog can go where big dogs can't and this friendly little two littered Chihuahua/dachshund mama gets outfitted in a total body suit--they all wear protective booties--with a camera on her head and one on each side of her body, so she can be lowered into a hole and they can read the environment, arf-roscopic surgery at its best.

Later, after many daze, never really sleeping, only going from home to the site and back, I heard a buzz and then, walking down the road which had been only traffic for troops, dump-trucks, buses of supplies, monster caterpillars, generators, flatbeds of almost unrecognizable fire trucks, the dispirited, the anxious, the exhausted, comes Donald fucking Trump, Armani suit, no boots, no hard-hat, no mask, lousy hair and I thought, this is the first of the carpetbaggers, going down to look at the real estate, surveying it for Trump Towers 2...."

......

"And now as each day becomes increasingly more grim, complicated and difficult, I am trying to figure out not only where does this fool fit in but also, what on earth we're going to do, now that we have passed as a nation thru the terrible initiation out of our flagrant childhood, into the age of us, US, as home war-scarred adults."

"Much love to all of you.
Pat
on her back
altho
finally
coming back"

About her work she writes: "Pat Oleszko is a visual and performance artist whose work rages from the street to stage to the silver screen thru humor by way of absurdity with a nod to exorcism and a bow to the fool. The work has been sited in PLAYBOY, ESQUIRE, ARTFORM and SESAME STREET MAGAZINE. She has played at the Vatican and slept in jail. There have been many awards and some justification, all based on a very large and highly costumed body--of work. Oleszko recently presented ROAMIN' HOLIDAY A VIEW FROM A BROAD based on her Rome Prize escapades in Italy, and will put her brand on Boston with some thirty formidable pneumatics including A BREASTED DEVELOPMENT and THE PATSYDERM featured on the Green for First Nite.

EIN HAROD, ISRAEL -- Five women artists -- are exhibiting works relating to maps, hidden borders and self-identity -- personal and collective in a vexing and loaded social and political reality -- in LIMINAL.(through November 30, 2001 at Mishkan LeOmanut)

The exhibition includes:

Ahlam Shibl, UNRECOGNIZED
Ahlam Shibli, who worked for four years as a social worker and is completing her masters degree in cinematography, direction and production at the Tel Aviv University, is exhibiting a series of photographs of the Arab al Na'im village, situated between Sahnin and Carmiel. "It was only recently that the village received official recognition, however it still doesn't appear on the map and its residents are denied basic facilities such as a pipe-connection to the local sewerage system, and linkage to the national electricity grid and water supply.

Mirjam Bruck-Cohen, MAPRESSIONS LOCI
Mirjam Bruck-Cohen embroiders, knits and patches from building wire, wool, mesh screens and fabrics. Her point of departure stems from architectonic rural settlement plans, mainly Arab towns "As a child Mirjam Bruck-Cohen experienced being torn from her home, being a refugee. This biographical context surfaces in her works, exposing bare nerves. She is aware of the pain of Israel's Arab citizens, of the anguish of dual or denied identity and of the place where they are not manifested even in her view." In her works Mirjam Bruck-Cohen sublimates the presence of an Arab town, a presence that is physical, cultural and political. She does this through her absorption with urban grid plans , not only of Arab towns but Jewish towns as well, such as Ashkelon, Tirat HaCarmel and Ir Havradim. She opens a dialogue after she discloses her point of origin as a refugee. She dispenses the agony of her identity, acknowledges the agony of their identity."

Vered Nachmani, ME, WHEN PASSIONATELY SITTING, WAITING FOR YOU
Vered Nachmani paints large dimensional paintings of landscapes concealed from view. "In one painting a courtyard is seen through a bamboo fence, in another a village scene is observed through a barbed-wire fence."

Ariane Litman-Cohen, WHITE LAND
"Ariane Litman-Cohen creates tiles from 'ready-made' aerial photographs, as if they were tiles covering areas of a wall in a home. However the aerial photographs are incomplete and so the continuity contains missing spaces: from the photographs mapping Israel, areas considered to be of strategic importance, have been erased by order of the military censor and now they appear on the photograph square as geometric or organic stains, as white as snow. The point of departure for the exhibition is the forest, which Litman-Cohen calls the forbidden forest, a forest donated to the J.N.F by the family in 1967, and which at some unknown date became a military camp. The site was erased from every map or photograph and it became physically impossible to enter it.'

Yael Elboim, CIRCLES
In her work, she focuses on circles, "an exemplary utopian form, which she fashions. The works are made of bandages that are frayed and worn thin leaving only a fine mesh of fibres. From these fine fabrics whose edges have frayed, Yael Elboim creates fragile circular cuts, like a wreath of leaves or flowers lain on the ground or hung on a wall, like a funeral wreath or the contrary, a victory wreath. By means of "Circles" the artist relates to the same ideal of perfection which was part of her family biography, to its collapse, to the complexity of transfiguration at the level of the individual and the community."

Galia Bar Or Curator and Director of the Museum of Art, Ein Harod, curated four of the Exhibitions. Haim Maor curated Mapressions Loci.

For more information, contact Galia Bar Or at bar-or@einharodm.org.il or Mirjam Bruck-Cohen at mirjam@actcom.co.il