Video/Art: The First Fifty Years

The curator who founded MoMA's video program recounts the artists and events that defined the medium's first 50 years

Since the introduction of portable consumer electronics nearly a half century ago, artists throughout the world have adapted their latest technologies to art-making. In this book, curator Barbara London traces the history of video art as it transformed into the broader field of media art - from analog to digital, small TV monitors to wall-scale projections, and clunky hardware to user-friendly software. In doing so, she reveals how video evolved from fringe status to be seen as one of the foremost art forms of today.

Barbara London is a writer, curator, and longstanding interpreter of video, performance, media, installation, and sound art. She founded the video exhibition and collection programs at the Museum of Modern Art, New York, where she worked between 1973 and 2013. London was also the first to integrate the Internet into her curatorial practice. She is adjunct professor in the Yale Graduate Department of Fine Art and a consultant with the Kadist Foundation.