Video/Art: The First Fifty Years

A personal and expert account of the artists and events that defined the medium’s first 50 years, written by a true expert in the field. 'London’s book excites because it brings new artists into a lineage worthy of greater stuff. Her passion for lesser-known figures … is contagious.' – ARTnews, The Best Art Books of 2020. Since the introduction of portable consumer electronics nearly a half century ago, artists throughout the world have adapted their latest technologies to art-making. This first-hand account by the curator who has been following video art from its beginnings in the late 1960s highlights video’s ongoing importance in the art world, tracing the genre’s development alongside technological advances that have continued to open up new possibilities for artists. London has worked closely with the artists she writes about, including Joan Jonas, Nam June Paik, Bill Viola, Shirin Neshat, Pipilotti Rist, Miranda July, Ragnar Kjartansson, and Ian Cheng. The text is both art-historical and personal, weaving background information and insightful interpretations with anecdotes and experiences to trace the history of video art from analog to digital, small TV monitors to wall-scale projections, and clunky hardware to user-friendly software, revealing how video evolved from fringe status to a leading art form today.