ICC Artists´ Database

(Working Research Version 1994)

A Study of User Interface Design Methodologies for a Multimedia Database

Project of Intercommunication Center, NTT (ICC), Tokyo

The Intercommunication Center, NTT (ICC) is a new organisation created by Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (NTT) for supporting the technical and creative arts. The ICC aims to study the relationship of contemporary art forms, communication culture and media technologies through exhibitions, workshops, events, publications, audio-visual broadcasts and a variety of other media activities. It has already sponsored several exhibitions and several publications, including art and techno-science Magazine.

The ICC is currently proceeding with the design and construction of a permanent facility in Shinjuku, Tokyo. It will feature an exhibition space for traditional and modernist art works, as well as participatory interactive installations such as those based on the latest in submersive Virtual Reality (VR) technology, an on-line experimental museum accessible through the telephone and other communications networks, and many other novel functions not found in conventional art museums.

A directory of media artists world-wide is an essential resource to such a media art museum. The ICC began collecting data about the careers and activities of media artists in 1992. Then, from 1993 it started researching appropriate database systems to make the information available to the general public. The result is a digital "Who's Who" named the "ICC Artists´ Database". Technical specifications about the type of computer system that this database will run on, and the functions required for it to be actually put into service have yet to be finalised. We also intend to integrate a number of ideas about the database's GUI (graphical user interface) design into a series of prototypes and offer them to a limited user base, studying the comment and reactions of as many people as possible before we open it to the public at large.

Working research version 1994 (CD-ROM Based Model), contains data on approximately 300 artists who have agreed to open their data to the public. The works, activities and underlining philosophies of these media artists often differ greatly from those artists engaged in the production of traditional paintings and sculptures. The media they use include computer, video, robot, biotechnological, laser, holographic and other systems. Most of these artists deny a strong relationship between "talent" and originality in their work - ideas on which most classical aesthetics and art criticism are based. Some artists even go so far as to create what can be called "groupware" - pure collaborations between artists and engineers. The ultimate objective of our database design is to reflect the specific nature of the contents trough the functional and aesthetic aspects of the user interface.