ELO conferences

This is the second interview of Rui Torres for the ELR. He answered some questions about the event that he chaired.

The 2015 ELO Conference’s call for papers states that "[e]lectronic literature is situated as an intermedial field of practice, between literature, computation, visual and performance art. The conference will seek to develop a better understanding of electronic literature’s boundaries and relations with other academic disciplines and artistic practices."

This roundtable discussion, led by both established and emerging e-lit scholars and artists, will explore the idea of electronic literature as an intermedial practice, looking at the topic from a wide range of forms including literature, performance, sound, computation, visual art, and physical computing. Drawing upon artistic work they have produced or studied, each panelist will provide a five-minute statement that touches on qualities related to intermediality like hybridity, syncretism, and collaboration. Following this series of brief presentations, the panelists, then, encourage engagement in a wider conversation with the audience.

Because it is our contention that multiple media in combination in a work of art provide endless opportunities for innovation, contemplation, and “fresh perspectives” (Kattenbelt), rendering the notion of an “end” impossible to reach, the goal of the panel is to engage the ELO community in a discussion about the shifting boundaries of electronic literature and its ongoing development as an art form.

(source: ELO 2015 conference catalog)

This half-day workshop will be focused on the preservation and archiving of Electronic Literature Organization events and conferences. Scott Rettberg has been asked by the ELO board to establish a standing committee of ELO members that will be focused on documenting and archiving current and past ELO events. This workshop will be focused both on the future scope and projects of that committee and on the hands-on documentation of ELO conferences in the ELMCIP Electronic Literature Knowledge Base. We will consider questions including:

What are the best practices related to archiving for ELO conference organizers?
Should relationships be established with one or more libraries or archives to preserve data and ephemera from ELO conferences?
How should we best go about gathering ELO archives materials and preserving them?
How can we archive events using the platform of the ELMCIP Electronic Literature Knowledge Base?

The session will include a discussion of these issues followed by hands-on work in the ELMCIP Knowledge Base. Participants will learn how to document their presentations, papers, creative works, and events in order to preserve them and make them available to other international researchers.

(Source: ELO 2015 catalog)