CONFIDENTIAL AND PROPRIETARY TO ISAST AND NOT TO BE SHARED OR DISCUSSED OUTSIDE LEONARDO/ISAST BOARD

MINUTES OF REGULAR MEETING OF THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS OF LEONARDO/ISAST



October 10, 2004


Present: Roger Malina, Sonya Rapoport, Marty Anderson, Anne Brooks Pfister, Beverly Reiser, Christian Simm, Joel Slayton, Darlene Tong, Steve Wilson

Guest: Meredith Tromble

Staff: Pam Grant-Ryan, Kathleen Quillian

Absent: Penelope Finnie, Michael Grey, Greg Niemeyer, Ed Payne

1. Welcome Board. Welcome guests.

2. Approval/Modifications of Agenda. Approved unanimously.

3. Approval of minutes of August 2004 meeting. Approved unanimously.

4. General news – Roger Malina

a. Welcome Christian Simm. Christian gave a brief introduction of himself and work and says is looking forward to working with Leonardo.

b. Intel grant for REFRESH art history conference. We have received the check from Intel for $2500.

5. Committee Reports:

a. Nominations – Sonya Rapoport


i. Board Elections: No election this meeting

ii. Nominees under consideration:


1. Larry Larson – Michael Grey. Michael Joachim Grey is not present. Nomination is tabled until Michael can pitch the nomination.

2. Tami Spector – Sonya Rapoport. Tami Spector teaches at USF in the Chemistry Dept. Is Co-Editor of Hyle (International Journal for Philosophy of Chemistry). Has a strong interest in molecular aesthetics. Would be a good addition to the board in the area of science.

3. Denise Caruso was mentioned as another possibility by ??


iii. Board vacancies:


1. Penelope Finnie’s term is up soon

2. Sonya wants to cement the alliance with SFAI to see where the direction of the organization is going. There are currently two vacancies with probably one more coming up. The Board has been very good about sending new leads. Roger doesn’t feel the urge to find new members. Roger proposes to consolidate the current board.


b. Finance & Compensation Committee Report – Marty Anderson


i. Revised 2004 Budget. Kathleen Quillian has stepped in for Melinda Klayman and is now working 40 hours a week. Pat Bentson has also gone up to 40 hours a week. There is a deficit of 2 months which the Malina Family will make up for again. They can do this for a few more years only. The audit was put on hold until October but should be done by the end of the year.

ii. 20 year policy. The 20 year policy is currently up for negotiation. Attorney says it's okay to do anything that is not discriminatory. Has looked into other non-profit organization's policies who add one extra week of vacation. These other organizations are bigger than Leonardo. Marty moves to add 2 more days now, and then the Finance and Compensation committee will review policy to maybe make changes later if it's affordable to the organization.

iii. Sick Pay. Pam asked whether there had been any decision made on the sick pay policy. Roger says it needs to be re-reviewed and then approved by the full Board.


c. Prize and Awards – Roger Malina (for Lynn Hershman)


i. Excellence Award status. The jury is currently at work reading through the nominated articles. The deadline for deliberations to start is November 1st. The jury consists of Neora Berger, Machiko Kusahara, Mark Beam and Luc Courchesne.

ii. CAE Special Award. The CAE has been awarded the New Horizons prize. The charges of bioterrorism against Steve Kurtz have been dropped but he is still being charged with mail fraud. All references to the legal defense fund have been taken out of the press release. They will be given $500 to do whatever they want to do with it.

iii. Award Events – Beverly Reiser. UC Davis has funds to pay for Steve Kurtz to travel to California to accept the award if it is done in conjunction with the Sommerer/Mignoneau salon in November.

iv. Global Crossings award – Pam Grant-Ryan. The Global Crossings award is partly sponsored by the Rockefeller Grant. The Global Crossings committee is in a time-crunch. They need to decide by the end of the year what the award is being given for and then to award it. It has proven logistically difficult to make happen.


d. Advisory Board report – Beverly Reiser


i. New Approved Collaborations. None.

ii. Pending Collaborations. The Art and Life Sciences Exhibition organized by Julie Newdoll and Cynthia Parnucci is a traveling Art and Science exhibition. Roger thinks Leonardo should be involved concretely, otherwise should provide editorial assistance to the catalog. It is not yet funded and they don't have an organizing committee. Pam says that the staff has been discussing ways of finding more sources of income and maybe this could be one. This will be put through the Advisory Board for consideration. Pam also mentioned that we really need some sort of cross-communication between staff and Board to help decide whether the staff has enough time to take on new projects. Roger explained the newly-formed PAL (Planning and Action for Leonardo) committee consisting of Pam Grant-Ryan, Pat Bentson and Roger Malina which will be able to take on this role.


e. Fundraising and Marketing : Roger Malina


i. Status. Lost some momentum with Melinda leaving. Kathleen is taking over most of Melinda's duties. Pam and Pat are handling the rest.

ii. Corporate membership. Trying to get 6 corporate members per year. Have a list of corporations to consider and will try to get the membership drive back on track.

iii. Banff Art History: There has been lot's of activity.


1. Brazilian companies- An agreement has been made with Itau Cultural which is a Brazilian organization who has agreed to fund Brazilian delegates to the conference and a Portugese language publication.

2. Sloan Foundation. No progress yet. Is next proposal to go out.

3. Ford Foundation (Mark Beam). The final report has to be in by November 30th. We already have a Ford grant for the Global Crossing project.

4. Rockefeller Foundation. Turned us down for Arty History/Banff. A new cultural director has stepped in and all budgeting is currently on hold. An extension will be requested on the current grant.

5. Oliver Grau successfully got a grant for his organization.

6. Getty. Said no.

7. Langlois Foundation. Stopped giving grants for this year.

8. NEH. Roger says we've decided we don't have the energy to get all the documents together that foundations require when you first apply. The decision was also made to not apply because the NEH does not fund many non-profits.


iv. individual fundraising. We are working on individual email fundraising. The staff decided to focus on the educational community. Last year we made $3000 through individual fundraising. Roger noted that the Board should be visibly supportive of the organization. It is good for the staff and outside organizations to see support). Kathleen will be helping with the fundraising. We may possibly bring in a consultant instead of a new staff member.

v. Marketing. Library subscriptions have been declining. Darlene has looked at the situation and found that Leonardo is too expensive for print subscriptions. Libraries can save a significant amount by subscribing electronically. Roger has talked with Rebecca McLeod at MIT Press who has renegotiated the deal with Project Muse. Joel mentioned that students won't generally subscribe when they can rely on electronic subscriptions through school libraries. However, we should still try to promote Leonardo through teachers. Steve mentioned that maybe we should just focus on promoting electronic subscriptions totally if that is the way the trend is going. Kathleen will send the currently targeted libraries list to the Board to see if anyone knows anyone on faculties in the schools. Roger mentioned that it has been noted that most authors do not subscribe to Leonardo and asked whether we should make it a requirement to publish in the journal. Pam mentioned that Leonardo is supportive of the community, but they are not really very supportive of Leonardo. Darlene mentioned that she was initially confused by the subscriber vs. membership status of Leonardo and finds that Leonardo is different from other membership organizations and asked whether there would be a price reduction if it was necessary for a member to subscribe. Steve noted that high prices discourage working artists, students and those working on the fringe. Roger noted that Leonardo is really a society of odd people in other professions. Sonya mentioned that maybe the names of all the members should be printed in the journal.


f. Web – Steve Wilson

The new banner has been put into place. Annick and Nisar are too overwhelmed to do anything just yet. Pat is making the effort, but it is basically on hold until Annick and Nisar put the banner up.

g. Journals Report – Pam Grant-Ryan

Things are going well at the editorial office. The staff is solid. Editors are evolving the look and feel of the print journal and are working with a new typesetter. Sonya mentioned that calendar year subscription is awkward to give as a gift. MIT is willing to change if we want. Young artists think Leonardo is too stodgy


1. Experimental publishing project: The Experimental issue debut is being targeted to coincide with ISEA/PRNMS (2006). The Social Text is in use to plan the 2006 ISEA/PRNMS symposium.

h. Leonardo Book Series – Joel Slayton

Five books are due to come out in sprint. Matthew Fuller is a pre-eminent scholar on art and technology and we are very fortunate to have gotten him for the series. Working books through MIT Press is extremely painful, not sure why except maybe that Doug is so overwhelmed. MIT is very happy with how things are going with the series. MIT has final say on what goes into publication. Joel's time to work on series if short because he is also working on ISEA. The Malloy book people either love or hate. Steve Wilson's book has done very well.

i. Subcommittee Reports:

ISAST-SFAI Committee Report: (Meredith Tromble for) G Niemeyer
Things are pretty much where they were last. The Executive Committee of SFAI has met and approved the proposal. Chris Bratton (SFAI Pres.) has reiterated that this is a high priority and we should go ahead with things. Meredith would like to figure out where SFAI and Leo connect to apply for funding. Applications are in for internships. Proposals are being sought for planning of new office space. Everything is moving ahead as planned. Jeff Corbut and Paul Klein will be on planning and oversite committee. The IDEA grant (NASA) might be a possibility through SFAI.

Leonardo Music Journal Editor Appointment (Roger)

The Board needs to figure out what to do with Nic Collins internally before he arrives in January 2005. Roger is favorable towards continuing to work with him.

6. ISAST Project Reports:

a. ISEA 2006 Pacific Rim New Media Summit: Roger Malina, Joel Slayton

ISEA will be held in conjunction with Art and Technology Festival in San Jose. There are many converging issues with politics and money. The four main themes of the conference are: interactive city, community and community domain, transvergence and Pacific Rim. There are 8 working groups: Directory Working Group, Curatorial Group, Education Group, Mobile Community and Urbanity Group, Eco-Social Activism Group, Latin-Amer-Asian New Media Initiatives Group, Organization/Symposia Group, Pacific Rim ITCP Group. Only the committees have been decided at this point; nothing has been locked down. A proposal has been submitted to bring ACM/Siggraph, GX and ISEA together in 2005 unsure of who pays for it. Current budget is $120,000. San Jose State University has contributed in terms of allowing time to work on it. $88,500 is for planning and implementation. The idea is to keep it a two day event and come away with real tangible results. The city of San Jose estimates 60,000 attendees for the entire festival (including 17 other parallel programs). Steve Wilson said we will need to finish up the experimental publishing project ahead of the conference. The steering committee is in place and general fundraising is moving forward for it.

b. REFRESH: Banff Art History Conference (Roger)

Problems between Roger and Oliver Grau seem to be getting better. Roger anticipates it should be a good conference.

c. College Art Association-Leonardo Working Group

The next CAA conference is in Atlanta in 2005. We have one panel chaired by Yvonne Spielmann and Jay Bolter . Leonardo is trying to feed into the CAA mentoring program and have been given an extra roundtable. Ellen Levy is trying to move CAA into the future and is very excited to have Leonardo involved. Leonardo is now being contacted by SLS (the Society for Literature and Science) who want to work with Leonardo.

7. Leonardo/OLATS Project Reports (Roger)

a. JASMIN Mediterranean Rim Project

The JASMIN/ Pacific Rim project is in July. Will hold meetings in Beirut and Cairo. A curricula needs to be developed with people working in Art and Technology.

b. UNESCO

Christine got a grant for a listserv to be hosted by the University of Athens. The meeting with the World Bank in Marseille went well (they fund projects that have economic development behind them).

c. Space Arts Working Group: Budapest Workshop 2005

The Space Arts working group are co-sponsors of the Space conference in Budapest. They are working with C3 and Melinaria in Budapest.

d. LABS

Headed by Sheila Pinkel at Pomona College. 30 abstracts have been received from the first call. A good peer-review committee is involved. There will be a quarterly call for abstracts. It is currently not funded. Students and recent students of all Board members who are faculty should be encouraged to submit to the project.

8. New Business:

9. Board Member News

10. Other

11. Adjourn 7pm